As I was going through the Peck family genealogy for my last project, I found that the wife of Ira Peck (who was the subject of my investigation) was Marsha Dixon. As I continued the search for Ira Peck’s family, I found that a Mary Ann Peck had married Eli Wilson Dixon. Were these siblings marrying siblings? Cousins? That question began the addition of the Dixon family into the Port Byron Family Tree.
As I am finding with many of these early and large “founding families”, there were so many of them living in the Port Byron/Weedsport area that it was worth the local paper to print long and detailed genealogical history type articles. In the July 19, 1951 Port Byron Chronicle, you can find an article titled; “Ball and Whitman Farms Section of 144-Year-Old Military Tract”. This was a reprint of an article that was first published in The Cayuga County Farm and Home Bureau News. The focus of the article was the Dixon-Ball-Whitman line as they were the local farmers, and it helps to lay out the early Dixon lineage. (It would be neat to see if the family still has the photos that were used in the article.) And since they are a “founding family”, Stroke’s 1879 History of Cayuga County also provides a lot of useful information. Thankfully, a very good researcher on Ancestry.com used all this info, and much more, to create a detailed and helpful history of the family.
James Dickson moved to Mentz from Hebron in Washington County, New York, sometime prior to 1800. James Dickson was a native of Ireland and came to this country before the Revolutionary War. Although an older man in his forties, he served in the Continental Army and was awarded a 100-acre land grant for his service. James moved here with a Eli Wilson, and they settled on farm lands that were east of the village near Centerport. At one time the cross-roads was called Dixon’s Corners, but today it is Centerport Road. The Dixon-Wilson Cemetery was the family burial grounds. James Dickson’s wife was Miriam Hamilton, another familiar name that deserves more research. Over the years, the spelling of the name had changed from Dickson to Dixon.
Stroke’s history says that James was followed to Mentz by a John Dixon, who was likely one of his sons. His other sons; James, Moses, and David, also appear to have settled here, although David did continue to head west. To further complicate genealogical matters, Phebe Tillou, the wife of Darius Peck III, remarried John C Dixon after Darius died. So in one family, there are Peck’s and Dixon’s who are step-siblings. However as the children of the Darius Peck/Phebe Tillou union were females, the name disappears over time. One of these daughters was Martha Anne Peck. She married James White, a veteran of the Civil War, and after James died, Martha and her daughter Isabel became very active in local veteran’s affairs. We have posted some items of hers on the Facebook page.
As I noted, once Darius died, Phebe married John Dixon. John was her third husband, and also twelve years younger. Phebe would give birth to T. Fayette Dixon when she was forty-two-years-old. T. Fayette was what I call the village branch of the Dixon tree, as they lived in Port Byron rather then on the farm. He would become well known for his work in local government and his grist mill. This mill would later be sold to the Warren family, and it still stands today along Mill Street.
Moses Dixon stayed on the farm and would pass it down to his children. It was this branch of the tree was highlighted in the newspaper article. In fact, the newspaper article gives an incredible amount of information about the family. His daughter Janet would marry Harvey Ball, and the farm would be passed down to Guy and Emma Ball Whitman.
And as it turns out, Ira, and Mary Ann Peck were first cousins who married Martha and Eli Wilson Dixon, who were also first cousins.
I will remind everyone that the purpose of the Port Byron Family Tree is to show the connections between the families of the village and town, and not to prove ancestral information. Everything that we add has been checked, and maybe cross-checked, however if you use any information from the tree, be certain to do your due diligence.