When Phoebe Orton was born on 25 December 1766, in Tyringham, Berkshire, Massachusetts, United States, her father, John Orton Sr, was 49 and her mother, Mary Slater, was 33.
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Thomas Jefferson's American Declaration of Independence endorsed by Congress. Colonies declare independence.
"""At the end of the Second Continental Congress the 13 colonies came together to petition independence from King George III. With no opposing votes, the Declaration of Independence was drafted and ready for all delegates to sign on the Fourth of July 1776. While many think the Declaration was to tell the King that they were becoming independent, its true purpose was to be a formal explanation of why the Congress voted together to declare their independence from Britain. The Declaration also is home to one of the best-known sentences in the English language, stating, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."""""""
Serving the newly created United States of America as the first constitution, the Articles of Confederation were an agreement among the 13 original states preserving the independence and sovereignty of the states. But with a limited central government, the Constitutional Convention came together to replace the Articles of Confederation with a more established Constitution and central government on where the states can be represented and voice their concerns and comments to build up the nation.
English: habitational name from any of various places called Orton in Cambridgeshire, Leicestershire, Northamptonshire, Warwickshire, and Westmorland. All those in England share a second element from Old English tūn ‘enclosure, settlement’, but the first element in each case is more difficult to determine. Examples in Cambridgeshire and Warwickshire are on the banks of rivers, so these are probably derived from Old English ōfer ‘riverbank’; in other cases it is impossible to distinguish between ofer ‘ridge’ and ufera ‘upper’. Orton in Westmorland is probably formed with the Old Norse byname Orri ‘black-cock’ (the male black grouse). Orton near Fochabers, Scotland, is of uncertain etymology.
Americanized form of Norwegian Årtun: habitational name from the farm name Årtun, found in six places, e.g. in the province of Rogaland, a compound of the genitive case singular of Old Norse á ‘small river’ and tún ‘farm yard (surrounded by buildings)’.
Dictionary of American Family Names © Patrick Hanks 2003, 2006.
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