Anyone enjoy Genealogy?

[Pokeyonekenobie]

Some people definitely get crazy with it!

One of the fun stories from my mom's side is my great grandfather (her grandpa) came over from Switzerland.  I'm only 3rd generation American on that line.  He went through Boston Immigration, which is interesting because it was mostly Irish and Italians that went through Boston.  I think he was a teenager at the time and came over to live with his older brother but he learned 7 languages by playing marbles with the all local kids.  Apparently his neighborhood was quite diverse. 

One line on our tree ends abruptly because during the Depression one of my great aunts was placed in an orphanage with her brother while their dad went to find work.  Her mother had died and apparently that was a common enough practice during the Depression to leave kids at an orphanage and then when you could afford them again you went back for them.  Well, the orphanage caught fire and all the records were lost so we have no idea who her parents were because she was young enough that she didn't know.

[MerryAnvil]

I was always interested in mine, but it's less of a 'oh my gosh I need to know everything about my ancestors' and more 'Huh, it'd be interesting to find out how my family lived'. I'm more interested in whether my ancestors were farmers or bankers than whether they were famous. It'd be interesting to know if blacksmithing was a trade that was in my blood!

I do know that my ancestry is heavily Scottish, and mostly farmers. My paternal grandmother was a Duncan, which is pretty cool because my sis and I were able to join the Donnachaidh clan thanks to that bloodline. My maternal grandmother was a Rose, another Scottish family. They also have a clan, but it's a lot smaller and you generally don't see them at festivals that often. Funny enough, the Rose and Donnachaidh clans actually warred with each other briefly, as they were on opposite sides during the whole Jacobite uprising haha.

Scottish clans are awesome, and it's really neat to go to Scottish festivals and meet up with your clan and watch clan members complete in the Highland games. They're basically like a big, welcoming family. I go to Scottish festivals a lot anyways since the blacksmith association I'm a member of puts on demonstrations there, so I get to see my clan several times a year. This year was our Chief's 80th birthday and also his 35th year as Chief, which was pretty cool.

My biological father's family pretty much came from Oklahoma and the West in general, and I have some Cherokee blood. He had enough to qualify for a scholarship to a Native American college if he'd wanted to go, but he didn't. Which is just as well; I honestly don't understand how you could qualify for that when your papers all list you as Caucasian and you have no immediate ancestors who are Native American lol. There's a small group of people who like to go around claiming they're 'Native American' because they're 1/63rd Cheyenne or whatever. It's silly. I'm a Caucasian who just happens to have Native American ancestry, thank you very much.

[lovesbabysquirmy]

One of my ancestors was a Campbell and I married into a clan of the MacDonalds.  HAHAHA  oh the irony!

Hi Cousin!

Soooooo which side are you? 

I have some FUN names in my family tree... I think my favorites are Alphleda and Jehoba.  Don't think those are coming back into fashion anytime soon...

[mlp4me]

One of my ancestors was a Campbell and I married into a clan of the MacDonalds.  HAHAHA  oh the irony!

heheheh.


I know my husband's Mom's side is pretty well cataloged. My uncle supposedly has a book of my Dad's side. I feel like DNA testing is a way for our government to have even more access to us so I guess it makes me paranoid to even have any testing done. Not that I have anything to hide or to offer humanity with my DNA.... Mainly German roots here from what I've been able to verbally confirm with family.

[Barnacle_lady]

I really enjoy reading this I should look more into it I think. As for the royalty line. I won't be surprised if a lot of "native europeans" have some of it in their blood. It is known that the royals have been "fooling" around a lot.
@mlp4me: I understand your concerns but the DNA tests are usually done by private companies where you pay them to find out.

[brightberry]

I'm interested in it!  I do have some amazing photos.  But I haven't joined any online sites.  My grandmother had a big fat book that supposedly traced our ancestors to the Mayflower.  I used to think that was highly unlikely until I realized that just one person on the Mayflower could have spawned millions. So maybe?  I think the estimate of Mayflower descendants is 35 million. The people who made that book must be very rich.

But what I find most interesting is that all humans most common recent ancestor lived as recently as 3,000 years ago.  That's just so amazing to me.  I know people are trying, but I would love to see how far back people can trace to the "most common" ancestor.

Ancestor Video - it's ok to be smart

Scientific Study

Tracing Mayflower Descendants

Ancestor Article

[Pokeyonekenobie]

I really enjoy reading this I should look more into it I think. As for the royalty line. I won't be surprised if a lot of "native europeans" have some of it in their blood. It is known that the royals have been "fooling" around a lot.

My mom once joked that one of our lines probably goes through a kitchen maid and a randy prince.  She was joking, but she's probably still right. 

[Noasar]

I’d love to trace my family tree but I haven’t got a clue how to get started. What websites do you all use? How much does it cost?

[flutterscotch]

I really enjoy reading this I should look more into it I think. As for the royalty line. I won't be surprised if a lot of "native europeans" have some of it in their blood. It is known that the royals have been "fooling" around a lot.

My mom once joked that one of our lines probably goes through a kitchen maid and a randy prince.  She was joking, but she's probably still right. 

