Seeing “the homeland” is it on your radar ?

I think it depends on how much you're interested in genealogy and even more, how much you research your history before you go there. I love history and family history is even better. In 2022, I went to Germany and visited the town were my great-great-grandfather emigrated from in Germany. I did tons of research before I left, looking up old baptismal records, marriage records, and birth records. I also met one of the town locals who had kept track of the emigrants online, and we started communicating. When I got there, he and his wife spent the next four days showing me all over Ostbevern and taking me to many historic places that were relevant to me. His wife spoke a little English, but he spoke none. Luckily, my German was good enough for us to be able to communicate somewhat.

We visited the church where my great-great-great-grandfather was married and where my great-grandfather was baptized, the plot of land where their house was before they sold it and emigrated to the US, and then took me to see other historic areas in the town. I loved every minute of it, and at some point would love to go back again. He also told someone who worked on the local paper about me, and they interviewed me, and wrote an article about my research and how the older couple helped me while I was in town.

I also found out information there that I would never have gotten anyplace else. For example, he told me that the reason my great great great grandfather left with his five sons and wife was because the Prussians were conscripting boys as soon as they were old enough to fight, and they decided that was a good reason to leave the country.

And I discovered that my last name was not through my great-great-great-grandfather, but through his wife, who he married after his first wife died, leaving him with two sons (one of whom was my great-great-grandfather). The two of them then had three more sons. Back then, it was the custom for the name to follow the land where they lived, and since his second wife had been married before and they moved onto her farm, he took her name. So my last name comes from somebody that I was never related to by blood. 😊

Anyway, sorry for the diatribe but you got me started. 😂 I do think genealogy is fascinating and I love finding more out about my family!

I wish I had been as prepared as Mardee but I did go to Germany and drive through the area my family left to come to the US. I found a cemetery filled with people with my very unusual last name but no living relatives. I loved seeing the area and it made me wonder what prompted them to move seemingly all at once and not without Some significant effort. The locale reminded me of where I live today which made it seem relatable. Some day I would like to return armed with better research.

Many years ago, I had traveled to La Petite Pierre in Alsace as that was the village of my grandfather's grandfather. Planning on going back during a day excursion off a Viking River Cruise, I contacted the hotel where we had stayed to ask about our ability to get there for lunch from the boat in Strasbourg. I mentioned my family name and the owner said: We have a 'Stoeckel' still living here in the village." He connected me to him, and then I was connected to his sister. She did all the research, found our connection, AND found another relative living nearby that she didn't know about. By the time they met us at the ship, we were able to visit the home of that newly-discovered relative, and then we were taken by a family home, and all had a wonderful family meal at the hotel! We have been able to meet with my "cousin" and her husband several times since then! Location was special, meeting relatively, priceless!

Occasionally I see posts along the lines of, “my people are from XYZ place in Europe, therefore I want to see this place”. Is this something that resonates with you ?

No. I feel no familial connection, the States are my homeland.

One part of dad's family arrived in Virginia in 1649 from Norwich. One part of mom's were Mennonites from what is now Rhineland-Palatinate between 1750 & 1848 to Canada and then Chicago in 1903.

Similar to Mardee, I love history and family history as well. Researching with my DNA led to a fourth cousin in Northern Ireland contacting me, and three trips later and one more coming this fall, a part of my heart is forever in a small area of County Tyrone. Before our first trip, I contacted the minister of the tiny church in town, and he was able to find the original marriage record for my great great grandparents in 1847 and we were welcomed by more (and more) cousins. And again similar to Mardee’s experience, those lovely people welcomed my husband and me, insisted on feeding us at every opportunity, and had so much information on my family. I was able to find the family farm…the house is no longer there, but, for me, standing where my ancestors lived and worked was so important to me. It’s definitely not something that is meaningful to everyone, but there is so much information available to those who would find the value and the time in their travels to visit those lands of their ancestors.

The year we were in Glasgow for a conference I took a bus out to Glencoe as that was one origin strand. I was surprised to feel that the highlands resonated. I’m hoping to go back next year to explore more.

We had an in-law take the RS Southern Italy tour with us in 2019. He found out he had a relative in Matera that had a restaurant and we went there for lunch. It wasn’t in the tourist corridor, so that was an adventure. The language barrier limited conversation, but we met the owner and his mom and they were so kind. Since then extended US family members have connected with him on Facebook and are in frequent contact.

So the answer is “yes”.

I love getting an impression of both what my ancestors may have (or did) see every day and wondering how my life would have been different if I had grown up in that place.

I think it's probably much more interesting for people whose ancestors came to the United States relatively recently. My ancestors, at least the ones I can trace, came over long before the United States was born. So if you do the math, that gives me so many ancestors here in the United States, it's impossible for me to say where I am from in Europe. Probably all over the place.

