Ramsey Family Documents

 

 

An incomplete article on the Ramseys from the McBurney family history.



A photograph of the 'Old Ramsey Homestead' in Mahomet, Burnet County, Texas, the home of AM and Ellen Taylor Ramsey



The text on the back of the photograph describing the people and property. From Jessie Ramsey's age, the photo was probably taken in 1890 or 1891.

 

 

 

An 1888-89 catalog for the nursery before its name was changed to Ramsey's Nursery.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The birth, marriage and death records on AM Ramsey's father, mother and siblings.

 

 

 

Birth records on AM Ramsey and Ellen Taylor from the Ramsey family Bible

 

 

 

The birth records on the children of AM and Ellen Taylor Ramsey and FT and Belle Sinclair Ramsey

 

 

 

Marriage records from the Ramsey family Bible

 

 

 

Death records

 

 

 

An 1894-95 catalog for Ramsey's Nurseries. Notice the stamped note that they had moved to Austin

 

 

 

 

 

An obituaty on AM Ramsey written by FT Ramsey and published in the Farm and Ranch Magazine.

 

 

   

 

Two more death notices for AM Ramsey


 

 

Photos and locations of the gravestones of AM and Ellen Taylor Ramsey. Mercy Ramsey Carl is in the photo on the left with AM's broken gravestone.

 

  

Closer views of the drawings of AM and Ellen Ramsey's gravestones from the McBurney history

 

 

On the Burnet County Rootsweb site are transcriptions of gravestones in Bear Creek Cemetery. These are the ones of family that were transcribed.

 

Malcolm Niel Ramsey - Sep 13, 1887 - May 27, 1888 

(Malcolm was the son of FT and Belle Ramsey who died of Meningitis and 'water on the brain.' Notice the unusual spelling of Neil. I thought it was a typo until I looked at a list of gravestones created by Margaret and she listed the spelling that way as well. But the Bible records for FT and Belle Ramsey spelled his name the traditional way. I have two letters written by Ellen Ramsey to her daughter Ella. A warning - Ellen didn't use much punctuation in her letters. In the first one, dated April 17, she said,  "I know you are looking for Frank up there well their babe is very sick it took it with fever and grew worse we sent for a Doctor was here twice then they thought best to take it over to Bertram where the Doctors could consult - there appeared to be something the matter with its stomache it vomits a great deal - it may be a little better." On May 3rd she wrote, "I went over to Bertram Monday and Stayed all night. That poor little babe still lives it has Meningitis and no one can tell what turn it will take it can't see now for over a week and is unconscious, but can swallow they feed it - it is very low indeed." In the next sentence she talks about having so much cloudy, wet weather they can't work in the fields. Dying children must have been a more common occurrence back then. Malcolm died on May 27th at a little over 8 months old.)

 

 

 

Malcolm B. Sinclair

M. B. Sinclair - Jul 27, 1887 - Age 30 Yrs 

(Malcolm B. Sinclair was one of two brothers of Belle Sinclair Ramsey. He died from being struck by lightening while standing on the porch of a store in Bertram 'pitching dollars' with some other men.  Because of the untimely deaths of Malcolm and other family members named Malcolm, and an accident involving at least one other, the family dropped the tradition of passing along this proud Scots name to male children.)

 

 

 

 

Jessie Black Sinclair

 

Jessie B. Sinclair - Born In Scotland 1822 - Died Nov 2, 1892 

(Jessie Black Sinclair was Belle's mother. She was born in 1822 on the Isle of Mull in Scotland. She came to Canada and married John Sinclair, after knowing him one week. He died in 1864. leaving her a widow with six children. Desiring to escape the cold winters of Canada, she sent her oldest son to a World's Fair to choose a place to live. He had trouble deciding between the Georgia and Texas exhibits, but chose Texas. The two sons came first and bought land near Bertram in eastern Burnet County. They were followed by the rest of the family in 1881. My records indicate she died in 1894 not 1892; I need to verify which is the correct date.)

