The surname Goodwin, meaning “God’s friend,” originated in medieval times in England. Thomas Putman Goodwin’s ancestors were spirited risk-takers: early planters, seafarers, fishermen, and entrepreneurs. Their story is one of determination, capability, and courage. Thomas is a Mayflower descendant of Stephen Hopkins through Elizabeth (Kenney) Goodwin, the sixth-generation daughter-in-law of Thomas’s immigrant ancestor, Daniel Goodwin of Yoxford, Suffolk, England.

Winner of the 2020 National Genealogical Society Award for Excellen

The Committee on Heraldry was established in 1864 within the New England Historic Genealogical Society to study coats of arms and the people who bore them in the United States. The Roll of Arms project, begun in 1914, is a record of settlers in the colonies or immigrants to the United States who were entitled to coats of arms under the customs of their mother countries. This newest installment, the Eleventh Part, is introduced with an updated history of the Committee and the Roll of Arms.

An indispensable resource illuminating the world of decorative arts and its relationship to family history, this book features fifteen chapters by leading authorities, including Abbott Lowell Cummings, Wendell Garrett, Maureen Taylor, Laurel Thatcher Ulrich, and others. The book contains more than 200 black and white illustrations and 16 color plates.

By D. Brenton Simons and Peter Benes

Published: 2002

8½ x 10½ hardcover, 350 pages, illustrated