A great deal of thanks must go to Grace Virchow Corman and Helen Corman Ahrens.  They both saved information passed down to them about their ancestors and shared it with other relatives.  For Grace, this is remarkable because she is not a Sherbondy descendant but married into the family when she married Farmer Allen Corman, a grandson of Joseph Williamson Sherbondy (Clan J).

Grace was fascinated with a story (the Legend) about the Sherbondy ancestry that she heard from two of Joseph’s sons.  Joseph’s son Richard told her about it during a half-hour discussion with her and Joseph’s son Bert told her about it in a letter written in 1943.   They also told her about a ledger book kept by Joseph Williamson that had details of the family ancestry.

Grace wrote down information from these conversations in her notes.   Later, she contacted other Sherbondy descendants to gather more information.  One of them contacted a genealogist to help with research on the original John Sherbondy.  That contact validated some information in the stories she heard.  Grace also pursued a search for the ledger book talked about by her husband’s uncles.  That search never resulted in its discovery.

Fortunately, all of these records, letters and original handwritten notes were passed down to Grace’s daughter Helen.  Helen shared them with Jeffrey D. Sherbondy when he contacted Helen (his very first letter) in 1976 expressing an interest in learning about the Sherbondy ancestry.   We are all grateful to Grace, Helen and their descendants in keeping these records for future generations!