Who Are You People?

[PearlsNLace]

Cool Thread!

I have a lot of dead ends in my tree- a Great great grandmother who ran away from her tribe. Which one? We have no idea.

A Grandfather who was adopted. Sort of. No official information on his family of origin.

Oh, wait, and then there is the understanding that my grandmother is actually not my grandmother, but the woman forced to raise my mom- the baby my grandfather brought home after being birthed (and named after) his mistress. It took 40 years, but my grandmother treats my mom like a daughter now. But, then, who was my actual grandmother? What became of her?

My Dads line might be easier to trace, although my Great grandpa hired a company once to do that, and he got ripped off BIG time.

My paternal great grandma just rolls her eyes when I ask questions. She has never understood my want/ my need to KNOW who my ancestors are.

I dont have any understanding of how to begin.

[NJFemmie]

My parents were polish POWs who came to the US after WWII.
They met in a German DP (displaced persons) camp where they married and had my two oldest brothers. They came here in 1952, had a few more kids and the rest is "history".

[Toughy]

According to my paternal grandmother's 'Cattle Book' (yes it is a ledger book with 'cattle book' on the front cover...it was used to list livestock way back when, she used it for our family genealogy)........we used to read that thing all the time and ask her questions..........when she died....laughing......my sisters and I got that book and my dad's & uncles' box of marbles (from their childhood) out of her house before anyone else showed up.........funny what is important.........

She has traced us all the way back to the 1600's when my ancestors from England and Ireland (there was an O' in my last name when we were in Ireland....I've seen the documents) first came to this land. I am eligible to be a member of the Daughters of the American Revolution.....I was a member as long as my grandmother paid the dues....I refuse to have anything to do with them.

My maternal sides goes back at last to the late 1700's early 1800's (and probably longer considering where they were) to what is now Illinois and Arkansas. My grandmother said her grandmother was 'black dutch' (whatever that means) and Cherokee (half and half).

My maternal grandfather was Scot and Irish.

Parts of my family have been in New Mexico for around 120 years.......both sides.

I have no relationship to being an immigrant.....no connection to Europe at all. My family has been on this land hundreds (and some thousands) of years.

[JustJo]

Originally Posted by Toughy

My grandmother said her grandmother was 'black dutch' (whatever that means) and Cherokee (half and half).

Hi Toughy,

I am also a quarter "black dutch"....and there are a few theories about what that means. Here's a site that lays out the primary theories... happy researching...

[Arwen]

Originally Posted by JustJo

Hi Toughy,

I am also a quarter "black dutch"....and there are a few theories about what that means. Here's a site that lays out the primary theories... happy researching...

Very cool as I am Black Irish (which means somewhere waaay down the line I probably have a Moorish ancestor.)

[Cowboi]

I am Scots-Irish on my Dads side of Family. Spanish on my Moms side.

[Hack]

I'm half German and half Polish. Both sides emigrated to the US shortly after the US Civil War and homesteaded in Ohio and Michigan, eventually settling in northern Lower Michigan. My German ancestors are listed on a ship passenger log from a ship that left the northern part of Germany, which now is part of Poland (post-WW II). The log is on file at the Michigan Historical Center. My Polish ancestors came from the Poznan region of Poland.

Wickedly weird story. My parents got a call from a guy in NYC once who was doing family tree research. His wife's family had the same last name as my dad's family and traced back to the same area of Germany, but my dad didn't know of any relatives in NYC. He gave the gentleman my name and number, saying I had done some digging around in the state archives here, and may know more. The guy and I compared notes on the phone, and discovered that the ancestors did indeed trace back to the same area of Germany, but we couldn't find a connection. He asked if he could email me some old family photos, and I said sure. Later that night, I checked my email and opened up a photo the guy sent me. It was taken in the late 1800s, and was of the family who first came to NYC from Germany. The family was a mom, dad and a few kids. The dad looked JUST like my dad. I mean, the spitting image. It was freaky!! I emailed the guy back and told him this, and he replied with some more information...that the guy opened a cigar shop in NYC when he emigrated here. My dad is a big time cigar afficionado. To this day, that picture freaks me out.

Jake

[Diva]

This is a great thread!

I have a double whammy in that I am adopted.

My adoptive Dad's cousin did a major research project on his side of the family and it is in book form. It goes up to his great great grandparents and fortunately, I have it from there.

