Frederick and Malantha have gone home.
I found this photo over the weekend at an antique show in West Palm Beach, Florida, from a Virginia vendor who had a very large collection. Where he got the photo, I do not know, nor did he.
The photo is labeled on the front: "Frederick A. Ripley 1869" and on the back "Brother to Oliver Ripley." The photo was taken at the Collins Photographic Galleries in Westfield Massachusetts.
Armed with those details, it was literally a matter of a few minutes' research before the data came pouring in through such sources as Massachusetts Census and Death records.
This is Frederick Augustus Ripley, born in 1812 and worked as a farmer in Granville MA, a community near Westfield. He had a brother named Oliver (born 1811), also a farmer, and their parents were John Bradford Ripley and Elizabeth Barnard.
Frederick married Malanthy D. Noble (born 1818). They had three daughters Lucinda, Mary (a dress maker married to William Clark, she lived to age 60) and Ella M. (she married Wilbert Loomis and died of consumption at age 26.) On Census records, a couple named Lorenzo Noble and Elizabeth Ripley Noble also lived and worked at the Frederick Ripley farm. Lorenzo was probably a relative of Malanthy, whose maiden name was Noble.
Brother Oliver had a larger family. His offspring on Census records include Hubert [Herbert?] (1846), Rascoe [or Irester] (1848), Horace (1851), Jabez (1853), Hetty (1855), Edward (1858), and Daniel (1864).
Death records reveal that Frederick died July 20, 1891 of dysentery following gangrene of the foot. He died in Granville and was buried in Westfield in the family plot at Pine Hill Cemetery.
UPDATE: I went back on the second day of the Antique sale and sifted through the box of photos again, and found something that made me so very happy I'd gone back.
MALANTHA NOBLE RIPLEY was Frederick's wife. Further inscription on the back identifies her as "sister to Lo Noble" who was presumably the Lorenzo Noble who lived and worked at the family farm.
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