Mostly German. All of my mom's ancestors migrated from Austria and Germany. Dad half German, 1/4 each British and Irish. Have never done any ancestry searches.

I've traced mine back to the 1500's. We are mainly of Scottish and Irish descent. I am very interested in our family history.

Mine has been traced back to before the 1200s on the English, and Scotch sides. What I find interesting tho is that every war till WW1 families were split as at least two people in each would fight on different sides.( as in the war between the states one went north and one brother went to the south. Each spent time in the other sides prison.)

It would be nearly impossible to trace. Not only was my father born in Russia he was adopted by his German stepfather and his bio father's name was never known to him as far as I know. We are the oldest living generation now.

I could trace my mother's lineage since they were a rather important family back in Russia but so much is hearsay and there was so much hiding out during the revolution in attempts to escape. My cousin in recent years found family with the last name that fits certain criteria and may well be blood relations but their last name is spelled differently.

I just figure it like this. I am closer in genetic appearance to my father's side of the family. I have just enough slightly Asian characteristics to know that my genetic history includes the Mongolian race. That is enough for me. Knowing any more than that doesn't change who I am.

I also have seen my DH's family get into genealogy and so much turns out to be a bunch of wishful thinking or hype. One of his cousins sent a list for example of all the male lineage. It would be fine but when you do the math the great greats were siring sons at the age of 10. LOL If I pointed this out to them they would be highly offended. They want to believe so for them little things like math and science don't count.

Never really too interested in it. But I do know that my Mom's family emigrated from southern Germany. Apparently 100% German. Dad's family emigrated from Croatia. 100% Croatian. So that makes me 50/50

Maybe it's just me, but I don't need to know. I was born in Canada to Dutch immigrants who are the children of Dutch people (one grandmother born in Germany) and that's just fine by me. I was born here before my parents became citizens, so I was a Dutch citizen born in Canada.

One side of my family came here from Germany a little more than 100 years ago. A lot of that was documented through their church. Some of that info is written up. I need to get an expanded Ancestry member ship to research them or at least look at what some of the others have in their trees.

The other side of the family gets fuzzy after about six generations. So many people have the same names. The research gets trickier. There are some lines with the same last name that connect to nobility and some people are trying so hard to attach to them. I don't trust a lot of what I have seen at that point. There are some notable individuals in the first few generations. We have what I consider a relatively good amount of photos for these people. It has been fun.

Since I am Cajun, I have a large amount of native American /Indian, French, a little German and some Irish and English from my mother.

I have not done much on my family but my husband's family has done pretty extensive research. It can certainly be interesting and lead you down the rabbit hole with hours lost in deep research lol.

My maiden name was Stout. My great grandmother, seven times removed, was Penelope Stout. She was a tough old bird and survived an Indian attack that left her half scalped, her bowels protruding, and her shoulder hacked. She lived to be 110 by some accounts...into her 90's by others, and had 10 children.

Penelope Stout

watchme you do not have to reply although others that wish to may. The Asian look in your features may be from being low thyroid as a child. Back when doctors looked at physical appearance then took tests to confirm any problem having a broad Asian appearing face especially in females was considered a clue to test to see how low a thyroid level was.

I recently took the 23 test to confirm a suspicion that part of my father's family had passed. According to the results other than my ancient ancestress there is no trace of that. The test did lead to many other questions as according to the tests the German and French came in about 1860 and most of that area of the family was from those regions way before that time. One of these days I will look at the blogs to see why there is such a gap.

For me giving nations rather than regions is a fallacy as Germany did not exist as a large country until fairly recently as an example. One of my great???? came from the Alsace region which has been in both France and Germany.

I scorned my paternal grandfather's zeal over his ancestors, primarily because he evidently thought it made him 'special'. He lived a long and lazy life. After both he and my father had died, I had some time on my hands, and I looked over the rambling pages of family heresay. I found some verifiable lines hiding amidst vast conjecture and inaccuracies -- like the confusions of parentage that Watchmelol spoke of. I also found some amazing people ignored by family lore because they had no connection to 'fame'.

Genealogy interests me as it personalizes the broad scope of History. I haven't pursued it in recent years, but I was always most interested in the motivations and emotions I could detect in people's lives. Letters exchanged by my immigrant French and Scots ancestors to their families at home are examples:

The bachelor in Cincinnati who marries the now wealthy widow he'd courted as a girl in Scotland.