But I have known a few people who went to Europe looking for their ancestral home, and from talking to them, it seems like they had a great trip, very enjoyable like any trip to Europe.

I was planning to visit the village my great grandparents came from but then Russia attacked.. I've had to postpone.

It's interesting how interests vary from the US to Europe.

If I were American, I'd definitely be what people consider to be "Irish-American". I've never thought of myself as the slightest bit Irish though. I've always been Scottish.

I'm maybe a bit of an outlier, but Irish roots (I have them on both sides of my parental family) isn't something I've ever considered exploring. I'm usually quite curious about other things. I have what I guess is an anglicised corruption of a Gaelic name. The same surname actually appears not too far back on both sides. Make of that what you will. I've always assumed coincidence, but I don't know. I know that both Mum and Dad's side of the family came as Irish immigrants to Scotland, but never thought to go any deeper than that.

I've never really spoken about heritage or genealogy with anyone. I don't think there's the same interest in it here. It's never come up in conversation as far as I can remember.

I feel I should be more interested in it than I am, lest I be some sort of philistine, but it's never been really important to me. I'm sure sociologists would have theories about why that is, particularly in comparison to the US and Canada, if it is a wider pattern.

cathy, That's a wonderful story! I didn't mention this above, but I also met up with an 8th cousin when I was in Boppard on that same trip. He brought his twin brother and his mother along, who was 98 years old, and we sat and talked for about two hours. We still keep in touch by email, and now a lot of my other siblings and cousins have gotten to know him.

I know that not everyone is as interested in history as I am, but to me, this is one of the most fascinating things about history: making that personal connection.

Absolutely! Both in the "old country" and here.

Like others here, my hobby is genealogy.

My father's side are more recent immigrants, late 1800s and early 1900s from Denmark.

My mom's side go back to the 1600s, primarily England and France.

I'd like to visit Ellis Island and then take the possible train route my grandmother would have taken from NYC to Chicago.

And this being the US Sestercentennial, I'd like to do more visits within the US to visit my Patriot ancestors' home states. (And the Turncoat relations too.)

Not exactly. Seeing the "homeland" wasn't on my radar when I went to visit relatives in Ireland in my 20's. To be honest, I think I was just interested in traveling and seeing someplace new. However, my relatives (next generation up from me) took me to see the cottage that my grandfather and his 16 siblings were born in. I was impacted by the experience and it is something that has stuck with me all this time.

I think it's probably much more interesting for people whose ancestors came to the United States relatively recently.

The Other Marty, it's true, it does make it easier to find relatives, although I'm still working on my dad's maternal side. My paternal grandmother's father came from the Hanover area, but I have yet to find any records.

But on my mom's side, her maternal side of the family came over before the U.S. was a nation; back in the early 1600's. So it's hard to find European records. That said, on Family Search, which is the Latter Day Saints' website that gives everyone in the world free access to genealogy records, there is a section where you can look up to see who you are related to. And they show documentation of that. In other words, if you have a family tree on there, they will link up your tree to another person's to see if you're related. https://www.familysearch.org/en/discovery/famousrelatives

I'm related to amost 70 well-known people, including Abe Lincoln, Winston Churchill, the Wright brothers, Eli Whitney, JFK, Agatha Christie, Emily Dickinson, James Cook, Gordie Howe and many many more. But my point is that all of these connections were made solely from my mother's maternal side of the family. And they were the ones who have been over here in the States the longest, and there are more records available to trace them back.

If you really want to have fun with genealogy, I highly recommend visiting the Family Search Library in Salt Lake City, which has a plethora of information and records. You will have access to so much information, books on family histories, and so on. There are also centers all across the United States. It's really a treasure trove of information. Ancestry is good too, but you have to pay for it. Family Search is completely free.

It's not that I'm not interested in history, I just don't feel that connection. I'd struggle to feel like people separated by more than a generation or two in Ireland were anything like related to me. Sure, it would be nice to meet some friendly Irish people, but I don't feel that sort of connection.

What I do know, Dad's Dad was a street bookie in Rutherglen, on the southside of Glasgow. They were always a bit better off than the poor people around them and could afford to have an annual holiday. I know nothing about Dad's background other than that really. I assume Irish immigration just because I know that it was a Catholic family.

My great grandmother on my Mother's side came to Scotland as an orphan, and grew up in an Irish immigrant mining community in the west of Scotland. Granny married a Scottish Protestant, who converted to Catholicism even though he was a career soldier.

My Dad served in the Royal Navy in WWII and I would be interested in his war history. He never talked about it particularly much. From the little bits of memory of the stuff I did hear, his service was mainly on destroyers in North Africa and The Mediterranean. I don't know which ships he served on. I gather he was an NCO and may have had service in special operations in the Greek Islands. Interesting to know from a historical perspective and I should look into it.

