Genealogy Myths: Real, Fool’s Gold, or Both?

Family stories are a wonderful thing. They often give you insights into the lives of your ancestors. However, beware! Not all family stories are true. Many such stories are fictional. Yet, even the stories that are either entirely or part fiction may contain clues to facts.  Good genealogical practice requires that we admit the fiction. But the next step the genealogist takes separates art from science. Before we discard these stories altogether, we need to mine them for nuggets of truth. Let’s look at a few of the more common “family legends” to see which ones you can mine for real gold.

Myth #1: Our name was changed at Ellis Island.

Fact: No evidence whatsoever exists to suggest this ever occurred. In fact, Ellis Island had rigid documentation requirements. Anyone who arrived at Ellis Island without proper documents from "the old country" proving the person's name and providing other required information was sent back at the shipping company's expense. In fact, the shipping companies obviously knew this and always checked for proper documentation before allowing any passengers to board the ship in Europe or the British Isles.

Many people assume that there was a language barrier at Ellis Island and that millions were admitted under different names because immigration officials could not communicate with the newly-arrived travelers from many lands. This is also a fallacy. Ellis Island hired a small army of interpreters. The interpreters spoke the required languages fluently. Most were either prior immigrants themselves or the children of immigrants who learned their mother tongue as children. No immigrant was ever admitted until after answering multiple questions, usually through an interpreter on the Ellis Island payroll.

One interpreter at Ellis Island was Fiorello La Guardia, who would later become famous as the mayor of New York City, responsible for cleaning up the corruption of Tammany Hall. He worked at Ellis Island for an annual salary of $1,200 from 1907 to 1910 and helped thousands of Italians and other immigrants enter the country. Perhaps your Italian ancestor was admitted with the help of Fiorello La Guardia.

Thanks to the documentation verification conducted at the port of embarkation in Europe, your ancestors' names were known and proven before arriving at Ellis Island and were never changed there. A very few exceptions were made in 1945 and 1946 as refugees from the war-torn areas of World War II were sometimes admitted without documentation. Looking at Ellis Island records will almost always show the original names as first recorded in “the old country.” Of course, you will find major spelling variations, as many illiterate immigrants could not spell their own names even in their native languages, much less in the still-unlearned English language. You can read more about this myth at http://blog.eogn.com/eastmans_online_genealogy/2006/07/ellis_island_an.html and at http://eogn.com/archives/news0120.htm.  

Even so, I suggest you ponder these family stories a moment before you categorically discard them. They may hold a nugget of truth that you can use to track down your immigrant ancestors. Many family names were changed in the months or years after arriving at Ellis Island. As immigrant families settled into their new neighborhoods, many adopted “Americanized names.” Teachers, clerks, and neighbors sometimes found the original names to be difficult to pronounce; so, they frequently called these people by traditional American names. In many cases, the new immigrants or their descendants adopted the new names. Therefore, you might find yourself checking immigration records for name variants, based on clues in the stories passed down to you.

Myth #2: All the records were destroyed during the war.

Note: there are many variations of this one, such as “all records were destroyed in the flood,” “all records were destroyed during the fire” and many others.

Fact: In short, it is essentially impossible to destroy all records in any catastrophe because records typically are stored in many different places. Census records are kept in one place, tax records are stored in a different location, and military pension applications are stored in a third location. One fire or one flood or even one war never destroys all the records. If you hear this myth, don’t throw in the towel: search on!

Myth #3: There were three brothers who came to America. One went north, one went south and the third went west...

Fact: This is an excuse used by lazy genealogists who cannot explain why the same surname exists in different places. In fact, the families probably are not related at all. It is interesting to note that nobody ever seems to know the first names of these "three brothers." I find it amusing that nobody ever mentions “four brothers” or “five brothers.” There were always three. This one is a red flag; ignore any claims of three brothers.

Myth #4: We are descended from a Cherokee princess.

