Network Knowledge....Didn't even think about it....

I was reading through blog posts for the class and I stumbled upon Bayrider's post about Ancestry.com

I found his post so interesting as he discussed the connection between the Ancestry website and Network Knowledge activities. I started thinking about the connections that my family made through the website. 

A few years ago, my parents decided to get each other the DNA test through Ancestry.com for Christmas gifts. We never thought anything of it as we assumed the results would come back with a lot of Irish and Scottish. We had always believed that was what both sides mostly were. 

Months later, the results came back. While we did indeed see a lot of Irish and Scottish on both mom and dad's side, we found a few surprises. 

Mom found a bit of french creole and was able to trace exactly when her mother's side had migrated/immigrated. There weren't a whole lot of surprises though or much we could find on her side thus far. 

On dad's side though, we have found a lot....First, we discovered he is 68% British! That is such a huge number. But I will explain this ...we will begin the crazy dig into history. 

After a few leafs and connections, my dad had some messages and was able to trace our family lineage all the way back to none other than  John  of Gaunt. If you don't know, John was the Duke of Lancaster, was an English prince, military leader, and statesman. He was the third of the five sons of King Edward III of England who survived to adulthood. Most European monarchies are descended from John. The Houses of Lancaster, York, and Tudor were all descended from John of Gaunt’s children. So I guess, unofficially...I'm royalty??? lol. Pretty cool stuff. 

** even with the early British royalty connection, the 68% British match is still confusing though as we all know the British colonized all over the world. So who is to say what British ancestry actually is? What markers were used to determine British DNA and as of what time frame? 

We found out more too. The Old Gran Dad Whiskey brand was created and named by one of my ancestors. In fact the picture on the bottle is my great, great, great (IDK how many greats) grandad. 

My father has the particulars to all of this but I've seen the information and the documents. 

It is crazy how all this is recovered through this DNA process. 

Funny enough, my dad is the history buff in the family and he is the one who has fostered my love of history. And he is the one who appears to have all the historic connections. Could our love of history be because of our family ties to it???? The universe is so mysterious........