The Beginning !

 

I stand looking eastward, down a slope towards the inlet and the Atlantic Ocean beyond. It is from this piece of ground, my family roots first took hold in North American sometime in 1640. That's the earliest we know that Joesph Bolles, a man about the age of 32, is known to own land and be one of the founders of Wells, York, Maine.

From Joseph and his wife Mary (Howell), thousands of individuals, I being one, have been given the opportunities to become the people they were, are and will be in the future. There are many tales, twists and turns to going from 1640 to today. From this blog. I look forward to share some of the many treasures that help tell our family's history.

The site to the left, is Founder's Park. It was established as a memorial to those first band of adventurers and their families that set sail across the Atlantic and settled on this rocky coast of what was then considered part of Massachusetts. The park was part of the 350th anniversary of the incorporation of Wells, Maine. The close up shows the twenty six signers of that incorporation in 1653. Joesph's last name has the Old English spelling of Bowles, which was found on numerous documents that he signed as an official in the Wells area during his lifetime. The family name has also been found as Boles, Boals, Bolle and Boules as well as many more.

I have to be up front and say that the information that will be logged on this blog is not all from my findings. The bug that bit me many years ago was from going to a family reunion in New London, Connecticut during the early 1970's Though I always enjoyed history, traveling many places throughout New England area while growing up, it's strange on how certain places where more comfortable than others. New London turned out to be one of those comfortable places!  At that reunion, I learned of the Bolles Family Association, (http://www.bollesfamily.org/) which was formed due to the publishing of "A GENEALOGY of the Descendants of JOSEPH BOLLES of Wells, Maine" by George E. Williams. With that book, families learned of other families, a group of individual joined together and the association was born. Thanks to George and far too many to mention in this posting, the Bolles and all the other families with Bolles blood have a good record of how we all came about.

My hope is to follow in their footsteps and continue the process for those whose to carry on in the future.

 

To be continued......