Unfortunately, I can't find that book!!!!

I have my Mom's side back to my great~great grandparents.

I know my birth mother's name and some of her relatives ~ I actually have pictures of my bio great grandparents (Arwen, you may have seen them on the wall in the Girl Room) who came across the pond from Ireland. I have my birth father's name only.

I would like to get started ~ if only for my daughter's benefit. And I'd also like to do her father's side, too, as I know he won't.

It's a fascinating subject to be sure! Thanks for this thread!

[Toughy]

Thanks Jo .....laughin.....I think the 'whatever that means' certainly holds true.........

Arwen........by connection I meant my family has been in the US for generations....I am 300+ years removed from Europe. It's hard to think of my family as immigrants to this country.....I am a US American.....hard to see any connection other than family members LEFT Europe. I've been to Berlin and Amsterdam and felt no connection to the land or people. My connection is to this land.....mostly to New Mexico and west/panhandle Texas.

Since I am mostly Scot-Irish, perhaps I might feel a connection to Ireland/Scotland if I ever go there.

[firie]

I grew up with the understanding that my grandfather's family (maternal) was "Black Irish." Interestingly, most of the people in his family were/are blonde and blue-eyed and "Black Irish" was always discussed as a condition of poverty, like so poor you were constantly dirty, and so blackened by dirt/soot, and my grandfather was quite ashamed of that because he grew up quite poor.

I have read a bit about it, because it has always intrigued me. No one, apparently, can quite pin down exactly where it started or why, and it is sometimes pejoratively linked to poverty and so a classist slur (association to the potato famine (black potatoes/black death)) or to shanty towns, or to the very poor immigrants coming into the US as a result of the famine, but also to phenotype (African, Native American, French, Jewish, Caribbean, and even Spanish), and with the exception of the "Spanish/Irish" phenotype, was generally thought to be a racist slur, and a product of the entrenched racial discrimination carried over from English sentiment to the US toward the Irish as "savages" along with Africans and Native Americans--some Irish were enslaved and shipped to parts of Africa by the English (there is some speculation that the name came from the Irish that actually stayed on the continent, but it also seems unlikely). Most of what I have read seems to suggest, however, that the actual usage of "Black Irish" is a purely American phenomenon, and that the Irish don't really use the reference, and that it might have connections to where the Irish found themselves in early African and Native American slave history in the US.

There are very romanticized stories that "Black Irish" came from a mix of Irish and elite Spanish blood, an attempt in folklore by the Irish to step up in the world a bit, and so perhaps they actually fabricated a very glorious event at one point in history, where a ship in the Spanish Armada wrecked into the coast of Eire and Irish ladies felt awful for the worn Spanish warriors, and so nursed them, and then had their children, and thus you have the link to darkened hair and eyes so associated with these mythical phenotypes of "Black Irish"; this, and other variations of the Spanish connection, to most scholars, is complete myth.

The whole topic is something I have been interested in for some time. Here is a neat look at some of the theories out there, link here.

I am now going to read the links about "Black Dutch" because I have never heard of that before and must know if this phrase is as curious in history as "Black Irish."

[Arwen]

Originally Posted by Toughy

My maternal sides goes back at last to the late 1700's early 1800's (and probably longer considering where they were) to what is now Illinois and Arkansas. My grandmother said her grandmother was 'black dutch' (whatever that means) and Cherokee (half and half).

My maternal grandfather was Scot and Irish.

Parts of my family have been in New Mexico for around 120 years.......both sides.

I have no relationship to being an immigrant.....no connection to Europe at all. My family has been on this land hundreds (and some thousands) of years.

Toughy, my great grandmother was referred to as Dutch or so we thought.

Turns out it was Deutsch or German. Kid you not. You might want to check that country instead of Holland.

And, um Toughy? If your maternal grandfather was Scot/Irish, you kind of do have a connection to Europe...through the British Isles as it were.

[Arwen]

Originally Posted by PearlsNLace

My Dads line might be easier to trace, although my Great grandpa hired a company once to do that, and he got ripped off BIG time.

My paternal great grandma just rolls her eyes when I ask questions. She has never understood my want/ my need to KNOW who my ancestors are.

I dont have any understanding of how to begin.

Sounds like you have some sleuthing fun ahead of you.

I've run into the Irish black hole that is New York City. I can't get my Lynch line across the pond. LOL Still working on it!