Genealogy

[Geowhizzer]

Speaking of another nerdly passion:

This summer one of my big projects was working on my family history.  It's been fascinating trying to research my lineage, to see how history worked through the regular folks.  I've found two branches of the family that date back to New Castle, New Hampshire in the mid-1600s.  No wonder my grandma had a funny accent.  Another branch I can't get past the late 1800s. 

Has anyone else here traced their family history?

[Diomedes]

Nope.  Don't really care where I came from, especially since the lines end with me.

But I did work at an archives once.  That's where I really learned to hate Mormons.  See, Mormon superstition has it that any blood relative of a living Mormon, no matter how long dead, can be given the chance to be saved.  Or whatever the stupid lingo is.  So all the geneological research that's worth a damn world wide has been performed by the Morons.  They are meticulous and rigorous..they do good work.  Superstitious fervor will have that affect on a weak mind.  Once they find a distant relative and can prove it, they go to church and offer some kind of special ceremony and the dead person's soul gets a shot at joining up. 

I was on a project researching the lives of black barbers of Baltimore.  Barbers were some of the first free blacks to gain enough wealth to purchase homes and businesses.  Since the records kept in the past generally center on birth, death, and property, the records say more about black barbers than they do about black teachers, for example.  It was a cool project.

The biggest obstacle to getting my shtein done was the Mormons.  They were in the microfiche room in force every day, and they didn't like these snot nosed kids on the summer internship cramping their style.  They were saving souls, afterall!

Idiots.

[MURP]

My Uncle traced them way way back.  Glad you brought it up, I wanted to ask him to get a copy of that info.  I know it was quite an undertaking to get that information.

[Rome]

My wife is an estate researcher.

Truth.

[Diomedes]

I'll add that to my files.  It's amazing what people will tell you online about their offline lives.

[Rome]

She's also an ex-CIA agent.

And an astronaut.

Plus she looks like a supermodel, cooks like Emeril and fargs like Jenna Jameson.


Truth.

[ice grillin you]

i really could care less about my lineage....but i do know that my last name literally translates into "the white people"

[Rome]

^^^     ^^^

[Tomahawk]

i really could care less about my lineage....but i do know that my last name literally translates into "the white people"

Huh, my name literally translates into the exact opposite, or so my German teacher told me.

I'm going to try to learn more about my roots at Oktoberfest in Munich this year, or maybe just get drunk. Either way, sie sind hundin.

[ice grillin you]

yup...apparently my peoples lived up in the mountians in czechoslovakia....probably all walking on their hands...anyway...they lived high up where the snow was...hence 'white people'

[Phanatic]

I'm a Dutch bastich....

[Susquehanna Birder]

My sister traced back a couple of generations, but things pretty much get lost in the countrysides of America. I'm definitely a mutt.

[mussa]

I am Irish, Swedish, German and English

My girl is obsessed with her families history.  i really don't give two shteins, but she likes it so i just act like im interested. nod and agree, nod and agree.  i think mostly people with a vagina and breasts are interested in this matter.  farg yo couch nicca

[Drunkmasterflex]

My sister traced back a couple of generations, but things pretty much get lost in the countrysides of America. I'm definitely a mutt.

That about sums it up for me as well.

[rjs246]

Welsh, German, Native American, Dutch, Sicilian, English and Irish are all pumping through my veins in various quantities.