OK, in accordance with the Prince theme that must b present in all topics...I christen this thread "Family Name"...in honor of Prince...

Now...who has done their geneology on their ancestors and came up with results?! Any outstanding discoveries? I want 2 hear stories! Have u ever found some1 of a different color in ur family (like Thomas Jefferson's descendants)--and it just blew u away?

And also, if u could provide some good websites that would b easy 2 start me off on. I have looked at some but not found much since I have a very strange last name that no1 else has. It also is not very helpful that most will not list those who r living and born after a certain date (long ago) and that certain records must b paid 4 b4 they can b accessed!

I think our name is British and a "k" got dropped off the end. It looks Slavic, but that theory is doubtful. It's increasingly hard also because my one great grandfather was adopted and so his last name was not his real last name......well, it's confusing. But at any rate, it still interests me.

Okay Neps I am posting here but I don't have much to add.

I have never done any geneology research so I am unable to answer any of your questions.

One time I was on-line and I was looking for the meaning of my last name and I ran into a lot of the pages that you are talking about that wanted me to pay for information.

My advice to you would be to start by talking to your grandparents (if they are still around) because in my case my grandparents really have a lot of the family information written down already. I think this was more important to the past generations.

Well good luck.

Good topic neps.

I did some research on mine (my real surname is not MEAT, but I have been called that!).

I'm English by birth, but my family are from Ireland, but my name actually comes from France.

One big family eh!?

When Prince started bantering around names to people in the crowd, that bothered me, because he hadn't done his homework or was trying to cause shit.

He called people Lynch or Blackburn, which seemed to many to place a menacing quality to the names we have.

Yet Blackburn is very misleading. The name blackburn is a very old traditional English name. Nothing to do with "black" and "burn".

Its a name that goes back to the time of the mayflower and actually refers to people from the north of England. "Burn" refered to the Scottish for river (excuse my spelling), and people who lived in the North West of England, near the scottish border, lived on a river which was one, dirty, and two, polluted by the coal.

The town of Blackburn is very near the area the name came from.

The name simply came from the river.

SquirrelMeat said:

Interesting topic Nep.

My Grandfather (on my mother's side) and all of his sisters and brothers were half white. And they all look white. Hair, skin coloring, eye color everything. My grandfather had light blue/grey eyes. Oh by the way, did I mention this was in the South.

All the children have this white mans last name. However, no marriage certificate was “found,” but when this man died, he left all the land to my great-grandmother and my family owns it today. We know his last name, but nothing else of who he was or anything else about his family.

When one of my great uncles died a few years ago they allowed him to be buried in one of the "white only" cemeteries because his father is buried there. He is and will be the only person of "color" to be buried there.

As a sidebar, my mother (who looks white also) was asked to do modeling for Barbizon back in the 50s while she was living in NY, but not as a black woman. They wanted her to “pass.” That’s what they called it back then. When a black person looked white enough to “Pass for white.” She declined.

You see, researching the family tree can be very “enlightening” to say the least.

Nep where does the quote in your signature come from?

I've never done geneology research, but my grandmother had before she passed years ago. All I remember is that Tomas Jan Masaryk, president of Czechoslovakia in 1918-35, is related to my family somehow. The name changed spelling to "Masarik" somewhere down the line, as well, within our family anyway.

All I remember is her showing me a picture of him in the Encylcopedia and some old letters she had from family. I really should look into this more...

p.s. if he did anything bad...I don't want to hear about it.



.
[This message was edited Sun Jul 21 19:28:48 PDT 2002 by AzureStar]

Hey Battier, did you know my grandmother is Russian?

its funny u should start this topic as the other day while at work and really bored, it occured to me that every generation u go back your direct ansestry is doubled (obvious i know) eg 2 parents , four grandparents 8 graet grand parents,, please bear with me, if you go back 20 generations or approx 500 years your direct ancestry would be about 1 million people, do the math it works, but this is where it gets wierd because if you go back another 500 years or 20 generations that figure would be 1 million million which is obviously impossible, in conlusion we are all from a smaller gene pool than most people would think,

so practicly evereyone u meet, will have a common ancestor with u if you were able to look back at your family trees for a few centuries.

ponder this over a smoke, and wow

Neps, I have recently become VERY interested in geneology research. My interests have been mainly to find my half brothers and sisters - my father was 83 when he died (I am 32) and I found out after he passed that I had SEVERAL half brothers and half sisters that I may never meet unless they are also looking up their family name. I did meet one of my brothers about 2 years ago which was exciting. And, searching my father's name on http://www.google.com (of all places) led me to someone who posted a message on a message board saying they were looking for their GRANDFATHER (my father) so you'd be surprised what is on the internet! It's a wonderful tool for this type of thing. DON'T PAY ANYBODY to do the research for you.

I'm also very curious about my family history in general.
As far as I know, my generation of "kin" have been the only ones to marry or bear children outside their race (myself included). But I haven't dug much further (yet) but it really becomes compelling - you do want to learn more and more once you begin making the connections to your history.

Anyway, I have come across some really good websites to get you started. Many allow you to search WORLDWIDE records.
So here you go and good luck to you:

http://www.rootsweb.com
http://www.ancestory.com

One line of my family tree HAS been traced all the way back to Adam, and the connections to so many other families and peoples is ridiculous -- that's why I don't agree with a lot of discussions about racial pride. We're all so much more than race.

My family tree has been traced back to a nameless simian-type creature... my DNA has been proved to be 98% identical to various monkeys out there too...

