America 250, My Cowboy Legacy: Peaceable Folks and a Rough Rider

 

Edward Hicks, The Peaceable Kingdom (1826)

Oil on canvas. One of approximately 62 versions Hicks painted between 1816 and his death in 1849.

On October 6, 1683, the British ship Concord sailed up the Delaware River and dropped anchor at Chester, Pennsylvania. On board were 32 German Palatines—13 families—who would found the Quaker community of Germantown (now part of Philadelphia).

Among them was my 8th great-grandfather:

Reynier Tyson (also spelled Reynier Theissen / Rynear Tyson)

• Born 1659 in Krefeld, Germany

• Arrived on the Concord in 1683

• Became a convinced Quaker

• Died 27 September 1745 in Abington Township, Montgomery County, Pennsylvania

The ship Concord, 1683 (commemorative U.S. postage stamp)

The Religious Society of Friends’ famous peace testimony comes straight from the Gospels: “Love your enemies… turn the other cheek.” Quakers have always believed that non-violent confrontation and reconciliation are superior to violence.

Reynier Tyson’s story is quiet and ordinary—exactly what a good Quaker life was supposed to be. But one of his descendants took a very different path.

Theodore Roosevelt (1858–1919) was Reynier Tyson’s 4th great-grandson… which makes TR my 5th cousin, 4× removed.

Theodore Roosevelt – the 26th President of the United States, Rough Rider, naturalist, historian, explorer, and the very embodiment of early-20th-century American masculinity.

My direct line to Theodore Roosevelt

Reynier Tyson (1659–1745)

↓

Elizabeth Tyson (1690–1765) m. William Lukens

↓

Elizabeth Lukens (1730–1798) m. John Potts

↓

Margaret Potts (1799–1861) m. Theodore Roosevelt Sr. (1831–1878)

↓

Theodore Roosevelt Jr. (1858–1919)

(Full descent through my mother’s paternal grandmother Lillian Amanda Pierce (1867–1957) → David Jackson Bailey → etc.)

Why The Peaceable Kingdom belongs at the top of this story

Edward Hicks was a Quaker minister and folk artist who painted the same biblical scene over and over for thirty years. The image is drawn from Isaiah 11:6–9: the wolf shall dwell with the lamb, the leopard lie down with the kid, and a little child shall lead them.

Hicks almost always included a small background vignette of William Penn signing his famous treaty with the Lenape Indians—the moment when Pennsylvania was born in peace rather than conquest. For Hicks, that treaty was the real-life fulfillment of the prophecy: a peaceable kingdom on American soil.

So here we have two very different legacies from the same 1683 voyage:

• One branch of the family stayed true to the Quaker testimony of peace and simplicity.
• Another branch produced the man who charged up San Juan Hill, built the Panama Canal, and spoke softly while carrying a very big stick.

Both are part of the same American story. Both started with a small band of German Quakers stepping off a ship called the Concord onto the banks of the Delaware.

Peaceable folks… and a rough rider.

Two sides of the same family tree.

Thank you to Grok xAI for the updated information.