Lake, Phipps Waldo

Phipps Waldo Lake

Regions: Rensselaer Co., NY; Walworth Co., WI

From History of Walworth County Wisconsin by Albert Clayton Beckwith, Vol. II, Publ. 1912 - Page 936-938
ELDER PHIPPS WALDO LAKE. When Elder Phipps Waldo LAKE, one of the pioneer preachers of Walworth county, passed away there was added to the list of honored dead whose earthly records closed with the words, "Well done, thou good and faithful servant"; but as long as memory remains to those who knew him the influence of his noble life will remain as a source of encouragement and inspiration. "Our echoes roll from soul to soul and grow forever," and the good we do lives after us through all the ages, handed down from generation to generation. Who, then, can measure the results of a life work, and especially such a life work as that of Elder LAKE? To the uplifting of humanity his energies were ever devoted. With unerring judgment he recognized the spark of divinity in each individual and endeavored to fan it into the flame of righteousness. Not to condemn, but to aid, he made the practice of his life, and the world is better and brighter for his having lived. But though the voice is stilled in death, the spirit of his worth and work remains as the deep undercurrent of a might stream, noiseless but irresistible. His influence was as the delicate fragrance of a flower to those who had the pleasure of his friendship. His sympathies were broad, ennobling all by his Christian character. His life was beautiful in its purity, goodness and virtues.
Elder LAKE was born at Hoosick, Rensselaer county, New York, May 1, 1789. He was the son of Henry and Jemima (WALDO) LAKE, the mother being a descendant of the famous Governor Phipps, who was rewarded by King George III by an appointment as governor of Massachusetts, for raising a rich Spanish galleon, or treasure ship. Henry LAKE's father was one of the old patrons of the early Dutch colonists, and he owned a large tract on the land on the border of New York and Vermont, but by adhering to the British side in the war for independence his estate was confiscated by the Americans and he was compelled to flee to Canada. His son, Henry LAKE, was on the side of the colonists, being a soldier in the patriot army. After the close of the Revolution he settled in Otsego county, New York, in the region made immortal by the incomparable Fennimore Cooper in his "Leather Stocking Tales," and he there cleared and improved a farm in the then heavily timbered wilderness, and there he spent his active days, but in old age moved to Ames, Montgomery county, New York. He was a deacon many years in the Free-Will Baptist church and during his declining age he was familiarly known as "Father LAKE."
Phipps Waldo LAKE received a common school education and he studied law, but finally prepared for the ministry in the Free-Will Baptist church. He was one of the pioneers of this denomination in New York state and one of the leading ministers of the same for many years. He was a soldier in the war of 1812, serving at Sackett's Harbor.
In early life he was united in marriage at Richfield, Otsego county, New York, with Rebecca BEARDSLEY, who was born at that place in 1792. Her parents were of English ancestry and were early colonial settlers. She lived to be ninety-two years old.
Elder LAKE preached in Cortland and Montgomery counties, then settled at Ames, where he preached fourteen years. He purchased two hundred and fifty acres of land in that vicinity and became a prosperous farmer. In the spring of 1839 he became a pioneer settler on Bigfoot Prairie, Walworth county, where he bought six hundred and forty acres in sections 34 and 35, Walworth township, one hundred acres of which had previously been broken and a crop of corn, wheat and oats planted. He made extensive improvements on this land, built a frame house and there passed the remainder of his life, becoming one of the successful farmers and substantial citizens of the locality, his death occurring on August 17, 1860, when about seventy-two years old. He was a speaker of much ability and did much good among the early settlers of this county, besides having charge of a church at Lake Geneva which he served continuously for several years. For a period of thirty-eight years he preached in the Baptist church. Politically, he was a Whig in earlier life, later voting with the Republicans when that party was organized. He became prominent in party affairs and served two years in the Wisconsin legislature.
Eight children constituted the LAKE family, named as follows: Polly died unmarried; Beardsley became the owner of three hundred and twenty acres adjoining his father's farm, and he lived there until 1868, when he moved to Harvard, where his death occurred; Levi also lived at Harvard after 1867, engaged in the lumber and wagon making business, and later in life made a fortune in Wisconsin pine lands, dying in 1905 at the advanced age of eighty-nine years; Waldo spent nearly all his life on the home farm and died at Big Foot; Mary married Delaney READ and lived at Big Foot, where she and her husband both died many years ago; Rebecca, who married a Mr. VAN WAGENEN, lived in Dubuque, Iowa, and died April 4, 1912, aged ninety-one years and nine months; Lucretia, who married Charles ARMSTRONG, died about fifty years ago; Sarah, who married James E. SMITH, Sr., is the mother of Oliver Lines SMITH, whose sketch contains a history of her family and is to be found on another page of this work.
Submitted by Carol