Raphael Pumpelly

Raphael Pumpelly (September 8, 1837 – August 10, 1923) was an American geologist and explorer. He was born on September 8, 1837, in Owego, New York, into a family with deep New England roots that trace back to Thomas Welles[1] (1590–1659), who rrived in Massachusetts in 1635 and was the only man in Connecticut's history to hold all four top offices: governor, deputy governor, treasurer, and secretary;[2][3] John Deming,[4] (1615–1705) an early Puritan settler and original patentee of the Connecticut Colony; and Honor Treat, the daughter of Richard Treat (1584–1669) an early New England settler, Deputy to the Connecticut Legislature and also a Patentee of the Royal Charter of Connecticut, 1662.[5][6][7] He was also a descendant of William Pynchon, a colonial assistant treasurer and original patentee of the Massachusetts Bay Colony. He led the 1635 settlement of Springfield, Hampden County, Massachusetts, which was named after his home village, now a suburb of Chelmsford in Essex, England; and Captain Elizur Holyoke, the namesake of the mountain, Mount Holyoke, and (indirectly), of the city of Holyoke, Massachusetts. His father was William Pumpelly, son of John Pumpelly and Hannah Bushnell.[8] His father was great grandson of Jean Pompilie, a sea captain who settled at Plymouth, Massachusetts. He was a French Huguenot refugee from Avignon, France, originally from Spoleto, Italy.[8] His mother, Mary Hollenbeck Welles (born in Athens, Pennsylvania, 6 May 1803; died in Paris, France, 4 December 1879), was a poet. She was the daughter of Prudence Talcott and George Welles (a 1779 graduate of Yale College.)[9] She wrote religious historical poems, including "Belshazar's Feast," "Pilate's Wife's Dream," "Herod's Feast," and "An Ode to Shakespeare." Some of these were collected and published in a volume (New York, 1852).[10]