THREAD:

In which family history, DNA, family mysteries regarding ancestry, and a plausible explanation for a missing branch of my family that has baffled three generations.*

+

*CODICIL:

It would be inappropriate as a white-passing American woman not to acknowledge all the Africans, who were forced onto slave ships and came here, losing their names, history, culture, language, religion, and traditions.

Knowing 7/8 of my family tree is privilege.

+

I’ll start with what we do know.

On my dad’s side, they were mostly from the Scottish Highlands, Norway, and northern England, with some French/German smatterings.

My paternal grandma had a Scottish ancestor trace the line back to Adam and Eve, so insanity runs in the family.

My paternal grandfather probably came from Yorkshire horse thieves, who fled England a few steps ahead of the noose. They were also Norwegian.

My grandmother was a DAR member, fwiw. I can’t and wouldn’t claim it, aside from proof we were here as Revolutionaries.

My mom’s side is where things gets interesting and where the mystery exists.

I know my paternal grandfather left Naples, Italy and came to NYC in the early 20th century, if not a decade before. He was an orphan raised in a Catholic orphanage but had a Jewish name.

Sad fact about my paternal great-grandfather (he’s the one who left Italy): he was left at an orphanage as an infant with his real name attached so he could be re-united with his family if they ever returned to get him. They didn’t. But that’s how we know he was a Sephardic Jew.

My paternal great-grandmother was also Italian and Catholic. That branch either became lapsed Catholics almost immediately (my mom famously told the priest is was all bunk at her first communion) or married back into Jewish families.

Here’s where it gets interesting/weird:

We know NOTHING about my maternal great-grandfather. We know my maternal great-grandmother was of German descent and she died from a stroke whilst yelling at her children. But her husband? Nada.

My maternal great-grandfather was from Europe. In his early to mid-twenties, he came to America from Poland and settled in western PA. Married twice. Had kids. Owned a coal mine. Was rich. Lost a lot in the Depression but managed to still be modestly comfortable.

He NEVER talked about his family. He spoke at least five languages, Polish amongst them.

No one knew his real name. We have the Americanized version and the Polish-sounding version, but there are NO records of him in Poland.

He was a master carpenter (built his house and it still stands, solid and strong, at least 120 years later). He was a master arborist (grafted together five different fruit trees...the tree amazingly still survives and bears different fruits).

For a long time, we wondered if he was maybe Jewish and had fled Europe during one of the many pogroms. However, there are no Ashkenazi markers in our DNA. That doesn’t mean he wasn’t Jewish, but the likelihood goes down.

In addition to never knowing his real name, my maternal great-grandfather (my grandma’s dad) wrote and received letters to/from Europe in a language NONE of his children recognized. They knew English, Polish, Russian, German, and Hungarian. They could recognize others languages.

The language most likely wasn’t Yiddish because a German speaker would’ve been able to recognize it. And even if you don’t know Greek/Hebrew/Arabic, those are easy to recognize too.

Unfortunately my great aunts burned his letters when he died.

This destruction of property/lack of sentimentality is fairly on brand for that branch of the family, though. I definitely get my “Why would I want to keep this stupid photo of me in my marching band uniform from 1984?” instincts from them.

So. The letters are gone.

WHO WAS MY MATERNAL GREAT-GRANDFATHER????

None of us know.

I don’t think he was Polish, even though he had a Polish “name” that was Americanized.

No one from that branch has reached out from 23 And Me or Ancestry.

So, if he’s not Polish, not Jewish, speaks six languages and one of those languages is completely indecipherable to his daughters, who knew his five other languages, and he’s a competent tinker-type, and he fled Europe and never returned, is it possible he was Roma?

The reason why I ask if he could have been Roma is the unknown language of his European correspondences, his varying abilities, the fact that pogroms against Roma were as common as pogroms against Jews, and his lack of “place.”

So then I wonder if he fled and never returned because of a pogrom? Because he had committed a crime and needed to escape? Bcs he was wrongfully accused of a crime and needed to escape?

But if he’s Roma, that might also explain the lack of DNA trail. Roma know who they are.

Anyway, this thread is brought to you by my dream last night where I had this epiphany abt my great-grandfather, who he might have been, and why there’s so much mystery surrounding him still.

I may never know. That’s okay. But I wonder abt genetic memory. And who I am.

/Fin