As I blueprinted the mechanics of this website, I soon realized that I might be asking too much of myself and the site. Because the surname “Hoyle” (and its variations) cover hundreds of families, related and unrelated, I would have to find a way to not only present the stories of famous and notable Hoyles, but also of those of us who are less well known or without any “public face.”

I also wanted to provide a compilation of genealogies and maybe some commentary about the similarities and differences between those family trees. As I’ve researched some of these historical documents, I understand that the Hoyle families in North America really came from four major sources:

• The United Kingdom and British Commonwealth families (Hoyle, Hayle, Hoile, Haile, Hale, Hoyles) that settled in New England, Virginia, and the nothern states in the 17th and 18th Centuries.
• The German, Prussian and Dutch families that immigrated to America in the 18th Century and settled in Pennsylvania, Maryland and the Old South (Heyl, Heil, Heill, Hoyl, Hoil).
• Hoyles that came to America during the 19th and 20th Centuries as part of the great immigration of families from Europe, the Baltic, and Asia Minor.
• European Hoyle families that first immigrated to South and Central America or other countries and then later into North America during the 20th Century. 

I’ve spent many a sleepless night wondering how I was going to be able to take on this project and do it justice.  Jon Hoyle (see my article) took the approach of adding an informal directory to his personal website that provided links to various web pages by or about individuals with the Hoyle surname.  Those external pages appear within a framed area and are only marginally indexed.  The result is that Jon provides a very enthusiastic and rather comprehensive directory of “Hoyle websites” - and then leaves it at that.

My goal is to take Jon’s great idea and build upon it, providing the missing ingredients of commentary and organization that his original site lacks.  I also want to provide easy methods for other Hoyle family members to submit their stories and background information.

I’ve decided to develop this site, HoyleHistory.com, as a compendium for all the general information about families and individuals that carry the surname Hoyle.  You might describe it as a cross between an encyclopedia and a search engine – but with just one primary subject - the name “Hoyle.” 

I’ve also decided to create a companion site that would deal with the genealogies covering the families from the second category listed above, namely the Hoyles who immigrated from Germany and Prussia in the 18th Century.  That site will be www.Hoyle-History.com (with a dash).  The core of the site already exists but is not ready for general viewing.  Much of the framework is there, but hidden from view until I can get some of the genealogy data uploaded and catalogued.  I know that It will be quite an undertaking, but that site could become a great data resource about the ancestors of that branch of Hoyles.

If this subject interests you, then I strongly suggest that you subscribe to the free newsletter I offer to stay up-to-date on my progress on that new site.  For those of you who are not descendants of that branch of the Hoyles, I sincerely apologize.  If someone from one of the other branches is computer and web-savvy and would like to build a similar site to include your ancestral histories, please feel free to contact me.  I would encourage you and help in any way that I can – and most certainly provide links to your Hoyle sites from here.

Thanks for the kind words and encouraging emails I have received so far.  I have a lot on my plate at the moment, but will always take a few hours a week to continue to build on this site and to keep in contact.  Eventually, with your support, this site may reach the goals I set for it.

Fred Hoyle was born in Gilstead, West Yorkshire, England. His father, George Hoyle, worked in the wool trade and his mother, Mabel Pickard, had studied music at the Royal College of Music in London. Hoyle was educated at Bingley Grammar School and read mathematics at Emmanuel College, Cambridge.

Hoyle spent most of his working life at the Institute of Astronomy at Cambridge and served as its director for a number of years. He died in Bournemouth, England in 2001, after a series of strokes.

In addition to his work as an astronomer, Hoyle was a published writer of science fiction, including several co-authored with his son, Geoffrey Hoyle. Among his fictional books were A for Andromeda, The Black Cloud, and several others.

Hoyle was reportedly an atheist during most of his early life, but became agnostic when he found that he could not feel comfortable trying to explain the finer workings of physics and the Universe as simply “an accident.”