Fact: Sorry folks, but North American Indians did not have royalty. There never was any such thing as a Cherokee princess or anything similar in the Navajo, Apache, Pueblo, Abenaki, or other tribes. When Pocahontas went to England, the publicists of the seventeenth century claimed she was a princess in order to create publicity. However, the title existed only in the imaginations of the early promoters. P.T. Barnum was also known to apply the word “princess” to some of his female Indian performers but, again, you shouldn’t believe everything that P.T. Barnum claimed. There has never been a princess in the Cherokee tribe or any other North American tribe.

If you have an Indian princess in your family tree, she must have been born in India.

Myth #5: Our family always spelled the name as ...

Fact: The moment that you insist your surname was always spelled a particular way, you have just labeled yourself as a beginning genealogist. Name spellings have varied widely and, in fact, have only become standardized in the past 100 years or so. The people who created earlier records often were census takers, town clerks, tax collectors, clergymen, and others, who wrote down what they heard. In the days when most people could not read or write, many did not know how to spell their own names. When a clerk asked, "How do you spell that?" the most common answer was, "I don't know." A census taker late for dinner on a long, hot, dusty, summer day may not have cared whether a name was spelled STUART or STEWART.

For instance, my mother always spelled her maiden name as Deabay. In old records, I have found my ancestors listed with the name of Dubé, Dube, Deabay, Deabey, de Bay, du Bay, Debay, Dubey, and other variations as well. My grandfather spoke two languages fluently but could not read or write either one. He never went to school and didn't know how to spell his own first or last names. His sons (my uncles) have since adopted three different spellings of their own last name. When speaking English, my grandfather always called himself Mike; but, when speaking French, he would tell you that his first name was Maxime. Some people called him Max. Every census takers spelled his names differently.

Even William Shakespeare signed his own name in different ways:

(a)    From 1612 deposition: William Shackper
(b)    1612 Blackfriars deed: William Shakspear
(c)    1612 Blackfriars mortgage: Wm Shakspea
(d)    His 1615 will, page 1: William Shackspere
(e)    Will, page 2: Willm. Shakspere
(f)    Will, page 3: By me William Shakspeare [often questioned as by a different hand]

Note: there is some controversy as to whether or not all these signatures were actually written by William Shakespeare. However, assuming that he was literate, we could assume that he at least dictated the spelling.

My favorite story is the man who wrote his own will in the 1600s on a large piece of parchment paper. The will was several paragraphs long. In his own handwriting, he wrote his own name three different times on the one piece of paper, using three different spellings of his own name!

Myth #6: Our ancestors came over on the Mayflower.

Fact: If every claimed Mayflower ancestor actually was on the Mayflower, that ship must have been bigger than all of today's cruise ships combined! In fact, William Bradford of Plimoth Plantation recorded the complete list of all 102 passengers in 1650. His hand-written list has survived and has been digitized. You can find it on the web in many places.

About half the passengers died in the first year at Plimoth. In order to claim Mayflower ancestry, you must be able to document descent from one or more of the surviving passengers listed at http://www.rootsweb.com/~mosmd/mayfpas.htm.

Myth #7: Our ancestor arrived on a later voyage of the Mayflower.

Fact: Sorry, folks, but the Mayflower only made one trip to Plimoth.

Myth #8: We are related to Robert E. Lee.

Fact: If all those claims are true, that must have been a very big family! In fact, the name Lee was common in Virginia and elsewhere with many different, unrelated immigrants of the name. There were tens of thousands of Lees in the U.S. by the mid-1800s, and most of them were not related to each other. Robert E. Lee was a hero of the Confederacy, and many Southerners perhaps wished they were related to him. In fact, very few were.

Myth #9: A town in England, Norway, Germany, etc. is named for our family.

Fact: Names of towns were generally created long before people started using family names (surnames). If your ancestors came from the region in question, it is more likely that your ancestor adopted the name of the town, not the other way around. The good news is that such a story may give you the name of a town that you can check for records of your ancestral family.

Myth #10: Our ancestor was a stowaway on the ship.

Fact: That's a romantic story but rarely true. If a stowaway ever was found, he normally would be sent back in chains to "the old country" on the ship’s return. Very few ever escaped and became residents of the New World. If you hear such a claim in your family, try to prove it. I doubt if you can.