The French immigrants who described to their parents the success of their 'confectionery' in Tennessee -- whose probate itemized tools of the brewery trade.

The news clipping about a couple who returned to France in their old age, along with the family notation that they hid their savings in a laundry basket.

I am first generation American on my Dad's side of my family. His ancestry has been researched back to the late 1700's, to an area that was Denmark at that time. I don't know when that area became part of Germany, but my dad always said he was just German. He came to the states in 1923.

I am second generation American on my Mother's side, she was first generation. Her parents emigrated from Germany sometime in the mid to late 1800's. I haven't yet found much on her ancestors, one of these days I will have to make an effort to figure out more about them. To the best of my knowledge, from things she talked about, her family was German all the way back. So I have always considered myself pretty much German.

Growing up, I was taught that my nationality was American of German descent, with a little bit of Danish. When my Dad finally got his citizenship, he said he was American of German descent. The years of WWII were pretty hard on my family.

My late husband's ancestry has been traced back to the early 1600's. That ancestor, of the same last name, came to the U.S as an indentured servant. I would like to find out more about his story, just not sure how to go about it.

I thoroughly enjoy tracing ancestors, (or trying to), and can easily get lost in it, spending way too much time on it. But I also get bogged down and tend to stay away from it for as much as months at a time, then go back to it.

Rusty

My Mom was born in Ireland & so were all her family members. My Dad was born in America but both his parents were born in Ireland & so were all his family. I do know on both sides both great great great parents were Irish after that I do not know.

I find genealogy mildly interesting and have put together a family tree for my husband and myself going back as far as I can easily find, which is generally at the point when I get to an ancestor that immigrated here from Europe. His side is mostly Irish and German, my side is mostly German/Austrian/Swiss. The biggest riddle I would like to solve, though, is the origin of my last name, which is a common English/American word but a fairly unusual last name. Unfortunately, I haven't had any luck tracing that line back far enough to find out if the name was originally the same word in a different language, or changed from a similar-sounding name in a different language, etc. The search continues! ;)

My mother's side is from County Donegal and County Cork, Ireland, except that her maternal grandfather was German. My father's side is mostly from the Lazio region in Italy, but my paternal grandmother's father's family is from the Calabria region.

I do genealogy research nearly every day, for varying periods of time.

I know my moms side from her being in the DAR, English. Have no idea about my biological father, found out I was the result of an affair after she had Alzheimer’s. Too late to ask questions.

German (Woerishoeffer) / Irish (McIntire) on my mother's side.
Puerto Rican (Velez) / Eskimo (Changunak) on my father's side.

Don't know much about my mother's side other than when the German side came
through Ellis Island they dropped the "Woeris" off the name and used only Hoeffer as the family name.

However, I know a bit more about my father's side of the family but only going back to the 1870s when my great-great grandmother was born.

Her name was Mary Changunak-Antisarlook-Andrewuk ... aka Sinrock Mary, Queen of the Reindeer. Through a series of events (gold rush in Nome, AK, ill European sailors, and years of fighting legal issues) she became the most sought out and eligible woman, the wealthiest and the only woman to own property in Alaska up to that point.

Below is the Wikipedia page about her and below that a webpage I created back in the early 2000s with a few family photos.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinrock_Mary
http://www.award-graphics.com/newell/eskimo/index.html

I don't know much of my father's relatives but my grandfather, born here in US, his father emigrated from Germany . His mother from Sweden. My mother's parents both were born in Norway ,Kristiansand and Drummon. Someone helped my mo take her mother's side back to 1500s. Her father's parents died and taken in by a doctor..no church records located.

Maifleur - That's interesting information. . I know it's not true in my case. My father's mother came from an area of Russia near the Mongolian border. If it was low thyroid then he, myself, my grandmother and my brother all would have had it. I look just like my grandmother who looks just like a lot of people from that region. I don't have a broad Asian appearing face at all. Just a slightly Asian look to my eyes and a very slightly broader turned up nose. You would have to look for it to see it or identify it.

