Orton FHS

This was the web page of the Orton Family History Society

but now it is part of Paul Orton's website. Please note that the Orton Family History Society no longer exists. The Society was wound up by Derek Beck in 2006.

The aim of the Orton Family History Society was to promote and encourage research into members of the Orton family and their descendants anywhere in the world. The Society was founded by the late Peter Orton, and was run in memory of him. The Society published the Orton Family Journal (now called the 'Peter Orton Journal') quarterly, with the aim of helping and encouraging research into Family History in general, and the Orton name in particular. The Society was non-profit making.

This page is being maintained for interest only by Paul Orton. Please feel free to make any suggestions as to content. I hope to put copies of the Peter Orton Journal on here in due course.

Famous Ortons

Joe Orton, 1933-1967

Born in Leicester as John Kingsley Orton, the son of William and Elsie Orton. Bored by office jobs, he trained as an actor at RADA before turning to writing novels with his lover, Kenneth Halliwell, then to novels and plays of his own. They enjoyed public pranks such as goading various institutions into idiotic correspondence with Orton's creation, 'Edna Welthorpe'. Their prank of defacing library books cost them both six months in prison.

From 1963, after a decade of total literary failure, Orton became a playwright of international reputation, bringing the word 'Ortonesque' into the language to refer to macabre outrageousness. His plays included Loot (winner of the Evening Standard best play of 1966) and What the Butler Saw (1967). They often scandalised audiences, but his wit made the outrage scintillating.

He lived from his RADA days until he died with Halliwell, who in August 1967, disturbed by his own failure and Orton's success, along with Orton's sexual promiscuity, battered his friend's head with a hammer before killing himself. Orton's death had special public interest because of its very Ortonesqueness. Not surprisingly Joe Orton left no descendents.

Arthur Orton, 1834-1898

Arthur Orton, alias Thomas Castro, also known as the 'Tichborne Claimant'. English butcher and imposter, born in Wapping, London. He emigrated to Australia in 1852, where he met Sir Alfred Joseph Tichborne, 11th baronet (1839-66). On the death of the 11th baronet, he persuaded the widow of the 10th baronet (Sir Francis Doughty Tichborne) that he was actually her eldest son, Roger Charles Tichborne (b.1829), who was presumed to have been lost at sea off America in 1854. Invited to England in 1866, he brought an action as the 'Tichborne Claimant' against the 12th baronet, but his action collapsed after 102 days in court. Orton was charged with perjury and found guilty after a trial of 188 days, and sentenced to 14 years' hard labour. Released in 1884, he confessed the imposture.

Job Orton, 1717-1783

Job Orton, dissenting minister (1717-1783). Born in Shrewsbury, the son of a grocer. He preached his first sermon at Welford, Northants, took on a united presbyterian and independant congregation in Shrewsbury in 1741, moving to Northampton to succeed his mentor Philip Doddridge in 1752 after turning down an invitation to move to a congregation in Westminster. He had a prejudice against London, and never visited it in his life. He retired in 1766.

Orton was seen by many dissenters as a patriarch, and he exercised his greatest influence in his retirement in Kidderminster, where he corresponded with many dissenters and clergymen. He was tall and erect, fond of horse exercise, simple and methodical in his habits, and employed his ample means for charitable uses. He never married, and was buried in of St Chad's, Shrewsbury, where there is a monument to him.

Reginald Orton, 1810-1862

Born at Surat, near Bombay, he was educated at the grammar school at Richmond, Yorkshire, before becoming a member of the Royal Society of Surgeons in 1833, and taking over a surgery in Sunderland where he married and lived until he moved to Bishopwearmouth shortly before his death.

Although only locally conspicuous in his lifetime, he brought about changes which affected the whole empire. It was his initiative that brought about Sunderland's gas lighting, water-supply, public baths, library and institute. On a wider scale he was responsible for forcing the end of the window tax, getting it replaced with a fairer house duty. Through his interest in maritime affairs, he projected a new form of reel lifebuoy, and patented an unsinkable lifeboat in 1845.

Dr. Samuel Torrey ORTON

Dr. Samuel Torrey ORTON (1879-1948) was a very famous American neurologist who lived and worked back in the 1920's. He worked with dyslexic students and figured out exactly how the brain is wired in order to understand the printed word. He identified the syndrome of dyslexia as an educational problem and subsequently worked with Anna GILLINGHAM who had a superb mastery of the English language and together they created the ORTON-GILLINGHAM approach. This is language based, multisensory, structured, sequential and infinitely flexible; it is a philosophy rather than a system. Dr. ORTON's pioneering work has formed the basis for all subsequent treatment of dyslexia. The Academy of ORTON-GILLINGHAM Practitioners and Educators is a non-profit educational organisation which was created in 1995 in the state of New York. Planning for the Academy began in 1991 in response to discussions initiated by the ORTON Dyslexia Society (International Dyslexia Association). Details can be found on the ORTON Academy website http://www.ortonacademy.org

The Orton Family History Society:
was a Member of the Guild of One-Name Studies;
was a Member of the Federation of Family History Societies;
had World-Wide Membership. This site is maintained by Paul Orton (contact details below)