I recently learned about The Welcome Society while working on an application for a client. What is this society? It is an ancestral organization for families who can trace their family to the ships of William Penn. The Welcome was the first ship and it just so happens, there was a Nicholas Wall/Waln on that ship. His great granddaughter, Sarah Wall, married George Shoemaker who came over from Kreigsheim with his mother, Sarah and siblings. The Shoemaker’s arrived in 1686, but through the Wall’s, that will take me back to 1682.
Of significance is that the Wall House is still standing and owned by Cheltenham Township, Montgomery Co., PA. The next meeting of The Welcome Society will be meeting there. Unfortunately, I won’t be able to attend, but have already been there. Very close by is the Shoemaker Burying Ground where Sarah and many of the other Shoemaker’s are buried. The Wall house is open on Sundays for tours, so google it.
If anyone is interested in joining The Welcome Society, wait a couple of weeks until I get my application approved and you can tie into mine for an easy route to membership.
I also joined First Families of Pennsylvania on Sarah Shoemaker. She was quite a woman, arriving in Pennsylvania in 1686 with kiddies in tow, bought 200 acres and started a new life. I hope that is where I get some of my spirit.