Blanding family.

Physician and naturalist William Blanding was born on February 7, 1773, in Rehoboth, Massachusetts, where his family had lived for five generations. He was the eldest of nine children born to William and Lydia (Ormsbee) Blanding, and his siblings included James Blanding (1781-1870) and Lucy Blanding Carpenter (b. 1783). William attended Rhode Island College (later Brown University) and received his A.B. in 1801. Upon graduation, he returned to Massachusetts, where he briefly taught school in Somerset and practiced medicine for several years in Attleborough. William married Susanna Carpenter of Rehoboth in 1805, and the couple moved to Camden, South Carolina, in 1807. There, William established a medical practice and ran an apothecary.

Susannah Carpenter Blanding died in Camden in 1809 and two years later William married Rachel Willett of Philadelphia. The couple moved from South Carolina to Philadelphia circa 1835, where William practiced medicine and was an active resident member of the Academy of Natural Sciences. Elected to corresponding membership while living in South Carolina in 1825, William made frequent contributions to the Academy’s collection of specimens. He was a renowned naturalist, and is credited with the discovery of a species of turtle known as Blanding’s turtle (Emydoidea blandingii). William left Philadelphia circa 1846 and returned to Rehoboth, Massachusetts. He died there on 19 October 1857.

In his old age, William lived in Rehoboth with the family of his brother, James, who cared for him as his health deteriorated. James and his wife, Elizabeth Carpenter Blanding, the sister of William’s first wife, had eight children, including Susannah (Susan) Carpenter Blanding Arey (b. 1812), Elizabeth Parthenia Blanding Lyon Plimpton (1814-1871), Nancy Augusta Blanding Nattinger (b. 1816), Juliet Maria Blanding (1818-1853), William Willett Blanding (1820-circa 1920), Abram Ormsbee Blanding, M.D. (1823-1892), Lephe Hunt Blanding (1825-1864), and Sarah (Sally) M. Blanding Bowen (1827-1911). Of these children, Nancy, Juliet, and Sarah are the most prominent authors in this collection.

Little is known about the Blanding sisters besides their vital statistics and the information that can be gleaned from this collection. Nancy A. Blanding was born on 31 March 1816 in Rehoboth, Massachusetts. In October of 1840 she spent a year in Philadelphia teaching at the "Foster House" school and enjoying close contact with her aunt and uncle, Rachel and William Blanding. A year later, Nancy traveled from Philadelphia to Springfield, Ohio, to teach school. There she lived with family friends and relatives, among them the Nattinger family. By late 1847 she had returned to Rehoboth, Massachusetts, to live with her parents and siblings. There, she became the primary caregiver to her ailing uncle. On 25 September 1856, Nancy married John G. Nattinger and moved with him to Ottawa, Illinois. The couple had one daughter, Juliette Augusta, who was born on 27 March 1858. Nancy A. Blanding Nattinger died on 11 December 1887 at age 71.

Juliet Maria Blanding was born in Rehoboth on 8 May 1818. In the early 1840s she attended Mount Holyoke Female Seminary (later Mount Holyoke College) in South Hadley, Massachusetts. In 1843 she traveled to Evansville, Indiana, and lived with the Barnes family while teaching school. By March of 1846 she had returned to Rehoboth, but in October of 1847 she journeyed to Camden, Mississippi, to teach. She took ill in the spring of 1851, and returned to New England that summer. Juliet lived for some time with her sister Susan C. Blanding Arey in New Hampshire, and died in Rehoboth on 7 May 1853.

The youngest of the Blanding children, Sarah M. Blanding, also known as Sally, was born on 21 June 1827. She attended the Seekonk Classical Seminary in the early 1840s, and in November of 1849 she joined her sister, Juliet, teaching school in Camden, Mississippi. Sarah returned to New England with Juliet in 1851, and by 1855 she was living with her parents and siblings in Rehoboth, Massachusetts. She assumed the primary care of her uncle upon Nancy’s departure from Rehoboth in 1856. On 23 February 1865, at age thirty-seven, Sarah married Reuben Bowen. The couple had five children. Sarah M. Blanding Bowen died on 31 December 1911.

Biographical material was derived from the collection. Blandin, Bill. "Descendants of William Blanding." Retrieved from http://www.koopa.org/genealogy on 28 October 2002. A portion of this online genealogy has been printed and is in the Blanding family papers collection folder. Mr. Blandin’s genealogy relied heavily on: Blanding, Leonard Clark. Genealogy of the Blanding Family. [Grand Rapids, MI]: L. C. Blanding, 1995. Finding Aid to the William Blanding Papers, South Caroliniana Library, University of South Carolina. A copy of this finding aid is in the Blanding family papers collection folder. Griffin, Kathy. Finding aid to the Blanding Family Papers, Massachusetts Historical Society, Boston, Massachusetts. A copy of this finding aid is in the Blanding family papers collection folder. Spamer, Earle. Letter to Carrie Foley regarding William Blanding’s membership in the Academy of Natural Sciences, 9 October 2002. A copy of this letter is in the Blanding family papers collection folder.

From the guide to the Blanding family papers, 1801-1920, 1834-1858, (University of Delaware Library - Special Collections)