There is definitely a castle or two in my past, but...like, they're glorified mansions.  Nothing huge or famous.   And not actual royalty. This is the one I recall offhand. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moreton_Corbet_Castle

But what I find most impressive is that two of my descendants (one of two father and son pairs) signed the Flushing Remonstrance (direct line, and I knew this as a kid, because my 3rd cousin or something researched it well for a long time, 40+ years). It was the boilerplate for the United States' freedom of religion amendment...and he wasn't even a Quaker. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flushing_Remonstrance 

[lovesbabysquirmy]

I’d love to trace my family tree but I haven’t got a clue how to get started. What websites do you all use? How much does it cost?

Ancestry.com is the most popular site - it links into a number of the databases.  I also use findagrave.com to cross-reference because it lists siblings, children, spouses, etc.

Ancestry does have a paywall for most records, BUT on certain holidays, they have freebie days.  Like on Victoria Day , the UK records are free to access that day.  Or on the 4th of July, there are a bunch of free US records that you normally have to pay for. 

I think if you access through a library, you have a few other databases open to you for free.  FamilySearch.org is definitely that way.

I haven't paid any money yet and I already have over 850 people in my family tree that I have found using Ancestry.com 

[BlackCurtains]

I’d love to trace my family tree but I haven’t got a clue how to get started. What websites do you all use? How much does it cost?

Ancestry.com is the most popular site - it links into a number of the databases.  I also use findagrave.com to cross-reference because it lists siblings, children, spouses, etc.

Ancestry does have a paywall for most records, BUT on certain holidays, they have freebie days.  Like on Victoria Day , the UK records are free to access that day.  Or on the 4th of July, there are a bunch of free US records that you normally have to pay for. 

I think if you access through a library, you have a few other databases open to you for free.  FamilySearch.org is definitely that way.

I haven't paid any money yet and I already have over 850 people in my family tree that I have found using Ancestry.com 

Thanks for the info! I'd like to find out more too and figured you had to pay big $ for anything.

[Pokeyonekenobie]

I’d love to trace my family tree but I haven’t got a clue how to get started. What websites do you all use? How much does it cost?

So one of the things you can do is find a local LDS Family History Center.  You do not have to be LDS (Mormon) to use them and they are free.  They can help you get started and they have a ton of information available.  You can go to https://www.familysearch.org/locations/ to find one near you.  (No, they shouldn't try to convert you if you're just doing genealogy, though if you have questions they will be glad to answer them.)

[KarentheUnicorn]

I had an ancestry account, I was paying but have stopped it for a few months since it is kind of expensive. I'm thinking of restarting it as they sent me a email saying new records have been listed and some of the stuff I've been looking for on my dad's side looks like it might be in that file.

But I did the DNA for myself and my dad and gave one to one of my cousins for Christmas, so we all have our DNA.

I've gone back pretty far but I knew a tad bit about some of my history, I'm actually a descendant on my mom's side of a man named Arthur Allen, he build a home here in Virginia back in 1676 and it is recognized as the oldest brick dwelling in North America. Incidently if you go to the page myself and some of my family members picture is on the front page right now as they had a descendants day this summer, so wow, didn't know they put that up there.

https://preservationvirginia.org/historic-sites/bacons-castle/


My DNA says I'm
29% Great Britian
24% Ireland/Scotland/Wales
21% Europe West
17% Scandinavia
6% Iberian Peninsula
3% South Europe

There is also another site called gedmatch.com

you can download your raw data from ancestry and upload it into gedmatch. Another member of ancestry contacted me and told me about it. It's free and has a bunch of different things you can do. You can go into some of the more ancient DNA stuff.

Like one of the tests breaks your DNA down more, so instead of telling me I'm 21% Europe West. This one has a Eurogene DNA breakdown that gives more of a breakdown like 7.94% French, and interestingly this test tells me I'm 13.99% Iberian, where ancestry says I'm only 6%.

This one I printed out also has stuff like I'm: South Asian .13% and Amerindian .12% Basque 4.02%

I think it's cool but I think at some point it seems we can only go back so far finding people as far as paper records go, but it's cool that the DNA can tell you such interesting breakdowns. But also find people you're related to DNA wise.

I wonder if any of us ponyfolks are related

[Noasar]

My DNA says I'm
29% Great Britian
24% Ireland/Scotland/Wales
21% Europe West
17% Scandinavia
6% Iberian Peninsula
3% South Europe

Ireland/Scotland/Wales is Great Britain! So you are 53% British! How cool.

You have all inspired me to try and trace my family tree. Not sure how reliable the DNA stuff is...is it legit? I know with dog DNA tests they pretty much just make things up.

[Pokeyonekenobie]

You have all inspired me to try and trace my family tree. Not sure how reliable the DNA stuff is...is it legit? I know with dog DNA tests they pretty much just make things up.

Well, I saw a thing where identical triplets sent in their DNA and two of them were close but the third wasn't as close as the other two. They sent them to 23andme and the breakdown of the results were a little different for each of them.  I think they did the reveal on a talk show.  You can probably find it on YouTube.