Think of it as Actor Yul Bryner's features as opposed to figure skater Evgeni Plushenko. Both are ethnically Russian but both have completely different facial characteristics. It's the regional influence as well as the borders (along with invasions) with Mongolia as well as the French blood so many Russians carry. Russia is the largest and most populous nation/ethnicity on the border between Europe and Asia

Russia used to be only a small portion of the USSR which is why I would like the various DNA testing companies to do more small regions rather than countries.

Well the oldest relative I know of was my great great grandfather who was in service to Catherine the Great. The youngest relative, my mother, was born in mid 1916. So this was all pre-USSR.

• English, Irish & Scottish (paternal grandfather). rumor has it, we're related to the Lockheed family... but as Forest Gump said... we ain't seen a nickle of that money.

Almost all Welsh...

"Russia used to be only a small portion of the USSR "

I believe this is incorrect. Here's just one of many interesting bits of info from Wikipedia. There's an instructive map too

"At the beginning of the 19th century, the Russian Empire extended from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Black Sea in the south, from the Baltic Sea on the west to the Pacific Ocean, and (until 1867) into Alaska in North America on the east."

The Baltic states, the so-called Central Asian nations, the Caucasus areas like Georgia and the others, etc., etc., were all part of the Russian Empire. And later, as separately named SSRs, of the Soviet Union.

Russian Empire article from Wikipedia

Ever heard of Rus?

I have gone back to the early 1600's for my family but it took years of searching the internet without using any paid sites but with help from others who did. Two of the family names i was searching for any info on were my English Booth, Chase and Hulley or Hooleys. Any tme I typed anything into the search bar with Booth or Chase surname the results were people who had info on or wanted to say they were related to John Wilkes Booth or people who were related to the Chase's of New York and the search for the Chase fortune. Neither of those were my Chase's or Booth's. I didn't have access to any paid sites at the time. I posted on a geneaolagy message board asking someone to help me find info on my Booth family. Because I knew my Grandfather's brother was adopted by a Booth Aunt after his mother died after giving birth to him someone was able to find all my Booths from the census. Wonderful, that brick wall fell. I think he got the family back to the late 1600's.

I also posted once on a message board years ago I was looking for info on my Grandfather's English family. I received a message back and the person said we were looking for one of the same people. She said her 80 year old Mother was my Dad's cousin and she remembered him coming to England during WW2 when he was in the Navy and on leave while the shipped docked in Liverpool went to visit their family and he brought citrus fruit, candy and other food that had been rationed. They they called me on the telephone. My 3rd cousin was also doing our family tree and with our combined info we have gotten pretty far. I sent all kinds of old family pictures to her Mom and she was just thrlled and she was thrilled again when I gave her all the Booth info. Sadly Mary died but I still keep in touch with her daughter. I posted one of my recent finds on my Grandfather's family on the Anglophile thread.

My Dad's Mom's Chase family was really hard to find without going to paid sites. I didn't even know where they came from except somewhere in Lancashire. My Dad's Mom and her sisters and her parents eventually all emigrated to Canada so I don't think anyone is left over in the UK that I know of. A family member gave me some books of old postcards that belonged to my Grandfather thinking I might like them. What a genealogical gold mine. I found out my Dad's Mom and her family were from Bury and Rochdale in Lancashire. I also found out my Grandfather emigrated to the US first before he ended up in Canada. He landed on Ellis Island so I went to that site and found his ship listing. I never knew that. I laughed when the ship listing said he was going to visit his Uncle J.W. Booth in New Jersey, but thankfully not that JW Booth. I was at the library one day having access to the library Ancestry and I typed in my Chase Great Grandfather's name and this Chase family tree appeared and it listed my Dad's Mom and her parents and sisters. Another brick wall solved. I have been trying to contact the owner of the tree on Ancestry but she hasn't answered my messages so I don't know if she is alive or not. I was just thrilled to find that. I haven't been back to the library to print up that family tree. I think one of the Chase members that ended up in Ireland way back might have been from France - possibly Huguenots that had to leave France. I still have more checking to do on that side.

