# That famous person is related to WHO? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [July 14, 2011, 7:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/that-famous-person-is-related-to-who/589049 "2011-07-14T19:34:34Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 9
**Author:** ![JKellyMap](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jkellymap/32/15880_2.png) [@JKellyMap](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JKellyMap)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2011, 1:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/that-famous-person-is-related-to-who/589049/161 "2011-07-21T01:50:45Z")
i just have to say…this is a terrific thread ---
**Author:** ![Obeseus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/bbce88/32.png) [@Obeseus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Obeseus)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2011, 2:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/that-famous-person-is-related-to-who/589049/162 "2011-07-21T02:21:24Z")
Chuck Yeager, first pilot to break the sound barrier, is the uncle of major league baseball player Steve Yeager. Charles Sweeney, who piloted “Fat Man” over Nagasaki, was the uncle of Boston Bruins hockey player Don Sweeney. Herbert Schwarzkopf of the New Jersey state police, who was a lead investigator in the Lindbergh kidnapping, was the father of Stormin’ Norman Schwarzkopf of Desert Storm fame. Fictional character Britt Reid (the Green Hornet) is a descendant of the nephew of John Reid (the Lone Ranger.) The degree of kinship depends whether you go with the radio or television events. ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2011, 2:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/that-famous-person-is-related-to-who/589049/163 "2011-07-21T02:45:06Z")
> [@Obeseus](#): > > Charles Sweeney, who piloted “Fat Man” over Nagasaki… And I knew his navigator! He got us into Bokscar when we went to Dayton. The matter-of-fact reality of the aircraft reminded me of “the banality of evil.” It was just an airplane. He was just a guy i’d had dinner with. Lots of banality that you could not argue with, but the evil was in your interpretation of what happened that day. ---
**Author:** ![williambaskerville](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/f14d63/32.png) [@williambaskerville](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/williambaskerville)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2011, 6:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/that-famous-person-is-related-to-who/589049/164 "2011-07-21T06:17:57Z")
This one is indeed about someone being related to WHO ? Doctor Who’s daughter played Doctor Who’s daughter, had a baby by him and is reportedly enaged to him. That possibly merits some explanation. Georgia Moffett is the daughter of Peter Davison, the fifth Doctor Who. and played the Doctor’s cloned daughter in 2008, when David Tennant was playing the tenth Doctor. She subsequently developed a relationship with David Tennant,and they had a child together. It’s also been reported they’re engaged, but I understand they’ve never confirmed this publicly. Since their daughter is both the child and grandchild of Doctor Who, she obviously needs to be worked into a Whovian plotline urgently. ---
**Author:** ![Wheelz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wheelz/32/5718_2.png) [@Wheelz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wheelz)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2011, 12:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/that-famous-person-is-related-to-who/589049/165 "2011-07-21T12:26:00Z")
> [@Sampiro](#): > > Shalhoub’s wife, [Brooke Adams](http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000724/), is a busy and recognizable character actress. She was on Monk several times. She’s a descendant of John and Abigail Adams. A former Playboy Playmate named [Stephanie Adams](http://www.allstarpics.net/0043011/016735190/stephanie-adams-pic.html) (SFW pic) also claims to be a direct descendant of John. I have no idea if she really is. ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2011, 1:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/that-famous-person-is-related-to-who/589049/166 "2011-07-21T13:10:48Z")
Peter Benchley, author of Jaws, is the grandson of Algonquin Round Table member Robert Benchley. ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [July 22, 2011, 1:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/that-famous-person-is-related-to-who/589049/167 "2011-07-22T13:24:34Z")
Early SNL writer Rosie Shuster is the daughter of comedian Frank Shuster of Wayne and Shuster fame and a cousin of Superman co-creator, Joe Shuster. And she met Lorne Michaels at age 15, married and divorced him. ---
