Cragin Cousins

Growing up in North Worcester County, I remember my father, Donald H. Cragin was passionately interested in anyone named Cragin, and scoured the archives of various newspapers he wrote for. I have a heap of the old xerographic copies of pages from the Boston Herald Traveler and other defunct newspapers describing Cragins who were cops and criminals, politicos and poets, even the third person in the triangle that sparked the free-love Oneida community back in the 1840s.

I think his interest was ignited by his own father's late-in-life fascination with Cragin antecedents. Howard A. Cragin compiled some genealogical information from Scotland but I don't think he lived long enough to read June Godley Cragin's enormous and encompassing Cragin tome that arrived at our house sometimes in the 60s.

The Cragins were originally from Scotland, a place called Craggan, which means "rock." (Still trying to figure out how this may have encouraged my decision to major in geology). The original Cragin, John was captured as (in all likelihood) a teenage soldier fighting for the Royalist side. He was packed on a boat, the John and Sarah, shipped to the new world around 1680. The drama of his story is that he was ailing while on board -- and not just seasickness: small pox. "In those days, the cure for that was getting shipped -- overboard," my father gleefully explained, adding that family legend had it that Sarah Dawes (an ancestor of Richard Dawes, who was one of Paul Revere's colleagues, and the one who actually made it to Lexington) nursed him to health, and saved him from a watery grave. John the first worked off his indenture at the Saugus Iron Works, had one son, and promptly died.

There are many, many other Cragins, and I'm sending a link to all people named Cragin so that they can post or read as desired. I'm looking forward to writing about:
19th century entomologist Isabelle Sophronia Cragin
19th century Wheaton Female Seminary Instructress Mary Jane Cragin (who got a dorm named after her)
20th century bassplayer Hal Cragin (my brother)
Daniel Cragin, manufacturer of perfectly-shaped wooden boxes (the factory's still cranking out these "peck measures" in Southern NH)
Plus the Cragin who was presented a shotgun by, I believe, the government of Paraguay. This hangs over a window here, and is aimed towards Boston. Nothing against Boston, mind you.

I changed the address of this because I have found that my branch of the family is connected to so many others that we are constantly saying, "is this first cousin twice removed? Second cousin? Or are we third cousins yet... "