This says Chekijian in Armenian

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The Name            


THE FIRST KNOWN CHEKIJIAN IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA


HRAND KRIKOR CHEKIJIAN (a.k.a.) Dr. Henry K. Emerson 
Born 1864 (Aintab, Turkey),  Died 1941 (Los Angeles, CA)  
  
Son of Krikor Chekijian (1830-1895) who had nine brothers and one sister (Araxi). They were all born in Caesarea and moved elsewhere by 1850. Several of them settled in Aintab, such as the eldest, Krikor, and Kevork. There, they became prominent tailors with their father, Hagop.

Krikor had three sons: Hagop, Hrand and Gurgen.

We'd like to know the significance of the pin on his lapel in the above image.

Hrand was the first cousin of Hagop Chekijian (the head of the household in the family photo taken in Aintab seen HERE). 

Hagop was Krikor’s brother Kevork’s oldest son, the other three sons of Kevork being Manuel, Nazaret and Hovannes Chekijian - all were born in Aintab).  

Apparently in the 1880's when Krikor’s second son Hrand was in his early 20's, he emigrated to the U.S. through Ellis Island via Alexandria, Egypt (where there were other Chekijians at the time) and adopted the name Henry K. Emerson. This was his name when he graduated from Cleveland College of Physics and Surgery in Cleveland, Ohio on March 17th, 1897. His specialization was osteopathy.  
 
After a brief period of practicing medicine in the state of Missouri and becoming certified there in 1895, he relocated to Los Angeles and married Lura Brown. Lura was born in 1880 in Hiawatha, Kansas and also was an M.D., with a degree from the University of Southern California in anesthesiology.  
 
"Dr. H. K. Emerson" had a son in 1916 who was named Henry (Hank) Krikor Emerson. They lived on 7th Street in downtown Los Angeles. There, Dr. H.K. Emerson had a clinic, and he saw patients six days a week.  
 
One story goes that a patient of Henry's was an "ice-cream man" who used to bring a cold treat to the doctor in lieu of payment.  
 
Henry was also involved in industrial medicine and he received a badge as a surgeon for the Los Angeles Fire Department. Apparently Dr. Emerson used to attend many Armenian picnics in the San Fernando Valley when it largely consisted of fruit tree orchards.  
 
He died at the age of 77.  

HENRY (HANK) KREKOR EMERSON (1916-1944) 
 
Dr. H. K. Emerson's only child was born and raised in Los Angeles and graduated from UCLA and Harvard Business School. He was a Captain in the U.S. Army (that’s his captain’s uniform in the above image) on the staff of Major General Charles H. Corlett (1889-1971). Corlett was nicknamed "Cowboy Pete". He commanded troops in both the Pacific and European theaters during World War II, led the attack on Kiska in 1943 and commanded the 7th Infantry Division in the amphibious assault and the taking of Kwajalein in the Marshall Islands between January 31 to February 7,1944.   
 
Hank married Dorothy Mae Wasson, and their son Henry Gregory Emerson was born on April 19th 1942.  
 
Less than two years later on February 4, 1944 Hank was killed on Kwajalein while engaged in forward reconnaissance for which he had volunteered. Hanks citation for the Distinguished Service Cross awarded on March 4, 1945 (America’s highest award after the Congressional Medal of Honor) notes that he led his tank out ahead of infantry troops and against enemy resistance and his forward tank position provided both cover and inspiration to the ground troops behind him. When he exited his tank at the North end of the Island to reconnoiter on foot he was instantly killed by enemy fire. 

Dorothy remarried Barry Stubbs, who adopted Dorothy’s only son, Henry Gregory Emerson. They renamed him Gregory Emerson Stubbs. When he grew up, Gregory founded a law firm in the San Francisco bay area, and he now lives in Sonoma, California and has four daughters. 

Through a random DNA test, Gregory Emerson Stubbs’ relation has been verified as an “exact match” with Cesar Chekijian, who is the great-great-grandson of Gregory’s great-great-grandfather Krikor’s younger brother Kevork.

HAGOP CHEKIJIAN (1862-1935) 

Hagop is the older brother of Hrand (Dr. H. K. Emerson), also born in Aintab, who immigrated to Montevideo, Uruguay in the 1930’s with his two sons Aram and Nazaret and had two more sons, Garabed and Mardiros. They were born in Montevideo (each of the four sons had four children, whose grandchildren and great-grandchildren now live in Uruguay).

GURGEN CHEKIJIAN (1868-1940) 

Gurgen was the youngest brother of Hrand (Dr. H. K. Emerson) and was also born in Aintab. According to published records, he came to the U.S. in the early 1900’s and was issued a Social Security number in California.  We don’t know about his descendants of his as yet.


A FINAL, MISCELLANEOUS NOTE

Kayseri (Caesarea to the ancient Romans) is a town about 100 miles northwest of Aintab, in central Asia Minor. It is the place where
two apostles of Jesus Christ, Mathew and Bartholomew, were beheaded. They are said to be buried at the Sourp Garabed Cathedral
in Kayseri. Kayseri is on a plain at the foot of Mt. Erjias guarded by two perimeter walls, an outer and inner, the outer wall was built in the
11th-12th centuries.

The original Roman Caesarea is just northwest of the current city. Within the walls, there were two Armenian churches St. Astvatsatsin
and St. Sarkis. They were located in places that are dug underground into the hillsides like most of the living quarters in Capadocia and dark,
where people descended into them by wooden ladder. Until the 18th century, there were 500 Armenian families living within the walls.
Some were wealthy merchants and teachers, but most were tailors and cabinet makers, according to the chronicles of Simeon of Poland.
He visited Kayseri around 1615 AD. He said that Armenians who lives within the walls of Kayseri only spoke Turkish or Persian, and that
other Armenians living outside the walls spoke Armenian. This explains why most Armenians from Aintab spoke Turkish - yet they used the
Armenian alphabet to write in Turkish. The Chekijians must have been one of the 500 Armenian families living within the inner walls of
Caesarea.

Being that the outer walls of Caesarea were built in the 11th century, more than likely it was built by the Crusaders as an added defensive
measure, and coupling the fact that Chekijian DNA has migrated to a significant extent to Scotland and Britain, one would lead to the
conclusion that Scot & Brit Crusaders during the 11th-13th centuries intermarried with local Armenians and had their siblings travel back
and settle in Britain and Scotland. In so far as 20% of current population o fsouthern Italy bearing the same Chekijian DNA would
more than likely be from the Roman period, when Armenian and Roman were allies in most part (Armenians and Romans never battled
against each other directly) and several Roman Legions heading to the Middle East and North Africa, had major encampments in Capadocia
and created Caesarea, and being that Capadocia was part of the Greater Armenia at the time, Caesarea would have been populated in
most part by Armenians, who again would have intermarried with the Romans who took back their siblings to what is now southern Italy.

Watch THIS PowerPoint presentation about an amazing discovery in the region.

- MORE on the sons of KEVORK

- The FIRST Chekijian in the U.S.

- Chekijians TODAY