Myth #11: Our ancestor was burned at the stake as a witch in Salem, Massachusetts.

Fact: No accused witches were ever burned at the stake in North America although that did happen in Europe. Nobody ever started a fire for that purpose in Salem. All of the accused Salem witches were hanged, except for Giles Cory (also spelled Corey or Coree), who was pressed to death, a particularly cruel and painful way to die. You can find more information about poor Giles Cory at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giles_Corey.

Not all family legends are false, but they may be misleading

Family legends may provide clues, even when they are not completely accurate. For instance, when I was growing up, I was told that our Eastman ancestors came from Salem, Massachusetts, and participated in the Salem Witch Trials. After researching the family tree for a while, I was disappointed to learn that there were no families named Eastman in Salem during the time of the witch trials. Apparently, the story was false. But wait a minute; there is more to the story.

It seems that the original immigrant named Roger Eastman and his wife Sarah did live about 25 miles north of Salem. Several of the Salem witch trial victims came from their town and, indeed, both Roger and Sarah dictated depositions telling how they believed one of their neighbors was innocent of the claims made against her. The depositions presumably were later read aloud in court in Salem.

Another ancestor, named Goodale, did live in Salem during the witch trials, and his descendants later married into the Eastman family. So, indeed we did have ancestors in Salem, but they were not named Eastman. Also, our Eastman ancestors did contribute a bit to the Salem witch trials, although apparently not in person.

While the original family legend told to me turned out to be false, it held at least two nuggets of truth confirmed with other research.

Finally, I have to list one “semi-myth.” There are many variations of this, but generally, it is something like this: "We are descended from royalty." Another variation is, "Our ancestors were rich and famous."

Fact: This story is probably true, even though most people who make these claims have no idea of who those ancestors were or when they lived. In fact, you have two parents, four grandparents, eight great-grandparents, sixteen great-great-grandparents, and so on in a geometric progression. If you go back 300 years, you have roughly 3,000 ancestors. Going back a thousand years results in theoretically billions of ancestors, more people than ever lived on the face of the earth! In reality, the same ancestors will show up in multiple places in your family tree as you have multiple lines of descent from many of these people.

The odds are that at least a few of these millions or billions of ancestors were members of royal families or had money. If we could create complete family trees for thousands of years, every person on the face of the earth probably would find royal ancestors some place in the family tree. The odds of royal ancestry are overwhelming.

Almost everyone is descended from kings and queens. Your challenge is to find your royal ancestors and to document your descent from them!

Family legends are a fascinating part of who we are and where we came from. Many of the storytellers who passed down these tales surely believed them, and even those who didn’t must have had a strong sense of family pride. Why would your ancestors repeat these stories if not to preserve their family’s history? Be aware, however, that many family legends are false or perhaps only partly true. Ferreting out the nuggets of truth can be a fun exercise that enriches your family tree.

Comments

[Chris Gonyea]

Interesting post. Been trying to track down a "family legend" or "myth" myself. Supposedly there was a "Gonyea Mountain" and "Gonyea Road" in a little town called Ripton, VT during the 1870s-1880s when my ancestors lived there.

If that mountain and road exists, it isn't by those names. However we did find a "Gonya Brook" in Ripton, VT that exists on a map currently and we are almost certain believe was named after my family. Heck, it is probably the site of their farm.

Still trying to track down some old VT maps from the 1870s-1880s to see if the myth is true.

[Barbee Hodgkins]

My success has been proving the story that my Augustus Sherman who resided in the same town as William Tecumseh Sherman is not true. Have checked out every note on The General and there is no connection to be found. Have also checked out every Augustus Sherman to be found so did he change his name or what.

[Jude]

Ah, well, but... So far, every one of those pesky family legends has proven to be true in my case, or at least to have been essentially true. Family legend: Your ggg-grandfather had a gold mine. Truth: It was a silver mine, not gold. Family legend: Your g-grandfather, first name unknown, was in the Civil War. Truth: Yes, he was. Family legend: Your great-grandmother was a Cherokee. Truth: Probably. I finally know her name, but I lack the resources/time to track her down. But there is that photo of my grandpa standing next to his half-brother who is about a foot taller and many shades lighter, and since everything else is proving to be true, I think this one is as well. Oh, and actually, in *my* family, there were always *two* brothers, and so far that one is panning out as well.

