Welcome to the official site for the Keep Family Society. The society’s stated purpose is
- to record and perpetuate the history and genealogy of the descendants of John Keep of Longmeadow, Massachusetts and the related families; and
- to promote membership and membership activities
Our site is brand new and still a work in progress. Please check back regularly for updates, or contact us with suggestions or comments.
Current News and Upcoming Events
The 107th reunion of Keep descendants will be held in Girard,
Pennsylvania, on Sunday, August 8, 2010.
Photo shown from 1984 reunion. Click for larger image.
Who was John Keep?
Excerpt from JOHN KEEP OF LONGMEADOW, by John Keep and Bob Warner
When, why, and how John settled in New England still remains a mystery. We do know now, through the Keep DNA Project, that he was indeed from England, and that he did leave behind a nation that was being torn apart by religious and political unrest, resulting in armed conflicts, the execution of Charles I, and the replacement of the English monarchy by the Commonwealth of England until the Restoration of Charles II in 1660. More information can be found at www.keepdna.net.
There is an old family oral tradition that a member of the Northamptonshire Keep family fled to America and was murdered by Indians. John Keep (or some say his father) was, according to this, purportedly an agent of the Parliamentarians who escaped to America in 1640 just before the English Civil War started, when an arrest warrant was issued against him by the Earl of Strafford. It was also claimed that John’s death later in 1676 was the result of the British paying the Indians to kill him because of his involvement in harbouring and assisting the Regicides (Major-General Whalley, and Colonel Goffe). There is another school of thought that because of his activity in England his killers were actually the English dressed up as Indians. Or all of this may be untrue. Much more DNA testing is needed to help trace his lineage back to Walter Kep, b. ca 1230, in Astwood, England.
In any event, records of John Keep’s passage from England to America have not been found. There were some 300 ship landings in Massachusetts and elsewhere between 1620 and 1640, or sometime before 1660 when he apparently appeared in Longmeadow, Mass. There was little emigration from England from 1640 until after the American Revolution. This Great Migration ended in the early 1640s at the outbreak of the English Civil War, and it was also affected by stories of intolerance that were carried back to England during that time.Read entire article-->