***Official Ancestry and DNA Thread***

[Pablo]

My family is all from Sicily. Nonna Giovatelli-Gorgonzola always made a real spicy meatball and I call pasta sauce "tomato gravy"!!!!

/takes DNA test. Definitely just English with some mutt mixed in.

[srvy]

American Pharoah.
https://www.postandcourier.com/news/...c075593f4.html

[oldman]

I find it interesting to see what parts of our history immigrants played a part in. There was a documentary on the Smithsonian Channel I watched the other day about an all Irish brigade in the Civil War that was pretty interesting. I did some research for my cousin and found this forgotten piece of history a little closer to to KC. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Cole_Camp_(1861)

[Iowanian]

I wonder how many people find out bad things....like...you're a bastard and your mother let a stranger slip one past the goalie...

[BigRedChief]

Originally Posted by Iowanian

I wonder how many people find out bad things....like...you're a bastard and your mother let a stranger slip one past the goalie...

On my wife's side she had one of those handwritten accounting of the family tree. It was actually accurate except for one thing that made no sense. It appeared to skip a generation in the 1920's. Turns out they were just trying to cover up a bad piece of history.
Turns out that her 4th grandfather, the son of a well respected pastor in town, killed a man in a bar fight. Found a newspaper article that confirmed what happened. He was drunk, started a fight and killed the guy. Left a young wife and kids and was living in an hotel. Multiple arrests for public drunkenness.

[Oxford]

Originally Posted by Iowanian

I wonder how many people find out bad things like your ancestor let a stranger slip one past the goalie...

Oddly enough, its possible in my case... Paternal GF adopted (family name is Thayer), but my DNA profile is a close match to a Benson, and there are marriages between the Thayer and Benson families back about 200+ years.

That's one explanation anyway.........

[BigRedChief]

Originally Posted by Oxford

Oddly enough, its possible in my case... Paternal GF adopted (family name is Thayer), but my DNA profile is a close match to a Benson, and there are marriages between the Thayer and Benson families back about 200+ years.

That's one explanation anyway.........

DNA doesn’t lie. Whatever it says is about as close to “fact” as anything about us, who we are that ever gets confirmed.

[oldman]

Originally Posted by Oxford

Oddly enough, its possible in my case... Paternal GF adopted (family name is Thayer), but my DNA profile is a close match to a Benson, and there are marriages between the Thayer and Benson families back about 200+ years.

That's one explanation anyway.........

Hey, it's hard to court when dad won't let you borrow the mule.

[Frosty]

My dad's side of the family is pretty well researched back quite a few generations but my mom was adopted so I did 23 and Me a bunch of years back to see what her background is and if I have any genetic ticking time bombs. Turned out that she was mostly from a very specific minority in Finland/Russia. So that was interesting, I guess.

The funny thing I found related to a great-great-grandmother that the family usually refers to as "Cherokee Mary". I was expecting to have at least a little Native American because of her but actually had 0%. I do have about 4% Sub-Saharan African DNA so now I expect that Cherokee Mary was actually Mulatto Mary.

[Stewie]

My sister did the Ancestory DNA thing. We know our family history back to the 1400s. All my grandparents emigrated from Norway/Sweden in the early 1900s. It confirmed our history, but there was some Irish DNA. We figured one of our Viking relatives brought back a hot chick from Ireland after a raid.

[BigRedChief]

Originally Posted by Stewie

My sister did the Ancestory DNA thing. We know our family history back to the 1400s. All my grandparents emigrated from Norway/Sweden in the early 1900s. It confirmed our history, but there was some Irish DNA. We figured one of our Viking relatives brought back a hot chick from Ireland after a raid.

so it was your family that kidnapoed my 16th great grandma?

[morphius]

My family name is very well documented. We got here in 1638, from England, and the first was a constable and tavern owner (must have been an interesting career path). My direct ancestor Nathan fought against the English in the revolutionary war. My relatives moved out of the Mayflower family area into Pennsylvanian, through Iowa and into MN as farmers. The first into MN also fought for the North during the civil war. My family stayed on that farm until my Fathers generation. Funniest piece was I looked up the manifest to the ship and saw the name of my team lead, at the time, and saw that name on there. When I talked to her she knew all about it as well. Basically found myself sitting next to someone in KC whose family came over on the same ship nearly 400 years before. Kind of a "small world" feeling.

My Mothers Mom was 100% Norwegian with both her parents migrating from Norway. We have info on the ancestors there, but it is a bit messy as Nordics don't really follow standard last naming convention. Her Fathers line escaped from Scotland to Ireland, than later moved to the Canada and migrated into the US from there.

I have info on my other Grandmothers line, but I don't remember anything of note, other than it should also be Irish as well.

["Bob" Dobbs]

3-4 years ago, my dad did the 23 & me thing... He passed away a year ago, and in reading his tree, I saw something that definitely didn't belong. Turns out, I've had a half sister for the past 50 years that NOBODY knew about. I mean, not ever even a hint. He took that secret to his grave. Apparently mom didn't know (she passed before he did). Since then, we've contacted her and learned that SHE knew but was sworn to secrecy. We plan on meeting up this summer when she comes to KC.

[JD10367]

I dunno, I guess this stuff is like going to a psychic: if they predict shit that hits close to home, it’s easier to believe in it. I know one set of grandparents is from Sicily, and the other set is either Sicily or southern Italy. Did Ancestry.com snd they nailed it.