Hugh's mother, Arizona Lucinda Watkins, was married to John Beal Coffman on 30 October 1892 in Harrison, Arkansas. Arizona left her husband and headed west shortly after Hugh's birth. She and Hugh, her only child, spent time in California and Nevada. Hugh told me he was just a child when they lived in Fallon and Reno, Nevada. This was early in the century about the time of the Goldfield and Tonopah gold boom in Nevada in the early 1900s. Arizona met a local man named Isaac Asa "Ike" Taylor and married him in 1920.
Hugh brought his family to California in the early twenties and worked as a horse handler near the Fresno area. However, they later moved to Santa Clara, and then the San Fernando valley in Los Angeles. First Lopez Canyon, then San Fernando and later, Sylmar. Hugh ended up working for the Lockheed Aircraft Corp. during World War II. In 1959, some years after Hugh's retirement, he, his wife Cosy, his son Kenneth and his mother Arizona moved to Auburn, California. Except for Kenneth, who later moved to Idaho, they spent the rest of their lives there.
Tracing Hugh's genealogy I found that he had an ancestor named Hans Kauffman born in Erlanbach, Switzerland (1642-1674). This line of his descendants were Kauffmans until after arriving in the colony of Pennsylvania (Lancaster County) in the early eighteenth century. Johan Andrew Coffman (1718-1763) was the son of Johan Andreas Kauffman (1668-1743). One can only speculate as to the reason for the change, but from then on the Coffman spelling stuck.
Larry Coffman, grandson
Hugh's mother, Arizona Lucinda Watkins, was married to John Beal Coffman on 30 October 1892 in Harrison, Arkansas. Arizona left her husband and headed west shortly after Hugh's birth. She and Hugh, her only child, spent time in California and Nevada. Hugh told me he was just a child when they lived in Fallon and Reno, Nevada. This was early in the century about the time of the Goldfield and Tonopah gold boom in Nevada in the early 1900s. Arizona met a local man named Isaac Asa "Ike" Taylor and married him in 1920.
Hugh brought his family to California in the early twenties and worked as a horse handler near the Fresno area. However, they later moved to Santa Clara, and then the San Fernando valley in Los Angeles. First Lopez Canyon, then San Fernando and later, Sylmar. Hugh ended up working for the Lockheed Aircraft Corp. during World War II. In 1959, some years after Hugh's retirement, he, his wife Cosy, his son Kenneth and his mother Arizona moved to Auburn, California. Except for Kenneth, who later moved to Idaho, they spent the rest of their lives there.
Tracing Hugh's genealogy I found that he had an ancestor named Hans Kauffman born in Erlanbach, Switzerland (1642-1674). This line of his descendants were Kauffmans until after arriving in the colony of Pennsylvania (Lancaster County) in the early eighteenth century. Johan Andrew Coffman (1718-1763) was the son of Johan Andreas Kauffman (1668-1743). One can only speculate as to the reason for the change, but from then on the Coffman spelling stuck.
Larry Coffman, grandson