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| Maggie, Persape {Koundakjian}, Sarkis and Henry Badeer |
Our story begins around 1884 in an Armenian village known as Kessab in Northeast Syria. A teenage boy named Sarkis Garboushian (birth date unknown) was attending an American Mission School in Latakia, a Syrian town by the Mediterranean Sea, south of Kessab. The School missionary Henry Easson apparently was impressed by Sarkis and asked him to go with him to America. Sarkis was interested, but had to ask the permission of his mother, Martha, who was a practical midwife. “Go my son,” was her reply.
After two months of travel by sea, Sarkis and Missionary Henry Easson arrived in the United States. Whether or not they had to stay at Ellis Island is unknown. Sarkis worked his way through school and graduated from Geneva College in Beaver Falls, Pennsylvania (where Easson was from). Subsequently, he entered Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia and graduated in 1893 (His diploma is still in the family archives).
During this period the college considered the name “Garboushian” to be too long and difficult to pronounce. They asked Sarkis his father’s first name. It was Badeer (traditional counterpart of Peter). They decided to call him Sarkis Badeer, which appears on his diploma from Jefferson Medical College (now known as Jefferson University in Philadelphia.)
During this period the college considered the name “Garboushian” to be too long and difficult to pronounce. They asked Sarkis his father’s first name. It was Badeer (traditional counterpart of Peter). They decided to call him Sarkis Badeer, which appears on his diploma from Jefferson Medical College (now known as Jefferson University in Philadelphia.)
