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John Cobook Research Paper

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JOHN COOK was born in Liverpool on the 11th of September 1851. His parents were inhabitants of the city at this time due to, presumably, his father being contracted to a Liverpool-based ship. John holds the distinc-tion of being the only English-born Cook. Upon his parents’ return to Ardrossan, he was baptised on the 22nd of April 1856. As a boy, he went to school in Ardrossan and by the age of 19, he appears to have left home.
John went on to become a telegraphist, a career that would eventually take him far from his ancestral shores. In 1871, he was working as a tele-graph clerk and lodging at 8 Argyle Street in Greenock. Writing in 1917, Inglis stated that John worked as a telegraphist on isolated Valentia Island, where the Old World …show more content…

According to the work of William Frederick Gardner, himself a descendant of Amelia’s brother James Wil-liam Gardner, Emma was born in 1849 in Islington, Middlesex in Eng-land. She was the daughter of James and Amelia Emma (née Pavitt) Gardner, who came to Harbour Grace, Newfoundland about 1856 as mission teachers. Gardner wrote that Emma was “an excellent musician, singer, and teacher,” who played the harmonium at St Paul’s Anglican Church from the age of 13. She apparently played the harmonium on the day that her brother, Reverend George Gardner, rector of the Heart’s Content congregation at St Mary’s Anglican Church at the time, held a service to commemorate the receipt of the first message transmitted from Valentia Island. Emma’s first marriage to George Unicume in 1872 re-sulted in three children: Annie Louise in 1873, Mabel Frances in 1875, and Henry James in 1876.
John and Emma had four children of their own in Heart’s Content: Jessie Emma[C.1.2.4.3.1] in late 1879 or early 1880, Archibald Boyd[C.1.2.4.3.2] in 1883, Mary Barrie[C.1.2.4.3.3] in 1887, and Blanche[C.1.2.4.3.2] in 1894. At some stage after 1881, John’s mother, Jane, made the voyage from Scot-land to join her son in

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