[Mauro]

One tidbit about myth 10... Lots of immigrants "Jumped ship" meaning they were merchant marines or something similar and never got back on the boat... I believe lots of these stories (Post 1924) to be true...

Just like the many unaccounted immigrants that cross over from the Mexican border today

[Roger Moffat]

Here's a good myth I've yet to be able to prove or disprove. Published in the Chicago Daily Tribune on 16 December 1906. I've put some notes here in a message board post with an image of the article from said newspaper linked in that message...

http://boards.ancestry.com/surnames.moffitt/759/mb.ashx

And there are a couple in my family that I'm unable to prove so far. Interestingly 1 of them I've heard from two different branches of 1 of the families - I think out to a 4th cousin once or twice removed of mine had heard the same thing I had heard from my mother..

Hmmmm :-)

Roger

[Charles Hansen]

Myth #3: There were three brothers who came to America. One went north, one went south and the third went west...
Well I have documented FIVE brothers coming from Denmark to Minnesota all 5 bought land in Minnesota and 4 brothers stayed there, only my grandfather left Minnesota, first to Montana and later to North Idaho where he died at 90 years old. He was always insistent to spell the surname HANSEN which indicated he was from Denmark, but I know spelling was not always done the way he wanted it..

[Honest Abe]

A lot of what people consider family traditions are not actually family traditions - they have no pedigree. They're guesses genealogists of the past century made about people who lived in the 1600s or 1700s. What those genealogists told their relatives and cousins, for example, a guess at where a colonial immigrant originated in Europe, have since crystallized into what people alive today think are traditions that have been passed down for hundreds of years in their families, when in fact, they haven't been. Guesses we make about our families today might be considered traditions hundreds of years old by future generations of genealogists.

[Sue Martin]

Not my family lore; Charlemagne was one busy guy with all the 'our genealogy goes all the way to Charlemagne' or we have documentation of all the way to Charlemagne and/or Adam and Eve. It's amazing, when I tell them(nicely) I would enjoy reading the old documents, they walk away.

I hear the princess,Charlemagne, Mayflower and royalty or "my aunt did our complete genealogy, it's done" quite often.

I've been working on genealogy for over thirty years and I'm still finding and learning.
Sue

[Patricia A. Rogers]

I love the one where the family is adamant that their Great Grandfather was the owner of the mine, factory or whatever. You produce the ownership records and they are stunned. The family took it literally when GGF said he was going to "his office" etc. Funny how little expressions can become woven into family lore.

[Jim McMillen]

"This one is a red flag; ignore any claims of three brothers." What?

How would I explain to all the descendants of Robert, William, and James McMillen, who came to America from Ulster, that they are nothing but family myths. James lived in Maryland and died in Ohio. William went west, lived many years and died in Colorado. Robert went to the heartland, lived and died in Kansas. I have visited descendants of all three of those mythical brothers. They all appeared to be pretty normal folks, but who am I to judge, since I am the most mythical of all. My great-grandfather McMillen (the immigrant) was one of three brothers, my grandfather McMillen was one of three brothers, and my father was one of three brothers. My only redeeming feature is that I don't have two brothers, myself.

[JT]

Many French Canadian families tell a story about Native American ancestors. Some of these stories are, in fact, true, but very difficult to prove. Yes, the ones about the Native American Princess are fiction, but might indicate a distant memory of a tribal connection.

[Randy]

The three brothers myth may have derived from the Howland family, one of whom (John) came over on the Mayflower. They were quite prolific and there are many descendants, including several presidents. I'm descendend from one of the brothers, but not sure which one - one researcher has at one time or another run us back to each of the three brothers! Unfortunately, his research was available to my grandmother, so not sure anymore. (The three brothers had descendants living in the same town, all named John, so it is hard to pin down who's a sone, nephew, etc., in the wills).

