History

I have been working on my family history. I have a relatively small family. Both of my sets of grandparents had two children. My sister and I are their only grandchildren.

I had a fair amount of history on my father's side, but only back to around 1880 or so when that part of the family arrived from Germany and Ireland. By using familysearch I was able to go back an additional generation, which was kind of exciting.

But last night I started to work on my maternal grandmother's side. I had a name Thaddeus Stocker and that he lived during the Revolutionary War. From that name I was able to use the site to travel back an additional ten generations!! I got all the way back to 1470 in England (John Wyllie). Needless to say this was pretty amazing to me.

I found out that our family lived in Fairfield, CT (Henry Jackson, Mary Morehouse, etc..) for over 150 years and were among the first European settlers. I found that parts of the family were Tories and parts were fighting in the Continental Army. And this was only in about an hours worth of work. I am probably related to half of Connecticut.

Much of this was inspired by the amazing PBS series by Henry Louis Gates which traced the history of several African-Americans. Now history can be enlightening, powerful, and painful. But the internet is a VERY powerful tool in this regard. I urge you to try to connect with your past.

Update: I think I got back to the year 1256!! Alexander de Forbes in Scotland.