Editor’s Notes: Evidence would indicate that Sir Fred Hoyle would be considered a member of the British branch of families that carry the Hoyle surname.

Although Hoyle coined the phrase “Big Bang Theory,” he often explained his use of the term as a way to best describe the theory that was then (and still is) in vogue. He explained that he agreed that the Universe is growing outward and its bodies are moving away from each other, but he disagreed that all of mass and energy could have been generated by a single over-energized atomic particle.

Hoyle proposed several theories of his own to explain the functions of the Universe. While many are still used to explain certain aspects of the motion of bodies and time/space relationships, other theories of his have been discounted and in some cases rejected by later generations of scientists.

For his contributions to astronomy and science in general, he was elected a fellow of the Royal Society in 1957 and was knighted in 1972. Although he won many distinguished prizes and honors, he was overlooked for a Nobel Prize that was awarded to a co-worker of his for a project that both had contributed to. It was thought that Hoyle’s frequent criticism of current accepted theories made him somewhat unpopular amongst some of his peers, and may have injured his reputation somewhat.

As one reviewer of Fred Hoyle’s 1994 autobiography (Home Is Where the Wind Blows: Chapters from a Cosmologist’s Life ) described him, “[Fred] Hoyle so distinguished himself at Cambridge for his mathematical prowess that he was subsequently awarded a high place within the British scientific establishment…But it was Hoyle’s willingness to stand apart from the scientific establishment, his intellectual daring, that enabled him to fathom supernovas and to predict the existence of quasars.”

The phrase “according to Hoyle” is most often used in situations when a speaker wants to indicate that his comment is based on some acknowledged level of authority, especially when a direct written reference is not available. In other words, a speaker is asserting that what he is saying or proposing is based on the highest authority and in accord with a strict set of rules.

Little is known about most of Edmond Hoyle’s life. Hoyle is believed to have been trained to become a barrister (lawyer, attorney). In 1741, Hoyle began working as a whist tutor to members of the English Royal Family and other members of the upper classes. In addition to providing personal instruction, he sold a short booklet on the game of whist to his clients, describing his strategies for playing the game. After hIs booklet became quite popular, unauthorized copies of it began to circulate throughout London. Hoyle later published and copyrighted his A Short Treatise On The Game Of Whist: Containing The Laws Of The Game And Also Some Rules (1743) in an attempt to prevent the unauthorized publication of his works.

Editor’s Notes: Evidence would indicate that Sir Edmond (Edmund) Hoyle would be considered a member of the British branch of families that carry the Hoyle surname.

Because of his success, Hoyle followed with similar treatises on backgammon, chess, quadrille, piquet, and brag. In 1750, a compendium of these essays was published, as Mr. Hoyle’s Games Complete, and over time it pushed off the market Charles Cotton’s aging The Compleat Gamester, long considered to be the “standard” English-language reference work on the subject of playing of games – especially gambling games – since its publication in 1674.

Hoyle’s A Short Treatise On The Game Of Whist was regarded as authoritative until 1864, after which time it was superseded by the new rules written by John Loraine Baldwin and adopted by the Arlington and Portland clubs.

Many modern game rule books still contain the word “Hoyle” in the title, but that doesn’t mean that they are works that are directly derivative of those written by Hoyle.

Sir Edmond Hoyle was a charter inductee into the Poker Hall of Fame in 1979 thanks to his many contributions to not only poker, but all types of card and board games.

Sir Edmond’s surname can still be seen printed on hundreds of books such as Hoyle’s Rules of Games: Third Revised and Updated Edition about card and board games and on the backs of playing cards.

During my studies I always had a nagging curiosity about where my ancestors would have been and what they were doing during major historic events. Were some of my ancestors famous knights going on the Crusades? Were others soldiers during the Napoleonic wars? Were any involved in the American Revolution or the Civil War? If so, who’s side were they on? Were they “johnny rebs” or did they wear Union blue? Did any of my family meet George Washington or Robert E. Lee in person?

