Results 1 to 10 of 55
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11-25-2008, 02:29 PM #1
Are You Historically Related???
Okay guys, in high school (5 years ago for me) we did a genealogy project in my World History class and we had to trace back as far as we could go. Well, some people found out some pretty interesting things! My teacher even found out that his roots trace back to the house of Charlemagne, famous king of the Frankish empire.
Upon further research after high school, I came to find out that I'm related to a historically and culturally significant individual as well:
Rembrandt van Rijn, Painter
Turn out on my mom's side, Rembrandt would have been her great-great-great etc. uncle. My mom's maiden name, van Ryn, was the last name of Rembrandt. However, his last name is the proper Dutch spelling of van Rijn. However, when my mom's grandparents came over to the US from the Netherlands, they had to change their last name of van Rijn to van Ryn, to make it more "American." To make a long story short, my mom's grandfather also traced their lineage at one point and it wound back up to Rembrandt! How awesome is that?
(Too bad it didn't run in the family. I love painting, drawing, and all types of art, but I'm not great at it at all.)
So, do you know of any famous lineage in your extensive family tree? Lets hear it!
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11-25-2008, 02:43 PM #2
Nice man, i highly doubt im related to any historical figure. I wouldn't even know where to begin to search lol
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11-25-2008, 02:43 PM #3
I wish I knew. Any ideas how I could find out?
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11-25-2008, 02:51 PM #4
First place to check is family. Ask your parents/grandparents if they have any family tree's or genealogies completed already. It might already be done for you. If not, then see how far you can go back, with the memory of your relatives. If that doesn't work, there are a lot of online tools you can use. Here are a few:
http://www.myheritage.com/page/free-genealogy
http://www.accessgenealogy.com/
http://www.ancestorhunt.com/
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11-25-2008, 03:04 PM #5
Mom said she doesnt know how true it is but she's always been told we're related to James Wilkes Booth.
Ashley
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11-25-2008, 03:07 PM #6
Cool! You should do some research and see if you can prove it. It's only about a 150 year span since he lived, so it wouldn't be too incredibly difficult!
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11-25-2008, 03:08 PM #7
Really? A long time friend of mine said he was also related to James Wilkes Booth.
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11-25-2008, 03:16 PM #8
Doesn't surprise me. Obviously, people with larger families have such a higher number of relatives. Booth himself was the 9th of 10 children. Although having no children of his own, Booth still would have had a LOT of nieces and nephews, seeing as how he had 9 siblings.
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11-25-2008, 03:45 PM #9
As soon as I get some time (probably Christmas break), I will!
Ashley
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11-25-2008, 03:46 PM #10
Awesome! Lemme know how it goes!
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Originally Posted by Aikman_TheGreat 
