The Begining

When I first started working on my families genealogy I only had my Granfather's name and my Great Grandfather, Oscar Reeve. I knew Oscar came to California from Ohio somewhere and had settled in the San Jose area. That was it. My father really didn't remember too much. I started running google seaches for Oscar Reeve and behold, some kind soul had posted Oscars obituary on Roots Web (the free precurser to many genealogy sites). It's sad I can't even locate that post anymore since ancestry.com gobbled up rootweb. Oscars obituary gave me a number of family names as well as the town of Willoughby Ohio.

As I searched I kept coming accross the name Joel which I knew was Oscar's middle name. Fairly quickly I found the census records for Joel Rumsey Reeve 4/25/1823-2/16/1909. I spent the better part of a year working through census records, made multiple all day trips to the Sutro Library in San Francisco and even a week long genealogy vacation to Salt Lake City. I became convinced that Joel 1823 was connected to Joel 1755 and his father Bethuel, but I had a missing link. About that time I reconnected with a Cousin who had also done a lot of genealogy research. She send me her material and there was Rumsey 1790. I had already found the The Early History of Southampton, which gave me this nugget:

Reeve Family
For a long time the descendants of James Reeves of Southold have spelled the name Reeve. Bethuel Reeve of Southold town bought land in North Sea in 1758 and resided there. He was of about the fourth generation in Descent from James.
1. Bethuel d. 1782, had w. Mary and ch. 2 Joel b 1755, 3 Silas, 4 Daniel, 5 Zebulon, 6 Jeremiah, 7 Keturah and 8 Bethia.
2 Joel d. Dec. 14 1831, had w. Anna and ch. 9 Bethuel, 10 Rumney, 11 Wines, 12 Jeremiah and 13 Jetur.
12 Jeremiah had ch. 14 Jetur, 15 Barnabas, 16 Jeremiah, 17 Frances, 18 Bethuel, 19 Josephine, 20 Charlotte and 21 Charles.
From: The Early History of Southampton, Long Island, New York with Genealogies by George Rogers Howell, M.A. (Yale University), 2nd ed., pub. 1887 Southampton, Long Island, New York,

However, the ascertion that Bethuel was a descendant of James was much in doubt and not proof of it has been found then or since. This made me a bit sceptical of the accuracy of Mr. Howell's information. I really wanted more hard source proof. Then I found Bethuel and Rumsey living next door to each other in the 1820 Renslaerville census. Feeling more confident I began to scour any Long Island Record I could get my hands on. Finally, I found what I was looking for, a school record from the North Sea School:

North Sea School Taught by William Lemuel Sandford Quarter began 29 Sept. 1795 Ended 15 March 1796. The first six names on the list are as follows:
Bethuel Reeves (would have been 12)
Phebe Reeves
Rumsey Reeves (correct spelling on the first name this time he would have been about 5)
Orinda Reeves
Polly Reeves
Bethiah Reeves

The document is signed by the "Trustees" Joel Reeves, Samuel Scott, and Stephen Harris.

The book of records of the town of Southampton : BOOKS 1, 2, 3 and 4 - 1st book. 1639-1660 -- 2nd book. 1660-1717 -- 3rd book. 1717-1807 -- 4th book. 1809-1870, AUTHORS: Southampton, Henry P Hedges, William S. Pelletreau, Edward H. Foster, including all the writings in the town clerk's office from 1639 to 1660: with other ancient documents of historic value, Sag Harbor, N.Y.: J.H. Hunt, book and job printer.

At last I had my secondary proof that Rumsey was Joel's son, and as a bonus I got his daughter's names as well. With the help of the Curator at the Renslaerville Historical Society, I was able to flaesh out Rumsey's family more. Then I discovered the History of the Western Reserve which provided lots of details about Rumsey's son Joel. Having cleaned up the ties between my two Joels. It was time to turn my attention on Bethuel's origins.

The mystery of Bethuel is why I began this blog. I read some tips on genealogy that said a blog was a great way to keep your research handy and in one place. I've found it very helpful, hopefully it's helpful for others as well. As I come accross records or things I want to save, I have a button in my browser that puts it in my blog. I also store links and facts I refer to frequently. Eventually, I may resort to help from a professional genealogist to see if there is anyway to really link Bethuel to Solomon. Who knows, there maybe some obscure document, deed or legal paper that survives that will tie them together. Or perhaps I will have to resort to DNA, but I don't even know if there is a living male that is proven to be in Solomon's line. Proving Israel and Bethuel were brothers might be easier, but it doesn't make the puddle jump. I've resorted to hunting down side lines to mine in the meantime. I've been finding a fair amount about what I think happened to Bethuel's sons Silas and Zebulon.