Ancestors
May 9, 2026
I’ve always been interested in genealogy. I started my
interest when I began following thoroughbred race horses through the Los
Angeles Times sports page as a kid. I
always went to the sports page first to view the previous day’s race results.
Now, to be honest, my parents’ home was about a mile and a
half from the Santa Anita track, up in “The Rancho”. The Rancho was mostly land once owned by
Lucky Baldwin, of the LA County Arboretum fame and he was a horse owner. In fact, one of my great uncles trained some
of his horses and lived near the Hugo Reid adobe. Another of my great-uncles was the personal
assistant to Anita Baldwin and traveled with her all over the world.
But, I digress.
So, I followed race horses for YEARS. My maternal grandfather, who lived less than
a mile from Santa Anita, used to take me with him to watch the horses race in
the afternoon. I honestly don’t know
how he got away with dragging a 10 year old girl with him, but he would place
small $2.00 bets for me. I often didn’t
pick the winning horse, but I got pretty good at picking the horse for 2nd
place (place). I frequently came home
with a good pile of winnings.
When pedigree query came onto the Internet, I was
THERE! I spent HOURS on my computer
looking up horse pedigrees. I wouldn’t bet on a horse until I checked out his
or her pedigree. Sometimes this helped,
often it didn’t. The trainer made a
huge difference.
I remember seeing Native Diver run at Hollywood park. My grandfather told me stories of
Seabiscuit, Whirlaway, and Citation. He
actually took my mom and aunt to the track to see Seabiscuit run. What days those would have been!
So, I’d been told stories about having ancestors in the
Revolutionary War. Both my mother and
father picked out one ancestor to research and yup…found their lineages and
followed them back to the war. My
mother’s ancestor was a 2nd generation Swiss immigrant family from
Bern, Switzerland. My father’s ancestor that he traced (John Hickok) was a
father who went off to war with his 16 year old son. The father survived. The son ended up as a British prisoner of
war on a ship in New York harbor and didn’t return.
With the invention of the Internet, I was able to trace
more of my ancestors, especially the ones on my dad’s side (the FEMALE
LINES). He completely ignored
them. I found them to be much more
interesting than the dull, dry, boring Connecticut farmer males on his
line! And, they had ancestors who
fought in both the French & Indian war and the Revolution!
I found one ancestor, on my mom’s side, who was a SPY for
Francis Marion, the “Swamp Fox”! Another
was a fife for the Militia (fife=small flute).
Another one bred horses used by the militia and another one was a wagon
master. I’ve found two who were in the War of 1812 and one who fought in the
Civil War.
It takes TIME to do the research, but with all the
information available these days on the Internet, it’s pretty easy to do.
You’ll need to start with your ancestor’s full name and date of birth and go
from there. JUST be aware of other
people with the same name as YOUR ancestor!
That’s why having a map and plotting their information on a map is
useful.
I just have a couple of cautions: BEWARE of Ancestry.com…I’ve seen a LOT of
mistakes there. People don’t live to be
200 years old and girls don’t have children at age 8. So, I NEVER took notes on info from that
website without having it confirmed from at least 2 other sites. And, BE REASONABLE. I ended up having a map on the wall in the
hallway to trace where my families went.
It was a steady westward expansion, except for my dad’s male lines which
remained in Connecticut. The map also
presented a visual representation of time and movement. One of my cousins has a wife who is a
professional genealogist, but I’ve never asked her for professional help. She DID, however, send photos of the John
Hickok house back in Connecticut which she and her husband visited, as it is now a historical interest home. (It’s an example of an early salt block style
house.)
Don’t be afraid to write to other relatives. Our son is actually doing the research on
his dad’s lines and he’s found cousins all over the country! Of course, he hasn’t done my lines yet…sigh…
I did write to a cousin back in Connecticut and he send me
back a long letter full of family info.
And, since my father was the last male of his direct male line going
back to 1632, I went looking for a male cousin with a possible DNA match and
found one and he provided a lot of information before he passed. Some websites
have forums where you can ask questions about your ancestors, too, and people
will answer.
So, between all the resources that I used, I had a fairly
good idea of who my ancestors were and where they came from. Then the son started his own research and
even took a DNA test, which confirmed my own findings. But, I’m even a bit skeptical of those
results, which don’t show any German ancestors on my side and I have TONS of
them! I’m not really sure how these
companies map out their results, so just make sure their results back up your
own independent research.
If you have any questions, please post them below as I
check in daily. I’m NOT an expert at
family research, but I HAVE worked on mine for over 10 years now and I’m
confident with my results, which, for the most part, have been confirmed
through DNA testing, except for the German element! Maybe they just lump that in with “Northwest
Europe”? And, I have a LOT of Norman
ancestors which also didn’t show up on their map. Anyway, right now Ancestry has a Mother’s
Day special on DNA tests for only $29.99, if you are interested.
Until next time!
1054 words
/cd
