Monday's Question of the day - February 24, 2014

MoochNNoodles

MoochNNoodles

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I'm posting this before I go to bed since it's technically Monday here.
  It's also now officially Mooch and Noodles' 9th birthday!  I don't know for certain this is the day; we just counted back the number of weeks old we were told they were at the shelter. 


Today's question is about ancestry!

Do you know where your ancestors came from?  Is it where you live currently?

I'm not sure if it's an American thing; but my cousins and I were always fascinated with knowing where our ancestors had come from.  3 of my Grandparents were the first generation born in the US.  The other Grandpa was the 2nd generation born here.  I am 50% Italian, 25% German, and the other 25% is Polish with some Greek mixed in.  I'm not 100% sure where the Greek ancestry came in.  If I remember right; my Grandmother is 25% Greek.  For some reason I'm questioning that tonight.  I also know that my ancestors were mostly farmers but also one Great-Grandmother was a servant.

DH's family has been here much longer than mine.  I do have an informal family tree of sorts his Grandmother wrote out that goes back to pre-Civil War times.  With that time here; knowledge of his ancestry before this is more limited. 
 
happybird

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My Mom's family is from Scotland and the family name is St. Clair. I have been doing research on my ancestors over the past year and it has been fascinating. There are several illustrious and historically significant St. Clairs/Sinclairs. There is a very strong tie to the Knights Templar and St. Clairs were the likeliest founders of Freemasonry.
My branch of the family is in the US (Pennsylvania) and have been here for a while. In fact, Major General Arthur St.Clair was a close associate of George Washington and participated in the famous crossing of the Delaware River. He was in charge when Fort Ticonderoga was lost (oops) and present when Cornwallis surrendered. Later, he was elected President of the Continental Congress (close to the end of it's existence, a year before the Constitution was ratified) and elected governor of the Northwest Territory. Pretty cool! I have been toying with the idea of joining the DAR.

My Dad's family is proving impossible to research :( The only thing we can find are census reports stating 'Slovakland' as their country of origin. He believes his grandparents were from either Poland or Lithuania, but is not sure. I have been trying to hunt down immigration documents, but have had no luck.
 
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peaches08

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I'm also second-generation American.  I'm 50% German/Austrian, 25% Sicilian, and 25% Russian/French.  Actually that last 25% has German/Austrian in there too.
 
Winchester

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My maternal side is German; there's an old family rumor that somebody in Germany died many many years ago and left something "important" to my great-grandmother. But she had to go to Germany to claim whatever "it" was and she refused to go. Might have been interesting to see whatever was going on. But they were German completely.

My paternal side is also German. My paternal ancestors came to America from England on the boat "Judith". We have family history going way, way back; it's quite interesting to read the book. My paternal great-grandmother was a Cherokee. 
 
denice

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Both of my grandmothers were Cherokee.  My grandfather on my mothers side was Irish and my grandfather on my father's side was Norwegian.
 
Draco

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Both grandmothers and one grandfather came from Sicily, Italy. My grandfather, my dad's dad, came from Poland.
 
AbbysMom

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I am French, Polish and Portuguese. I have great-grandparents that came from Poland and my grandfather was born in Portugal. On the French side, the family can be traced to Quebec and then back to France.
 
W

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My brother just had one of those DNA tests done (that particular test can't be used on women). It said he was mostly Northern European, with 23% Scandanavian and traces of Portuguese and Native American. We know my dad's side is all British (Scottish, Irish, English) except for the small bit of Portuguese. The Scandanavian part was a surprise, because we thought my mom's side was all German, French-Canadian, Welsh, and Irish. I'm sure the Native American part comes from the French-Canadian (those trappers got around ;)). He opened an ancestry.com account and has been trying to find more info, but we're still not sure who was Scandanavian, LOL.
 
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MoochNNoodles

MoochNNoodles

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happybird said:
My Mom's family is from Scotland and the family name is St. Clair. I have been doing research on my ancestors over the past year and it has been fascinating. There are several illustrious and historically significant St. Clairs/Sinclairs. There is a very strong tie to the Knights Templar and St. Clairs were the likeliest founders of Freemasonry.
My branch of the family is in the US (Pennsylvania) and have been here for a while. In fact, Major General Arthur St.Clair was a close associate of George Washington and participated in the famous crossing of the Delaware River. He was in charge when Fort Ticonderoga was lost (oops) and present when Cornwallis surrendered. Later, he was elected President of the Continental Congress (close to the end of it's existence, a year before the Constitution was ratified) and elected governor of the Northwest Territory. Pretty cool! I have been toying with the idea of joining the DAR.

