Mary Pierpont Barnum Hogan ’24 died early in the twenty-first century, having lived well into her 90s. Her obituary noted that she was the great-niece of the famous showman, P.T. Barnum. In fact, she was his great-great niece, her great-grandfather, Milo Barnum, having been a brother of Phineas T. (Good nineteenth century names in that family!) Mary, however, had a host of other connections to famous Americans, both by blood and by marriage. First among these was James Pierpont, the founder of Yale, who was married to Mary Hooker, daughter of Connecticut founder, Thomas Hooker. (Emma Hart Willard was also a proud descendant of the Connecticut Hooker.) Mary Hogan’s grandmother, for whom she was named, was Mary Pierpont Barnum ’66. The elder Mary was raised by her grandfather, John Pierpont, an influential Massachusetts minister. Her mother had died, and her father, James, had gone south to seek his fortune. (Much to his abolitionist father’s disappointment, he fought for the Confederacy. James’s biggest claim to fame, however, was not his military prowess, but his authorship of “Jingle Bells.”) James’s sister, Julia, did better for herself. She married Junius Morgan; their son was John Pierpont Morgan, better known by his initials, J.P. Mary Hogan’s grandmother’s side of the family–Cowees, Thompsons, and Bontecous–were local Troy people. Although not nearly as famous as the relatives on her grandfather’s side, they contributed at least five trustees to the Troy Female Seminary and Emma Willard School. The elder Mary Pierpont Barnum had a great-niece, Jessie Cluett ’86, who married Cornelius Vanderbilt’s great-nephew, Cornelius Vanderbilt Barton. Finally, Mary Hogan’s mother, Antoinette Alden Barnum ’89, was a direct descendant of John Alden of colonial and literary fame.
This one short biography of one Emma Willard student amply demonstrates the way the lives of pupils in this historic school have been woven into the fabric of American history.