Posted by Mardee Duluth, MN🌲

I know that not everyone is as interested in history as I am, but to
me, this is one of the most fascinating things about history: making
that personal connection.

I have a couple of quotes that I have in my genealogy notebooks.

One is, "When a society of a civilization perishes, one condition can always be found. They forgot where they came from."

The other is a longer one that I paraphrased from someone else's genealogy that is along the lines of, Some Day the children will want to know where they came from. Everyone is too busy now, but the time will come when you will wish that you had listened and taken the time to write down dates and names and stories. As the years go by, facts fade, the family story gets lost.

If you watch Finding Your Roots with Henry Louis Gates, so many guests will find out some really interesting story about an ancestor and wonder how that information ever got lost.

I also love reading old newspapers. One of my ancestors was a delegate to the state convention to consider ratification of the US Constitution. The debates in the Legislature and the discussions in the convention are fascinating in how much they were concerned about the same things that are being discussed and debated today.

In the words of ABBA, "Momma Mia! Here we go again" 250 years later.

GerryM,

FoldThree.com is a good source for military information. Ancestry owns them now, but I think you can still search FoldThree for free. If not, your local library may have a subscription?

We Americans are known to talk about "where we are from" in the sense of where our ancestors immigrated from. Personally, I love the attachement I have to my grandparents country of origin. I grew up knowing where we were "from" and we are relatively close with my maternal cousins (paternal grandparents also from same country just did not know them.) It's pretty mind blowing to see how they lived there life before immigration and the long, storied connection they have to the area - hundreds of years! It's also pretty surreal to be around people who look eerily just like me. For some people, their ancesteral story gives a sense of belonging and place, which is never a bad thing.

This can be a mixed bag I daresay.

As a lifelong Cleveland Browns fan (which means our mortal enemies at the Pittsburgh Steelers), I recently discovered I had ancestors from the Pittsburgh area and let me tell you, whoa, it caused quite an uproar when it was announced during the last family reunion.

Happy travels.

FoldThree.com is a good source for military information.

Thanks. I've opened a browser tab and will look at it this evening.

@VAP - "One part of dad's family arrived in Virginia in 1649 from Norwich.". Interesting! Perhaps we are zillionth cousins....my earliest traced ancestor immigrated in 1645 from Norwich to Virginia as a bound servant. So must have been a known path for young men looking for opportunity.

On the other side of the family, I did go visit the Milan Duomo specifically because the family story my Mom was always told was that her grandfather who emigrated from a small town north of Milan in 1875 walked to the "big church" in Milan for services. The story was told as if he went every week but it was 25 miles so he might have done it on one occasion for a special event. Anyway, in spite of my fear of heights, I went onto the roof just to think about what it would have taken for him and later his wife and child and indeed anyone who undertakes an emigration to another land.

On the other hand, the places that resonate most specifically with me including the disparate sites of Orkney and Paris have no apparent familial attachment.

Everyone is too busy now, but the time will come when you will wish that you had listened and taken the time to write down dates and names and stories.

khansen, this for sure! I wish so much that I had bombarded my close relatives with questions about the past. Now there's nobody left on my dad's side and only one aunt on my mom's side. She was the youngest, and she doesn't remember everything. I tell my grandkids that history is important, and one day they will want to know more, and there won't be anyone left to tell them. I'm not entirely sure that much gets through to them, but you never know.

Pam, that's one of the things I love about Family Search. If you can find other people there, you can find out if you're related. You both need to have a family tree on there, but it's so cool to find relatives that you never thought you had. I found one woman who was a member of an organization that I was on the board of, and it turned out that we were third cousins. We've stayed in touch over the years and are Facebook friends.

On the other hand, the places that resonate most specifically with me including the disparate sites of Orkney and Paris have no apparent familial attachment.

That's interesting you mentioned that, because I felt the same way. For example, I have to say that I feel more of a kinship with England than I do Germany, even though my dad's side is almost entirely German. I do have some ancestors that came from England, but something about the country just really appeals to me. But that could also be the shared history we have, and that most of our forefathers in this country came from there.

ETA: I once read that all blue-eyed people are descended from the same person. Evidently a a genetic mutation occurred over 6000 years ago in a single ancestor, caused the gene to "switch off" the ability to produce brown eyes, resulting in the first blue-eyed human. So if you have blue eyes, chances are you're related to me. You may or may not want to claim it, though. 😂

In Scotland on 2022 on our way from Edinburgh to Inverness we made a 1-hour detour through Fife to see the area where my ancestors on my Mom's side came from. We've been able to trace them back from this area to the late 1500's. Fun fact, I seem to have several ancestors with the first name 'Marmaduke' in my lineage. I recently brought that up with my cousin's daughter who was expecting their first child, but I got a blank stare when I suggested she should continue the Marmaduke tradition.

