Watauga County North Carolina Biographies

An AHGP Project

Watauga County North Carolina

The Mast Family

Joseph Mast, the first of the name to come to Valle Crucis, Watauga County, was born in Randolph County, N. C., March 25, 1764, and on the 30th of May, 1783, married Eve Bowers who had been born between the Saluda and Broad Rivers, South Carolina, December 30, 1758. Joseph was a son of John, who was brother of the Jacob Mast who became bishop of the Amish Mennonite church in Conestoga, Pa., in 1788. They had left their native Switzerland together, and sailed from Rotterdam in the ship "Brotherhood," which reached Philadelphia November 3, 1750. John Mast was born in 1740, and shortly after becoming 20 years of age left his brother Jacob, who had married and was living near the site of what is now Elverson, Pennsylvania. John wandered on foot through many lonely forests, but finally settled in Randolph County, where Joseph was born. There he married a lady whose given name was Barbara. From Joseph and Eve Mast have descended many of the most substantial and worthy citizens of Western North Carolina, while the Mast family generally are people of influence and standing in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Nebraska, Iowa, Montana, Oregon, Florida, Illinois, Missouri, California, Kansas, and in fact nearly every State in the Union. C. Z. Mast of Elverson, Pennsylvania, in 1911, published a volume of nearly a thousand pages all of which are devoted to an excellent record of all the Masts in America.

John A. Mast was born on Brushy creek September 22, 1829. He married Martha Moore of Johns River, December 5, 1850. He died February 6, 1892. His paternal grandfather, John Mast, and maternal grandfather, Cutliff Harman, were among the pioneers of this section, and were Germans, settling on Cove creek. His wife, Martha Mast, was born April 13, 1833. She died February 15, 1906.

Source: Western North Carolina a History From 1730 to 1913, By John Preston Arthur, Published by Edward Buncombe Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution, of Asheville, N. C., 1914

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