My Dad’s side of the family has been in the US for quite some time. Indeed, my Grandmother’s line includes someone on the Mayflower, and people who settled in the Pioneer Valley of Western Massachusetts in the 1640s. They remained in the Pioneer Valley until the mid 19th Century, then moved out to Chicago, where my Dad was born in 1951. A family homestead still exists near Northampton.
My mom’s side of the family is French Canadian, three of her four grandparents were born in Quebec. They settled in the Pioneer Valley of Western Massachusetts in the first two decades of the 20th Century, as part of the wave of French Canadians attracted by the mills in Holyoke and Chicopee. I don’t know which of them arrived last, but it would have been before 1920, as my grandfather was born in Springfield in 1921.
My maternal grandmother’s father was born on a farm in Quebec in the 1880s. He was one of 14 children, and I believe only two of them made it to adulthood. He was a carpenter, and died of a stroke in the 1940s. I have the feminized version of his name, and I was born roughly 100 years later. It boggles my mind to think of how different my life is to his.
I also think it is really neat that both sides of my family spent significant amounts of time in the Pioneer Valley, brought there at different times for different reasons.
Most Recent Paternal: a Curphey from the Isle of Man around 1870. Least Recent Paternal: probably a Payne in 1630’s Connecticut.
Most Recent Maternal: my Morrell grandmother, born in Australia and raised into her early teens in southern England; came through Ellis Island 1909. Least Recent Maternal: Daniel Finch, on the Winthrop Expedition from England, 1630.
I don’t have my geneology papers handy but I think it may be a close tie between my paternal grandmother’s parents and my maternal grandmother’s parents who both came over sometime around 1890. The paternal grandmother’s parents came over from Italy. Actually, I think her father came first and later sent for the mother. Unfortunately, the father’s name got changed at Ellis Island and we have not been able to get any information on our Italian geneology. The maternal great grandparents came from Ireland.
On my father’s side, my grandfather came over from Czechoslovakia in 1924. He left from a German port on an Italian ship called the America, which I find rather amusing.
On my mother’s side, the most recent I know of was my great-howevermany greats it takes-grandfather from 6 generations back, who came from Germany about 120 years ago and started farming in Minnesota.