Counterfactual Family History
Counterfactuals are the study of “what-ifs” in history. Though there is some debate to the real value of counterfactual history, one acknowledged purpose is to evaluate the real significance of people or events in history.
We are interested in knowing the significance of historical events in your family history, and so are offering this counterfactual poll. The results will be included in an upcoming issue of Ancestry Magazine.
Read some of the considerations below and then take the poll here.
Loading ...1. Though popular history claims Sir Alexander Fleming was the first to discover the Penicillium mold from which penicillin is made (in 1928), in fact it was discovered more than 50 years earlier by British scientist, John Tyndall. Nothing much came of Tyndall’s discovery and so the world would have to wait until 1942 for a drug to be developed into a form that could effectively treat bacterial infection. If work to convert Penicillium into a usable anti-bacterial treatment had begun with Tyndall in 1875, penicillin may have been saving lives in the last years of the 19th century. That means it would have been available for wounded soldiers in World War I, to treat diseases such as pneumonia, and for a variety of other life-saving tasks.
2. When talks began about a transcontinental railroad in America, two main routes were suggested: the central route, which is what was ultimately built, and a southern route, which ran through Texas, avoiding the Rocky Mountains. The main benefit of this route is that it would avoid the snow and inclement weather of its central counterpart. The United States even purchased land in what is now Arizona and New Mexico to facilitate the route. A variety of political issues, many involving the Civil War and the benefit this railroad would be to the South, influenced the decision to build along the central route.
3. Though President Wilson vetoed this immigration act multiple times (as did several presidents before him), Congress overrode him and it went into effect in May of 1917. Among a variety of things, this act prevented many Asians and Pacific Islanders from entering the country, as well as anyone over the age of 16 who was illiterate. The exclusion list also included idiots, alcoholics, prostitutes, polygamists, and others.
4. The bill, which was passed in 1944, helped thousands of veterans of World War II, the Korean War, and Vietnam go to college, buy houses, and get jobs For a variety of reasons, mostly disagreements about how exactly it should function, it almost did not pass.
We’d love to read your comments and see what events in history had the greatest impact on your family.
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I’m nobody, just an ordinary joe. I claim no fame for myself because of what my ancesters did… and have little respect for those that do.
I’m one of the relatives who is seeking for a long lost cousin in such a big universe. We don’t know each other. The history of our family parted us before we were born in defferent countries. The World War 2 is to be blamed in separating our ancestry. My uncle, (V)Biktor Sakheishvili, went to that war as a volanteer and was lost as there wasn’t his name in the death records and besides, family heard a story about his captivation in Europe. They said he was able to escape from his captivity and ran to Greece, where he married a rich Greek woman and had a daughter from his wife . As if then they moved to the United Stases and before his death he asked his daughter to give his surname-Sakheishvili - to her 2 sons and find his family in Georgia. What we know is that she tried to find us 10 years ago, publishing her letter in a Russian magazine, telling her and her father’s story coinciding to ours. Our family friend told us about that letter and that she was living in Brazil. Actually, I possess very scanty information about her existance, I don’t even know her name. All this aggravates the real situation -to find each other. Having read your letter, I had been inspired with a little hope-maybe some day I would be given chance to meet her…
I’m an ordinary joe as well, and while I don’t want to claim fame for something that I had no hand in, I am proud of the things that my family accomplished. Because of my family, I have a history that is steeped in American tradition; some fought in the revolution, some fought for the Confederacy, and even though the South lost the war, my ancestors stood up and fought for what they believed was right, and I am proud to say that, as far as I, and other members of my family have dug back, I am an 11th generation American.