My grandmother also used the three brothers story related to her Page family, that three brothers came to America and settled in Vermont and we're descended from one of those brothers. However, in this case she was correct - but didn't mention that the brothers came from New Hampshire.

Related to name spelling, I read once that Sir Walter Raleigh spelled his name numerous ways, EXCEPT the way we all spell it today!

[Dick Eastman]

As to the three brothers" stories: don't ignore what I wrote: "There were three brothers who came to America. One went north, one went south and the third went west..."

Indeed, millions of families came to America and I am sure that includes many where two, three, four, or more brothers traveled together. However, most families remained close-knit after arrival in America. They did NOT have "One [who] went north, one went south and the third went west..."

Somewhere there probably was an exception or two, but it was rare. The stories have been repeated tens of thousands of times but I would suggest that the so-called dispersions to different points of the compass were usually false. Usually...

- Dick Eastman

[Ellen Crawford]

One of the first things I learned when I started genealogy...Don't take family stories as the absolute truth. My Mom always said her grandmother's family name was Climer. Her grandfather's family name was Benton. I found the index for the 1870 census of Hill Co TX and was excited to find the surnames Climer and Benton. I ordered the film (this was before census records were on the internet.) Boy, was I surprised. Mr Climer was Mom's grandfather's step father......not her grandmother's family. I did later find that her grandmother's family name was Nunn.

[Dae Powell]

My family has a tradition of tardiness. We are always late for meetings, weddings, and ... well, everything but supper. Tradition has it our ancestors came over on the JUNEflower.

Happy Dae·
http://ShoeStringGenealogy.com

[Billie Walsh]

My son and I were in Hardy Arkansas for a family reunion. The day before the reunion we spent just walking around the town. Most of the stores were now craft or antique stores. As we wondered around one of the antique stores I could help overhearing the store owner telling some other customers stories about how her family went to Oklahoma and Kansas to work in the lead mines whenever times got tough. [ Probably a common practice for those in that small hill town ] When the other people left I went up to her and told her that I had always heard those same stories from my grandmother while growing up. Turned out she was a cousin from my ggrandmothers side of the family.

So listen to those stories. Never know when you may hear them from someone else somewhere.

[Bob Williams]

RE: "Three Brothers, etc." I wasted a lot of time trying to track down the three brothers story; only to realize that, just as you stated, they did not split up and they stayed in the same area until firmly settled. My fifth Great Grandfather was named Otho, although he is English, and he totally disappeared after reaching America, because he changed Otho to William, the English version of the name. Later, some "Otho" names returned, although I haven't made a good connection to them.

[Tom Cole]

I was taught in school, long before I started genealogy, that immigrants tended to move westerly and rarely north and south. This has been remarkable accurate in both my and my wife’s families. My family went from Vermont to Wisconsin, Dakotas, Montana, Idaho, Oregon, and Washington. My wife’s family went from Virginia to Kentucky, Tennessee, southern Illinois and southern Missouri. The only exception seems to be California where practically everyone’s family eventually has a descendent. That may be because California comprises much of the west coast, however.

[Marilyn]

One of the early tales that I remember is that we descended from a governor and Civil War General in the south. This tale has been passed down for several generations. Yes, this man did exist but he had no children of his own. Famous people have good biographies. I have not found any of my family in that state. The only possibility is a connection somewhere in the 1700's. Still searching for that possibility and maybe then the family will stop looking at me like I am crazy.

[George McSwain]

Regarding Myth #5: Spelling of words during the 1700's, particularly of people's names, was not standardized. In fact, Dr. Samuel Johnson was famous for the "Dictionary of the English Language" which he brought out in 1755, and which is often called the first English Dictionary and began to standardize spelling. In the 1785 "Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides", during a discussion of 14 different ways to spell the name Bruce, Boswell stated, "I told him the different spellings of my name. Dr. Johnson observed that there had been great disputes about the spelling of Shakspear's name; at last it was thought it would be settled by looking at the original copy of his will; but, upon examining it, he was found to have written it himself no less than three different ways."

