Barbara Blosser ^{1 2 3 4}

  General Notes:

A BIOGRAPHY OF BARBARA "BARBARY" BLOSSER FAST, by Larry Overmire (3rd great nephew), Aug. 2008:

Barbara or "Barbary" Blosser was born in York County, Pennsylvania, on May 9, 1788, the daughter of John Jr. and Mary Catherine (Clemmer) Blosser.

At the age of 19, she married Nicholas Jacob Fast, the son of Revolutionary War hero Christian Fast and his wife Anna Barbara Mason, in German Township, Fayette County, Pennsylvania, on April 16, 1807, one of three Blosser sisters who married three Fast brothers. Barbara would give birth to 12 children in the ensuing years.

Nicholas and Barbara went by flatboat with other members of the Fast family to Ohio about 1815, settling in Richland County, the same area where Nicholas's father Christian had been held captive by the Delaware Indians years earlier during the Revolution. These Delawares were elated to find Christian alive and well, as they presumed he had died those many years ago. They considered him one of their family. George Hill, in his 1880 History of Ashland County, related the following story:

"In the fall of 1819, old Thomas Lyons and a party of Delawares had a feast, on what is now known as the John Freeborn farm, southwest of Savannah, to which Mr. Fast and his sons were invited. Being unable to be present, his sons Nicholas and Francis, aged respectively twenty-five and fifteen, attended. The feast was in their camp. There were present some fifty or sixty Indians, and no whites, except the Fasts. A large black bear had been roasted and boiled. The body being roasted, was cut into small slices, and handed around on new bark plates. The head and feet, unskinned, were boiled in a copper kettle, and a sort of soup made there from which was handed around in wooden ladles. Nicholas and Francis partook, courteously, with the Indians. The roast was elegant, but the soup was not relished. At the conclusion of the feast, Lyons insisted on painting Francis, Indian fashion. The boy readily submitted, for the fun of the thing. 'Old Tom' laid on a good coat of Vermillion, which gave him the appearance of a young Indian. The paint was so adhesive that, when he returned home, he was unable to remove it for a long time; and was afterwards known as 'Indian Frank.' Billy Montour, Jim Jirk, Monos, Jonacake, George and Jim Lyons, Buckwheat, Billy Dowdee, Captain George, and other well known Delawares, were at the feast."

In 1823, Nicholas and Barbara moved to Elyria, Lorain County, Ohio. In 1832, Nicholas purchased 325 acres in Troy Township, Ashland County, and established his farm there.

Nicholas passed away in Troy on Dec. 14, 1868, at the age of 82, and was buried in the Nova Cemetery in Ashland County. Barbara went to live with her son Isaac in Lola, Cherokee County, Kansas, where she appears in the 1870 census. That is the last we know of her. She probably died in Kansas, but we don't know where she was buried.
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  Burial Notes:

Find A Grave Memorial #29268616

  Noted events in her life were:

1. 1850 US Census, 5 November 1850, Troy Township, Ashland, Ohio, United States. ¹ 1850 US Census
Page 383B, Dwelling 47, Family 47
Troy Township, Ashland, Ohio
Barbara Fast..68..PA

(Living with husband.)

NOTE - If her birth date was 9 May 1788, then her age should have been 62 instead of 68.

2. 1860 US Census, 9 June 1860, Troy Township, Ashland, Ohio, United States. ² 1860 US Census
Page 32, Roll 930, Dwelling 257, Family 248
Troy Township, Ashland, Ohio
Barbary Fast..68..PA

(Living with husband.)

NOTE - If her birth date was 9 May 1788, then her age should have been 72 instead of 68.

3. 1870 US Census, 2 August 1870, Lola Township, Cherokee, Kansas, United States. ³ 1870 US Census
Page 8, Dwelling 53, Family 59
Lola Township, Cherokee, Kansas
Barbara Fast..83..PA

(Widowed and living at the home of her married son, Isaac, and his family.)

NOTE - If her birth date was 9 May 1788, then her age should have been 82 instead of 83.

Barbara married Nicholas Jacob Fast, son of Christian Fast and Anna Barbara Mason, on 16 April 1807 in Greene, Pennsylvania, United States. (Nicholas Jacob Fast was born on 11 June 1786 in Greene, Pennsylvania, United States,^{1 2 5} died on 14 December 1868 in Troy Township, Ashland, Ohio, United States ⁵ and was buried after 14 December 1868 in Nova Cemetery, Nova, Ashland, Ohio, United States ⁵.)

  Noted events in their marriage were:

1. 1850 US Census, 5 November 1850, Troy Township, Ashland, Ohio, United States. ¹ 1850 US Census
Page 383B, Dwelling 47, Family 47
Troy Township, Ashland County, Ohio
Nicholas Fast..64..PA..Farmer
Barbara Fast..68..PA

2. 1860 US Census, 9 June 1860, Troy Township, Ashland, Ohio, United States. ² 1860 US Census
Page 32, Roll 930, Dwelling 257, Family 248
Troy Township, Ashland County, Ohio
Nicholas Fast..74..PA
Barbary Fast..68..PA