Mayflower Descendants?

[GooooMarquette]

On this eve of Thanksgiving...

I did a bunch of ancestry research a year or two ago, and was able to track a couple branches of my family tree to a couple of Revolutionary War veterans. Lots and lots of branches to follow that far back, so that was the best I had at the time.

But a couple weeks ago I got a notice from someone who saw my family tree overlapping with theirs, and suggested a couple of Mayflower connections. I went down branches I hadn't been down before, and sure enough, I am directly descended from 11 Mayflower passengers (all 11th and 12th great-grandparents), and have two other relatives from the voyage.

Anyone else out there have ancestors from the Mayflower or other voyages to 'the new world' around that time period?

[warriorchick]

Sorry, no.

My mom has done quite of bit of family genealogy, and apparently, we are descended from royalty: the McAlpin Clan, the most purely Celtic clan in all of Scotland.



I also have an ancestor who was counted in the 1890 census while he was in county jail in Virginia.

[Jockey]

Sorry, no.

My mom has done quite of bit of family genealogy, and apparently, we are descended from royalty: the McAlpin Clan, the most purely Celtic clan in all of Scotland.



I also have an ancestor who was counted in the 1890 census while he was in county jail in Virginia.

So maybe you can explain why you are a descendent of Celtics (pronounced with a ‘k’),  but descendants of the Boson basketball team are Celtics (pronounced like an ‘s’). 

[warriorchick]

So maybe you can explain why you are a descendent of Celtics (pronounced with a ‘k’),  but descendants of the Boson basketball team are Celtics (pronounced like an ‘s’). 

No idea.

[Billy Hoyle]

On this eve of Thanksgiving...

I did a bunch of ancestry research a year or two ago, and was able to track a couple branches of my family tree to a couple of Revolutionary War veterans. Lots and lots of branches to follow that far back, so that was the best I had at the time.

But a couple weeks ago I got a notice from someone who saw my family tree overlapping with theirs, and suggested a couple of Mayflower connections. I went down branches I hadn't been down before, and sure enough, I am directly descended from 11 Mayflower passengers (all 11th and 12th great-grandparents), and have two other relatives from the voyage.

Anyone else out there have ancestors from the Mayflower or other voyages to 'the new world' around that time period?

when my mom retired she got crazy into ancestry (she travels around to do research) and has identified up to six family members who on the Mayflower. She's now a member of the Mayflower Society.

[MU Fan in Connecticut]

Out here in Connecticut I've known quite a few who are descended from the Mayflower.  My kids said they would always here other students mention in grammar school during presentations near Thanksgiving.

Not related to the Mayflower, but I had a friend retire and him and his wife moved to Plymouth.   His son lives in Boston and they wanted to be closer.

[buckchuckler]

Nm

[ZiggysFryBoy]

Dont get much more white privileged than the Mayflower Society, aina?

[wadesworld]

Dont get much more white privileged than the Mayflower Society, aina?

Rich white kids.

But you'll get triggered when someone who doesn't know you say something about you.

[Celtic Truth]

My Mom actually looked into this over the past couple of years. She traced her ancestors on her fathers side back to the mayflower. She just recently became a member of the mayflower society. I haven’t bothered to become a member, maybe someday. Apparently my ancestors didn’t like to move much once they landed in Massachusetts. We’ve been in Boston & Quincy for a few hundred years.

[dgies9156]

On this eve of Thanksgiving...

I did a bunch of ancestry research a year or two ago, and was able to track a couple branches of my family tree to a couple of Revolutionary War veterans. Lots and lots of branches to follow that far back, so that was the best I had at the time.

But a couple weeks ago I got a notice from someone who saw my family tree overlapping with theirs, and suggested a couple of Mayflower connections. I went down branches I hadn't been down before, and sure enough, I am directly descended from 11 Mayflower passengers (all 11th and 12th great-grandparents), and have two other relatives from the voyage.

Anyone else out there have ancestors from the Mayflower or other voyages to 'the new world' around that time period?

When the Mayflower landed, my Dad's side mostly was either German agrarian peasants or Irish potato pickers. My Mom's side was somewhere in Northeastern Britain  near York doing whatever they did or in Bordeaux, France waiting to board a ship for the Canadian Maritime provinces.

So nope, no Puritan here.