In 2018 my wife and I brought my mother-in-law to London to meet some cousin's she never met and it worked out well. Here's an excerpt from a Trip Report I wrote about one of the days.

We were meeting with another of Gladys’s cousins later in the day.
It’s interesting when you start following a bloodline. All of her
brothers and sisters are short; the women are all in the 5’ range with
the men topping out at about 5’6”, and all extremely outgoing and
friendly. Here we are crossing the Atlantic to meet cousins we’ve
never met before and the English side of the family are spitting
images of the Canadian side. 5’6” Tony Addison came to our apartment
and as we introduced ourselves he asked if we were really related, I
find it typical of my wife’s family that a stranger could write to say
who they were and would like to meet and the that person would
willingly show up and suddenly we’d all be best of friends; the
resemblances and personality traits were uncanny.

My wife is a genealogist and my Grandfather (Paternal) did a lot of family research in the 40s and 50s.
Most of our ancestors came from the UK and Ireland.
My paternal line was from a small village in Cardiganshire in SW Wales. We did four weeks of driving around the countryside in Wales and England in 2017.
We visited places were our ancestors came from, including the small Welsh village where my ancestor left in 1716, There were no people in the village anymore with my surname (a common one in Wales). My ancestor and both of his brothers departed Wales for America together.

My wife found that she had ancestors in Tenby, Wales as well as other places in England.
Also, we have visited Ireland, Northern Ireland and Scotland and have a great feel for the people, culture and history.
I am pretty much a mix of Celtic (Wales, Scotland, Ireland) and Anglo-Saxon ancestry. I do have some ancestors from France, Germany, Scandinavia and very small amount from Iberia.

I am very glad that we visited these places. Of course, Ancestry.com tells me that I am defended from William the Conqueror from three separate lines.

It's as good a reason as any to travel somewhere. I think interest in family history skips a generation so yes it's good to put things in writing for future generations.

-blue-eyed Stan

Back in the twentyteens, I was researching a possible trip to explore Belarus and Ukraine where my wife's family immigrated from. Russia's invasion put an end to that.

We are visiting Scotland again in a month to search for some of my mother's heritage. It'll mostly be visiting cemeteries or taking photos of past farm residences.

"Pam, that's one of the things I love about Family Search. If you can find other people there, you can find out if you're related."

Mardee, I haven't gone on Family Search in a long time but it used to be that ANYone could change YOUR family tree so I stopped as someone kept messing with information that I had gotten direct from microfiche files in the Family History Library (and had photocopies of).

Geovagriffith.....my paternal line supposedly came from Wales but I've not found the link back to there. I kind of decided that some might have changed their names and altered their oral history. With a name like Griffith perhaps they just took on the surname in honor of Dafydd ap Gruffudd.

signed: Blue-eyed Pam....so Stan, Mardee and I are related, lol!!

Visited the apartment that my paternal grandmother lived in during the early 20th Century in Oslo. Also stood in a field that used to be an orchard in Apremont, France. Almost 100 years prior my maternal grandfather was in a furious firefight with advancing German troops. Right or wrong these places were/are part of my heritage.

"Also stood in a field that used to be an orchard in Apremont, France. Almost 100 years prior my maternal grandfather was in a furious firefight with advancing German troops."

This heritage is important. I stood in a pear orchard in Eastern Belgium at the end of a German-built airfield runway that was taken over by the Allies and where my Dad crash landed his P47 after engine trouble, It was his best "war story"....

I'm one of those from a more recent immigrant experience. All four of my grandparents were born in Ireland. I have visited five time and 4/5 times have visited with family there, and I have seen the towns, cemeteries, houses, etc. Two years ago, I went with a same-age friend whose great-grandfather emigrated from a small Mayo village about 20 miles from where two of my own grandparents lived. There was little left but the headstones and a vague idea of where the family home used to be. Still, it was a profound experience to be there. And it sparked her curiosity about her great-grandmother (the wife of the man from Mayo), who it turns out had also emigrated but from an area in the southeast of the country. Had we known that, we could have visited that area, as well. That'll be for her next trip, which she plans to take with her adult children. As far as I know, the rest of my friend's family came to the US from who knows where, many generations ago. She has a very Irish name and has always felt a pull to visit.

"Where did my people come from?" You have a father and mother, you have 4 grandparents, 8 great grandparents, 16 great great grandparents, 32 great great great grandparents, and so on. All of us probably came from all over the place.

Posted by Pam

. . . on Family Search . . . ANYone could change YOUR
family tree . . .

This is true. And some people are very sloppy with sourcing information if they source anything at all.

