|
25% of my anscestry is pretty much lost to me. My mother's father died when she was six and any remaining connection to his family was tenuous at best and did not continue beyond her.
For the other 75% I don't know much. My paternal grandmother has a well research family tree that is pretty much all people in the United States as far back as the mid-1700s. First in what is now Maine and then shifting to Kansas and then a significant post-WWII migration to the northwest to work int the timber industry.
A German surname that was in the United States at the time of the Revolution. For a long time I liked to think that they came from a group of Hessians brought from Germany by the British to find on their side in the Revolution. But apparently that's not true. No information on the actual migration or where they came from in Europe. In the 200+ years of that family tree segment, not one single person has ever risen to even local prominence. Farmers, sheepherders, and timbermen for the most part.
I know the names of three of my great-grandparents (and only because I knew them personally) and none older than that.
I can't decide if this is an american of an "American Story" or essentially the epitome of one since I am so engrained genetically within this country that I can't barely trace myself to a root outside of it.
However, my non-genetic family has all been immigrants (my stepfather from Germany; and Lani from Japan). I ended up related personally to people who fought on the wrong side in World War II in both theaters.
|