American Mutt?
 

The latest political thread got me to thinking.

Lots of us are mutts. No insult implied!:D

My father was a Naturalized citizen. He was from Russia originally.

My maternal grandmother was also from Russia, my mom born in NY.

So, I am a Russian American. Not much variety here but some of you may be so much more!:)

So many of us have varied heritage.

What are you? Did you family come over on the Mayflower?

this monkey's a mutt. :D proud of it. i consider myself a true blue american.

all 4 of my grandparent's came to the usa from other countries.

i was born on a millitary base in another county.

lil'monkey has honest to goodness gypsy blood in her. yup...she has ancestors that lived inthe gypsy caravans.

i bet there aren't too many in the world these days that don't have atleast a drop of another nationality.

i hate those "check one box" nationality choices. dis mutt needs to check a few. :wink:

I looked into one of my branches on my family tree -- my dad's mother's branch. Her grandfather (my great great grandfather) came from Germany arround 1840.
I looked into my name (maiden name) after I heard from TV that a guy by the same name is one of the 'big guys' at Anhauser Busch in Germany (& the same 1st name as my bro.) so I just got interested. The meaning of the name is a miller ("works at a mill" & barley a beer ingredient). The suffix MAN was maybe added to that(maybe it means "man who is a miller"??). They added MAN or SON to lots of names or words, for instance maybe JOHNSON means John's Son.
My mother's mom (or was it her mom's mom?) came from Hungary.

Well, let's see...

My mother's mother was from Portugal. Her father was from Ireland.

My father's mother was part Native American Indian, and part Scottish.

My father's father's family was Welsh.


All four of my husband's grandparents were from Russia, although very different parts.

Yup, I'm a mutt, too.

lets see...........

dad's side.......english/ plymouth rock.......... and norweigin.......vikings????
moms side......polish and jewish maybe?

My family never seemed o talk about family history. Now everyones either dead or really old and dont remember!!!

Im a mutt.....sometimes a cranky biting little dog .......sometimes a big lazy cuddly one!!!!:p

my children have a very mixed muttcestry :D

my side has Welsh, Portughese(Madeira), Dutch, Prussian and English with a hint of huguenot French melded together into South African.........

Hubby's side we dont have all the links on but we do know there is European- Jewish in the American-New Yorker mix

http://bestsmileys.com/dogs/1.gifhttp://bestsmileys.com/dogs/4.gif

ha got some mutt here
Me- American Indian, French, German, Irish, and Canadian
Hub - German, American Indian, some Polish and some African American

Our two girls all that and a bag of chips :p
PEACE
BMW

My Mom's father was Cherokee Indian (I never got to meet him as he passed before I was born). Her mother was of Irish decent. My Dad's family is of Irish decent, too.

My Mom and both of my sisters have/had jet black hair and olive skin. I either got all my coloring from my Dad or.....well, I won't go there.....but I definitely do not have my Mom's side of the family in my genetics! I do favor my Dad in most ways. I even got the Irish name!! :)

Great thread! I guess the whole point is now that we are here lets slam the doors shut? Of course we can't take in so many people that the boat sinks. I still think that a lot of people redirect their anger and frustrations about their own life onto this issue.

good grief. that is NOT the point of this thread at all. slam the door? i don's see how you got that from THIS thread and please DO NOT drag other threads into this one.

the point is....ALL of ancestors came to the USA, one way or another...unless you are a full blood with not a drop of mix...native american indian. (and where did they come from?) so NO more pointing fingers and name calling..and NO more trying to pick fights.

yeah write/right on with that Curious :highfive:I myself thought it was awesome just going down the thread and everyone of the posts just sharing the topic of their heritage and NOTHING MORE then the chain stopped with a post about something way diffrent :confused:
and they didnt even share what they are ..but in a another way I guess they
might have...
PEACE
BMW

Sorry!!!!!

sooooooooooooo

back to our regular scheduled programming :D

motivation
 

I actually started this thread due to a recent experience that I had.

I have a few old pictures of relatives and once, when I was in my teens, a man showed up on our doorstep claiming to be a distant cousin. He was from Canada. Turns out he was our cousin.

Then, a few month ago, another Canadian cousin sent an e-mail. He never knew about his American branch until he started a genealogy search. He was coming here for Spring Training (Baseball) and wanted to meet me.

We met for dinner and it was a great time. I had an old hand written family tree that may have revealed that a brother/sister of one family may have married a sister/brother from another family.

Some of this tree moved to America, some to England (large family was noted) and one moved to France.

Because of the Holocaust, we do not know what may have happened to the man who lived in France. My cousin is working on the newly discovered England connection.

He has been meeting all of his American cousins who are mainly in NY, NJ, AZ and CA. He said it has been an interesting journey, he never knows what personality he is going to encounter.