[GooooMarquette]

My Mom actually looked into this over the past couple of years. She traced her ancestors on her fathers side back to the mayflower. She just recently became a member of the mayflower society. I haven’t bothered to become a member, maybe someday. Apparently my ancestors didn’t like to move much once they landed in Massachusetts. We’ve been in Boston & Quincy for a few hundred years.

My ancestors made one big move about 8 or 9 generations back: from the East into Southwest Wisconsin. Since then, we have stayed mostly in the upper Midwest.

[The Hippie Satan of Hyperbole]

None of my ancestors were on American soil earlier than about 1880. 

[mu_hilltopper]

I've done genealogy for ~20 years off and on.    One thing .. it takes just one mistake on a tree to screw it up .. and once you've made that mistake, others follow your research over and over, repeating the mistake forever.

Your average family tree sleuth is eager to expand their tree and not analytical enough to ensure high confidence connections .. so when you look to add tree members from matches on other family trees .. it's like intermingling your COVID bubbles.   You have no idea where they've been.

.. I do recommend the AncestryDNA thing .. I think it's on sale this month for $50 .. I did it last year*, and bought one for my wife this time around.  Upon submission, they give you a 90 day subscription for $1, which I jumped on.  (Otherwise it's $20/month.)


(* I am 72% Arby's.)

[Billy Hoyle]

Dont get much more white privileged than the Mayflower Society, aina?

Tell me about it. I probably don’t get into MU with out it, I get out of speeding tickets by dropping that little nugget of information, I get free NE Hazy IPA’s wherever I go, yeah, it’s a sweet life having my mother being part of a society most people don’t know exists and holds no power whatsoever. 

[Galway Eagle]

That is pretty cool. I am curious, at that point I'd call you about as ethnically "white American" as you can be. When you were younger would you still break it down saying "I'm this % x, y, z" or would you say "I'm American"? because after this many centuries I'd say you're one of the people who can claim to be ancestrally American. 

Also weird question to everybody but at what point do you think you would say you're American not "(insert ethnicity)-American"?

[GooooMarquette]

I've done genealogy for ~20 years off and on.    One thing .. it takes just one mistake on a tree to screw it up .. and once you've made that mistake, others follow your research over and over, repeating the mistake forever.

Your average family tree sleuth is eager to expand their tree and not analytical enough to ensure high confidence connections .. so when you look to add tree members from matches on other family trees .. it's like intermingling your COVID bubbles.   You have no idea where they've been.

.. I do recommend the AncestryDNA thing .. I think it's on sale this month for $50 .. I did it last year*, and bought one for my wife this time around.  Upon submission, they give you a 90 day subscription for $1, which I jumped on.  (Otherwise it's $20/month.)

(* I am 72% Arby's.)

Agreed. I was skeptical at first, but the Mayflower Society (and other organizations) have professional genealogists who have verified lineage information to get you from the original passengers to a couple of generations ago. These are some pretty well-worn paths. In my case, it led to my great grandfather, and it is pretty easy to show the line from him to me.

You are right, though...and I remain skeptical of some of the information I found on my mom's side that appeared to lead back to the Scottish royal family. Not gonna claim that one without the help of a genealogist....

[Dr. Blackheart]

Scoop is so incestuous. This proves it, genetically.  Cheeks is related directly to 49 posters here, for example

[Billy Hoyle]

One relative (my mom’s uncle) did a years long genealogy project and established a direct link to Byron Kilbourn, one of the founders of Milwaukee and for whom Kilbourn Avenue is named. That was a really cool thing for a MU grad to learn.

[dgies9156]

I've done genealogy for ~20 years off and on.    One thing .. it takes just one mistake on a tree to screw it up .. and once you've made that mistake, others follow your research over and over, repeating the mistake forever.

Your average family tree sleuth is eager to expand their tree and not analytical enough to ensure high confidence connections .. so when you look to add tree members from matches on other family trees .. it's like intermingling your COVID bubbles.   You have no idea where they've been.

.. I do recommend the AncestryDNA thing .. I think it's on sale this month for $50 .. I did it last year*, and bought one for my wife this time around.  Upon submission, they give you a 90 day subscription for $1, which I jumped on.  (Otherwise it's $20/month.)


(* I am 72% Arby's.)

I did the Ancestry DNA and it was fascinating. I have a German last name and my family played up our German roots most of my Dad's life. Even though my Dad's family was German, Irish and Norwegian. My Mother's was French and British. I used to say I bled out all the Irish blood by the time I was three.

