Tingleys-United International Reunion, 2000
A Photo Essay by Stephen A.
Abbott
The year 2000
Tingleys-United Association International Reunion was held in the Attleboro,
Massachusetts area, home to generations of Tingleys before they moved westward,
northward and southward throughout the U.S. and Canada.
On Friday, July 22, Tingleys from the U.S. and Canada began to
gather at the Marriott Courtyard Hotel in Foxborough, Massachusetts. Registration
- and some "get re-acquainted time" - was spent in the room of Kristen
Riggs, who organized the weekend's events.
A good-sized group of Tingleys and Tingley descendants met at a neighboring
restaurant at 6:00 pm for dinner, then, they awaited the beginning of the
reunion the next day.
Saturday July 22, 2000
Several people awoke early on Saturday for breakfast at a nearby Friendly's
restaurant, and most everyone else met the chartered bus at 9:00 for a
"Tingley Tour" of Attleboro's historic sites. [Follow the rest of the page,
in a zig-zag pattern - left, then right - to follow the day's events.]
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(Begin here)
Our first stop was at the First Congregational Church in Attleboro.
[To the left, you see Kristin Riggs directing everyone off the bus and
into the church.]
Chartered in 1721, this early church is considered
a "grandmother church", because it helped plant several "daughter"
churches, which in turn planted others in the area. It was active at the
time many Tingleys resided in the area, and a Tingley has been found in
the register as a member of this congregation.
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| Interestingly, there was a connection
between this church and Harford, Pennsylvania - site of where some of the
Tingley's settled after leaving Attleboro. It was explained by the congregation's
clerk - who was an excellent guide to the church and its history - that
the globes on the church's gaslights [Visible in the top center of the
photograph on the right.] were a gift to the congregation, as long as someone
went to Pennsylvania to get them! They did, and they are still there. A
humorous note was the "tickler/club" used to awaken sleepy parishioners
during church services! A majestic note was the organ, which, despite being
challenged with too-few ocatves (according to the organist) it was still
able to put out a mean Bach! |
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Next, the tour visited the Woodcock Garrison
House, in Attleboro. While not a Tingley-related home, it represented the
type of home Tingley's would have lived in during the Revolutionary War
and into the early 1800s.
The house, orginally an inn, has been completely restored
to represent a home of the era by the Rice family
of Attleboro, and now features many artifacts from several prominent citizens
from the area's history. Also nearby was a one-room "Little Red Schoolhouse", which brought
back memories among several of the older T.U. members - and two of
its youngest - Kristen Riggs and her sister Karen Malcolmson - who had
attended this very schoolhouse as part of a program in
third grade to familiarize children with the early history of
Attleboro.
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As we pulled away, we saw the Thomas Tingley House. It
is owned by others today, so we had to be content with a drive-by. But
some of us thought of knocking on the door and saying "Hey, we used
to live here!" Maybe they'd invite us to a
barbeque!
But we were off to lunch anyway, and after a nice lunch
at the "Goochie Cafe" (which luckily had room for all of us) we
headed off to the highlight of the day for many - the Newell
Cemetery.
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| The Newell cemetery is the final resting
place of many of the Attleboro Tingleys, including Timothy (son of the
Second Samuel Tingley), his son Timothy (4) and Timothy's son, Thomas (5),
and of course, their wives and children.
That Thomas' son, Elkanah (6) left for
Pennsylvania, and is the ancestor of the PA Tingleys. The Second Samuel
(grandson of Palmer) is also buried there, as is his son, Samuel (5) and
grandson Samuel (7). There were several TU Reunion attendees from  this branch of the family. [To
the right, and above right, you can see the family looking over the
gravesites, taking photos for posterity, listening to stories, and, as
always, consulting Marian Frye's Book One for reference. [Click on the
stone at left to see a larger view of one interesting gravesite.]
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The bus arrived back at the hotel at 3:00, and at 5:00 p.m. the Tingley
family gathered again for social time, dinner, and a business meeting.
For the evening meal, we enjoyed pizza, cookies, drinks, and hearty conversation.
The business meeting immediately followed dinner, presided over by Vice
President Betty Hall of Nova Scotia. During the meeting, an entirely new
crop of officers were elected (including, for the first time since 1998,
a president of T.-U., Rollin Tingley), and the site of our 2002 international
T.-U. Reunion was discussed. It was decided that we would all meet up again
in Harford, Pennsylvania, where a branch of the Tingley family settled
after leaving Attleboro. |
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Below is a photograph of those attending the T.-U. Reunion in Attleboro
in July of 2000 - - Memories to last a lifetime! Many thanks go out to
Kristin Riggs, for putting this incredible event together, and keeping
it on track.
Group shot of 2000 Tingley Reunion Attendees (Stephen Abbott Photo)
Sunday, July 23, 2000
Several T.-U. Reunion participants had breakfast at the Marriott restaurant's
hefty buffet, and then said a sad farewell to their Tingley cousins.
On a personal note - myself, my mother, Louise and grandmother,
Emily Wilder - all had a wonderful time at the reunion, and I
hope you did, too. It was fanscinating to meet so many Tingley relations,
and I can't wait to attend the 2002 reunion in Pennsylvania! Hope to see
you there!
-Stephen A. Abbott