EDITION NO. 2

JANUARY 1999

Greetings from the warm temperatures of the Southern Hemisphere to all Magsons and their connections. This newsletter has been a long time coming but is here at last, with thanks to the people who have contributed.During the last few months I have managed to make some more Magson contacts, two in England, one in South Africa and another in Canada, and that has been wonderful. I have also joined The Guild of One-Name Studies, their website ­ http://www.one-name.org They have many objectives, including maintaining and publishing a Register of the one-name studies registered by members, to secure the widest possible public awareness of one-name studies. Maybe some more Magson information will come through this. In return I am supposed to deal with all reply-paid enquiries about the registered surname.

What has been happening in the Magson world? Well, I have found some very interesting web-sites featuring the name.

They are ­ Catworld, Issue No 245, an article by Adrian Magson about a diabetic cat ­ http://194.205.156.171/zzdemo/245%2D15.htm

Magsons Supercentre Goa, there is even a Hotel Magson Centre ­ http://www.indiaexpress.com./goa/busdir/shop_magson.html (Thank you to David Magson for telling me about this Goa site)

A cousin of my father gave me a copy of information about the Magson name, this is attached. Any comments on this would be gratefully received. This would have come from a shop similar to the one that supplied the Magson crest, I wonder about their authenticity. The following are some contributions from around the World. Ken has suggested the idea of putting up a small website with all the information that we have accumulated so far, perhaps a series of family trees and asking people to send information to fill in the gaps. I think that is a wonderful idea. Please e-mail me with your ideas about this possibility.

CONTRIBUTIONS FROM OTHERS ­

FROM KEN MAGSON - Hi, my name is Ken Magson. I was born in Kitimat, British Columbia, Canada in 1958. I am the only son of Reginald Magson born in Coventry, England and Margaret nee Knight, born in Yorkshire, England. My father's parents were Reginald Magson and Dulcie Ramsay. I have no children of my own. I am a retired veteran of the Canadian Armed Forces and now run my own business of administrating Internet Web Sites which is how Rae found me in the first place. I have lived all over Canada and now reside near Toronto, Canada with Patricia Storer.What do you think of the idea of putting up a small website with all the information that has been accumulated so far? Maybe we could actually put up a series of family trees and have send us the information to fill the gaps. I have a number of sites of my own or ones that I administrate and I could easily tilde a site on my own as it will probably not get that much traffic. I would love to be able to trace as much of the Magson Family tree as possible. If anyone has further information that could help me, please e-mail me at support@kcomtech.com Ken Magson - - - -

FROM ROB MAGSON ­ My earliest certain Magson ancestor was called Grace Magson. She was married late in life to William Firth. Her 1838 marriage certificate states she was 46 and daughter of James Magson. I believe, but cannot prove that she was born at Luddenden, Yorkshire. Certainly her illegitimate son, Samuel, my great great grandfather, lived in Sowerby Bridge nearby; where census returns show he had various jobs in the weaving trade. His son my great grandfather, Thomas was injured in a mill accident as a teenager and turned to teaching. My grandfather, father and sister all followed in his footsteps. My most fascinating Magson mystery is Magson House. Very close to Luddenden it has carried the name for centuries. About ten years ago the owners let out holiday rooms for 'bed and breakfast'. I stayed there one weekend and had a good chance to look around. The history of the house has been researched but there is no record of a Magson connection. No one knows why it is called Magson House. Most of my research was carried out in the early 1980's before computers and the World Wide Web. I would be happy to pool my information with others and to cooperate with any moves towards a one name society or Magson genealogical web site. My e-mail address is robmagson@aol.com Rob Magson - - - - - -

FROM ALAN MAGSON - My name is Alan Magson and I live with my wife Julie in a village called Queensbury, near Bradford, West Yorkshire, England. Our two children are grown up and have left home. I am 54, a retired Police Officer and now work part-time with my local daily evening newspaper, the Telegraph and Argus http://www.thisisbradford.co.uk as a history researcher. Queensbury is actually nearer to the town of Halifax than Bradford and my ancestors all hail from a village called Warley, near Halifax. I originally traced my family back to 1794, when they had moved from Warley to the hamlet of New Hey, Milnrow, near Rochdale, Lancashire and set up as Shoemakers. However they returned to Warley where one of them resumed his trade as a Shoemaker, then joined the Halifax Police in 1847, retired as a Sergeant, and became a partner in a worsted spinning mill, which moved to Bradford in 1897, and his whole family moved with him. In the early 1980's I was contacted by another Magson, whose ancestor's also hailed from Warley, and we managed to join up our family trees with the result that we can now trace our ancestry back to 1662. All the family burials up to the 19th century were in the picturesque churchyard of Luddenden St Mary Church, just outside Halifax. Alan Magson amagson@hotmail.com - - - - -

