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Who here is into this?

I just received some family infofrom a cousin on my dad's side. Have never delved into this stuff before now.

Reading into my paternal grandmother's side is quite interesting. My paternal grandfather's info is pretty minimal.

The grandmother's side has a lot of soldiers from the revolutionary war. One that was quite famous. Definitely have some longevity in that lineage.

A brief dive into it tonight and I can see how people get sucked into the rabbit-hole that is genealogy.

The more complete family-tree info that someone worked on many moons ago has been lost. So some of the passing references I have heard about are not to be found. So I am hoping to do some casual digging to see if I can build on what I have already.

For those that are fluent, what is the best way to lay this stuff out? What are the best tools to look deeper into the family's history?

Word is that all the firms that do that sell it all to China.

It's more personal data that you pay someone to give away to other parties, whether they do it deliberately or not. Might be terminated in future for having too much Neanderthal in the bloodline - just saying.

I have gone quite a ways back just on findagrave.com

May not get a lot of information but can see names or 4th and 5th great grandparents in a couple of cases.

https://familysearch.org

I'm descendent of the first people who got off the boat at Jamestowne in 1607. 123 left Holland and then England, can't tell you how many died on the voyage across the Atlantic. History books tell that 80% of those who made it to the new world, died of disease or by violence from Indians. I am 17th generation from those 20% that survived.

From 1607 to 1625, 6 thousand Puritans came to Virginia.. 80% of those died from disease and Indian attacks. The population of the Virginia colony in 1625 was only 1200 people. I am also a descendent of Miles Standish from the Plymouth Colony. They were bound for Jamestown in 1620, but after bouncing down the North American coast in search of it, they ran out of food and beer ( which was drank instead of water, because most water had parasites in it that killed many people at the time). They landed at what became Plymouth Rock, and there they stayed. Miles Standish was a puritan also. The Meadows family were married into the Standish family before they came to North America.

My grandmother's side, came to Virginia in 1619. Their last name was Lilly. From the early days of the Virginia colony, I am related to a lot of folks that have historical name recognition. I am related to Robert E Lee, because his family married into our family, 5 Generations before Robert E Lee was born. Two Generations before Harry Lightfoot Lee., Robert E Lee's Grandfather.

As my grandfather use to tell us, when we were boys... Our people have been here so long, we qualify to be Indians.

Former Senator Mark Meadows from North Carolina, he is a carbon copy of my grandfather in his youth. My Grandfather died in 1968, born in Wytheville VA in 1907. LONG serving Senator Robert Byrd of WVa, he was my grandmother's first cousin. The Lilly Family Reunion, from my Grandmothers side, started by her grandfather and his 3 brothers in 1929, has made the Guinness World Book of Records six times since 1990, as either the largest family reunion held in North America, or in the world. Last time I attended, there were a little over 5,000 people.

https://www.onlyinyourstate.com/west-virginia/lilly-family-reunion-flat-top-wv/

Mine come back White Privilege all the way on both sides, barefoot and hungry....

If someone's family has been on this Continent from the beginning (first contact).

A good source is the Hudson Bay Company, Northwest Company archives, which are located on a number of different website's, perhap's they worked in the fur trade....lots of info there. I am not sure about the records kept by the American fur trade Company or the Pacific fur trade Company. Often employee's worked for different fur trade companies.

The records kept by these fur trade companies were extensive, often dating back to 1700 or earlier, records such as baptism's, birth's, marriages etc...

OTOH, there was a brief period about 4 years ago where Norwegian women were taping themselves opening up their dna results only to find they were not the African Zulu Princess they just knew the test was going to show but in a lot of cases it showed them being more white than black.

"We're not Romanovs. We're descended from thieves and whores."

Descended from religious fanatics, pork miners, and kohlrabi mongers

Kohlrabi mongers ??

You must explain.

kwg

Many of mine were here in the 1400’s. I really don’t bother with their prehop from Europe because they were here for so long.

One extremely weird thought that tickles me the most is my relative David Crockett. I literally get up in the morning before daylight in the area where he died and before dark I’m in my deer stand on the Burnt Corn Creek in Alabama where he fought the “Battle of Burnt Corn” against the Creeks.

Ones who engage in the wholsesale and retail sale of kohlrabis. Duh!

didn`t Davy Crockett die at the Alamo in Texas fighting the Mexicans ?

Yes, and as long as I hit Houston and Baton Rouge Bridge right I’m sittin on the Burnt Corn before dark.

I laughed out loud when I found out that the 2% African came from the redneck side of the family.

Tracing true direct blood ancestors can be extremely frustrating as well as a major challenge, for several reasons.

One is it was fairly common 'Back in the day' when a mother got crippled, sick or died, for her younger children, especially females, to be taken in by other 2 parent families and raised as their own, often including each taking their adopting family's surname.

Another is incomplete / inaccurate / nonexistent birth, death, military, census, marriage records.

And then there's your plain old, everyday, age-old, 'Momma's baby -- Daddy's maybe ', thing...

I’ve one twig of the family tree just like that, even documented on census with the new name and such but blood shows a different story.

Seems the real dad bounced out and a new dude moved in, granny was a whore I guess? Nevertheless I cut the new guy out and followed blood.

My blond daughter was surprised to learn her proud Grandmother's "pure blood Cherokee" recent ancestor was of African, sub-Saharan descent.

My mother and her clan traced her family back to Harman Bach landing in Virginia circa 1638. She claimed there were times the family "tree" looked more like a "vine"...