We really got along, they are hoping we come to Toronto to visit.

The car craze began in the 1920's. Before that, everyone must have either traveled by horse/donkey or be foot.

When someone has a history of being so muttinized, I have found this thread so interesting!:)

I hope it continues.:)

LOL, Cyn, every time I see this thread title, my brain starts singing "We're An American Band (mutt)" by Grand Funk Railroad.:confused:

I'm enjoying this thread very much as well. It's pretty fascinating to think of all the different places and people, customs and cultures.

I have muttonacious origins too. I'm 25% Irish and 25% Danish via boat people, part German, some questionable mix via TN supposedly including Cherokee and African American, and a good bit of British via Canada. The problem with a lot of our history stems from my tall-tale-telling-often-drunk grandfather who claimed to have run away with the circus (thus explaining his skills with bar-level magic tricks).:confused::rolleyes:

My European roots are pretty well accounted for as a couple generous cousins went over and did all the legwork for us.

Brigham-Young University has a fabulous database and many willing students who can assist in tracing roots. They're pretty famous for it down there.

This is fun/neat. I was interested awhile ago because many from (as I wrote before)my dad's mother's side are from a nearby small town (even the mayor has the name). I went to http://boards.ancestry.com/& put in the name. I got several ppl wanting and giving lots of info. on the name because it is their name or on in a branch of their family tree. I met a woman near me and her dad & my dad are cousins. After awhile a man by that same last name, who lives in Germany, got on & told us he did some research in the library there & the name goes back to about 1630 at least (he gave all the names & who was who's child, up to my grandmother). He also put my great grandmother's obituary on. He gave me the names of towns in Germany where these ppl lived. Try going there & putting in a name :)

Yuppers, mutt here. Both of my paternal grandparents came from
Poland. On my dms side is where it gets tricky. My maternal grandma
was french. My paternal grandfather was 1/2 mohawk(upstate newyork)
indian and l/2 german american. So......I like to call myself a heinz 57,
kinda like a pound dog.:)

This is strange, you all are making me hungry for ethnic foods! Sox, I LOVE Polish food...:D

lol...so true..i was thinking about some of the norwegian foods my grandmother taught me how to make.

lefse anyone? :wink:

Yummm Curious. One of my grandmothers came over from Hungary and she made great Hungarian food. I now make these little Hungarian Christmas cookies that she made. I have a Hungarian cookbook. My MIL & FIL were both of Hungarian descent & she made those cookies too & since she passed away, both families look forward to me making them.
Each yr in my town you can go to the Polish Festival in the Polish area, the Hungarian Fest. in Hungarian area & so on. The German-American Fest. is popular with many cuz of the sausages & beer. (I don't like beer)

We did have an ancestor on the Mayflower. A lone woman, she was either very brave or a prostitute. Dad's side - from Ireland. Mom's - English and Irish. (the son of the house got the Irish maid pregnant) I married a German-American. I never knew any of my Grandparents - early deaths, TB, Flu, etc.

family tree
 

Kicker - your entry made me think of this family story.

Long ago in my mother's house, she put up family pictures in the hallway.

The patriarch of the family is named Leo. He is as far back as anyone seems to be able to go.

When I saw his picture, I remarked that he looked VERY Asian. This was odd since I knew my heritage could be traced to shtetls in Russia. My mom told me that her family used to live close to the border and the Mongols used to raid the village to plunder. If a girl turned up pregnant, the child was just accepted, no problem. Hence why Leo looked so Asian.

No shame. Just love.

So maybe I should have added Asian to my muttiheritage.

Dangit, Cyn! Now I'm hungry for Mongolian BBQ!!!;)

Now how the heck did you all figure out the % mixed? My mat. grandfather was 1st generation Irish-American, grandmother was French Canadian. My pat. grandfather - American (history says German but records say otherwise) and pat. grandmother 1st generation Irish-American.

Now would I be 1/2 Irish and 1/4 French Canadian, 1/4 what ever my grandfather was? LOL.

Actually, when people ask me what I am, I always say American.

I say American too - whole Revolution on maternal parents side - 10 ancestors and counting - one on ship after Mayflower - the Fortune - was a nailmaker - came over with his tools - what better profession for a new colony - ancestors there were English, Scotish, and Dutch - my father was from Bordeaux, France - never met the man - divorced when I was 2 -

I'm the worst/best kind of mutt; I don't know squirt of my heritage.
Been interested in looking into it for some time now.

Thanks for the thread and responses. It has motivated me to start.

And if it isn't already taken, the title "American Mutt" would make for a great title of a book/song/movie.



I think.

Jeez Moose, yes you do. You're Moose, everyone knows where they come from.