My Mom's Scottish family was difficult to find any info as well because of no access to paid sites. I couldn't find any info for years. My cousin called me and said our Mother's cousin Jimmy passed away so I went online to the funeral home in Michigan which was owned by my Grandfather's brother's family to send my condolences and to say who I was and that I had been wanting to talk to him about our family history. A few weeks later I had be using the libraries Ancestry access at home and I came across a family tree with pictures. I was pretty sure one of the pictures was my Scottish Grandfather but the info listed with the picture was wrong. I kept looking at that picture and knew I had seen it before in a frame at my Grandparents but the info just didn't match. I finally contacted the owner and told them I think you have the wrong picture or the info was wrong on Andrew. That same day I found that family tree I heard the I heard the mailman put something in my mailbox so I went to get the mail It was a large white envelope with a lot of US stamps and postmarked Florida. I opened it up and to my surprise it was the family tree I was just looking at on Ancestry. What a coincidence. I think I stirred up the family ghosts that brought this to me. My 3rd cousin who I never knew about and was the funeral home owner saw my condolences on Jimmy's online obit. So he sent me his family and my Mom's family tree to me. It was huge. I found out my Great Grandmother's family name was Berry or Barry and she was from Ireland as were most of my Grandfather's family. I think my Great Grandfather's family was originally Scottish but ended up in Ireland somehow. I think they were sheep poachers haha. Here we were all thinking we were totally English and Scottish and now I find we have more Irish in us than either of those. Now I have 2 new cousins living close to me in Michigan I didn't know about and we are now connected on FB and the family resemblance to my Aunt Elsie is remarkable.

I haven't been able to find much on my Mom's Grandparent's from Scotland, the Paul's and my Great Grandmother her maiden name was McLauglan.

Sorry this has been so long, I am just fascinated by genealogy and finding those little bits of info on family members from the past.

I've already posted about my lineage elsewhere on this forum. My ancestors came from Wales; Acton, England; and Scotland. The Welsh ancestor arrived to the Virginia colony about 1730.

My father was born in Austria in 1913 and came to Canada as an infant. The surname of my Ukrainian speaking grandparents could not easily be spelled in English, so immigration officials anglicized it. The original spelling is lost now. I had thought that only immigrants with "difficult" names had new ones assigned, but not so. A friend from our local historical society mentioned that her ancestor, surnamed Foran, emigrated to the U.S. where an immigration official thought that this name was "old country" and gave him the surname Ford, as in Henry Ford.

Watchme, my family is also Russian but from Kiev. I have lots of relatives on my mother’s side but only a very old aunt with dementia on my father’s side who was banished to Siberia after WW2. We have totally lost track of that side of the family. I do know that my great grandfather was a General in the Tsar’s army.

Kiev is really in Ukraine instead of Russian, and they speak a dialect that is quite different from Russian. Aprilneverends is Ukrainian, and I really cannot understand when she speaks it, but she also speaks regular Russian, and I can understand a fair amount of that. I guess Ukrainians sometimes consider themselves Russian.

I was doing some research on my one of my uncles earlier today, and I found that my cousin Nancy was able to get information about our ancestors that I had not seen before - particularly from our great-grandmother. Our great-grandfather was Prussian and had immigrated from Europe, but his wife was evidently very American, and Nancy could trace her roots back to Rhode Island for a few generations and then back to England in the 1600s. I found out that I had ancestors who had lived in London, Devon, Hertfordshire, and Suffolk, even though I had never known about any English relatives before. I also learned that one of our ancestors (from about 1624) had been arrested in Rhode Island for adultery, and from the description, it sounded more like attempted rape. The description of his arrest and trial was rather graphic.

Anyway, this was my diversion from election trauma/fatigue.

I am primarily Polish Jewish. I would like to explore a bit more.

I do some work on genealogy on behalf of a couple of local organisations. One thing which leaps out when researching is just how wrong some people get their family trees. There’s a huge amount of misinformation and wishful thinking on family tree websites where people have made incorrect assumptions, leaps of imagination, and have misunderstood the records. Check, check and check again. And always try to see the original material.

Anne, on one of my grandfather's citizenship papers, it says he is from the Czarist Republic of Poland. ( I am Jewish, and as I always was told. one side was Polish and the other Russian)-- from near Kiev). I always thought that was interesting and a reminder that depending on the time period, that whole region was ever changing as to who ruled.

I wasn’t that interested in genealogy but my dad and sister got into studying it at the end of his life. We took a trip into NY area to visit cemeteries. When we found the stones of a William and Mary with my uncommon last name from the 1700s I found it really touching.

My mom’s dad immigrated as a child from Lithuania in the early 1900s but following those threads back for those of Eastern European Jewish ancestry is pretty difficult.