Ancestors

Today, I read about DNA and genealogy. I think most people are interested in who their ancestors were, but of course, other than grandparents, you're probably only going to find any information on ancestors who were famous. Supposedly, I and my siblings are over half German, with the remaining not-quite-half consisting of 8 different ethnicities. Typical American melting pot, I always figured.

I never heard that any of my German ancestors were famous, but then, it was the other side of my family that displayed any interest in this subject. And according to rumors on that side of the family, I'm a direct descendent of Sitting Bull and Betsy Ross.

Impressive, huh?

Hang on, I'm not done. The claim of Sitting Bull came through my maternal grandfather, who couldn't seem to decide if he was full Indian, half-Indian, or only quarter-Indian. That came from my maternal grandmother, whom he abandoned with five kids to raise on her own, so there was probably some bitterness there, and no way to track down the truth.

Hey, but I still had Betsy Ross, right? A few months before mom passed away, she and I spent a weekend searching through a collection of papers grandma had given us; yellowed copies of newspaper clippings, census pages, and so on. This was the best we could figure out – back in the 1800s, grandma's great-grandparents were moving west with their children. One of the daughters was named Lindy, who later married … well, I forget his name. What's that got to do with anything, anyway? Because Betsy Ross had some younger sisters, and one of them had a son or grandson, whose wife was named 'Lindy'. That, apparently, was my direct descent from Betsy Ross.

On the other hand, one article I read said that most everybody alive could count royalty in their ancestry. Guess I'll have to be happy with that, at least for now.

It did get me thinking. What if some person on the planet didn't have ANY royalty or famous people in their ancestry? Would he/she be different from the rest of us in some way? If they became aware of it, would they become determined to BECOME the most famous person in the world, or set themselves as the start of a new royal dynasty? Something to think about.