**Author:** ![tdn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/94ad74/32.png) [@tdn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tdn)\ **Post date:** [July 22, 2011, 2:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/that-famous-person-is-related-to-who/589049/168 "2011-07-22T14:48:32Z")
I’m trying to find out if singer Katie Mayhew is related to Martha’s Vineyard settler Thomas Mayhew. I found Thomas’s geneology online, but it stops at someone born in 1812. Nothing I can find out about Katie mentions him. But Thomas’s descendants live on the island to this day. ---
**Author:** ![tumbleddown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e9bcb4/32.png) [@tumbleddown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tumbleddown)\ **Post date:** [July 22, 2011, 6:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/that-famous-person-is-related-to-who/589049/169 "2011-07-22T18:51:12Z")
> [@astorian](#): > > Actor Mark Harmon gives us a lot of material One that wasn’t mentioned is that his sister Kelly (not the one who married Ricky Nelson) was once Mrs. John Delorean, of car manufacturing fame, or rather infamy. > [@Sampiro](#): > > Elizabeth Montgomery…then married William Asher who produced _Bewitched_, which worked out nicely for them both: she was kind of a last minute substitute for Samantha when the original actress cast, Tammy Grimes, reneged to do a play just before the pilot was shot. Asher and Montgomery had a long marriage and friendly divorce. William Asher’s marrage after Montgomery was to actress Joyce Bulifant, probably best remembered as the pageboy’ed blonde regular in the sixth seat on the game show “Match Game.” (Or the mother of the sick little girl in the movie “Airplane.”) Bulifant’s son, John Mallory Asher (from Bulifant’s second marriage but adopted by Asher) who is an actor/director, was married for a time to Jenny McCarthy. In another game of connect the family trees, this time musical, folk singers Loudon Wainwright III and Kate McGarrigle are the parents of singers Martha Wainwright and Rufus Wainwright. Loudon is also the father of Lucy Wainwright Roche, whose mother is Suzzy Roche of the folk group The Roches. Rufus Wainwright, though gay and engaged to his partner Jorn Weisbrodt, had a daughter this past spring, with Lorca Cohen, whose father is none other than the legendary Leonard Cohen. Lots of good genes in that little girl’s pool. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![jehan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f6c823/32.png) [@jehan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jehan)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2011, 1:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/that-famous-person-is-related-to-who/589049/170 "2011-07-24T01:06:14Z")
> [@42fish](#): > > Brian Forster (the second Chris Partridge) is also a great-great-great grandson of Charles Dickens. He’s also the step-grandson of Alan Napier (Alfred the Butler in the ‘Batman’ TV series). Napier, meanwhile, was a cousin of British PM Neville Chamberlain. Brian was also the stepson of character actor Whit Bissell. (From Time Tunnel, also Cmdr Lurry from The Trouble with Tribbles). ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2011, 7:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/that-famous-person-is-related-to-who/589049/171 "2011-07-24T07:29:37Z")
Jackie Mason has an illegitimate daughter he’s never acknowledged though DNA confirmed she is his and he was ordered to pay child support for her. She’s now in her 20s, works as a comic under the name [Sheba Mason](http://www.punchlinesandpregnant.com/About_Sheba_Mason.html), and actually has written an autobiographical musical on her (non)relationship with her father. (No idea if it’s any good.) David Cassidy is the father of Katie Cassidy, though she only began going by his surname when she was a teenager. Her mother (a former girlfriend of David, but they were never married) has trashed him in the press a couple of times for waiting until she’s famous to openly acknowledge her and for being far more her friend than a father figure. ---
**Author:** ![Canyon\_Surfer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Canyon\_Surfer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Canyon_Surfer)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2011, 9:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/that-famous-person-is-related-to-who/589049/172 "2011-07-24T09:39:04Z")
Another link from NCIS. Actress Sasha Alexander who played Caitlin Todd in the first two series is married to director Edoardo Ponti, son of the late film producer Carlo Ponti and actress Sophia Loren ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2011, 2:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/that-famous-person-is-related-to-who/589049/173 "2011-07-24T14:34:52Z")
