Family stories

Welcome to the "family stories" thread. Here, we can share interesting stories about our relatives, and some curious details. Let's make sure not be cruel, and have fun telling yarns about our DNA. It can be siblings, parents, grandparents, ancestors, cousins...you get the idea. I'll start off:

My maternal grandmother's family has a habit of being long-lived. Her mother lived to almost 93, and her mother lived to almost 91. Her cousin is still alive at 92. She even had an uncle who lived to a whopping 96. My maternal grandmother is 90 this year. Also, an interesting coincidence I've noted is a penchant for my matrilinial line to be December births. My mom, her mom, her mom and yes, even her mom were all born on December. Finally, my first name is the same as both my grandfather's middle name, and my middle name is my father's first name. If I ever have kids, I'm going to do the same theme with naming.

I'm apparently descended from a family of outlaws in Louisiana.

When my dad was like five or six, he went with my grandfather to visit their hometown (I forget the name, but it's tiny) in Louisiana.

Grandfather leaves my dad to run free, and like any little boy, he decides to use his newfound freedom visit a bar. He walks up to the counter, and asks the bartender for a beer. The bartender laughs and asks,

"What's your name, boy?"

Dad tells him his first and last name

"You's a <lastname>? Well shit, son, have as much as you want."

Turns out, my great-great grandfather was basically a redneck mob boss. During Prohibition, he ran a moonshine ring and it gave him complete control over the town. The sheriff would periodically 'arrest' him, but leave his cell door unlocked. Power passed down to my great-grandfather, and even my grandfather before he moved to Texas.

That is awesome. Like, really awesome. In terms of non-distant relationships, my maternal great-great grandfather helped make peace with a group of Maoris(I'm from New Zealand), and got a big old greenstone for it. You can find the stone in Rotarua

I'm descended from Sir Thomas More(18 generations)

edited 26th Apr '16 4:15:18 AM by RJ-19-CLOVIS-93

I'm related to Sir Francis Drake.

Now I kinda wanna see a documentary or read a book about your family.

I'll have to get more information from my (living) grandfather. This is either his dad or his father-in-law we're talking about.

Update: Here's the info: this was the paternal grandfather of my maternal grandfather. He was in contact with a small tribe of Maoris, and he taught them how to read and write. Out of gratitude, the chief gave him/his relatives a greenstone(it's the size of a necklace or something). Mom doesn't like me talking about it because she worries the Maoris would want it back. His relatives(my third or fourth cousins, I guess) have a kind of fame in the region

In terms of my family roots, I'm a New Zealander, however my great-grandparents are mostly Scottish with some English roots(pretty obvious if you know my last name). My male ancestry comes from Holytown, Lanarkshire

My paternal grandfather was in the Korean War(he didn't fight on the front lines, but he was a techie). His father fought in World War 1. My great-great-great-great grandfather(in links, that's my paternal grandma's maternal grandpa's paternal grandpa) was almost certainly a fighter in the Napoleonic Wars

edited 26th Apr '16 4:23:21 AM by RJ-19-CLOVIS-93

Most of my ancestors have been soldiers or administrative officials, but I have a few interesting stories.

On my father's side, my grandfather was on the Pacific Front, as a pilot. He saw a bit of action, in the war, and eventually, after it, became a firefighter at NASCAR, for his job, until he retired.

On my mother's side, my grandfather was one of the sailors on the pacific front, though he didn't see nearly as much action. He was a lookout whose job was to look for enemy ships and mines.

My grand uncle on her side, Arvel, however, ended up on the European front, and saw plenty of action. For instance, December 16, 1944. Battle of the Bulge. That was according to him, the worst day of his life, by far.

edited 23rd Apr '16 8:36:03 AM by RandomWriter413

The mom-side of the family have a saying "If ___ had been a snake, you'd have been bitten!" whenever I or my dad can't find things that are actually right in front of us.

On a possibly unrelated note, my Grandma spent half an afternoon inside the mouth of a crocodile. That is incidentally one of the reasons she hook up with my Grandpa.

My parents first met due to the Kennedy assassination.

In 1963, they were both students at the University of Pennsylvania. On Nov. 22nd, My Dad and his friend Burt were hanging around the frat house when the phone rang. A nearby sorority was having a mixer, and there were a couple of girls who didn't have dates. They said, "Sure, we'll go."

Then news of the assassination hit the airwaves. The sorority called back; the party was still on, since they already had the food catered, but the two girls called off, being too upset to attend. However, there was another girl (my future mother) whose date had cancelled on her.

Dad and Burt flipped a coin. And as Dad is fond of saying: "I either won or lost, I'm still not sure which." (At this point, Mom always tells him to shut the hell up.)

You know, the odd thing about that is if Kennedy was never assassinated, your father would've gone to that sorority, and may have never met your mother.

Update: I made an error. It wasn't my great-grandad, but my great-great grandad that was involved with the Maoris. I assume that mistake was made because they have the exact same name.

edited 26th Apr '16 4:24:44 AM by RJ-19-CLOVIS-93

@2

Wow. Seriously badass, dude.

Repost from The History Thread:

Huh; didn't know you were from Korea. Me, my ancestry comes almost entirely from the UK. All my grandparents were born in NZ and so on. 3 of my great-grandparents are Scottish, 4 of them are native in NZ, and 1 I don't know.

Question for you: who's your oldest living relative? Mine is my maternal grandmother, who is ninety years old

No offense, but your great-great grandparents sound like pricks.

edited 26th Apr '16 4:14:18 AM by RJ-19-CLOVIS-93

Both my brother and my paternal grandfather are named Kevan. Spelt like that, with an 'a'. Spelling it like that is supposed denote that you're a protestant, but both were baptized into the Catholic Church. There's a reason for this.

Way back in the early 20th century (we're talking late 20s here), my great grandfather ran off with a Catholic woman, who wanted to name her son 'Kevin'. He was told that he would be disowned from the family he gave his son a Catholic name, or raised him in the Catholic church. He decided to go ahead and convert to Catholicism anyway, but still gave his son a protestant name.

My brother was named after our grandfather, and was brought up as Catholic. He's now an atheist. Like most of our family.

This happened when the communists were trying to bring Greece into the Soviet Union (which ended up not happening).

One day, my grandfather on my dad's side asked one of the officers why communists call each other "comrade". He replied that "a comrade is someone who shares your ideals and your goals, your hopes and your dreams." My grandfather said "Then, according to your definition, the only person who has earned the right to call me 'comrade' is my wife." His friends and neighbors suddenly became afraid because they thought the officer would shoot him for saying that, but he did not. For a while afterward, my grandfather would call my grandmother "comrade" as an affectionate nickname.

I'm curious: what's it like for those of you who had a great-grandparent while you were growing up? What was he/she like?

Never had a great-grandparent growing up—by the time I was like 5 years old, most of my grandparents were dead. My last living grandparent died a couple months ago.

My great grandmother Kimbel, on my dad's side, was a very solitary figure, though she did love us.

She had a habit of smoking, but every time we brought it up, she'd say "It hasn't killed me yet!"

She was very, very stubborn.

Just like our great grandfather, to be honest.

Though she lived much longer than him.

She was very good at black comedy, and her room was covered in stuff from the old days, back when she was around.

She lived through WW 1, the Great Depression, and watched her son in law go to the Pacific Front, before dealing with the red scare, and everything leading up to 2010 or 2011. [I'll have to look up her funeral date.]

She was old, she was smug, and she died from lung failure.

She was pretty cool.

edited 1st Jul '16 6:56:45 AM by RandomWriter413

Curious; do any of you have a nephew/neice or uncle/aunt that's younger than you? What's that like?