The Mead family was originally from Connecticut, and members of the family settled in Waccabuc, in the town of Lewisboro, around the time of the Revolution. Polly Brundage Mead, wife of Alphred Mead, was born in 1791 and died in 1877. She kept a journal from the middle of 1849 until the middle of 1850, recording the activities of herself, her family of seven children, and their many relatives in the community. The diary is important both as a record of a prominent Westchester family and as a detailed account of the daily life of a woman in the middle of the 19th century.