Joseph Farquhar (by 1800 – 1866)
The earliest Farquhar I can trace in my family is Joseph Farquhar (by 1800-1866), born in Aberdeen, the third largest city in Scotland. Aberdeen, popularly known as the Granite City because many of its buildings are constructed of local granite, the chief export, is situated on the North Sea at the mouths of the Dee and Don rivers in northeastern Scotland. Its Cathedral of Saint Machar dates to the 15th century. It was here that Joseph married Margaret Christian Fraser (? – 1866) on December 2, 1820.
Their only son, John Fraser Farquhar, was born on September 20, 1821 and was baptized on September 20, 1821, in the same church where his parents had married. When John Fraser was eleven years old, the family emigrated to the U.S. (1832), landing at Montreal and entering the U.S. by way of Prescott, Ontario, on the St. Lawrence River, opposite Ogdensburg. The family settled in Easton, Pennsylvania, where Joseph found work as a stone mason for Alexander Wilson. The two helped build Lafayette College in the 1830’s.