FROM ROBERT MEGSON ­ A little information I found on Magson while searching for Megson. Descendants of Thomas Magson Thomas Magson married in Milverton, Somerset, England 1785 Mary Owen 1758- son John Megson 1785-1866 dau Elizabeth Megson 1787- source http://www.threshholds.com/ORG/trees/megson.htm http://www.thresholds.com/ORG/trees/index.htm Burials registered in the Parish of Hovingham. Jane, dau of Thomas Magson 16 Mar 1765 Elizabeth, wife of William Magson 16 Jan 1768 William Magson Sr 10 Jul 1769 Baptisms registered in the Parish of Hovingham James Magson, son of Thomas and Ann Magson 19 Oct 1800 Christopher Magson, son of Thomas and Jane Magson 16 May 1802 Slingsby Marriages Jonathan Heward, blacksmith, son of William Hewad, yeoman and Jane Magson, dau of Thomas Magson, yeoman 6 Feb 1851 Will send anything on Magson that I come across to you. Researching MEGSON (MAGSON) (MIGSON) in England and USA. Regards. Rob Megson rmegson@gis.net - - - - -

FROM DAVE MAXSON ­ Although I cannot confirm it, I suspect my family name may have been Magson prior to my first ancestor's (Richard Maxson) arrival here. I do not have any specific document to confirm this, I strongly suspect however that he came from the Boston area of Lincolnshire, England around 1630. He was an indentured servant and the spelling changed from either Maggsen, Magson or something similar to Maxson.. I'm a direct descendant of him. In the US all of us are now either Maxsons or Maxons. Dave Maxon SARMax@aol.com - - - - - FROM DAVID MAGSON - Hi all Magson's for reading this Newsletter. Firstly can I say how much I appreciate Rae taking the time and energy to put this together. One thing I hope she does in this newsletter is to ignore the rules of privacy and create a distribution list. Any one who does not wish to be on it in future can always ask to be removed. My name is David William Magson, I was born in Cinderford, Gloucestershire, England in 1945. I have lived in Indonesia since 1987 where I run a consulting house. For those of you interested I will attach our WEB pages!My fathers family comes from Pickering in North Yorkshire. Yorkshire seems to be the home of many Magson's though I have never met any outside of my immediate family. When I look back on the little bit of family history I know it is easy to see why - they were quite prolific. My great grandfather was George Magson who lived from 1851 - 1930. He married Ann? who lived from 1853 - 1929. They had 7 children George (my great grand father), Bob, Edward , Hanna, Rose, Annie, & Jack. I would be interested in hearing from any Magson who has any of these people in their family tree. The only person whose family I have traced is Great Uncle Jack the youngest. He had 10 children!! George (it seems to be a family name), Will, Ted, Stanley, Ada, Nora, Minnie, Lillian, Doris and Martha. The only one I met was Uncle Ted a grand old man who died in the early 80's. My Grandfather George had four children. My Uncle George, my father Arthur, Roland and Mary. Roland joined the Rhodesian police just before the second world war. Came home to become a pilot when the war started, and died during it. My father was a British service man - my one sister Sheila and I lived all over the world as children.. Arthur died in 1982. My Aunt Mary is a retired school teacher. My uncle George never married and continued the family business. George Magson and Son - Corn Merchants - in Pickering. I am not sure whether this was started by my Grandfather or Great-grandfather. One of them also used to drive the mail coach between Pickering and Scarborough. He is 82 now retired and sold the family business and home in 1982. However the name is retained and you can still see George Magson's Corn Merchants in Pickering. Pickering has a very attractive rural museum. At one stage it had lots of photos which had labels which named Magson's at various town events in the 1930's. A few years ago I visited it with Uncle George. There was no Magson names to be seen - they had all been removed. However Uncle George kept identifying relatives in the photographs!!In Rae's earlier newsletter someone mentioned that she thought the name Magson was Nordic. That would be nice and if more of you come from Yorkshire we could note that it was the heart of Danelaw back in the 10th century. However the articles I have read all say our name comes from Margaret's Son. It is related to Megson and is one of the few family names which derive from a female name. Most names came from a male e.g. Jackson, a place or trade. If so it makes you wonder what this ancestor of ours was and what she was like. If her children were named after her rather than her husband in a patralinear society then she was either very forceful, a widow or a woman of ill repute!I have never met a Magson outside my immediate family. In the late 70's I corresponded with a Magson from Bristol England trying to trace the family tree. Before I lost touch with him he told me we were not related. Searching the Internet I have found a few references. The most exotic being Magson' Grocery Store in Goa India!!. Who is going to start the Magson WEB site? David.Magson@mincom.co.idDavid Magson President Director PT Mincom Indoservices http://www.mincom.co.id Mitrais Software Development http://www.mitrais.com - - - - -