David M. Rolison, son of John and Rebecca of New Jersey is recorded in the 1850 census of Livingston County.  He was born August 22, 1813.  David and wife, Mary, with son Jacob, b. 1835, made the trip to Michigan.  In 1848, Henry was born in Michigan as are third son David and daughter Prudence, b. 1850 and 1852 respectively.  They settled in the northern part of Hamburg Township to farm.  Prudence married Charles Switzer.  In the 1880 census David and Mary are with Prudence.

It is 1880 before other Rolisons are recorded in the census.  At that time we find Charles L. Rolison, b. January 28, 1852 in Michigan, a son of Lewis b. 1830.  (Charles may be a nephew of David M.)  November 20, 1878, Charles L. and Laura Swarthout are married.  Laura’s parents are Gorsham and Fanny, members of the Swarthout settlers in Hamburg and Putnam Townships.  Charles and Laura had two children:  Claude L. b. January 18, 1880 and Fannabelle B. December 21, 1880.  In 1909 Charles is noted as the owner of one of eight Buicks in Brighton Village.  Liberty Bond sales for Livingston County, during WW I were under his direction.  It was a very successful campaign.

Claude L. married Lucy May Pitkin in 1908.  Lucy was an accomplished pianist.  She provided music, including the wedding march, at the wedding ceremony of Geneva Hilton and Guy E. Pitkin at the home of the bride’s parents in the Village, October 21, 1914.  Guy was a cousin of Lucy.  When Claude and Lucy married , he hired her father, David Pitkin, a local builder, to construct a Queen Anne style house on lot 319 of the Smith-McPherson Addition of Brighton.  An elevator was installed to avoid having to use stairs to the basement.  At some time Claude added a music room to the house.  (This land, south of Main, west of Ore Creek was part of a tract purchased by Elijah Fitch in 1835.  With the coming of the railroad Hiram Smith bought it and plated it as part of the Addition.  After the railroad construction this part of the Village rather quickly developed.)  Claude was a businessman in Brighton.  In 1911 he and his helpers set up the telephone switch board on the 2nd floor of the new Brighton State Bank building on Main Street by the mill pond.  In 1914 re resigned from the Brighton Exchange Mutual Telephone Company and purchased Gambel and Lown hardware on the west side and in 1924 Rolison’s Hardware was moved to the east side.  In 1914, his father, Charles L., was the local representative of the International Harvestor Company with offices at the store.  Son, Merle, was born to them in 1910.  He graduated from the Brighton High School with the class of 1928, the last to graduate from Union School.  There were 16 in the class.  In the early 1940s he was a member of the Brighton Fire Department.  Merle’s sister Garnet was born October 9, 1920.

Claude’s sister, Fannabelle, married Royal Schoenhals, June 17, 1908, and had two daughters, Violet L., and Helen Mae.  A brother LeGrande, b. 1894 died at the age of two.  Violet L. married Harold A. Jacobs, and Helen Mae married Francis L. Michaels.  Several members of generations of descendants of Charles L. Rolison still live in the area.

Compiled by Marieanna Bair from:  Census Records; Early Land Owners and Settlers and obituaries prepared by Milton Charboneau; from Settlement to City, Brighton Michigan, 1832-1945 by Carol McMacken and conversations with Kay Michaels.