Posted on 10/24/2012 11:36:59 AM PDT by GVnana
How many Commanders-in-Chief can you get in one family tree? When it’s former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney’s family tree, the answer is six.
According to Ancestry.com, the world’s largest online family history resource, Romney’s family tree connects him to Franklin D. Roosevelt, Calvin Coolidge, Franklin Pierce, Herbert Hoover, and both George H.W. and George W. Bush.
Romney is connected to Presidents George W. Bush (10th cousins, twice removed), George H. W. Bush (10th cousins, once removed) and Franklin D. Roosevelt (8th cousins, twice removed) through Ann Marbury Hutchinson, a key figure in the development of religious freedom in America and early settler of Rhode Island and New York.
More at link.
(Excerpt) Read more at blogs.ancestry.com ...
Hey, wait a minute, I’m a staunch conservative and I’m also related via family tree to J. & P. Alden, FDR and the Bush’s as well as both Adams’, etc. There’s no inbreeding involved, just a long line of American stock. One thing you do know about Romney, he’s all American unlike the Muslim in Chief.
Tenth cousin is not very closely related at all. I have read somewhere that any two people on Earth are no more distantly related than 50th cousin.
I can only imagine who 0 is related to.
Oh brother! See post 21. How about the fact that some American’s have ancestors from as far back as the Mayflower.
I’m related to every President and to each one of you. I just don’t know by how many degrees of separation.
Good job! I just told my kids it meant how many times they were kicked out of our family reunions! ;-)
How racist!!
Of course....if you believe sciencists we came from 'LUCY', who was discovered in Africa...
They tend to use the same set of famous people (probably because they have them in their database) and ignore others (probably because they don't), but it is fascinating nevertheless.
I found out my wife and I were distant cousins through a common ancestor in Rhode Island via a common famous person, Lucille Ball.
You might have even more fun. Any idea what the population of Martha's Vineyard was circa 1670? I'd bet you'd be working with an even smaller pool of ancestors than most of us.
One of the truly fascinating things about genealogy in this era is just how little people moved from one generation to the next. They might marry someone from the adjacent county but that's generally as far as it goes.
Then you have some major event like the American Revolution, completion of the Erie Canal or completion of a railroad and, all of a sudden, the next generation is moving far away.
My Dad had Dutch ancestors on New York from almost the time that Peter Minuit purchased Manhattan Island and they barely move-- Staten Island, Brooklyn Heights, west end of Long Island, that's about it, for more than 150 years. Then several of them join the American Revolution and congress can't pay their promised pensions and, boom, within 20 years, they are all in the Finger Lakes region of New York where congress awarded land grants in lieu of the pensions. A generation or so later, the Erie Canal gets completed and they're out of there.
Is he related to the infamous 14th Century Count Vlad Romney?
Well, at least he’s not his own grandpa, like so many of us!
Imagine my surprise 4 years ago to find out I was distant kin to Obama. As a white conservative growing up in the Ozark mountains of Arkansas as my parents, grandparents and great grandparents did, it was a stunner.
Good one.
Do the math. A 50th cousin would share 1/2^52 in common genetic material or 1/45 quadrillionth. You've got to get down to 31st cousins or so to even come close to equaling the earth's current population or 27th cousins or so to get to the half billion or so people who inhabited the entire earth before the industrial revolution.
It is interesting that that half billion number remained relatively stable for most of recorded history, fluctuating in a fairly narrow range of plus or minus about 200 million.
The earth only became capable of supporting more than that number once capitalism was invented.
Is that the same Hutchinson who was hanged? If so, then she is also a relative of mine as well as Mary Dyer/Dwyer..the Quaker martyr.
Dwyer is a great grandmother of mine..Hutchinson was on my Moms side and Dwyer my dads. They were hanged for preaching the Quaker faith in Boston. Dwyer was hanged jun of 1660 in Boston commons. She was also known as Mrs Mary Stewart.
He's my 10th cousin, common ancestors Matthew Allyn and Margaret Wyott/Wyatt.
I wondered because just about every single president is descended from royalty. Obama is said to be descended from Henry I (or II), too, on his mother's side.
I can figure relationships the hard way but can't explain it. I type two columns of generations, one for them and one for me. They start with common ancestor parent then child child child on down as far as necessary in each column, ending with me in mine and the name I want to know the relationship in the other. I can't use my genealogy program because it's "stuck" on my bad computer but there is a calculator here:
Perfect succinct explanation. My dad used to try to explain it over and over. Finally I get it when I started filling in the family tree in genealogy. Some people can probably do it in their head. I can if not too far back.
Jeez. I hope it doesn’t compel you to vote for him now ;-)
That is funny. I have an uncle who makes the same claim. Is that you uncle Brad?
To start that trace one would need to know who his parents are.
Good points.... Both of them.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.