[Anne R W]

Hmmm...Now I'm curious if your Roger and Sarah Eastman could have been witnesses in my ancestor, Elizabeth Morse's, witch trial in Newbury (now Newburyport), Mass. in about 1680, a good 12 years before the famous Salem trials. That's about 25 miles north of Salem.

I see that in Joshua Coffin's "History of Newbury, Newburyport, and West Newbury" that a Philip Eastman married a Mary Morse in 1678. Could we be related, albeit several generations back?

(Elizabeth was found guilty and sentenced to be hanged, but was later reprieved, escaping the fate of being, probably, the first victim of a witch hanging in Essex County.)

[Butch Weir]

A variation on the three brothers tale involved three sons in our family who joined the Confederate army, went to training camp, and came down with "camp fever." Their mother, as the story went, left home to care for them but ended up with the sad task of bringing their bodies back. Before she arrived home she became sick herself and died. A cousin later documented that the three actually survived and at least two of the sons migrated west, married and raised families.

[Jackie Reiss]

Re: Name changes. I searched in vain for years for the ship's passenger list showing my husband's ancestor. A couple of years ago, a person researching a collateral line discovered the record. The ancestor, a Prussian, had sailed from London, not from a continental port, in 1846. The names were anglicized on the passenger list. So, Franz Reiss was listed as Francis Rice. In New York, Franz kept the Francis but used the Germanic spelling of his surname.

[JK Jensen]

My grandfather told the story of his Irish greatuncle who joined the British Army and died on the island of St. Helena guarding Napoleon. I discounted the story until I was checking some military records and discovered his name and details that confirmed his identity. And when I looked at the details I was able to find further information about the family, particularly the exact townland in Ireland he had come from---something I had been searching for for years. Now I'm looking into another story that my grandfather told--that his grandfather (mother's father) was a drummer boy carried on someone's shoulders at the battle of Waterloo. This one I think must be a myth, but now I always follow up on these stories as they may have a grain of truth.

[A. Middlebrooke]

Yes, there are kernels of truth in family stories. My Mother told about her great-grandfather that was run over by a cannon in the War Between the States. We assumed he was in the Confederate army since they had lived in New Orleans. My niece received documents from the National Archives about his war-related pension as a result of wounds while serving in the Union Army from Missouri! He was an immigrant from France and had moved to Missouri.

A. Middlebrooke

[Constance Smith]

Family lore always said that my Husband's grandfather was in the Civil War & that his horse was shot from under him, he then made his way back to Texas , took his wife's horse & returned to his company.
Her horse was shot from under him, I took this story with a grain of salt, but when I sent for his
military records : at discharge, the document showed that he was paid for two horses. So now I accept this story as true.

[Bette Butcher Topp]

I can certainly testify to the spelling changes.My Kiddoo family has 33 different spellings in records that we have proved so far. I do have to laugh when they say, "oh it isn't my Clarke unless it has an "e" on the end." Give me a break. Have run into the Cherokee Princess line as well. And I worked a German line for 1½ years before I proved it wasn't ours but I did learn more during that time than ever since. At one time I had 52 family group sheets laid out on the floor trying to decipher my German families into the right parents. That is one thing the Germans did - everyone named their kids the same in the same generation. Those are brick walls even after 31 yrs. of researching.
Great article, Dick.
Bette

[Donna Rea]

My father always told me he was 1/8 Indian and that we descended from the Tuckahoe tribe of the Creek Nation. I searched in vain for many years for any reference to the Tuckahoe tribe. What I did finally stumble across one day was a reference to Scotch-Irish settlers in North Carolina. It seems there were two waves of Scotch-Irish settlers in North Carolina. The first group had money and settled in the lowlands near the coast. They owned plantations and slaves to work them. The second wave were poor and settled in the mountains. The plantation owners called them Cohees and they called the plantation owners Tuckahoes.

