Community Corner

eBay Tuesday: Arthur and Annette Lyons Portrait

Portrait of a New London couple who traveled extensively due to Arthur's job with the railroad

The couple in the photo that is this week's featured item gives a visual to one branch of a family tree that has been traced back a millennium. 

This portrait, offered by eBay user 4hearts, was made at the Bank Street studio Kenyon & Sons and portrays Arthur Hatsell and Annette Lyons. The user has included information from the 1910 federal census describing Arthur as a railroad telegraph operator. The information describing Arthur as being born in 1870 in Vermont, however, seems to be a little inaccurate.

Arthur is part of the Lyons family, which still maintains an ancestry website that makes a number of royal connections, including Queen Elizabeth II. One report says that Arthur was indeed born in Vermont, in the town of Somerset, but that this occurred in 1869 rather than 1870. Annette Armenia Faulker was born in Whittingham, Vt., in 1867. The two married in 1893.

The couple's first child, Chelsea Faulkner Lyons, was born in 1899. He was followed by Frankistine Ziller Lyons in 1901, but this son died sometime before the 1910 census. A daughter born in 1902 died the same year. Arthur and Annette's fourth and final child, Hatsell B. Lyons, was born in 1909.

Arthur's work on the railroad allowed him to travel throughout the Northeast and South, and Annette and Chelsea frequently accompanied him on these trips. A collection donated to Duke University includes detailed reports of his trips, postcards, brochures, an anti-Ku Klux Klan pamphlet written by James M. Gillis, and a short story written by Arthur imagining his father's service in the Civil War. 

Arthur and Annette died within a year of each other in 1951. Chelsea lived until 1991, Hatsell until 1992. 

It is unclear whether Thomas M. Lyon, who was featured in another eBay Tuesday, is related.

The asking price for the photo is $40 plus $2.50 for shipping and handling. The seller describes it as an original print, measuring about four-and-a-quarter by six-and-a-half inches, in fair condition with some light soiling and wear. 

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