WI BIO - Dane Co - PARKINSON, Frank E.
Biographical Review of Dane County, WI. Chicago: Biographical Review Pub. Co. 
1893, Vol I, pp 299-300

Frank E. PARKINSON, of the city of Madison [Dane County, WI], was born in the 
town of Fayette, La Fayette County [then Iowa County], Wisconsin Territory, 
16 October 1842, and is a son of Nathaniel Taylor and Maria Louise (BRIGGS) 
PARKINSON, natives [respectively] of Tennessee and New York. [Frank E. 
PARKINSON was born in the portion of Iowa County, Wisconsin Territory, that 
in 1846 became Lafayette County, Wisconsin Territory.]

Nathaniel Taylor PARKINSON, a mere lad, with his father, settled in Wisconsin 
Territory [Michigan Territory] in 1827, at Mineral Point. [Wisconsin 
Territory existed from 1836-1848, when WI became a state. In 1827 Wisconsin 
Territory was still part of Michigan Territory. Mineral Point became part of 
Iowa County, a Territorial County formed in 1829.] N. T. PARKINSON was a 
soldier in the Black Hawk War, fought in the battle of Bad Axe; was the first 
sheriff of Dane County, in 1839, appointed by Governor DODGE, and built the 
first Dane County jail. He was named "Taylor," at the request of General 
Zachary TAYLOR, who was a near neighbor of his father in Tennessee, and made 
him a handsome bequest in consideration for so naming he child. Our subject 
now has books in his law library bought with money derived from this Taylor 
bequest.

Mr. Frank E. PARKINSON was educated at the Wisconsin State University 
[Madison, Dane County], and received the degree of Ph. B; studied law in 
Shullsburg [Lafayette County, WI], in the law office of the Hon. John K. 
WILLIAMS; was admitted to the bar in Wisconsin and Kansas in 1872; began 
practice in the city of Stoughton [Dane County, WI] in 1873, and in 1875 
formed a copartnership with the Hon. Alden S. SANBORN, of the city of Madison 
[WI]; was Clerk of Stoughton [Dane County, WI] two years, and City Attorney 
of Madison one year; was twice a candidate, in 1880 and 1886, for Judge of 
the Dane County Municipal Court; is a Republican and a protectionist, and for 
twelve years has been secretary and attorney of the Northwestern Mutual Relief 
Association, a most successful life insurance company, of Madison, Wisconsin.

Mr. Frank E. PARKINSON is of the seventh generation of English ancestors 
settled in South Carolina; is a grandson of Colonel D. M. [Daniel Morgan] 
PARKINSON, who was a soldier in the War of 1812, and fought in the battle of 
New Orleans; was aide-de-camp to General DODGE in the Black Hawk War; was a 
member of the first three Territorial Legislatures, 1836-1840, first 
constitutional convention, and first State Legislature in 1849, and 
introduced the first free, or common school bill.

Mr. [Frank E.] PARKINSON's grandfather, H. L. BRIGGS, was a son of a 
Revolutionary officer, a soldier in the war of 1812; was superintendent of 
western mail service, and lived during the reign of four British monarchs and 
twenty-two American presidents.

Mr. [Frank E.] PARKINSON was married 23 December 1869 to Miss Nellie BELDEN, 
and they have twin daughters, Maude and Eve, now eighteen years old, and 
members of the senior class in the Madison High School, in the ancient 
classical course.

Mrs. Frank E. PARKINSON is a daughter of Merriwether Lewis and Judith 
(MARSHALL) BELDEN; was born 10 December 1843, in East Whately, Franklin 
County, Massachusetts; came in 1849, with her parents, to Illinois, and to 
Wisconsin in 1851, and is a descendant of Captain Samuel MARSHALL, a soldier 
of the Revolution. [p 300] Mrs. PARKINSON's ancestors came from England 
with the Connecticut colony in 1630, and in 1640 settled in East Whately, and 
took land under the royal British grant, which is still in the family, having 
descended from father to son through six generations. The BELDEN homestead, 
built in 1765, before the Revolution, is still a grand old mansion.

Mrs. PARKINSON is ninth in descent from Thomas FORD, who was born at Salcombe 
Regis, Devonshire, England, in 1580, and came to America in the ship "Mary 
and John," Captain SQUEBB; sailed from Plymouth in March, and landed in 
Boston on 30 May 1630. It is written of Thomas FORD that he was "a man of 
property, Deputy to the General Court, and a grand juror."

Mrs. PARKINSON is also eighth in descent from Captain Roger CLAP, who also 
came to America in the ship "Mary and John." He was twenty-one years captain 
of Castle William, in Boston harbor. He has slept two centuries in the old 
King's Chapel burying ground, one of the oldest in America, and his name, in 
quaint old lettering, can still be read on the time-eaten tombstone, and also 
on the bronze tablet at the Tremont Street gateway.

Among Mrs. PARKINSON's relatives may be found Anna BELDEN, who imported the 
seed, raised the first broom corn, and made the first corn broom in America; 
John FITCH, inventor of the steamboat; the proprietors of the BELDEN and 
LEONARD silk mills; Merriwether LEWIS, the great western explorer; Dixon H. 
LEWIS, one a U. S. Senator from Alabama; William Cullen BRYANT, the poet; the 
Professors WHITNEY, of Yale, Harvard, and Beloit; also Professor ELWELL, of 
Amherst; and her father served in the Florida and Indian wars under General 
TAYLOR. [See also other related PARKINSON biographies in both Dane and 
Lafayette Counties, WI.]

Submitted by Cathy Kubly