For such a tiny Island on a global scale, Jersey has plenty of connections with the world super-power of America, which today sees its 44th president sworn in.
THE JERSEY COW
POSSIBLY the most famous example of the Jersey cow outside the United Kingdom is Elsie the cow, the well-known mascot of a United States company. Her brown face and long eyelashes appear on cans of sweetened condensed milk, cheeses, fresh and shelf-stable milk for a company called Borden Milk.
Elsie the cow was originally a cartoon character that appeared in magazine ads for Borden Milk.
The story goes that at the 1939 New York World’s Fair, when people began asking where Elsie was, the company picked from their herd a ‘good-looking, good-natured Jersey cow’ named You’ll Do Lobelia.
Elsie, with her necklace of yellow daisies and smiling face, has been the mascot for Borden Milk for over a 
half century. But the JEP’s eagle-eyed picture editor has spotted an artistic error and that Elsie has a pink nose – one thing that a Jersey cow certainly does not have. Jersey cattle were brought to the United States in the 1850s. A man who has fond memories of the part he played in establishing some of the finest Jersey cattle herds in the USA is 95-year-old Jack Rondel.
As a young Jersey cattle breeder, with a herd at Haut de l’Orme, Trinity, where Rondel’s Farm Shop has since been established, Mr Rondel selected the best cattle he could find each year to sell to America. He went around Island farms to negotiate deals on behalf of Paul Spann in America so that Island cattle could be used to develop herds there. It was during his time as agent that PanAm flew to Jersey for the first time to transport the animals, a journey which took around 17 hours, with stops for refuelling. Mr Rondel, who said that the highest price paid was around £1,000, kept some old photographs from the time, many of which were taken by JEP photographers.
JERSEY AND NEW JERSEY
New Jersey is bordered by New York and Philadelphia and actually gets its name from Jersey, Channel Islands. In 1663 in recognition of his loyalty to the English Crown, Jersey’s Royalist Governor, George Carteret (pictured, courtesy the Jersey Museum), was gifted a large tract of land in North America known as New Jersey by King Charles II. During the English Civil War the Island of Jersey remained loyal to the English Crown and gave sanctuary to the king.
Reports say that it was from the Royal Square in St Helier that Charles II was first proclaimed King of England in 1649, following the execution of his father, Charles I. During the 1640s, England was split by civil war and hostilities spread into Scotland and Ireland. Jersey was also divided. While Islanders’ sympathy lay with Parliament, the de Carterets held the Island for the king. The future Charles II visited Jersey in 1646 and again in 1649 following the execution of his father.
Towards the end of the 17th century, Jersey strengthened its links with America after many Islanders emigrated to New England and north-east Canada. The Jersey merchants built up a thriving business empire in the Newfoundland and Gaspé fisheries. Family companies such as the Robins and the Le Boutilliers set up thriving successful businesses.
LILLIE LANGTRY
Described as the ‘It girl’ of the 1800s, she used her engagement ring to scratch her name into the window pane of St Saviour’s Parish Church, where her father, the Dean of Jersey, the Very Rev William Corbet Le Breton, was a rector.
A close friend of Oscar Wilde, it was upon his advice that Lillie took to the theatre. She appeared on the stages of several London theatres including the old Haymarket and the Lyceum before making her first provincial tour. About a year after her debut she appeared at the Park Theatre in New York and completed a tour of America and then South Africa.
In 1897, she became an American citizen and divorced her husband the same year in Lakeport, California.
Her admirers included the President of the United States, Theodore Roosevelt, who said ‘She is so pretty she takes away a man’s breath’ and George Bernard Shaw, who complained: ‘She has no right to be intelligent, daring and independent as well as lovely.’
Lillie Langtry pictured (courtesy of Jersey Heritage) the died in Monaco in 1929 and was buried in the graveyard of St Saviour’s Church in Jersey.
BUFFALO BILL
WILLIAM Frederick ‘Buffalo Bill’ Cody had an amazingly colourful 70 years as a soldier, hunter and showman, but not many know that his family can be traced back to the Channel Islands. The family name, Le Caudey from Jersey, gradually became anglicised to Cody.
It has been a persistent belief, one perpetuated by Buffalo Bill Cody’s sister Helen in her book Last of the Great Scouts, that their family came from Ireland. In fact, the original American ancestors were said to be Huguenots who emigrated to Massachusetts from France via the Channel Islands some time before 1698.
The Cody Family Association in America has several thousand members, all of them being connected with or descendants of Philip Le Cody. Other investigations have identified Philip and Martha with a Philippe Le Caudey of Jersey and Marthe Le Brocq of Guernsey, who were married in the Parish of St Brelade in Jersey on September 15 1692.
In 1698 Philip and Martha Cody travelled to America and purchased a home in Beverly, Massachusetts.
At the age of 30 Buffalo Bill was Chief of Scouts and Indian fighter for the 5th Cavalry and had hunted and killed over 4,000 buffalo to supply meat for the army and civilian workers.
He was named Buffalo Bill by a writer who was intrigued by his exploits, which in turn created interest in the Wild West.
JOAN CRAWFORD
ACADEMY-AWARD winning American actress Joan Crawford started out her career under her real name Lucille Le Sueur – a name well known in Jersey. It is said that her father, Tommy Le Sueur, left Jersey for Canada and met his wife, Anna Ball-Johnson, in the early 1900s.
The couple went on to have three children, and Lucille was born on 23 March 1908 in the poorer side of San Antonio in Texas. As a child she took up dancing lessons and eventually took to the stage on Broadway. She was spotted by a talent scout in 1925, which led to a contract with MGM, who eventually changed her name to Joan Crawford.
Crawford is quoted as saying that Sam De Grasse, a Canadian actor, said that her name Le Sueur sounded too much like ‘sewer’. She died in New York in 1977.