Olivia Newton-John is the grand-daughter of famed Physicist (and Nobel Prize Winner) Max Born. When I was at Rochester, “everyone knew” that Professor Emil Wolf was her godfather. This turns out not to be true, although there is a connection (Wolf added chapters to Born’s book **Optik** so that the Engilsh edition, **Principles of Optics** is universally known as “Born and Wolf”. It’s practically the Bible of Optfics.) ---
**Author:** ![42fish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/4/b487fb/32.png) [@42fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/42fish)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2011, 11:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/that-famous-person-is-related-to-who/589049/174 "2011-07-24T23:38:12Z")
Helena Bonham Carter’s great-grandfather was British Prime Minister H.H. Asquith Daniel Day-Lewis is the son of British Poet Laureate Cecil Day-Lewis ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [July 25, 2011, 1:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/that-famous-person-is-related-to-who/589049/175 "2011-07-25T13:25:13Z")
The FUCK I AM OLD! department: 19 year old rapper Pablo Dylan is Bob’s _grandson_ ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [July 25, 2011, 4:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/that-famous-person-is-related-to-who/589049/176 "2011-07-25T16:50:38Z")
One I just heard about. Dr Henry Heimlich (inventor of the Heimlich Maneuver) is the son-in-law of Arthur Murray (the dance instructor) and the cousin of Anson Williams (Potsie on _Happy Days_). ---
**Author:** ![TreacherousCretin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/treacherouscretin/32/476_2.png) [@TreacherousCretin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TreacherousCretin)\ **Post date:** [July 25, 2011, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/that-famous-person-is-related-to-who/589049/177 "2011-07-25T17:56:14Z")
Just to be thorough, here’s one that everybody already knows, Kurt Vonnegut’s older brother Bernard was the atmospheric scientist credited with discovering that silver iodide could be used effectively in cloud seeding to produce snow and rain. . ---
**Author:** ![kirk1168](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/45deac/32.png) [@kirk1168](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kirk1168)\ **Post date:** [July 25, 2011, 7:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/that-famous-person-is-related-to-who/589049/178 "2011-07-25T19:20:23Z")
For the Star Wars geeks among us: Ewan “Obi-Wan Kenobi” McGregor is nephew to Denis “Wedge Antilles” Lawson. ---
**Author:** ![UntouchedTakeaway](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/d78d45/32.png) [@UntouchedTakeaway](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UntouchedTakeaway)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2011, 12:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/that-famous-person-is-related-to-who/589049/179 "2011-07-27T00:19:43Z")
> [@Sampiro](#): > > \ > > Stretching it but I’ll mention anyway: Carol Burnett was the niece by marriage of William Saroyan. Her first husband, Don, was his nephew and she briefly went by the name Carol Saroyan. They divorced before her self named TV show (which was produced by her second husband) premiered. > \ Carol Matthau, Walter Matthau’s 2nd wife and the mother of his son Charlie, was married _twice_ to William Saroyan (she didn’t get enough of his crap the first time around, apparently). They had 2 children - Aram & Lucy. Carol Matthau herself had an interesting life. Her mother gave birth to Carol at a very young age and Carol never knew her father. Her mother then married a man and had a 2nd child. When she brought home the infant, the husband pointed at Carol & said “Good - now we can get rid of _that_ one”. According to Carol, her mother said “Can you hold the baby for a minute?” and then packed them both up and left her husband. Her mother’s 2nd husband was Charles Marcus, the head of Bendix Corporation :eek: Her 2 best childhood (and adult friends) were Oona O’Neill Chaplin and Gloria Vanderbilt. Her autobiography “Life Among the Porcupines” is one of the funniest things I’ve ever read. UT ---
**Author:** ![Tess](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e480ec/32.png) [@Tess](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tess)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2011, 10:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/that-famous-person-is-related-to-who/589049/180 "2011-07-28T22:12:49Z")
I’ve never heard how closely they were related, but Clare Boothe Luce was related to the famous 19th century acting family the Booths. Evidently Luce’s branch of the family tacked on an ‘e’ to distance themselves after actor Junius’ son John Wilkes went and stirred up some sort of trouble in D.C. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/that-famous-person-is-related-to-who/589049.md?page=8) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/that-famous-person-is-related-to-who/589049.md?page=10)