I am 2% removed from a monkey...

My parents are in the iron and steel business. My mother irons and my father steal.

IceNine said:

Are you saying you are Pook?

IceNine said:

So you see no need to talk about race either, eh? Even if we only go back a couple thousand years in most of our family lines, there are many connections to other families and peoples. Why claim one race? Or is this issue more about pure-blooded superiority? Hmm, scary.

lovemachine said:

Me. ...because the ink in that booklet smells NASTY!

lust said:

That's y I love this geneology shit!

We could all b related 2 kellyanne or Bart Van Hemelen.

I might even b related 2...Nikki Giovanni. !!!

Update: This is a good site 4 any1 looking 4 1:

www.rootsweb.com

I actually got 9 matches in one category as well as others. Now if I can find some 4 MY wierd ass name, I know someone else could 2!

Apparently these people lived in...Weeks, Cornwall, England. Hmmm...where's that Unfortunately, they're all dead.

Nep2nes said:

More likely you find a past of inbreeding. Hence your messed up thought patterns...

Essence said:

It's getting old...really, it is.

IceNine said:

POOK?

Nep2nes said:

It's *GENEALOGY* by the way.

Definitely start with all of your living relatives. They can provide a wealth of information that you won't find in the library or online. Second the most useful website I have found is http://www.ancestry.com/ It is a pay site but some of the info is free. The free stuff is all you need when getting started.

Also check out Cyndi's list at http://www.cyndislist.com/ It is a very comprehesive site of links. My last link for now is http://www.ellisisland.org/ If your relatives came to the states through Ellis Island you can find ship records and the sort there. If you want more info feel free to drop me a note.

- Adam

Great topic, Nep2unes...thanks.

My family tree..
My mother is half Norgwegian/half English-Irish, and my father half Norwegian/half Swede-the Swedish half is the half we jokingly blame for all his drinking,,,hee hee.

Just as there are many Polish jokes in America, the same jokes can be found in Norway(my uncle, who lives in Oslo, tells me them every time i see him) about the Swedish. I imagine there are Swedish jokes about Norwegians, too.

Anyway, my aunt recently researched our family tree and made copies of it for existing family members)i found out i share the same name with my great grandfather and his grandfather(my great great great grand father-i think)--on my dad's side.
My mother named me without knowing any of this.
Obviously this is quite a common name in Norway, but it still seemed weird to see the names so close on the family tree--as timeline went back to the late 1700's.

--

On my mother's side, my grandfather was in the Irish mafia, and bootlegged whiskey in the early 1920's. He knew Al Capone- as many midwestern bootleggers did, and even served time in Levenwurth, Kansas. We didn't find this out until after he passed away in 1979, because my grandmother didn't want us to know he had been to prison. I later found out from my mother that my grandfather had been married once and had children before he married my grandmother.

His son, Larry, who's now in his 60's let us in all the info. Turned out, my grandfather even changed his name to his middle name "Raymond", as he didn't like his first name "Lawrence"... BUT named this son "Lawrence" (???)
I personally think he changed his name after he left prison, but we'll never really know why.

--
BTW, if you have xtra time, I just looked up 'Prohibition' in a word search and came up with this great site:

http://encarta.msn.com/fi...=761564677

Found some similarities between the reason the laws were repealed and today's drug laws...

peace.
[This message was edited Mon Jul 22 8:09:59 PDT 2002 by mrchristian]--sorry about the edits)
[This message was edited Mon Jul 22 8:12:07 PDT 2002 by mrchristian]
[This message was edited Thu Jul 25 8:23:03 PDT 2002 by mrchristian]

IceNine said:

That is the same for everyone, Icey

Interesting.

Before she died, my mother had gotten our family history back to 1835 - which is amazing for an African American family. Great-great grandfather Jake, who was listed in the 1900 census as a mulatto, was born free in Tennesse in 1935. There is one branch of the family that we have lost touch with, the Griffins. They looked absolutely white. They just moved away decades ago and changed their race and their lives.

I always wonder. Stories of African Americans who "passed" are very common. Anyone born in this country can never really be certain which side of slavery his or her family genes stem from.

On another note, I was in Georgia last week. Spent some time walking around an old plantation. Visited the plot of the family that owned the place. Off to the side, under the trees were the grave sites of the slaves. The graves were only marked with rocks. As I strolled by the anonymous rocks, the place demanded silence. I was dumbstruck. The history of this country is amazing.

Anyway, I have inherited my mother's notes. I plan to trace us back to Africa if I can. If I have time, I'll also check the white side of the family and see what's happening there.

Hints for research: *The Mormons are collecting A LOT of family information on everybody. And they don't mind sharing the info. *New census information is becoming available to the general public. *If you are African American most of those online pay sites are not going to be really helpful. The Afro-American Historical & Genealogy Society,Inc. maybe a good starting place. They are located in DC. Good luck and happy hunting.

One question Nep: Why don't you like Giovanni?

AzureStar said:

Err... ummm... no...

NOT POOK
POOK MONKEY
ICENINE NOT MONKEY
POOK TIRED NOW
POOK SLEEP

soulsplash said:

I don't see any reason to be proud of being "pure-blooded" anything either... it makes no sense to me. I guess I have no racial pride... who can say.

I am 100% mutt and proud of it.

IceNine said:

What's with all this nonsense?

The point of doing ur geneology is 4 find out who ur ancestors were, discover interesting family history and/or look at ur family's health history.

No1 here has mentioned looking for purebred roots, so let's stop with the snobbery shall we?