Genealogy

Every once in a while I hop on Ancestry.com and search for info on family members. It's difficult to find any genealogical (is that a word?) data on my parent's families. The explanation for that is that most public records were burned during WWII. Also, many people had to flee their homes, and their homes were destroyed. As a result, there are not a lot of pictures around and information, like family trees, were left behind. I have some info from my dad's side, but not much. I have more from my mom's side.

Today, I searched on Keith's grandfather. I had done this several times before, but haven't found more info than I already had. But today, I hit the jackpot! I was able to find info that was already complied that sprouted off Keith's Dad's Father's Mother. So, going back, from that branch, Kevin, Kaela, Kyle & Kenna's ancestors can be traced back 15 generations. The earliest ancestor listed was from 1580. I find this all very fascinating. The tree has over 11,000 names in it. I spent a few hours pouring over it. It is not complete tree in that some of these families had 10 - 13 kids and they had 10 - 13 kids, etc. There was more info on some branches more than others. But it is so interesting to me that my kids have some part of them from these people that lived almost 500 years ago.