[margaret demick]

I found kernels of truth in my family legends too.
My grandfather said his family were once Southern plantation owners. That one not believing in Slavery went North and we came from that family. I did find his family did live in Maryland and that our ancestor did indeed move to the North. His father did not own slaves but two of his brothers did. That branch of the family also had a story of him moving North because of a dispute with them over the slavery issue. Perhaps it is true or more likely it was just one of several reasons for moving NW.
Another said we had been English Royalty who got sent to Scotland and finally under Cromwell to Ireland. Well I did find my Scottish line was hooked to English Royalty at one time. And they did go to Ireland. Cromwell didn't send them there though.
Margaret D in WA

[Phyllis Porter]

Also remember that information found is a book is not necessarily so. I wasted about 2 years early in my genealogical quest because a book of famous people of KY stated that his grandfather's name was Samuel. You would think the man would have known his grandfather's name, but he didn't. Finally, I found that the man's grandfather's name was Thomas, and Thomas' brother's name was Samuel.

[S. Chilberg]

Myth #1 My Greatgrandparents came from Germany.My greatgrandfather changed the spelling of their last name in 1917 when the United States joined in World War 1. He dropped 1 N off the last name,and went by the first name John instead of Johann. He considered himself to be a American, becoming a citizen in 1907 and didn't want to be associated with Germany in any way.There were cousins who said of course that the name was changed at Ellis Island.I sent them proof that the name wasn't changed until 1917 and that grandfather came thru Ellis Island in 1901.Never heard a word from them after that.

[Judy Campbell]

Change of last name -- A high school friend's family from Germany changed their name from "Frohwein" (Happy Wine) to Ford when they reached the United States. I understood that they did this at Ellis Island, "because they could change their family name once."

[Cleta]

Sometimes without any family stories some of us learn that we really do have famous people in our tree. Actually I did already know my maternal line had a connection to Daniel Boone’s family because a genealogist had been in touch with my grandmother during the 1940s. My fourth great grandfather’s only sister, Jane Van Cleave 1749-1829 had married Daniel’s younger brother Squire Jr. 11 July 1765 Salisbury, Rowan County, North Carolina.
I began researching in 1977 and have found connections to the Wright brothers, their
maternal grandmother was a Van Cleave, the Vanderbilt family (also through my Van Cleaves),Princess Diana was an 8th cousin, our common ancestor was John Strong 1605-1699, my line is from his son Thomas and hers was from son Jedediah. And there really was a gold mine in my maternal grandmother’s line. It was located in Cabarrus County, North Carolina and known at the time as the Vanderburg mine. I’m not sure how long it was owned by the family, it was small and did not produce much gold. I’ve also learned that two of my ancestors were accused as witches in 1692, Susannah Root and Thomas Farrar. Both spent a brief time in prison but were later released.
My kids have asked why I haven’t found anything interesting in their father’s family. All I can say is I just can not get his line back as far as mine. I wouldn’t have found as much as I have if others before me had not done their own work and as I kept pushing my line back I realized that my line connected to theirs.
I seldom mention any of these “famous” relatives as I don’t want to appear to be braging.

[Marge Vallazza]

Jacqueline Kennedy's mother, Janet (nee Lee) Auchincloss tried connecting her ancestry to Robert E. Lee's. Janet's immediate ancestry was from Ireland NOT Virginia.

[Craig Kilby]

Another frequent myth: "I am descended from George Washington." That would be news to George and Martha, who had no children. I'm a volunteer at the Mary Ball Washington Museum & Library, and we get these sorts of queries all the time. The variant on this "I am related to Mary Ball" and then they want to to know how. How indeed? All male Balls from her grandfather descend from her uncle William Ball. Though number of intermarriages is mind-boggling, the sad truth that so many of these people descend from the Pennsylvania Balls and due to a big lawsuit in the 1800s and a lot of hungry lawyers, the myth went out they were all related to George Washington.

[Kenneth Lary]

First, in regards to trying to find the name "Gonyea":

There are many variations on the spelling of the name, and based on those spellings, the pronounciation of the name. You should also look for Gagnon (pronounced gag-nun, gan-yen, gon-yar, and gon-yay) and then variations of spellings from those pronounciations. There are a bunch of Gonyars and Gagnons in Maine, along with Gonyeas.