And if you choose to keep your information solely on Ancestry, you pay their monthly fee for however long you want to keep accessing your information. One cousin wanted to download his Ancestry file to his own software and had a terrible time getting all of it.

I always recommend getting your own genealogy software.

Or go the old-fashioned route with paper charts.

Posted by geovagriffith Of course, Ancestry.com tells me that I am
defended from William the Conqueror from three separate lines.

According to Family Search, Bluetooth Harald was my 27X great grandfather.

Do I believe it?

Until I can verify sources, no.

But it's fun.

You have a father and mother, you have 4 grandparents, 8 great
grandparents, 16 great great grandparents, 32 great great great
grandparents, and so on.

I am my own Grandpa

Yes, it is something we do, a visit to a town where one of our ancestors came from. These have included Irrel, a very small town now in Germany, near the Luxembourg border. Some of my wife's family came from near Cochem in the Mosel Valley and Boppard in the Rhine Valley. We have also visited Roche, in Cornwall, UK where one of my ancestors came from. and a couple other places associated with family.

To be honest, we never expect something spectacular or interesting related to the family, just being there is a touchstone. In Cornwall we did find some family graves, and a couple houses they once occupied. But overall, all this migration happened just under 200 years ago, we have no connection to distant relatives, no famous ancestors, just poor farmers and laborers who likely were never missed once they left.

One thing we never do is claim to be "Cornish" or German, or any nationality. If talking to locals we might mention that we had ancestors that came from the area, but very long ago.

"According to Family Search, Bluetooth Harald was my 27X great grandfather.

Do I believe it?

Until I can verify sources, no.

But it's fun."

Hahaha...when I was new to Ancestry and Family Search there were some family trees that claimed one of my lines was related to Conan the Barbarian. insert eyeroll!!!!

Pam, Welsh surnames can be a nightmare when trying to do a family tree.
Traditionally they didn’t have surnames you were just named after your father, ‘ap’ meaning son of and ‘verch’ meaning daughter of. Then there was a messy period when people used the traditional naming after the father structure or modern surnames or an amalgamation of both eg ap Richard became Pritchard.
I have a woman in my tree who had four surnames sometime using more than one at the same time, she just seemed to pick what she fancied:-)

I find genealogy really interesting. Not just from a personal family point of view but from learning about how the family fitted into wider history. It’s amazing what you can find out from a google. It’s also a numbers game. With numbers doubling every generation you don’t have to go that far back to have 100s of ancestors and some have to be interesting.
I did a friend’s family tree and it was amazing. I was very excited when I ‘found’ she was descended from King Edward lII, less excited when I found out that if your family has a long history in south east England you are more likely to be descended from him than not! I also found she was related to the Dudley family who were ‘big’ in the Tudor period. I have recently found out I am likely descended from an obscure Welsh Lord, attached to Henry Tudor (Henry VII) so our ancestors probably knew each other 500 years ago. That is definitely a bit mad!

I am half Hungarian on mom's side, the remainder is a mix of Estonian, Scottish and German on dad's side. While I had a strong desire to see the "countries of my people", it also helped me decide how to prioritize my travels when I began in 2011. First up had to be London--but I visited Edinburgh on a long day trip. Then came Tallinn, as my paternal grandmother was born there--their outdoor living history museum gave me a sense of life there circa 1910. Finally got to Budapest in 2014, but didn't visit Tata, the small town in the northwest where my mom's mother was born in 1899, until my second visit in 2016. No Katonas seemed to still be there, but I found a few graves and entertained myself wandering the little town, imagining where they might have lived. It seemed important to me to go there, and I'm glad I did. I actually felt a stronger sense of connection when I visited Ellis Island--I had already researched their archives online and saw the ship's manifest for June 1899 with the entire family listed, including the address of where they went first in Chicago. Standing in the rooms where they were processed into America was very emotional for me.

signed: Blue-eyed Pam....so Stan, Mardee and I are related, lol!!

My people!!!!!

I do get that about Family Search, and my German cousin talks about it a lot. It drives him crazy, but neither of us wants to pay the high price of Ancestry. That said, you can access your own information and your own Family Tree on Ancestry without paying for a membership. But not much more...

By the way, did you know that Ancestry owns Find a Grave? I was surprised to find that out a couple of years ago, and I'm waiting for the day they start charging to use that.

What an interesting thread! Thank you for starting it joefarnacle.

Pam, I quit adding people to my Family Search tree as others kept changing my well researched information. I refer to the tree frequently. It seems every time I look at it something new has been changed. I'm so glad I kept good notes on paper of the sources used to verify my info. I guess I need to add it all into a tree that only I can access. It has been very frustrating to realize my work has been changed. If I had only known at the beginning this could happen I would not have put my tree on Family Search.