 

 



Mamie Cady

 

Mary B. Cady; Born In Manistee, Mich. Oct 14, 1878 - Died May 9, 1894 At Austin, Texas 

(Mary Belle Cady, nicknamed Mamie was Belle's niece, the daughter of Jessie Sinclair Cady Davis. Mary was going to live with Belle and Frank after her mother died in 1892. But she was taken ill, probably appendicitis, in Chicago before she traveled to Texas and died several days after reaching Austin. Her sister, Jessie Cady Dowell is the ancestor of the Sinclair- Dowell line.)

 

 

 

On April 1, 1899, John Ramsey, FT's uncle wrote him a letter in which he talked about family history.

 

 



 

 

In 1904, FT Ramsey applied for membership in the national Ramsey/Ramsay Association. His application has some very interesting information about him and his ancestors. He was 5 ft 10 in tall, weighed about 162 pounds, had a light or ruddy complexion, brown hair and blue-gray eyes. That means he was 3 inches shorter than his father, AM. Since FT also had Ellen's light eyes, he seems to have taken more after the Taylors than the Ramseys. He was a member of the Christian Church and the Democratic Party but had also voted for the Prohibition Party. He was a school trustee for the City of Austin and Ex-president of the State Horticultural Society. In the list of his children, after Winnie Bell's name, he said, "The later is also called Pansy Ramsey. We really did not need any more girls at the time so used her for an advertisement." FT obviously had a sense of humor. (This very interesting and informative document came to me out of the blue from a very nice person on the Internet who was also doing Ramsey research, saw my website and recognized names from the application. One never knows where helpful information will come from.)

 

 




 

The Ramsey Nursery was ahead of its time in marketing to Spanish speakers. This catalog from 1911-12 was translated into Spanish and shows four generations of Ramseys.

 



 

 

A copy of the US patent issued to F. T. Ramsey on 28 July 1925 for his invention of a land/water vehicle.

 

 

 

The schematic drawings for FT Ramsey's land/water vehicle


 

 

The New Encyclopedia of Texas, published by the Texas Development Bureau, Dallas Texas in 1926 had an article on FT Ramsey.

 



 

The front and back of a share of Ramsey's Austin Nursery stock dated 1 Sept 1928 issued to JM Ramsey and signed by FT Ramsey

 




 

An obituary on FT Ramsey from the Austin paper





 

The Handbook of Texas, first published in 1952, has an article on FT Ramsey.

 

RAMSEY, FRANK TAYLOR (1861-1932). Frank Taylor Ramsey, horticulturist, son of Alexander M. and Ellen (Taylor) Ramsey, was born in Burnet County, Texas, on June 15, 1861. His father was a pioneer horticulturist. Ramsey attended a local country school in Burnet County and at age sixteen became his father's partner in his nursery. By horseback and buckboard he scouted all Texas for native flora and introduced many choice wildings to cultivation. He married Annabella Sinclair on August 20, 1884, and they had four children. In 1894 the Ramseys moved their nursery to Austin, and Ramsey took over the business after his father's death in 1895. His establishment, the Austin Nursery, was a prominent and successful business throughout the early 1900s; it reached 430 acres at one time. Ramsey, nicknamed "Fruit Tree" from his initials, discovered or originated and introduced several domestic fruit varieties, including the Breck nectarine, the Leona peach, the Haupt berry, the Ramsey fig, a seedless persimmon, and the cluster apricot. He also developed several varieties of pecans, bred a Ramsey hybrid shrub, and introduced the Chinese jujube tree into the area. Ramsey contributed articles on horticulture to Southern Florist, Farm and Ranch, and Holland's Magazine. He also wrote his own verses in his nursery catalogs and produced a booklet of poetry titled 'Tis Sweeter Still and Other Poems. He was a Mason and a member of the Austin Public School Board of Trustees (1905-08). Ramsey died on December 28, 1932, and was buried in Oakwood Cemetery, Austin. Ramsey Park in Austin was named for him.

 

BIBLIOGRAPHY: Austin History Center Files. The Austin Nursery Catalog (Austin, 1923). Frank W. Johnson, A History of Texas and Texans (5 vols., ed. E. C. Barker and E. W. Winkler [Chicago and New York: American Historical Society, 1914; rpt. 1916]).