Posted on 09/26/2010 11:17:36 AM PDT by franksolich
When I was ten years old, our teacher assigned us to research our individual family histories, as best as fifth-graders could do. I swiped one of my father's lined green ledger books, and meticulously recorded my ancestors, and their vital statistics, as I collected them from the parents, aunts and uncles, and great-aunts and great-uncles who were still living at the time.
I was a late child, three of my four grandparents being dead before I had even known of them. I had many older brothers and sisters, after which there had been a substantial gap. My parents were grey and (prematurely) old when I was growing up; when my younger brother and I went around with our father, for example, he was oftentimes mistaken for being our grandfather.
Among the data I collected from my father concerned the parents of his father, my great-grandfather (1818-1897) and my great-grandmother (1825-1903). My grandfather had been born in 1880.
It was not until a couple of years later that I noticed something; my great-grandparents had been, uh, rather old when my grandfather was born.....not to add that my grandfather had a younger half-sister, born in 1890, ten years later.
I mentioned this anomaly to my father, who responded that my grandfather, his father, and the half-sister had been formally adopted as infants by their grandparents. Being young and green in judgement, I was not very good at "follow-up" questions; it was not until some years later that I began wondering why my great-great-grandparents had adopted their own grandchildren, but by then, my father had departed this time and place.
(Excerpt) Read more at conservativecave.com ...
grand parents were often forced to legally adopt their own grandchildren.
Often the distinction between grandparents and great grandparents was not recognized. My own parents often said grand parents when they actually were talking about their great grandparents. I have heard many people make the same distinction when talking about those that were elderly. The number of Grand in Grandparents was not distinguished.
Like you, I discovered an "American flag" connection in my dad's family: one of my ancestors was the father of one of the three Baltimoreans who commissioned the making of a large flag that subsequently flew over Ft. McHenry and became famous... the "star spangled banner." The historical pretensions of my line of that family decline precipitately from that shaky perch.
Mr. niteowl77
Many Mexican Americans have native American blood, they are metizos, that is, the descendants of mixed couples in Mexico. Most little Mexican babies are born with the Mongolian mark. It fades as they get older.
My grandfather (born 1877) had a cousin who was born out of wedlock and raised in her grandfather’s house. The child’s father went off to the Civil War (Co. E, North Carolina 15th Infantry) and died six months later. When he left neither he nor the childs mother knew there was a baby on the way. Sometimes things just happen that way and the older family members step in to raise the child.
Ha! Wikipedia (and my quick scan of pages) again proves it is useless for accurate information. I will ask my mother then. Thanks for the correction.
I learned one ancestors death was recorded as the Atlantic Ocean, must have been on a ship that went down....
Searching my fathers side was more difficult, his family had been here since before the civil war...getting information from the states is quite difficult....
Someone sent my father a copy of his genealogy because his name was on one of the branches of the family tree they searched....The only way for me to get any info was to go to the county seat where he was born and microfiche the records....
Do you have a link to the Mormon site, or what it’s called so I can google it? I really would like to know which Stewart clan I belonged to. On my mother’s maternal side they were Jones. Not sure if that is English or Irish. On my mother’s paternal side......yep, Indian. Not Cherokee though (ha). My great grandfather was full Creek. The only thing I got from him was straight black hair. The rest of me is pure Scots-Irish or whatever.
I then started to search in google until I found it...If most of your ancestors are American Indian, you probably won't find much there...On my mothers side it was Irish, went back far enough to also find Scot blood. The branches of the tree get more numerous the farther back you go....like 2 parents, 4 grandparents 8 great grandparents etc....I was only able to follow one branch back to the 1700's....some list date of birth and death, a few marriage etc... good luck...it was fun....
Ach, maybe you are a rare one! Apparently there is a variation called “Ectopic Mongolian spots” or aberrant Mongolian spots that “involve unusual areas such as the face or extremities.” I have never seen it anywhere but the base of the spine. Go figure.
They also have a new beta site that is helpful:
http://pilot.familysearch.org/
This site is helpful for their forums which you can sort by state, county, etc.
http://genforum.genealogy.com/
And finally, this site is great for scans of actual documents from the Civil War, Revolutionary War, etc. They are a subscription site but they often have free access to groups of documents for a couple of weeks at a time.
http://www.footnote.com/
Thank you for those links.
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