As far as my family goes, when I was elementary school age I asked my Dad "where were my ancestor's from". His reply was that we were mongrels! Genealogy research proved him right.

I grew up in a German and Swiss-German community settled by immigrants who came to the United States in the mid-1800s. That's my paternal side.
On my mother's side, her father's side came from England in the 1600s. On her mother's side they came from England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland. Oh and France. On my Mom's latest DNA update, Spain was added, along with Ukraine, Germans from Russia, Denmark, and Poland.

I really am a mongrel. My DNA test proves it!

I have traveled to one of the little villages in Bern, Switzerland where family came from and drove through a city in Germany. Two years ago I went to Ireland and saw places my husband's family lived. On Thursday I will return to Ireland and plan to travel to Northern Ireland where my Irish relation lived, the woman and her daughters were flax spinners. I still wish to travel to Scotland, Wales and England. And I will travel to Switzerland as long as I am able.

Happy researching and traveling everyone.

Even the poor farmers and laborers were living through the historical events going on around them.

I have one from Salem, Mass who was a witness in the witch trial of George Burroughs, the preacher. Haven't found a good court transcript yet, if one even exists, to know if he was testifying for or against him. Shortly after a group of Congregationalists including my family sailed south. Had to get away from all that craziness.

Kids would probably be more interested in history if they knew "my ancestors were there, living through all this".

A huge thank you to Mardee for sharing the info on familysearch.org- I have already learnt so many interesting things just this evening!

To answer the original question, one side of my family emigrated relatively recently (my grandparents' generation) so I know those areas well and have been several times- indeed we still have family there. The other side was further in the past (great-great grandparents' generation) and I would be keen to visit those places and learn more- which should be a bit easier now that so much of this info is freely available.

In the UK, I use a combination of Ancestry.co.uk and Findmypast.co.uk

Findmypast is better for searching addresses and let’s you search newspapers.

Well, I guess I'm related to a few of you (blue eyes).

We took our kids to visit my husband's paternal grandparents' villages and distant cousins in Ukraine in 1997, and then Luxembourg and German ancestral villages and towns in 2022. My maternal grandma's birthplace (Walthomstow---East London) did not invoke the same visceral response as did my her mother's church (in Whittlesey), and the other Cambridgeshire ancestral villages. I also felt deep connection to a paternal gggrandmother's Dumfries/Galloway area--particularly standing stones between a couple of ancestral villages. Finding graves and residences in Cornwall highlighted another trip before the kids left home. A couple of years ago, our trip to Yorkshire allowed a visit to another, then recently discovered, ancestral village. I have not narrowed down the Swedish/German twig locations, nor a rumored ancient Alsace connection. And, I'd love to find out the location of my Ulster Scots area but they left Northern Ireland in the 1600s.

Visiting personal heritage sites has both influenced and enhanced our itineraries. The connections have helped me to develop more of an interest in history.

My grandmother was born in Buda-Pest in 1905. I have relatives (3rd cousins) in Frankfurt. When we lived in Germany in 1957, we spent a lot of time with them. I've been back to see them 1 time since. We did get some really helpful advice from Uncle T. Wife and I have also been to Serbia where the family came in 1784 (Donau Schwaben). Many villages in that area have graves with family names. That also was interesting, but Serbia is hostile to the Germans who were expelled in 1945. These villages are all very very small, and completely devoted to farming - cabbages, tomatoes, grapes. I did enjoy the opportunity to see family history up close. That's due to the recency of the emigration of those family members.

A huge thank you to Mardee for sharing the info on familysearch.org- I have already learnt so many interesting things just this evening!

Cat, I'm so glad you found it useful. It really is pretty cool what they do. Of course I know why they do it, and I think the reason is a little odd, but they do have all this information and they are willing to share it for free, so I think that's wonderful.

For anyone with German ancestry, Germany is an interesting country. They have a lot of their records online, which is wonderful. I found so many church records where I could see the original writings online. Many of them are only in German, so it helps to either speak it or use something like Google Translate when you are there.

That said, they are so environmentally efficient that they only keep graves for around 50 years. After that, the grave stones are destroyed and recycled into cement for roads. I believe they only keep the ones that are historically significant.

"For anyone with German ancestry, Germany is an interesting country. They have a lot of their records online, which is wonderful. I found so many church records where I could see the original writings online."

I did a couple of programs with Road Scholar at the Family History Library in SLC about 10 years ago. I was shocked to find all the microfilm they have of German church records. I found it quite odd that the microfilming was done DURING WWII. I was told by a German ancestry specialist that there are some areas of Germany where the microfilming and records are more complete. I was specifically looking for records in the Baden-Württemberg area and found church records for my ancestors back to 1704.

