Woodbury-Fay Family Papers, 1819-1929, n.d.
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Administrative/Biographical History
Reverend Benjamin Woodbury (1792-1845) and Reverend Nathaniel Thomas Fay (1813-1908), Woodbury’s son-in-law, both worked as Home Missionaries through the American Home Missionary Society. The Society was founded in 1826 as a predominantly Congregational Church organization. It carried on extensive missionary efforts in the newer settlements and frontiers of the United States, and Oberlin was considered one of its many satellite colleges.
Benjamin Woodbury married Mehetabel Pettengill (1795-1849), daughter of Amos Pettengill and Charlotte True, in 1824 in Salisbury, New Hampshire. After holding several pastorates in New England, Benjamin removed with his family to Plain Township, Wood County in Northern Ohio as a Home Missionary in September 1833. He founded the Plain Congregational Church in 1835 in what is now Bowling Green, Ohio. Benjamin and Mehetabel had seven children. Mehetabel’s sister, Susannah Pettengill (1793-1837), married Benjamin Huntoon (d. 1864) in 1820. The couple lived in Cincinnati, OH before Susannah’s death in 1837. Benjamin Huntoon moved to Peoria, IL in 1838 and corresponded with Benjamin and Mehetabel, as evidenced in letters dating from 1838 to 1840.
Nathaniel Thomas Fay was born in Camden, Maine in 1813. After spending one term at Amherst College, he entered Colby Institute at Waterville, Maine, from which he graduated. He studied at Andover Theological Seminary. In November of 1833 he moved to Wood County, Ohio where he devoted himself to ministerial duties for many years. He married Roxana Dickinson Woodbury (1827-1872), daughter of Benjamin and Mehetabel Woodbury, in 1844, the year before Benjamin’s death. Nathaniel Fay was a delegate of the Christian Commission during the Civil War, and spent six weeks at City Point, VA, Nashville, TN, and Huntsville, AL. The couple had ten children, the first of whom was Ellen Bartlett Woodbury Fay (1846-1940).
Ellen Bartlett Woodbury Fay married Heman Nye MacDaniels (1835-1921) in 1871. Heman and Ellen MacDaniels moved to Oberlin in 1890 for better educational opportunities for their children. Heman received a Civil War disability pension and built, repaired and maintained several family properties. Ellen operated a boarding house for female students at Oberlin College and later, for young unmarried faculty. Their son Laurence was an outstanding student (Phi Beta Kappa) at Oberlin College, graduating in 1912. His wife Frances was also a 1912 graduate of Oberlin College.
Sources Consulted
Woodbury-Fay Family Papers, RG 30/315
Laurence H. and Frances MacDaniels Papers, RG 30/276
Author: Anne Cuyler Salsich Forms of Material (links to similar genres) Administrative InformationLaurence H. and Frances MacDaniels Papers, RG 30/276.
See also a typescript copy of Douglas K. Showalter’s sermon entitled “Rev. Benjamin Woodbury: The Good Fight of Faith,” delivered at the First Congregational Church of Falmouth, MA of the United Church of Christ, March 7, 2004. The typescript is located in the Oberlin File, RG 21, Series III. Lectures, Talks, Presentations.
The small collection of the papers of the Woodbury-Fay families are arranged into three series: 1. Biographical File; 2. Correspondence; and 3. Photographs and Illustrations.
There are various spellings of the names of the members of this family. Mehetabel Pettengill, in particular, appears in different spellings by various correspondents. She herself spelled her name Mehetabel Pettengill.
Series 1. Biographical File, 1929, n.d.
The items in this series provide context for the correspondence. They include a genealogical chart for the descendants of Amos Pettengill (or Pettingell), his daughter Mehetabel Pettengill and her husband Benjamin Woodbury and their descendants. Also included are biographical sketches of Benjamin Woodbury by an unknown author, and of Benjamin Huntoon Woodbury (son of Benjamin Woodbury) by Lucy Fay. Additionally, the donor of the papers provided excerpts taken from an article on the Jewett, Fay, Woodbury and allied families in Americana, dated 1929.
Series 2. Correspondence, 1819, 1821, 1825, 1837-40, c. 1844, 1845-46, 1852-53,
1856-58, 1860-61, 1863-65, n.d.
The bulk of the Woodbury-Fay Family Papers consists of correspondence, beginning in 1819 with the courtship of Benjamin Woodbury and Mehetabel Pettengill, and a letter in transcript form only from “Mary” to Mehetabel. Other letters to this couple include a call from a church to Benjamin Woodbury in 1845, a letter from Benjamin’s brother Charles Hall, also in 1845, and letters from Benjamin and Susan (sister of Mehetabel Woodbury) Huntoon between 1837 and 1840.
The highest number of letters were written or received by Roxana Dickinson Woodbury Fay and her husband Nathaniel Thomas Fay, between 1839 and 1865. Three letters describe events during the Civil War, during which Fay served as a delegate from an auxiliary society of the Cleveland Christian Commission. Several refer to the Fremont Company, which had 31 volunteers from Prairie Depot (Wayne in Wood County, Ohio) in 1861, and which became the 111th Regiment, Ohio Infantry in 1862.
Each letter is accompanied by a transcript provided by the donor. There is one transcript without its original letter. An additional set of copies of transcripts can be found at the end of the series.
Series 3. Photographs and Illustrations, ca. 1870, ca. 1900, n.d.
Contains only two original photographs: 1. A cartes-de-visite of Roxana D. Woodbury Fay, ca. 1870, and 2. A photograph of Ellen Fay McDaniels, ca. 1900, taken in Oberlin. Roxana D. Woodbury was the daughter of Benjamin Woodbury and the mother of Ellen Fay McDaniels. The remaining images are photocopies of book illustrations of Nathaniel Thomas Fay, Roxana D. Woodbury Fay, and Benjamin Woodbury.