My Dad's family is proving impossible to research
The only thing we can find are census reports stating 'Slovakland' as their country of origin. He believes his grandparents were from either Poland or Lithuania, but is not sure. I have been trying to hunt down immigration documents, but have had no luck.
Click to expand...
That is all really interesting!  I know one issue that we would have in our family is the changing of names when people arrived in the US.  One great-grandfather's last name was misspelled when he came here and they kept it that way till most of his children were grown.  Some of them reverted to the proper spelling but most didn't.  Another great-grandfather added to his last name when he came.  Gram said it made it more prestigious sounding.  But it would make things harder to research if we didn't know that already. 
 
catsallaround

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Not a clue except I know fathers side is Italian.  Moms side is so many different places. 
 
sivyaleah

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2nd generation here too.  3/4 of of my grandparents came from Russia, in various areas.  My maternal grandmother, is from Austria (so she said), but the borders used to change so frequently who knows what it was called when she was born.  Could have been Poland but she always maintained it was the former (if she were currently alive she'd be something like 110 I think, she died when she was 102).  

One of my cousins did a lot of family research and I seem to remember there *may* have been a very small percentage of French in someone's background.  
 
cassiopea

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My mom is Irish, and my dad is Finnish. Which of course, makes me half-Irish and half-Finnish. I'm a good ol' Euromutt! While happily Canadian-born.
 

People often wonder how a lady from Ireland and a man from Finland met - they met on a train in Belgium.

Granted, I also have some Swedish blood. Half of my dad's family came from Sweden to Finland in previous generations, and changed their Swedish last names to Finnish ones. To this day my dad dislikes the fact that he is part Swedish and often denies it or minimizes it. It's a long story why....

 

At any rate, we all like to make fun of each sides historical and modern cultural stereotypes
 it might appear peculiar to some, but to us we have fun.
 
 
 
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kookycats

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My late father was born in Russia but I believe came here at around the age of 5. Mother was born here but I think her parents were from Russia - not really sure.
 
stewball

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Winchester said:
My maternal side is German; there's an old family rumor that somebody in Germany died many many years ago and left something "important" to my great-grandmother. But she had to go to Germany to claim whatever "it" was and she refused to go. Might have been interesting to see whatever was going on. But they were German completely.

My paternal side is also German. My paternal ancestors came to America from England on the boat "Judith". We have family history going way, way back; it's quite interesting to read the book. My paternal great-grandmother was a
Cherokee. 
Click to expand...
Do you know why your great grandma refused to go to Germany not that I blame her. You real name is Judith only used when I'd done something wrong. It was used a lot.
You really really have a fascinating background.
 
stewball

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happybird said:
My Mom's family is from Scotland and the family name is St. Clair. I have been doing research on my ancestors over the past year and it has been fascinating. There are several illustrious and historically significant St. Clairs/Sinclairs. There is a very strong tie to the Knights Templar and St. Clairs were the likeliest founders of Freemasonry.
My branch of the family is in the US (Pennsylvania) and have been here for a while. In fact, Major General Arthur St.Clair was a close associate of George Washington and participated in the famous crossing of the Delaware River. He was in charge when Fort Ticonderoga was lost (oops) and present when Cornwallis surrendered. Later, he was elected President of the Continental Congress (close to the end of it's existence, a year before the Constitution was ratified) and elected governor of the Northwest Territory. Pretty cool! I have been toying with the idea of joining the DAR.

My Dad's family is proving impossible to research :( The only thing we can find are census reports stating 'Slovakland' as their country of origin. He believes his grandparents were from either Poland or Lithuania, but is not sure. I have been trying to hunt down immigration documents, but have had no luck.
Click to expand...
Do you know roughly when your dad's family came? Did you try the Ellis Island's records?
 
stewball

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3 of mu grandparents came from the Ukraine which was then Russia and a grandma came from Besarabia which switched between Russia and Romania.
They all came early 1900's to England so I'm second generation British. One granddad was a tailor and the other a watch maker.
 
ckdkitties

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My great-great-grandparents are British (and so I'm 5th generation?) and I currently live in England.
 
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