Yes, but I still have family there, and family in America does visit these distant cousins. (Switzerland). I wouldn't go on a commercial trip to see the family places but it does exist and my dad could tell me how to get to certain places family related.

I did a couple of programs with Road Scholar at the Family History Library in SLC about 10 years ago. I was shocked to find all the microfilm they have of German church records. I found it quite odd that the microfilming was done DURING WWII.

Oh, I love the Family History Library! I remember talking about that with you at one point. That's interesting about it being done during World War II, though. I had no idea. I wonder if it was so Hitler could keep track of people better.

My understanding is that it was done in order to identify and document people's genetic ancestry. Not necessarily a good purpose.

Most people in North America (Canada and USA) came from somewhere else, more recent or centuries ago.

Personal interest in your family background is variable. I was always interested in the stories my parents told about their childhood in the same small farming village in Hungary. They are not ethnic Hungarians and that has a whole lot of painful post WWII history behind it. I've been to their village once when not on a family trip- my dad's oldest sister still lived in Hungary and still owned their original home. On another family trip I've been to the town in eastern Germany that they were sent to when they were expelled from Hungary.

My brother didn't visit the village when he and his wife when to Hungary a few years ago. In contrast, my niece went to the village and found the house my maternal grandparents built in the 1930s. She and her husband have a memorable story of how villagers helped them find it. My dad's house isn't as memorable and is very different from its original state. On another trip, she went to the Pier 21 museum in Halifax and got information on the ship that brought my mother to Canada. My nephew doesn't have the same interest in family history.

While on a tour in Ireland, we had one night in Clifden where my husband's great-grandmother was from. We thought we might find her tombstone in the Catholic cemetery, but it was overgrown.

We've been to Norway and found the two houses in Alesund my great-uncle lived as an adult (my grandmother was born there in 1885). We also drove down the little road in Sand (near Stavanger) where my grandfather lived as a child (born there in 1870). I found tombstones in Alesund for relatives, but I don't know of any living relatives in Norway.

We visited some of my husband's relatives at the Ramstad family farm near Lom. All of the old buildings were still standing (some barely). They were stuffed full of old treasures. We also went to Morgedal where more of his ancestors are from. The Hemmestveit farm is still there, but we don't know any of that family, so we just stopped at the end of the road and took pictures.

I loved being in Alesund and it brought back wonderful memories of my grandmother and her brother. I never knew my grandfather, but there was a book published about immigration to America from Sand and it includes the story of him and his mother so I actually know quite a bit about his life.

Twenty years ago my uncle was taking his children and grandchildren to the village where his parents were from. I tagged along and took my then 11 year old daughter. A few other members of the extended family joined us and we were a jolly bunch of 18 people bouncing along with a private driver. It was enlightening not only because we saw our "roots" but also because my daughter got to know her second cousins very well. Imagine bumping into a second cousin 10 years later at check in for the San Francisco Marathon. LoL.

In 2019 my husband and I went to Barra in the Outer Hebrides, from where his family was cleared. We found a number of familiar names in the cemetery but the history center was closed while we were there. Ironically, our driver back to the airport was from the same clan as my husband. Wish we had known that earlier.

I'm maybe a bit of an outlier, but Irish roots (I have them on both sides of my parental family) isn't something I've ever considered exploring.

@Gerry. If you're interested it might be worth looking at Irish citizenship via blood relative. I'm in the process of obtaining it and hopefully it will be completed around June time. It costs about £245 which is a bit of a bargain for an EU passport. I've also recently had my Polish citizenship confirmed (there are no limits to how many citizenships you can hold in the UK) and I'm just waiting for the documents from Poland in order to apply for my Polish passport.

I can trace my paternal family tree back to the 1400's however my maternal Polish tree is pretty much unknown. I've never had any desire to go and visit any particular areas relating to my ancestry. I've been to Dublin which was where my paternal grandmother was born but that wasn't the reason I visited. I've also been to Poland on a number of occasions but never to where my maternal grandparents came from.

I’ve been interested in our genealogy since I was 15 and made a family tree from info from older family members, after writing letters to them all.
I still have it, it’s on the back of a movie poster for “Bonnie and Clyde” that I had on my wall as a teen!
Lived in Scotland for years as a student, so found out lots about my Scots Dad’s family and ancestors.
It wasn’t till the Internet took off that I became a bit obsessed with the research.
I haven’t made special trips to see any old sites related to our family, except once to Register House in Edinburgh a few years ago.
You pay £15 for a day and can research every bit of info they hold on Scottish families.
Absolutely worth it if you have a free day in Edinburgh.

https://www.scotlandspeople.gov.uk/visit-us

When I’m in Scotland, my cousin from there and I sometimes go and look at the old graveyards in East Lothian where some family lived .
We have very very common surnames in our family, so it’s difficult to research!

