Person:Katherine Whitman (1)

Katherine was the third youngest of Edward and Jessie's children. She was one of two girls born into the family, the other being her sister Mary, the oldest of the children. Katherine was the apple of her brothers' eyes. They called her Babe throughout most of their lives although everyone else knew her as Kate. On her mother's side Katherine is descended from a long line of Protestants, including Puritans, Congregationalists, Baptists and Quakers. Her father, Edward was a Roman Catholic by birth, but he foresook all religion and let Jessie raise their children as Baptists. It is interesting to note that all Ed and Jessie's children married Catholics, except Mary who remained at home with Jessie and eventually Katherine and Walter and family. Katherine converted to Catholicism when she married Walt and today she is a devout Catholic. Some say she is holier than the Pope. Katherine's ancestors include George ALDRICH, progenitor of the ALDRICH'S in America who, with his wife Katherine(SEALD), landed at Boston, MA on 6 Nov 1631. Her great grandfather, Anson L. ALDRICH served in the Civil War in both a VT regiment and a NY regiment and is buried in the VT Soldiers' Home Cemetery in Bennington. She is also descended from John LUTHER, progenitor of the LUTHER Family in America. One of her grgrgrandfathers was Welcome LUTHER, one of the early settlers in Bennington, appearing in the 1810 census as a blacksmith and also in the Harwood Diaries. One of her grgrgrgrandfathers was Dr. Elijah Hewes of Glastenbury, Vermont who wrote a medical textbook entitled "Female Nurse" for which he was somewhat famous back in the day. Her grgrandfather Peter Whitman came to this country from Hesse Darmstadt, Germany in 1851 and settled in the Troy area. When her father left the Troy area to marry her mother, his relatives all said he was going into the wilderness to marry an Indian. Katherine has always been devoted to her family and her children. Due to the times and the necessities of life she was unable to be a stay-at-home mother. She worked at various mills and factories around Bennington including the Allen-A, the E-Z, National Carbon/Union Carbide and Tansitor. But her children never felt neglected. In addition to as much of her time as she could give them, they had her mother, Jessie and sister, Mary to help raise them. Shortly after World War II struck, Walter enlisted in the Navy and Katherine and the children moved out of their small apartment on the corner of Safford St. and Carrigan Lane to live at 224 Grove, the family homestead. Her love of and devotion to her children became more encompassing as her 10 grandchildren were born. She extended this love and devotion to 15 greatgrandchildren until she passed away on 17 Feb, 2009 with one more great-grandchild on the way.