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Orra Sears Cook


Other Name:
Orra Sophronia Sears; Orra Sophronia Cooke
Gender:
Female
Born:
July 12, 1798
Died:
April 24, 1872
Home Town:
West Bloomfield, NY
Later Residences:
Tonawanda, NY
Marriage(s):
Edwin Cook/ Cooke (April 27, 1841)
Biographical Notes:
Orra Sears Cook was the daughter of Jasper Peck Sears of West Bloomfield, New York, and his wife Martha Parsons Sears. In 1816 Orra traveled to Litchfield, Connecticut where she boarded at Lyman Beecher's house while attended Sarah Pierce's Female Academy. Many years later, on April 27, 1841 Orra married Edwin Cook. The couple resided in Tonawanda, New York.

Education
Years at LFA:
1816
Room and Board:
Boarded with the Lyman Beecher family

Related Objects and Documents
In the Ledger:
help The Citation of Attendance provides primary source documentation of the student’s attendance at the Litchfield Female Academy and/or the Litchfield Law School. If a citation is absent, the student is thought to have attended but currently lacks primary source confirmation.

Records for the schools were sporadic, especially in the formative years of both institutions. If instructors kept comprehensive records for the Litchfield Female Academy or the Litchfield Law School, they do not survive. Researchers and staff have identified students through letters, diaries, family histories and genealogies, and town histories as well as catalogues of students printed in various years. Art and needlework have provided further identification of Female Academy Students, and Litchfield County Bar records document a number of Law School students. The history of both schools and the identification of the students who attended them owe credit to the early 20th century research and documentation efforts of Emily Noyes Vanderpoel and Samuel Fisher, and the late 20th century research and documentation efforts of Lynne Templeton Brickley and the Litchfield Historical Society staff.
CITATION OF ATTENDANCE:
1816 Litchfield Female Academy Catalog (Vanderpoel, Emily Noyes. Chronicles of A Pioneer School From 1792 to 1833. Cambridge, MA: The University Press, 1903).

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