Three Major brothers – Charles, William and John – emigrated to the United States from Ireland in the 1860s. Included on this page is all we have on descendants of John Major (1871-19??), who settled in Buffalo.

Charles Major settled in Skaneateles, NY. Here is everything we have on the descendants of Charles, except for a separate page that lists an extensive family tree for one of his sons, Thomas.

This family tree is our most detailed, thanks to information provided by a grandson, Charles Thomas Major Jr., better known in Skaneateles as Charlie Major, former town manager, State Supreme Court Justice and now the town judge.

Our starting point. William J. Major, like his brother Charles, settled in Skaneateles. His descedants include Stanley "Buster" Major, the Solvay, NY, mayor who married Helen Smolinski; thus the name of this website.

Like it was with my Major ancestors, my Smolinski family in the United States was started by three brothers who emigrated to the United States from what was then Russia-Poland.

This McLaughlin never came to the United States, but our American family started with his children.

James McLaughlin earned his nickname the obvious way – he settled near Skaneateles, NY, on 40 acres of land – but he could have called himself "The Teasel King."

Irish-born Elizabeth came to America with her husband, Patrick Doherty, and settled in Skaneateles, NY. Their first two children, however, heeded the call to go West.

Cornelius, perhaps better known as Neal, returned to Ireland, but left behind a son in the care of his brother, James. All but one of his children eventually emigrated to the United States.

John left Skaneateles and lived for awhile in Kentucky where his wife and first child died. He returned to Central New York, remarried and started a new family that included Rose McLaughlin, who married John W. Major.

William and his wife left Ireland for the United States after the birth of their first child, Mary Ann, who grew up to become a nun known as Sister Mary Antonia, author of 'From Convent to Conflict,' about her life in Belgium during World War I.

He took over his father's teasel business and expanded it – clear over to England and into Russia.

Dennis McLaughlin left Skaneateles for Syracuse and became a building contractor. His grandson, Edward F. McLaughlin, wrote the family history upon which much of the McLaughlin family trees is based.

In some ways he seems like the forgotten McLaughlin, perhaps because he left the family for almost 20 years and was given up for dead by many. But his brother, James Jr., never stopped looking, which resulted in perhaps the strangest story in the family's American history.

A partner in the McLaughlin Brothers teasel firm, John McLaughlin also was a mayor of Skaneateles. You might also say he electrified the village.

My Irish relatives took great pride in talking about our link with the famous O'Neill clan and its tale of The Red Hand of Ulster. It also turns out that it was probably an O'Neill who was the reason two of the Major brothers settled in Skaneateles, NY.