Name/Title
1951 Bull PicnicEntry/Object ID
000505Tags
Bull PicnicScope and Content
MIDDLETOWN
Bull Family Reunion Held at Stone House
HAMPTONBURGH - Approximately 400 persons from Orange County, surrounding areas and from as far away as California gathered at the old Stone House here yesterday for the 84th annual Bull family reunion and picnic. A program of varied activities for the descendants of William Bull and Sarah Wells took place from noon until eight p. m.
During a business meeting called by the William Bull and Sarah Wells Family Association, Inc., the Rev. Charles Beattie Thompson, of Thompson Ridge, was re-elected to the presidency of the association for another one-year term.
Others re-elected were Mrs. Sarah Wells Duffy, Port Chester, Bronx, vice president; E. Myron Bull, Tuxedo Park, treasurer, and Robert McLeod Jackson, Campbell Hall, secretary.
Cadwell Tyler of Goshen was elected to serve on the official board, while four others were re-elected to the board. They were Hamlet S. Roe, Chester; Silas B. Patterson, Monroe; Mrs. Corinna Bull Brown, of Stone House, and Charles F. Johnson, of Chester.
The treasurer's report indicated receipts of $5,363.81 during the year and expenditures and disbursements amounting to $4,657.19. The expenditures included a $3,789 item for heating plant installation.
Members were told that a two-zone, oil burning hot water system was completed in the old house last fall, and that its operation made the house comfortable at all times during the winter, something which probably never happened before in the more than two centuries during which the family homestead has been used. The rugged stone structure was built in 1722.
Acceptance of a gift of 12 pewter plates and mugs, which had been used at the Stone House in colonial days, was also reported yesterday. The plates and mugs were presented to the association by Edward B. Thornton, of Ridgewood, N. J.
A box of garments, used by the Samuel W. Eager branch of the Bull family in the early 1700 period, was also received from Mrs. George W. Simons, of Jacksonville, Fla.
Ribbons were presented to Mrs. E. V. Green, of Stony Ford, who was the oldest to attend yesterday's reunion, and to Dorothy Bull, five-weeks-old daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Culver Bull, of Campbell Hall, as the youngest family member in attendance.
Mrs. Charles Hunter, of Laguna Beach, Calif., was honored as the member who had traveled the longest distance to Stone House for the 1951 reunion, but special mention was made on behalf of Mrs. Guy Collins, of Oklahoma City, Okla., another who traveled an extra-ordinary distance.
Mrs. Collins, a Bull family descendant, read of Stone House and the annual reunions in an article contained in the August issue of a publication devoted to the affairs of the Daughters of the American Revolution.
She immediately communicated with officers of the association, according to Secretary Jackson, and made arrangements to fly east in time for yesterday's reunion and picnic.
Oklahoma Visitor: Mrs. Guy Collins, who flew east by commercial air liner from her home in Oklahoma City, Okla., in time for yesterday's eighty-fourth annual Bull family reunion, is shown here in Stone House with Robert McLeod Jackson, association secretary. - Photos by Carman.
Small Fry Entertains: Younger members attending the Bull family reunion picnic at Hamptonburgh yesterday take to the outdoor stage and present their version of oldtime vaudeville. William Bull Brown, of Stone House, appears as the magician, assisted by Alfred Booth, of Warwick, and John Howell, of Middletown (in striped shirt).