Mineral Industries and Geology of Certain Areas - Vermont Agency ...

REPORT OF THE VERMONT STATE GEOLOGIST. 23.
We need not go far back to establish the character of the
stock. James Wing, of Hardwick, Mass., the grandfather, was
a member of the " Committee of Correspondence " in the early
days of the American Revolution. The father, also James, was
a volunteer from Hardwick in the second war with Great
Britain.
To the home of the drst James, the grandfather, came thirteen
children. The third son, the sixth of the family, named
for his father, grew to early manhood in Hardwick. He was
noted for great ingenuity and sturdy self-reliance, qualities
much needed in those days of pioneer life. This James, with
other enterprising men, found his way to Rochester, where for
a little he spent his summers. \Vhen, however, the place at
Rochester had in part been prepared as a home, he with his
Young wife, Hannah Wetherbee, in the spring of 1804, left
Hardwick for a permanent place in Rochester. It was a horseback
journey they had. Blazed trees marked the way to what
was to he their home nest, husband and wife each carrying a
fledgling perched on the saddle.
To the two sons brought from Hardwick was added the third,
Augustus, at the above-mentioned date, November 19, i8o8.
Other children, sons and daughters, came to the family, until
the numl:ei in all was eleven.
The children enjoyed' such school privileges as Puritan
pioneers were always and early accustomed to give. The father
of Augustus prized the advantages of higher schools of which
he had been deprived in part, and he looked with favor on the
plan of the son when he proposed to carry his studies beyond
the range which the home school afforded. On the other side
of the Green Mountains, to the west, settlements had been
made earlier than that at Rochester; the comforts and privileges
of such life had outrun those of the eastern side. High
schools and academies had already been founded. So when
young Augustus wished to purste his studies further he had to
cross the mountain range. A school of past and present high
repute, the Burr and Burton Seminary, at Manchester, Vt., at-