I’d hope that I would see the name “Hoyle” show up as I studied. Maybe a famous general, a pioneer like Lewis and Clark, maybe a soldier at the Alamo. Every time I picked up a history book, I’d look at the index to see if my surname was listed. There seemed to be lots of Howes, Hoyts, and Holts in the indices, but never a Hoyle.

I was so happy the first time that I heard the expression, “According to Hoyle.” I had no idea what it meant, but my mother (Patricia [Jarvis] Hoyle) told me that anyone using the phrase meant “this is a fact” or “that’s the rule.” She further explained that it referred to “some Englishman (Sir Edmond Hoyle) from hundreds of years ago” who defined and wrote a book about all the rules of various card games and the expression caught on and remained fairly common, especially among older people.

Of course my elation at first hearing about this famous person with my last name was quickly deflated. When Mom said, “I don’t think we’re related to him” I was so disappointed. I’d finally found out that there was a really famous person named Hoyle, only then to discover that I was probably might not related at all.

Instead of that news discouraging me, it made me only more determined to find out if I did have any famous ancestors. What I found over the years is that most were not famous in the modern sense, but many were notable and honorable in their service to their countries and for their accomplishments in so many other meaningful ways.

In the 1950s afternoon TV was made up of soap operas (some like “General Hospital” are still on the air), cheapy game shows like “Queen for a Day,” Liberace’s daily show, and lots of old black and white movies from the 1930s and 1940s.

One day a movie came on called “According to Mrs. Hoyle” starring Spring Byington (”December Bride”). I was overjoyed and so excited. I couldn’t wait until it came on. The actual movie was very short (one hour), wasn’t really that good, and I can’t remember anything about it except for Miss Byington wearing those dowdy clothes and hats that older women wore in those days. In spite of those facts, I still enjoyed watching it with my mother. I’ve not seen it again and do not know that it even exists any longer.

I often wondered if other kids that had relatively unusual names felt the same way.

I asked my mother if we might have been related to the person shown in the movie. No, she said, it was just a fictional character and a made up story that used a catchy title based on the famous saying, “According to Hoyle.”

Even though the movie was basically a time waster, I was still excited that our family name was in the title of a Hollywood movie. For years later, every time I saw Spring Byington in a TV show or movie, I would immediately be reminded of that wonderful afternoon watching TV with Mom.

She explained to me that those were my ancestors – people who had lived, as she put it, “In the olden days.”  She coudn’t tell me much because it wasn’t her side of the family, but she pointed out that the names “Peter” and “John” seemed to be repeated each generation.

To say I was fascinated by this document would be a gross understatement. Although it was already quite battered, and so fragile that I was unsure if I should even hold it in my hands, Grandma Hoyle assured me that it was OK if I touched it.  As far as she knew it had no particular monetary value. When she asked me if I would like to have it to take home and keep, I was overjoyed and excited to get it. Grandma gave it to my mother and asked her to keep it for me until I got older. ”Maybe he could bring it up-to-date someday,” Grandma suggested. I assured her that I would and have worked hard to keep that promise since then.

Perhaps this website will be the payoff to that promise because, believe it or not, I simply can not remember any thing else that my grandmother ever gave me.

Remnants of that old document may still exist somewhere. Maybe someone from another descendant branch of the family might have a pristine copy of the document. Over the years it was kept by my mother until she finally turned it over to me in the 1970s. By then, time had really taken its toll and the original document was well beyond any stage of restoral. In the early 1990s I was able to make a reasonable copy of that document and kept it on a computer file. The original scanned photo file was unfortunately lost (along with dozens of scanned-in historic family photos) when my hard drive was stolen in 1998.

Perhaps someone in another branch of the Hoyle family that lived in Tennessee during the mid-1800s will have a copy.  If so, I hope that their copy is still in reasonably good shape and can be photographed or scanned to share with the readers of this website.