I'm "American" too, but when it comes to blood, I identify most with my Finnish heritage. My illness (hereditary amyloidosis) is known as the "Finnish" variant, and it has been traced back to a single ancestor, a Viking who settled in Finland over 700 years ago. My Finnish roots are all I see now when I look in the mirror. :rolleyes:

I traveled to Finland with my mother when I was a teenager, and I still have a lot of family over there. Unfortunately, they don't speak English and I don't speak Finnish.

When I was in Finland, my same-age cousin introduced me to a friend of hers who spoke English. Her friend asked me where I was from, and I proudly proclaimed "America." She asked "North or South?" I replied "North." She asked "Canada, United States or Mexico?" I replied "United States." My cousin's friend just rolled her eyes - guess she wasn't that impressed. :p

watchdog
 

The title of this thread is AMERICAN mutt.

It is great to be an American. (I think that is a lyric of a song:p)

This thread is not about being patriotic. It is about heritage. The point is not about being born here or a naturalized citizen.

It was more about your muttage. It is more about relating to yourself as more than just you. It was the journey that got you here as an American.

It was grandparents that came from four different countries; the nail maker;the pilgrim on a boat like the Mayflower;the fact that some of us had so many countries in our heritage.

With all due respect, let me repeat that AMERICAN was already in the title. If one is a Canadian or an Australian or another country and they want to participate, I am sure they will claim their country and tell their history.

Please, let's not make it about being proud to be an American. (Again, I can hear the country singer crooning in my ears:rolleyes:).

Let's just keep it about muttiheritage and our proud ancestors.

I had a Cuban friend who would get mad when those from the USA answered "American." She would say as snotty as she could, I'm American too, from Cuba, part of North America. She was feisty.

LOL Kicker :p

Yeah, I wouldn't want to tell my story to your friend. That girl in Finland left out Central America altogether when referring to the Americas. :eek: :D

Dad was of English and Welsh descent, no clue how far back. Mom`s parents were slovak, arrived in this country some time after world war 1, possibly when Hitler came to power in Germany.

Grew up in an area of Cleveland known as slavic village, boy has it changed.

What would be the cultural characteristics of a slavic village?

*
******
I've heard some family stories 8-O but as time marches on, people get old and die, bet there are many I will not know. DD going thru the pictures pointed to my aunt and her husband and asked "Whos that". Explained to her she didn't know them, the murder-suicide was when she was little. That sounds awful but it was an act of love. My aunt lay motionless without real speech following a series of strokes. My old Uncle was starting to have medical problems himself and the time was coming that he could no longer care for her, so they agreed on this course of action. She couldn't move, he had to shoot her first , then he shot himself. It was an act of love.

******
No, you would not!! Her last name rhymed with Hostile, we called her Hostile _______. Befittingly (?) she worked in Customer Service. Complain at your own risk, she was a firecracker.

wow, Kicker. These are the family stories that color our heritage.

How difficult it must have been for your uncle.

They were so in love. A second marrage after a bad one for both. Very hard. They were in their 70s. Very hard for my uncle I'm sure, but they were such a team. If she wanted this, he wanted this too. Another old aunt, my mom's sister (all gone now) told stories of growing up, WWII and being air wardens. My DD is amazed at my tales of "records" and punch cards for computers. I've crossed the line, I'm from the past for them. I'm one of the old ones. Yikes!!

My fathers side of the family comes from French, English and Native American background. There was a endentured servant to an aristocrat family that came over from Europe (England I think) in the 1700's and was one of the first settlers of a small town in Tennessee. My great great great grandfather fell in love with her and bought her so they could get married. I have found out that everyone with my dad's last name is related in one way or the other, they are all connected, from California to Virginia and who knows where else lol If you have my dads last name you are related to me! I also discovered there are some of our distant relatives living right here in Texas not too far from me, and also that a famous baseball player from years ago is in my family tree.

My mothers side of the family....well who knows! lol I do know that my grandmothers side was Cherokee but that's about it. I've tried to do some research on that part of the family but it gets too complicated.

So out of all that here I am with a light complexion, freckles and reddish/blonde hair, blue eyes!

Proud to be an American Mutt! ;)

(My aunt, by marriage was adopted when she was young, did some searching and found out she is a distant relative of Sam Walton...WalMart!)

My paternal grandfather's roots came over from Germany in the late 1700's from the black forest region (Waldorf an der tek) to near Lancaster Ohio. Family tree is well established back to the 1300's.

My paternal grandmother's ancestors came over on the second Mayflower (Moises Simmons). There's a book about the family at Case Western Reserve Univ.

My maternal grandfather - we don't know other than he came over from Germany in the early 1900's.

My maternal grandmother's ancestors came over from England in the early 1800's.

I'm 100% Michigan Wolverine!!!

Tom