Name/Title
Catherine "Auntie" FergusonEntry/Object ID
2024.1.1Scope and Content
Collection of news articles and genealogical information about Catherine Ferguson:
- Lorain Newspaper clippings 1903-1904
- Ferguson family birth and death dates and Ancestry.com profiles
- Copies of Brady's Bunch of Lorain County Nostalgia articles (written by Dan Brady)
- Correspondence with Rick Kurish (research on Ferguson burial plots at Elmwood Cemetery)
- Article, "Lorain's 'Auntie' Ferguson: From Ex-Slave to Millionaire's Friend" by Dan Brady (published in Trader & Gazette Black Swamp Firelands. Vol. XVI Spring 2012. No. 2Context
Catherine "Auntie" Ferguson was a resident of Lorain in the late 19th century. As the legend goes, Ms. Ferguson lived in a cabin near the current day Henderson bridge, which was on property that millionaires Tom L. Johnson and A. J. Moxham wanted to purchase to build a steel mill. As Mr. Johnson and Mr. Moxham were riding horse back surveying the property, they met Ms. Ferguson and the three became friends. They made an agreement that she could remain on the property until her death. The steel mill was built up around her, and the cabin remained there until a few months after her death in 1904.
Records indicate that although Catherine Ferguson (nee Tyler) was born in Appomattox County, VA long before the civil war, she was not enslaved when she and her family moved to Ohio. Ms. Ferguson was a well-known and much loved member of the Lorain community, and her life was celebrated in the local newspapers when she passed away.Collection
Lorain Black History ArchivesAcquisition
Accession
2024.1Source or Donor
Brady, DanielAcquisition Method
Donation