Second, in regards to family stories:

When I found one of my immigrant ancestors coming to Prince Edward Island (Hutty Brown) the story was that he was an officer who fought under Wellington to defeat Napolean and was given 100 acres of land on PEI for his service. In reality, he was an infantryman who spent 20 years in India and who apparently bought the 100 acres with his earnings after his service got done. Another branch that also came to PEI has three Biggar brothers who all settled on PEI. I don't know if this is the "three brothers" story to be ignored or not. The PEI descendants of these men all believe themselves to be related, so who knows?

[Karen Weston]

We had three brothers from Staffordshire come in the 1860's, but, as Dick said families remain close usually, they stayed together in Wisconsin. My husband is distanly related to Robert E. Lee through their mutual Bland ancestors. I got started in genealogy through a desire to find out the truth, if any, about the stories that came down on each side of the family. On my dad's side, it was said we were descended from a pirate - wrong, the man was a privateer on Long Island Sound during the Revolution. On mom's side, we were descended from Ethan Allen - again wrong, but they marched with Allen on Ticonderoga. A family legend is often a good way to get the next generation interested in family history.

[Laurie Hanophy]

Regarding "three brothers" - I've been researching my husband's ancestor who came from Ireland to New York City in 1847 (living around East 29th Street in Manhattan). Additional family members seemed to have settled rather deep in Brooklyn, NY around the same time. However I questioned whether they could actually have been siblings as they settled so far away from each other (over 40 years before the first bridge was built between the two cities, Brooklyn must have been fairly difficult to visit from Manhattan despite their relative closeness). However, I have recently obtained some additional information that seems to confirm that one brother moved to Manhattan and two others (plus a sister) moved to Brooklyn around the same time. Now to try to determine why...

[Joan H]

Since I married into my husband's French-Canadian family 46 years ago , I have heard the same 2 stories passed down. The usual Indian ( Never found her). And then there was grandfather Alphonse who went to the Yukon searching for gold with his never-named brother. Alphonse got gangrene and came home. The brother supposedly hit the mother lode and then moved to San Francisco where he allegedly died in the earthquake. When the Drouin went on -line I sat and read Ste-Croix for Modeste Huot and Caroline Lamontagne. I found more kids than the 3 the family talked about. 2 died young and the 3rd was Josephen Napoleon. After a lot of digging I confirmed that Alphonse and Napoleon did go to the Yukon, There Napoleon married Annie Buchanan of Halifax and moved to San Francisco where he died the year AFTER the earthquake. Of course some of the family are not happy that I "lost" the Indian and that the no-named Napoleon did not die in the earthquake - but we can't win them all, At least there was some basis for the Yukon story.

[Nancy Johnson]

I currently use Broderbund's Family Tree Maker version 11. I want to switch to Ancestry FTM 2010. Can someone tell me if the task of transferring all my data to Ancestry is easy and complete. In other words can the new software (Ancestry 2010) import the old data (from FTM ver11), without error or loss of any data? I have pictures, extra notes, and medical histories etc stored in Ver 11.

[Elizabeth Evans]

All very interesting.. did find my great grandfather under his middle name in the Castle Island immigration records on line..so try every possible asrrangement.
I have a very interesting family "tale" that I am running down now..due to DNA results..this newest " help" can be very disturbing also..it's like looking for not only our relatives but maybe their darkest secrets.. whee.. awsome.. but interesting..

[Elizabeth Evans]

Sorry.. I made a comment that has an error.. it was Castle Garden immigration and not Castle Island.. please correct..

[Shirley Hok]

Don't forget the story of the 2 brothers whose mother died, they were collected by a guardian from their mother's family who took them with him to Britain (England or Scotland)to be educated. They later returned to USA to settle near their father who had since moved to a new area, had another wife and a lot of issue by her. (They may or may not have caught up with him). I've heard this one for both my Dennis and Holland lines, and once heard another researcher refer to it for yet another line.
leyhok@gmail.com

[Mike]

I was talking to my grandma the other day and she told me we're directly related to CherokeIndians...............................................I have my reservations...