Anderson extended family to New Jersey

By Kay McMeekin

This is the family of John Anderson author of "the last mile hame."

His mother was Annie White (born 1874 in Pictou Nova Scotia) who was married to first Douglas Kennedy Anderson. When he died, his brother John married her. The Andersons below ( apart from the first one, her sister) are all her children.

The first Anderson to leave Cumnock for New Jersey was Elizabeth Anderson born 1870 and her husband John Pettigrew who was a mason in 1901.

They left on the Ethiopia in 1906. Their daughter was born in Jacksonville, Florida in 1907. They lived in Long Island and they finally settled in Hempstead  Nassau, New York. John was in the building trade. Elizabeth and 2 year old daughter Jeanie made a return trip to Cumnock in 1909 in 1914 and again in 1924.

1924 passport photo 

Jeanie Pettigrew age 16 in 1924 passport photo

Elizabeth's niece Jeanie Anderson was next to emigrate but not until 1926. Her husband Peter Stewart gave uncle John Pettigrew as the person in the USA they were going to.

They sailed on the California from Port Glasgow to New York. Their final destination was Roosevelt, Long Island. In the 1930 census he was working as a hod carrier in Madison, New Jersey,  Living with them were Jeanie Anderson's sister Mary Connel Anderson and her husband Hugh Torbet. Mary and Hugh returned to Scotland in 1931.

The youngest sister Annie Anderson went out in 1928 aged 15 on the Cameron also going to sister Mrs Jeanie Stewart. She married Anthony Infinito in 1937.

Lastly in 1930 the oldest son John Anderson , the author of "the last mile hame" went out on the Transylvania. He too was going to sister Jeani  e Stewart. He never married and was still living with the Stewarts in 1950 census in Madison. He returned to Cumnock for a visit about 1950 bringing football boots for his nephews Bobby and Ian Kelly, Madge's sons.

John Anderson

John Anderson left Cumnock for America when he was just 16. It would be another 30 years before he came home.

On his long journey home he wrote this poem called

THE LAST MILE HAME

When I was just a wee bit boy, my mither said to me

When you grow to be a man, John, what would you like to be?

And I told her all I'd like to be and all the deeds I'd dare

For I was then a dreamer building castles in the air

I had the urge to travel in those days so long gone by

For I was young and full of life and all my hopes were high

I'd sail across the ocean and my mither she would greet

But I'd bring hame lots o' treasures and lay them at her feet

My memory always takes me back through all the years thats sped

As I listened to my mither and this is what she said

you may sail to places far away and riches you may gain

But you'll hunger for the treasures, John

You left behind at hame

Now the years are far behind me and my mither, she is gane

And I seek no more adventure for I am coming hame

When I come hame to Cumnock and I flee across the sea

Nae man in aw this wide world will be happier than me

Now I dream of all the things I'll dae an all the scenes I'll view

For the day I land in Cumnock will be a dream come true

And nothing will annoy me in the noises that I hear

For the humming o' the engines will be music to my ears

It will seem to me they're saying as they're singing their refrain

I carry precious cargo I'm bringing Johnnie hame

An they'll aw be there to meet me my freens an aw my kin

Waiting there to greet me when the plane is coming in

My you're looking weel John I ken that's what they'll say

An you hivnae changed a bit, John, in the years you've been away

And when I pass through Mauchline I feel like I could cheer

For I'm almost in my ain toon when Auchinleck is near

Then coming down through Auchinleck

Wi' my patience nearly gane

The longest mile o' any journey is the last mile hame

And when at last my journeys ended then I will declare

This is the finest place on earth

For this is Cumnock Square

I'm thinking o' that last mile as I write these lines today

When I journey to my ain toon three thousand miles away

And speaking o' that last mile this truth I'll always claim

The longest mile of any journey

Is the last mile hame