Me and the President/CEO of IBM!

Here’s another one of those fun connections in which I am related to a famous person and in no way qualified to inherit any money! 😉

Thomas J. Watson Jr. was head of IBM from 1956 to 1971, following the footsteps of his father Thomas Sr. Here he is alive and well, smiling for a portrait:

And here he is in his January 1, 1994 obit, not so happy with the afterlife:

So, what’s my connection to him?

In my last post I mentioned 1600’s-era Massachusetts resident Capt. Hugh Mason, from whom I (and Kim Kardashian and Kate Upton and a few other celebs) are descended. Thomas Watson is also descended from Capt. Hugh on his mother’s side.

Here is Thomas’ ancestry chart so far as it pertains to my own common ancestors. Thomas is descended from Capt. Hugh’s daughter Mary, while I am descended from his other daughter Hannah (not shown). BTW, I am also descended from Capt. Hugh’s son John Mason, because back in those days that sort of thing happened-!

Meanwhile, also back on Thomas Watson’s mother’s side, we see Esther Marble, who married Artemus Estabrook, descendant of Capt. Hugh Mason. Esther was the older sister of my own ancestor Betsy/Eliza Marble, who married Martin Buss in 1823.

Esther and Betsy were daughters of Jesse Marble and Sally Putnam (of the infamous Salem Putnam’s, more on them another time!). In all, Jesse and Sally had 10 children, but here’s where the story gets sad:

According to “A history of Rutland; Worcester County, Massachusetts, from its earliest settlement, with a biography of its first settlers” (1836), “In 1813, this town was visited with a putrid fever which swept off about seventy of its inhabitants of various ages.” That explains why three of the Marble’s children died in August 1813, first Lewis (age 22) on the 15th, then James (age 5) on the 17th and finally Augusta (age 11) on the 24th.

In addition to these, two of their other children seem to have died years earlier (1796 and 1801), perhaps as infants (or at least I was not able to find anything other than their birth records).

Thankfully for myself and Thomas Watson, the Marble’s other children survived and had children of their own. One daughter actually lived until 1895 (age 89). My ancestor Eliza (Marble) Buss made it to age 56. Thomas Watson’s ancestor Esther made it to age 68.