My Genealogy Hound

EDWARD J. CRISSEY comes from a family which has been prominent in the affairs of Chautauqua county for nearly three-quarters of a century. He was born near Delanti, in Stockton, Chautauqua county, New York, September 23, 1851, and is a son of Jason and Roxana (Winsor) Crissey. (For paternal ancestry see sketch of Samuel Shepard Crissey.) Rev. Washington Winsor (maternal grandfather) was born in Rhode Island in 1784, studied for the Baptist ministry, preached in Otsego county a few years and came to Stockton, settling near Delanti in 1827, preaching here, at Carroll, and afterward at Cassadaga, where he died in 1840, aged fifty-six years. His children were: Chauncey, who married Lucy Crissey, aunt of E. J., and is a druggist at Delanti; Ora, who resides in Wisconsin; Roxana (mother), and James M., a fisherman, who lives in Newport, Rhode Island. Jason Crissey (father) was born in Fairfax, Vermont, January 5, 1805, and came with his father to Stockton in 1814, where, when quite a young man, he bought a farm of his paternal parent, and followed the tilling of the soil the remainder of his life. In religion he was a Baptist, being a deacon of that church for several years. He married Roxana Winsor in 1836, and had eight children, six sons and two daughters: Stanton, who died at the age of eighteen years; Mary A., married to L. C. Warren, a farmer and lawyer at Stockton; Sardis L., a lawyer, settler of estates, and also a physician, in Washington, District of Columbia, who married May Morse; Francis and Cynthia died while young; Jirah D., a farmer for several years, and now a druggist and undertaker at Delanti (Stockton), who married Diana Salisbury; Leroy, died in infancy; and E. J. Jason Crissey died in Stockton, April 1, 1875, aged seventy years. His wife is still living in her seventy-ninth year, having been born April 12, 1812.

Edward J. Crissey attended the winter terms of the common schools of Stockton, this county, until he was eighteen years old, when he became a student in the State Normal school at Fredonia, where he remained two years. In 1871 he entered the Fredonia Censor office, a newspaper which had just closed a half century of life and started on the other half, to learn the printing business. Later on he went over to another fifty years old newspaper office, the Advertiser. He remained here until 1875, and then went on the railroad as postal clerk in the United States mail service, his run the first year being from Buffalo, New York, to Toledo, Ohio, and from Niagara to Rochester, this State, and the next year from Dunkirk to New York City. In the fall of 1878 he entered the Fredonia gas company’s office, and has since remained there, being now secretary, treasurer and general manager. In religion he is an influential member of the Baptist church at Fredonia, of which he has been deacon for three years. Edward J. Crissey was married January 2, 1879, to Lucy Colburn, a daughter of Alvah and Annie R. (Norton) Colburn, the father being a miller at Fredonia. By this union there have been two children, daughters: Edith M., who was born April, 1880, and died in February, 1888; and Eleanor, who was born April 1, 1883.