Later this year the Sussex-Lisbon Area Historical Society will put together a display on founders about our original settlers. This two-part series is about one of them.
The year 2008 marked the 172nd anniversary of the beginnings of the settlement of the Town of Lisbon, dating back to its undisputed first land claimant, Thomas Spenser Redford (1818-1903), who claimed his first 160 acres May 15, 1836.
In 1986 Sussex and Lisbon honored Redford by having a year long sesquicentennial celebration.
But who was Thomas Redford?
According to the Redford family story, John Redford (born circa 1755) of was taking some friends to Londons Charing Cross Station Landing on the family horse and buggy when he was kidnapped and pressed aboard an English Navy man o war ship to fight against some revolutionaries in North America.
When he landed in New York, he promptly deserted and joined the revolutionary army.
John Redford married and had 11 children between 1782 to l797, 10 boys and one girl. The eighth child, Arthur Redford (1793-1877), fathered Thomas Spenser Redford.
Grandfather John and his family were among the early settlers to make a pioneer run to Fort Harrison in Indiana in 1817. They crossed the Allegheny Mountains on wagons to Olean on the Allegheny River, where their group constructed three rafts, which carried them and their household goods down the Ohio River and then up the Wabash River to Fort Harrison.
They were the first to settle Vigo County, Indiana, but the elder John Redford was not among them, having died on the way.
Arthur remained in New York, however, where he fought in the Battle of Niagara during a three-month stint with the army during the War of 1812. But when he applied in 1853 for bounty land in Wisconsin, he was refused because he had lost his muster and payroll records.
Arthur married Mary Scott in 1814. They lived in Genesee County in western New York and had six boys and two girls. Thomas was the second born on July 11, 1818. The family moved 12 years later to Perrysburg, Cattaraugus County, New York State.
Thomas was raised in the usual manner of farm lads and attended the common schools in New York. In his early teens, he learned the carpentry trade.
He left home Feb. 28, 1836, when he was just 16½ years old and started walking to the newly opened Wisconsin territory. After crossing Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, Indiana and Illinois, he came to the rough swamp town of Milwaukee on April 15, 1836 a walk of 46 days. Milwaukee was just a small trading village when he arrived.
Joining up with the surveying party of Hudson, Vliet and Brink, he traveled to Lisbon where, on May 15, at the gateway to the town, he made his claim of 160 acres around todays Silver Spring Road on the west side of Town Line Road. It cost him $200 ($1.25 per acre). It was the first land claim registered for the Town of Lisbon.
A month after staking his claim, P. Ray James Hanford, and William Packard came out from Milwaukee and helped Redford raise his first shanty, which became living quarters for all of them until each could build his own log cabin.
Later, in August of that year, a big influx of settlers arrived, the majority of them connected f the extended Weaver clan from Englands Sussex area.
Redford built his first home a log cabin, a requirement for a homesteader just north of Silver Spring Road, with a fire place outside for cooking. He used the soft, light basswood trees to build the cabin, rather than the heavy oak trees that were readily available and more commonly used.
After planting some crops during the summer of 1836, he traveled back to Milwaukee to make some money as a carpenter. He became a permanent Lisbon resident the following year.
In 1848, Redford built a proper sawn-lumber home next to it, which still stands today.
Retrospect: Political triumph, personal tragedy: a tale of three wives
Second of two parts
Posted: January 21, 2009, Living Sussex Sun
By Fred Keller, Sussex Village Historian