The US citizen’s connection to European ancestry

I'm too many generations removed from my family's European ancestors. Good or bad, it at least lets me see all parts of Europe with "fresh" eyes that don't have family stories coloring the picture.

OTOH, I am lucky to have my wife whose father came to the US as a teen, and we were able to enjoy several trips with him in Europe before he passed away a few years ago. His perspective was wonderful, and his multi-lingual fluency was also a great asset while traveling with him.

”Back then, it was the custom for the name to follow the land where they lived (Germany), and since his second wife had been married before and they moved onto her farm, he took her name. So my last name comes from somebody that I was never related to by blood.”

Mardee, this is exactly what happened in my family, also. The first husband died early before there were children, and her second husband moved onto their farm and took the first husband’s family name. My maiden name was long, difficult for people to pronounce & ended in “haus”. When I met my husband with his English short easily pronounced name, I teased him that it was a big selling point - LOL!

I’m 75% German & 25% English. The German relatives moved to the US by 1850 from farming communities.. The English moved here much earlier.

My Grandfather immigrated to the US from the UK between the world wars in search of employment. He always loved his homeland and passed that love and respect down to his grandchildren. I frequently visit places from family history and think of my Grandfather. I do think these types of visits are especially memorable if the relative is someone you knew and loved.

Last year my sister and I were able to donate his journal from his days in the Royal Navy during WWI to the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich where it was accepted into the archives. It was particularly satisfying for us to visit with the archivist and go through many entries together. It felt good to have it in a place where his experiences and service were honored. We feared our kids would just consider it “old junk” and dispose of it. They never knew him personally. The more generations removed, the harder it may be to find that connection.

I've been sporadically looking into family ancestry since joining Ancestry.com a year ago after my recent retirement. However, I have considerably picked up the pace after I recently made unexpected contact with a 2nd cousin and his two siblings living in the Cologne area whom I was completely unaware of. They are related to me through their Grandmother who was a sister to my Grandmother (so a Grand Aunt) who immigrated to NYC from Bremen, Germany in 1927 where 4 other sisters had already immigrated to the US. Unfortunately, this Grand Aunt was the only sister that remained in Germany and died in an Allied bombing raid in November 1943 while she was at home with her husband/my cousins grandfather. Their Mom survived because she was working in a factory at the time.

After the war, their Mom moved with her husband to the Russian occupation zone (where he was from) and my cousins were born in the GDR aka East Germany where they stayed until 1959 when their parents decided to escape through East Berlin to the West. My cousin and I have been in frequent contact several times a week since working on more geneology research together during which we discovered another set of 2nd cousins who live near Munich and Bremen which we have made contact with. We have been like police detectives working a cold case together. It is similar to peeling back the layers of an onion, the more you do it the more that you come across. You find a lot of people who have passed and cant tell their story and so it is very exciting when you discover live relatives. I would say that I have found this experience to be highly addicting.

As a consequence, our first RS tour will be the 13 day Germany one which briefly passes through Cologne and ends in Berlin. However, we are going to stay over in Berlin for a few extra days after the tour ends because there's a lot to see there and then take the DB train to Bremen to see some family history followed by another train ride to Cologne to stay for a week to meet my cousins in person for the first time. Since we are retired we don't need to worry about getting back to a job which is nice. This definitely brings a different flavor to the RS tour experience which will serve as a warmup to meeting long-lost cousins I never new existed.

I am French, but my maternal grandparents (separately) emigrated from Spain and it has been a driver in some trips, yes.

But not too often either, because both of their stories are sad. Without diving into excessive detail, neither my grandmother nor my grandfather ever saw their hometowns again - or, in my grandfather's case, their country. Being able to visit where they lived is a tribute to them, but is invariably emotional.

David, that is really interesting about finding your cousins in Germany. I felt the same way when I found my cousins in Germany and have been in communication with them ever since. It's really a fascinating experience working on your genealogy.

My 16-year-old grandson is interested now and asked for a DNA test for Christmas, which I got for him. We've been looking at that and figuring out where his relatives come from on his dad's side.

Balso, it must be sad to have a place associated with such a sorrowful time in your grandparents' lives. My German relatives that emigrated from Germany in 1835 did so because they worried about their five sons being conscripted into the Prussian military. But they had to promise that they would leave their oldest son behind, who was getting ready to turn 18, in order to get consent for the rest of the family to leave the country, which was required back then.

Instead, they opted to take all five sons, which meant a clandestine departure from Bremerhaven. They never had the opportunity to come back, and I'm not sure that they even wanted to. But it would be fascinating to be able to talk to them and find out what their thoughts were at that time and how scared they must have been leaving the country, worrying they would be caught.