Turns out, I am 55 percent British and 35 percent Irish. The remaining 10 percent is a residual mix, the most notable of which is Italian. We assumed some pizza guy made it over the Alps and was swallowed into the family.

My daughter is 21 percent Jewish.

[MU Fan in Connecticut]

I'm a typical mix.  My 25% French-Canadian ancestors arrived in 1634 in Quebec during the Percheron Immigration and meet Champlain himself.
My 25% Polish side arrived in the 1790's and my big fat Italian side arrived in the 1920s. 
I've done Ancestry.com.  The results matched mostly as expected.  (although 3% Greek must come from the Sicilian branch.)
The one thing I find interesting is who takes the test.  I can count hundreds upon hundreds of matching French-Canadian relatives but only 10 or so on the Italian side and the same on the Polish side.  I'm surprised to show no matches in Europe either.  Seems like none of the Italian or Polish descended want to take the test?  Don't know if it's a cultural thing?

[Warriors4ever]

All of my grandparents came from the part of Poland ruled by Austria before WWI. To no great surprise, I tested at 98% Eastern European-which apparently  was a higher percentage than people actually living there currently....
They’ve refined it somewhat as they get more data, but the basic percentage is still there.

[Galway Eagle]

I'm a typical mix.  My 25% French-Canadian ancestors arrived in 1634 in Quebec during the Percheron Immigration and meet Champlain himself.
My 25% Polish side arrived in the 1790's and my big fat Italian side arrived in the 1920s. 
I've done Ancestry.com.  The results matched mostly as expected.  (although 3% Greek must come from the Sicilian branch.)
The one thing I find interesting is who takes the test.  I can count hundreds upon hundreds of matching French-Canadian relatives but only 10 or so on the Italian side and the same on the Polish side.  I'm surprised to show no matches in Europe either.  Seems like none of the Italian or Polish descended want to take the test?  Don't know if it's a cultural thing?

It's been very difficult to get these tests to be popular in Europe. Because so many people there have been in that country for so many generations there no point. All of my cousins in Ireland view them as a waste of time because they can walk to a cemetery and find they're surname on graves going back to the Middle Ages.

There's the finding family argument but to quote my cousin's response to me asking about dating in in the tiny Irish town my mom's from, where our family is related to everyone, "after second cousin you pretty much just ignore it". So there's definitely less incentive to do those till they offer a lot more medical information

[GBPhoenix1993]

I am fairly certain I am not a Mayflower descendant but find the whole Ancestry DNA science fascinating.

I got the Ancestry DNA test maybe 2 or 3 years ago, and there's been changes in my Ancestry DNA profile each time it's updated.  I think the first time I got the results, it said I was like 11% Scandinavian.  Then the next time my results were updated, the results were 0% Scandinavian but some Portuguese was added.  For brief periods my DNA showed Spanish, Portuguese, Lithuanian/Baltic, and Greece.

3 years later, the Scandinavian stuff is back with 5% Norway and 2% Sweden and the Spanish, Portuguese, Lithuania/Baltic, and Greek are gone completely.  Oh well, it was fun claiming I was Greek for awhile there.   

Truth be told, the only places I have known ancestors from are Germany, France, and Luxembourg, but it wouldn't surprise me at all if the distant Scandinavia DNA is correct as I am the typical Blonde (at least when I had hair it was blonde) Blue eyed fair skinned type. 

It would have been fun to have known all my ancestors who came to the US in the 1800s and find out what their reasons were, it's something that I will never know completely.  Pretty cool for those who know their ancestors were on the Mayflower and planted roots here and started something amazing. 

[MU Fan in Connecticut]

It's been very difficult to get these tests to be popular in Europe. Because so many people there have been in that country for so many generations there no point. All of my cousins in Ireland view them as a waste of time because they can walk to a cemetery and find they're surname on graves going back to the Middle Ages.

There's the finding family argument but to quote my cousin's response to me asking about dating in in the tiny Irish town my mom's from, where our family is related to everyone, "after second cousin you pretty much just ignore it". So there's definitely less incentive to do those till they offer a lot more medical information

My wife, who is from Poland, did it as she received as a gift. 
No surprise, it came back 97% Eastern European.  The 3% was Finnish which was interesting in only that I work for a Finnish company
My Finnish friends said way back when Finland was part of the Kingdom of Sweden and the Swedish king would draft the Finns to do the dirty work when war happened.