King Family History

KING FAMILY HISTORY

Compiled and typed by Sterling King Hixson, 1959.

(Re-typed for digitizing by Richard S. Hixson, April 2006. italics added.)

At the time of this writing, little is known of this family. Thomas Norton King and his wife Rebecka Copp were born somewhere in the State of Pennsylvania. [Census records show Thomas Norton King birth place in New York, and census records show the birth place for Rebecca Copp in Conneticut and Rhode Island]. The only child that I know anything about was Leander Henry, also born in Pennsylvania. The date of his birth was January 26, 1837. This family came to Utah sometime prior to 1866 because Leander married on April 12^th, 1866, in the state of Utah to Esther Elizabeth Young, daughter of Ebenezer and Margaret Holden Young.

Leander King was a restless sort of person and liked the outdoors life. He was well known all along the streams coming from the Uintah Mountains. Because of this desire for outdoor life, he was away from home a great deal and did not provide for his wife and one daughter, as he should. His one daughter, Mary Edith, was born in 1868 at Wanship, Utah. Because of this condition, his wife obtained a divorce from him sometime in the 1890’s and then married a Mr. Dorr Curtis in the month of October 1899. Mr. Curtis died in February 1901.

Leander lived the latter part of his life in Provo. Although I never remembered having seen him while alive, I did attend his funeral. He died on January 10, 1925.

I remember well that my brother Lafe and my father made the trip to his funeral. My grandmother lived either with us or near by and had much to do with caring for me after my mother’s death. She had a bad fall down the steps of a neighbor, Mrs. Sugden, and broke her neck. She was over 70 years of age at the time and was in a cast in the hospital for sometime. She passed away on February 15th, 1932, and was buried in the City Cemetery in Salt Lake City, Utah. Her father had a family plot, which was never used by either he or his wife. John Taylor, one of the president’s of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints was a brother in law to my grandmother King as he married her sister, and is buried in the same plot as she is.

A little effort has been made to establish where this family originated, but at this time nothing has been found. Grandmother King received her endowments on November 22, 1901, but as far as we know she was not sealed in the temple to either of her husbands. We are in the process of having his work done now. Grandfather King will have to be baptized and then they will have to be sealed.

Some family records show that grandmother King was baptized in the year 1857 and I also have a slip made out in 1902 showing that Frank Hixson of Wanship, Utah, the brother of my father, baptized her again in that year. Why she was baptized twice is not known. My uncle Karl seems to think that many people were baptized twice when records were lost in early days, or especially if they had been inactive and then when they wanted to go to the temple. It had to be done over where there was no record of it having been done before.

Since I am the only one left that is in a position to work on this family name, I will attempt to do all I can. The fact that there are no male children born in this family after Leander, the family name had died out.