In the United States, most Hoyle families living in New England and the northern midwestern states have their roots in the British Isles.  Even though “Hoyle” is clearly an English surname, the largest group of Hoyle families, however, are not descendents of British immigrants to the American colonies, but rather from settlers that came from Germany and other Prussian states.

When German immigrants first came to America in the early part of the the 18th Century, they landed at seaports located in Baltimore, Philadephia and New York.  Mostly farmers and craftsmen, they took their families and moved west and south, into the western portions of Pennsylvania and into the Carolinas and Georgia.

Many of those who settled in Pennsylvania retained their German surnames and held onto many old country ways, many becoming part of a larger community often referred to as “Pennsylvania Dutch,” the term Dutch was really a corruption of the word “Deutsch” (German).

The word “Dutch” in this case owes its origin to an archaic meaning where the word “Dutch” designated groups that are today considered German and Dutch – prior to the Thirty Years’ War, the Netherlands were part of the Holy Roman Empire and the Dutch were generally regarded as one of several German peoples. Reference: Wikipedia: Pennsylvania Dutch

Some of these early German immigrants kept the name “HEYL” or ended up using variations of that surname, such as HEIL, HEILL, HAILL, HOILE, and to a lesser extent HOYL. As far as we can tell, the name was originally pronounced as sort of a gutteral “hale” sound (try clearing your throat or vibrating your tongue while saying “hale” to get the idea).

Many early immigrant families kept the original spelling and pronunciation of their surname. However, most – especially those who settled in the southern colonies – tended to Anglicize their names. Most of these families settled on “HOYL” or “HOYLE.”  During the mid-1800s in the United States, most families that initially used the the HOYL spelling later added the “E” in line with the more common usage.

Some German immigrant families, especially those living in Pennsylvania and some northern states, changed “HEYL” to “HALE” or “HAYLE” which was more in keeping with the original pronunciation of the name.  Other families just left the spelling of their surname HEYL or HEIL, similar to what it was when their ancestors first landed in America.

There will be much more on this subject in later postings.

My name is John Alan Hoyle.  I live in Salem, Oregon – a city that I consider to be one of the most beautiful in America’s Pacific Northwest.  I am a semi-retired grandfather.  My work and my hobby is the creation of websites for small businesses and private individuals.  I’ll tell you more about myself on another page at another time.  All you need to really know – beside the fact that I love and admire my own family - is that I also have a life-long passion for the study of history and genealogy. 

Today is Sunday, June 8th, 2008.  This project actually gets off the ground about forty years late – but after years of promising my family that I would write our family story, I am actually putting pen to paper – or should I say “fingertips to keyboard” - thanks to two things. First is a technological format that simply did not exist forty, or even twenty, years ago – namely the Internet.  Second – the fact that I have reached an age where I can live in semi-retirement and actually have time to do some of the things I’ve never really had time for before.

As you read my story, you’ll discover that I love family histories – especially any that involve my ancestors and also those of interlocking families.  Some of you may also enjoy researching – or at least hearing – stories about famous (and in some cases infamous) people that shared our name.  You may find out that you are related to some historical person that may have changed the course of history.  If you have children or grandchildren, they may grow to love hearing about famous people that carried their surname or were a part of their bloodline.

I hope that all that visit, and hopefully participate, will enjoy the stories about the people and places that are apart of our past and our present.   Although genealogy and family histories will be a major part of this site, I don’t want it to become just a list of names and dates of people long gone or of strangers that you may never meet.  I want it to become a living, growing history of the families that carried the surname Hoyle (or its variations), and something that you and your family will look forward to reading from time to time.

Until someone offers a better suggestion, I am choosing the tagline, quoting William Shakespeare, “There is a history in all men’s lives.”  The men and women of our family have many stories to share, both past and present.

My hope is to present those stories and introduce those people to you on the pages of this website in a way that will educate and entertain you.  I also hope that you will help by offering stories and details about your own Hoyle family members.  I actively solicit your participation in any way that you feel you can offer it.