Thread: Family Names
View Single Post
Old 09-27-2006, 07:50 AM   #10
Cathy
Senior Member
 
Join Date: May 2001
Location: Maine, USA
Posts: 1,967
Send a message via AIM to Cathy
Default

I saw the coat of arms and history of the Gibersons arriving in America. It's a bit different from the story of the Northern Maine Gibersons, though. My father's line came from Normandy, originally, but migrated to England, where they were called Gilberstons. Eventually, John ended up in Canada, around Bath, New Brunswick, and after a few years, headed about 25 miles North, along the St. John river. He settled in Tobique, which is now a huge reservation. He convinced the local tribes that he was a preacher, and converted a bunch of them to Christianity. They built him a church, thinking he'd stay around for awhile, but of course, he didn't. He migrated to Maine with his family, and eventually went to Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Oregon, leaving Gibersons everywhere he settled(probably his adult sons). Last count, back in the '80s, there were about 6600 of us across the US.
There's also a legend of The Lost Giberson Gold Mine, in the hills between Perth and Bath, NB. It seems one of his line found gold nuggets in a stream he was canoeing. Paddling upstream, after several attempts, he found the source... a vein of gold embedded in a rocky area along the shore. He mined it for several years, and kept its location a secret. Legend has it, the location died with him. I know this one is a little hard to believe, but all my aunts and uncles say it really happened, and I've also read about it on the Internet, although the story varies from site to site.
__________________
http://www.cathycowette.com
Cathy is offline   Reply With Quote