On my paternal side I found out that no they didn’t immigrate an uncle born before my father was born here in the USA. Both sides grandparents came over in the early 1800s. Which leads me to believe my paternal grandparents were both racists and assholes. Why? Because they refused to speak to my mother in English so she had to learn some German and hand signals. She was 17, had a bastard baby and was NA. Dad was not around much because he was working on the gas lines from Canada to Texas… but he stopped home long enough to have 6 kids. Meanwhile mom was working the farm, taking care of the kids and his elderly parents until they passed away.
On the maternal side I found out that great-grandpa was a black man from Virginia (b. 1853 and one census says mulatto, the next says black) who ended up in Canada where he met great-grandma. She was at the summer home for our NA band and she brought him to the winter home (Minn.). I also found out she had been married for a total of 3 times. I think one of the times goes back to the family legend of her being married to a French man who went back to his French wife. So I guess I don’t have any French in me since that guy wasn’t the father of my grandfather. I also haven’t come across any English blood in my lines. Turns out Churchill was a last name given by the Church and not by marriage.
Well, see my family has been here for a while. My favorite black sheep is Sir William Phipp, first royal governor of Mass Bay colony and slightly responsible for letting Salem happen. He was shipped back to London to stand trial for peculation but dropped dead first.
My maternal grandfather died at a young age - my mom was about 11 or so. Grandma remained single for the rest of her life.
When I was in my late teens or early 20s, I overheard a conversation between my mom and her brother, my Uncle Ben. The conversation included “Mamma” and “butcher” and some laughter. I asked my mom what she was talking about. She never fully answered me, but apparently, my grandmother was, on occasion, knockin’ boots with the neighborhood butcher.
There’s no real confusion, I think. [HS] is indeed my [HS]. The bit about “no closer than second cousins” was confusion on the part of 23&me or ancestry (dot) com, or maybe just weasel-wording the thing. 23&me, I’m pretty sure, simply did a basic statistical observation based on the number of genetic markers and interpreted it the way they did. I really don’t believe outfits like them do anything as complex as “rocket surgery” in the usual course of things.
So, to be clear, [HS] and I are both our Mother’s children. [HS]'s Dad is not/was not my Dad.
We had always heard that our family has some French Canadian heritage. Not too long ago, I noticed that Canadian actress Stevie Vallance resembles my mom at that age; Ms. Vallance also has a niece who strongly resembles my sisters at that age. Enough that I wonder if we have a common ancestor somewhere.
Well, unless that saint was a priest or nun, why aren’t they supposed to have descendants? Married people can be holy too!
Not exactly a “darK” secret, but:
My maternal grandmother was from a large family; her father had several kids by one wife, who died, then he remarried and had a few more. It was a very, very Catholic family.
Then a very distant relative tracked us down while doing genealogical research.
Turns out g-grandfather had been married before; he and his wife immigrated to the US and there are records of her running a shop in Baltimore… then she disappeared from the scene. We don’t know whether they divorced or she died. At some point he moved to another state, changed his last name, and married the first of the 2 wives we knew about.
Turns out, he also changed his religion - he was born Jewish. We don’t know whether the conversion was a true matter of faith, or social / economic expediency but I suspect the latter.
When the cousin tracked us down and we learned all of this, one of my brothers tried arguing that the fellow wasn’t really Jewish. I haven’t figured out why he cared one way or the other (he’s a jackass and we don’t keep in touch).
I just found out last week (along with other cousins) an interesting story. The basic plot isn’t that shocking, but my great aunt’s reaction was the kicker.
Great Aunt Kelly, born around the turn of the century, met her husband and they decided on a quick marriage, something quite common among devout Mormons even now. Right after their wedding, Uncle Bill went down to Las Vegas and Aunt Kelly traveled there shortly after. Nine months after the wedding, they had Cousin John, but he was a sick child and it was too far up to Southern Idaho to travel with him until he was 18 months old or so.
Fast forward, and as an adult he needed to get a passport. Except that Clark County didn’t have a record of his birth. Subsequently, it was discovered that his mother had lied to everyone about the DOB, and he had actually been born two months prior.
He died of an unfortunate accident in his 40s(?) and his wife Mary had his correct birth date put on the tombstone. This was the first indication to Aunt Kelly that her secret was out, and she never forgave Mary for that.
We cousins just found out about that at this reunion, and when I asked my mother to confirm, she just acknowledged it, without saying why she never mentioned it to us. She left out any negatives from our family history.
My father’s father was unknown - my grandmother had a teenage pregnancy (in the 1920s) and never identified the father. My father was raised as his mother’s sibling.
I assumed that I was just your basic Scots/Irish like all my known ancestors and pretty much everyone else in the part of Australia my father was from.
Then I got a DNA test, mostly out of curiosity about my mystery grandfather. Turns out he was Jewish, and apparently I take after him because I’m 31% Ashkenazi Jew and several more percent “southern European”. In case you’re wondering, you get 50% of your genes from each parent, but it’s common to get a skewed result from your grandparents. In fact you can’t get 25% from each grandparent because 23 chromosomes don’t divide into 2; if you get half a chromosome then ancestry is not going to be your biggest problem.
My father was in his mid 40s when I was born, and he died when I was 17, so he’ll never know, and he probably never did know. My grandmother died around the same time. I’m pretty happy to be crypto Jewish. My mum seemed a bit disturbed by it, when I told her. I’m an atheist, so the religion part makes no difference to me, and I’m not going to apply for Israeli citizenship, because Israel already has enough problems. I just think it’s cool.
Chromosomes don’t stay separate. Read about chromosomal crossover. It’s a key step in producing ova and sperm. So you don’t get an complete chromosome from a grandparent.
OK, I figured someone would have a better understanding of it than me, I’m just repeating the dumbed-down version I was told when I asked why I inherited more than 25% of my DNA from a grandparent.
