Life Deming was born in
Shalford, Essex, England. He arrived in New England during the
Great Migration with his older sister Elizabeth and her husband
Nathaniel Foote. Deming and the Footes first settled in
Watertown, Massachusetts, but left for the
Connecticut River Valley in 1636, where they helped found the town of
Wethersfield. Deming was brother-in-law to Connecticut governors
Robert Treat and
Thomas Welles. After Foote died Deming's sister Elizabeth married Welles in 1646.
Benjamin Trumbull named Deming one of the "fathers of Connecticut."
Descendants John Deming's descendants number in the thousands today. Some of his notable descendants include: •
Louisa May Alcott, was an American novelist. She is best known for the novel
Little Women •
Humphrey DeForest Bogart, was an American actor. He has been called a
cultural icon. •
Jérôme Napoleon Bonaparte, was a son of
Jérôme Bonaparte (brother to
Napoleon I) and
Elizabeth Patterson, an American. •
William Edwards Deming, (1900–1993) was an American statistician, professor, author, lecturer, and consultant. •
Bruce Dern, is an American film actor. •
Laura Dern, is an American actress, film director and producer. •
John Fay, was a
U.S. Representative from
New York. •
B.F. Goodrich, was an American industrialist in the rubber industry. •
Karen Linder, is an American business leader and author. •
Archibald MacLeish, was an American poet, writer and the
Librarian of Congress. He is associated with the
Modernist school of poetry. He received three
Pulitzer Prizes for his work. •
Cole Albert Porter, was an American composer and songwriter. His works include the musical comedies
Kiss Me, Kate, Fifty Million Frenchmen,
DuBarry Was a Lady and
Anything Goes, as well as songs like "
Night and Day," "
I Get a Kick out of You," "
Well, Did You Evah!" and "
I've Got You Under My Skin." •
Nancy Davis Reagan, was the wife of former United States President
Ronald Reagan and served as an influential
First Lady of the United States from 1981 to 1989. •
Harriet Beecher Stowe, descended from John Deming's sister Elizabeth and her first husband,
Nathaniel Foote the Settler, was an
abolitionist and the author of ''
Uncle Tom's Cabin'' (1852) that depicted life for African-Americans under
slavery. •
Tennessee Williams, was an American playwright who received many of the top theatrical awards for his works of drama. He won the
Pulitzer Prize for Drama for
A Streetcar Named Desire in 1948 and for
Cat on a Hot Tin Roof in 1955.
References • Case, Lafayette Wallace.
The Goodrich family in America. A genealogy of the descendants of John and William Goodrich of Wethersfield, Conn., Richard Goodrich of Guilford, Conn., and William Goodridge of Watertown, Mass. Fergus printing company, 1889. • Deming, Judson Keith.
Genealogy of the descendants of John Deming of Wethersfield, Connecticut: with historical notes University of Wisconsin – Madison: Publisher Press of Mathis-Mets Co., 1904 • Treat, John Harvey.
Title The Treat family: a genealogy of Trott, Tratt, and Treat for fifteen generations, and four hundred and fifty years in England and America, containing more than fifteen hundred families in America Publisher The Salem press publishing & printing company, 1893. • Whittemore, Henry
The heroes of the American Revolution and their descendants: Battle of Long Island The Heroes of the American Revolution and Their Descendants: Battle of Long Island Publisher, Henry Whittemore, Heroes of the Revolution Pub. Co., 1897.
Notes Further reading