Clint Hamm Genealogy

Welcome to the Kentucky Hamm Family Website

My Parents

This site is dedicated to my father Rev. Vestal Hamm and mother Gracie Ross pictured at right holding me.

My father was born and raised on Rock Fork in Rowan County, Kentucky. The surnames of his grandparents are Ham(m), Blanton, Littleton and Johnson.

My mother was born in Fleming County, Kentucky and spent most of her younger years living with Bill and Alice Staggs whom she called Uncle Bill and Aunt Alice in Wallingford, Kentucky. Her grandparents were Ross, Pugh, Beckett and Gooding.

Ham Origins in Northeast Kentucky

Samuel Harrison Ham, Sr. brought his family across the mountains into Kentucky in the early 1800s. Samuel purchased 200 acres of land on Triplett Creek in what is now Rowan County from George Johnson for $1 per acre.¹ The Hams lived up the hollows of Clear Fork and Rock Fork for over a century and a half, but now you will be hard-pressed to find anyone there by that name. Samuel and his two wives were parents of about 17 children and the number of their descendants in my database alone is nearly 2,500 individuals.

Beginning about 1930 the spelling of our family name changed from Ham to Hamm for some unknown reason, perhaps vanity. In this research, pre-1900 individuals will generally use the former spelling.

¹Fleming Co, KY Deed Books A-G Abstracts 1797-1818, Vol I, F66, 504, 22 May 1816 George Johnson and Samuel Ham Tr: Sale of 200 acres Fleming Co land on Triplett Creek for $200. Bounded by Alexander Moore land. Clerk: Leaken D. Stockton.