We’ve all had friends who just seemed so much like us that we had to be related, right? But have you ever put family history to the test to see if you really were related? Tell us all about it here.
I was parked in front of the TV a few nights ago when I received an unexpected phone call from Bob Velke, owner of Wholly Genes. He had a puzzle he suspected (correctly, as it turns out) I wouldn’t be able to resist. After we spoke, he summarized it in an e-mail:
My father-in-law, Thomas F. Reid, was a 26-year-old captain in 3rd U.S. Infantry Regiment (“The Old Guard”) in Ft. Myer, Virginia on 22 November 1963 when President John F. Kennedy was assassinated.
From the time I filled out my first family tree for a homework assignment in second grade, I knew two things: I was Norwegian, and I liked learning about my family. Fortunately, one of my grandmother’s aunts—Aunt Bertye—was still with us and never ran out of family history to share.
One day when I was 15, I sat down with 94-year-old Aunt Bertye, a box of old photos, and a tape recorder, and I had her identify as many people in the pictures as she could.
I have never liked the term “shirttail relative.” However unintentionally, it consigns some very interesting people to afterthought status. How many opportunities for information and illumination are lost to this dismissive epithet and its laundry overtones? You never know when a “shirttail” will turn out to be someone quite significant—someone I call a heartstring relative.
Do you laugh when you see yourself in an old photograph and wonder, “How could I have worn that?” Looking back, it is surprising to see how much clothes have changed in our lifetimes. But the same thing happened in the times of our ancestors.
No wonder Aunt Snake didn’t know what to call her big sister.
Our grandfather “Pappy” was notorious for labeling family members with a nickname. Some were cute and funny and some, well, were neither.
Sometime before 1986, my cousin David (a.k.a. Goliath) and I had the opportunity to sit down with Pappy and chat about these names and some other things. This was when I first heard of Squidge.
Jim Killeen was satisfying his curiosity when he Googled his own name and found 24 other Jim Killeens. With little more than that name and sometimes an occupation, Jim contacted as many of them as he could track down.
Most of the Jim Killeens were skeptical, but seven eventually agreed to talk.
Still looking for ancestral treasures in a closet or attic? Family historian Craig Pfannkuche, president of Memory Trail Research, Inc., would tell you to dig deeper—into the outhouse. Outhouses, says Pfannkuche, can provide amazing information that you just won’t find anywhere else.
I remember watching my mother tear the fluffiest pancake I’d ever seen into chunks, crumbling it into the pan, sprinkling it with sugar, and serving it up with a side of family history as she talked about her own mother making Kaiserschmarren. According to Mom, the Austrian dish’s name meant Emperor’s Dessert, although in German a schmarr is also a cut or slash.
Tarot cards. Crystal balls. Psychics. Fortune cookies. Whether you’re a believer or not, you can’t deny that mortals have spent thousands of years trying to unlock the mysteries of the supernatural and change their fates by divining the future.
( ca. 2000 BC )
You have probably heard that Druids were pagan tree worshippers.
