GENEALOGY IN EUROPE: PART II

Two days after our visit the bridge at Flavigny, my husband and I drove over the border to Germany.  There we spent the day in Losheim Am See, the small town where many of my mother's ancestors once lived.  In effect, we transferred our attention from my Brennan relatives, on my father's side, to my Schulien relatives on my mother's side. 

We had set a meeting time of 10:30 at what the Schuliens call the "Little Castle,"  a building that two Schulien brothers built in the 1890s. 

There we met Janine, who is a distant cousin of mine, as well as her mother, Birgit, and her aunt, Claudia.  Her 5 year old daughter was there as well.   Janine led us through a tour of the little castle, which as recently as the 1980s was home to some Schulien descendants.  She also pointed out that the building next door, which is now a simple storefront, was once another home built by the Schuliens, and had a glamorous façade.

We then had lunch at a very nice brewery (picture below) next to the hotel where we would be staying that night, and then returned to Birgit's house where we had tea and cookies, met Janine's sister in law, Sarah, and examined photographs and genealogy books. 

After meeting with Janine and her relatives, I had a much better understanding of the Schulien family, as regards genealogy.  For instance, I learned that we are all descended from Mathias Schulien (1790 - 1868) and Elizabeth Jung.  This couple had ten children, five boys and five girls.  Three of the sons (Michael, Johann Adam and Mathias) came to the United States.  Two stayed in America (Michael and Mathias)  but Johann Adam returned to Germany.  However, most of the children of the three sons remained in the United States and raised families there.  I also learned that there are at least three spellings of the surname:  Schulien, Schuligen, and Schulgen.  These may exist because of the way the priest spelled the surname in the baptismal registry, at a time when most of his parishioners could not read or write. 

Michael (1813-1883), the eldest son of Mathias and Elizabeth, used the spelling Schulgen, married Anna Reinert and had 8 children.  This family settled in Illinois, near or in Chicago.

Johann Adam (1818-1896) Schulien married Susanna Klesser or Glasser and had 5 children.  His sons emigrated before he did and settled in Chicago.  His son Peter married and had a daughter, Susan, but he died in an accident in the Idaho territory and his orphaned daughter was adopted by his brother, Mathias.  The youngest brother, Joseph, married Mary Egle and had five children.  Joseph settled in Chicago and opened a pub, which remained in the Schulien family until recent years, though the location was moved twice.  Johann Adam returned to Germany where he died, but his sons remained in the United States, though Joseph did return to Losheim for a number of years in the 1890s. 

My ancestors are descended from Mathias Schulien (1816-1870) who married Maria Petry.  Mathias and Maria were both born in Germany, as were their four eldest children.  My great grandfather, Joseph, was their youngest child and he was born in Ohio.  He married Mary Gertrude Frecker, also from a German family.

Joseph was the father of my grandmother, Mary Bernadine Schulien Mueller.  I never met him, but my mother always told me how much she adored him.  He had been an engineer at the city waterworks plant for many years, and later was an entrepreneur, opening a foundry with his sons.  During WW II, a number of German prisoners of war worked in Joseph's foundry, and on Sundays, his wife, Mary Gertrude, would cook a German meal for them. 

I recently discovered that Joseph had also gone to Colorado at one point to try to make his fortune in a gold mine, but had to return home because he could not tolerate the altitude.  He did carpentry in his spare time, and I have in my possession a doll cradle he made for my aunt when she was a child. 


Returning to Mathias and Elizabeth Schulien, I learned that one of their sons, Jacob (1810-1890) remained in Germany, married Maria Treinen and had six children.  One of those children, Johan (1857-1888) married Angela Jacobs and had four children before his premature death.  This is the family that Claudia and Janine descend from.  A picture of Johan is below.

 


Claudia's father (and Janine's grandfather), Reinhold, is the grandson of Johan.  Reinhold wrote a comprehensive genealogy of all the families in the town of Losheim.  It comprises three volumes, and it is from these pages that I have gathered much of my information on the Schulien family. 

The visit to Losheim was most interesting and informative.  The women we met - Janine, Birgit, Claudia, and Sarah - were lovely and could not have been more hospitable. 

It would have been wonderful to stay a few more days and visit, but we were on a strict time schedule and had to depart the next day.  I do want to emphasize how much a visit to distant relatives in the ancestral home of one's family can help one understand not only the genealogy of a family, but also the culture in which they lived, and the cultural elements they brought with them to the "melting pot" of America.  Though travel to ancestral homes is costly, if one can afford it it is well worth the trip. I now have found relatives in both Ireland and Germany, with whom I am acquainted and can correspond and that is priceless. 

GENEALOGY IN EUROPE: PART I

My husband and I just returned from 3 weeks in Europe and, having now had three weeks to recover, I am ready to share some of the amazing experiences we had, especially as they relate to family.

The family part of the trip occurred in the third week, but I must take a few lines to talk about the first two weeks. 

The first week was spent in Paris.  I had never been there before and wasn't prepared for all that I saw and encountered.  Paris has a well deserved reputation for being one of the most glamorous and sophisticated cities in the world, and in fact, Paris truly is magnificent.  My only wish was that I had been able to appreciate it when I was a little younger and more mobile.  Paris is not made for older people.  Still, there was so much to see that in one week, you could barely begin.  We visited two gardens: the Tuilleries and Luxembourg.  We saw three museums:  the Orsay, the Pompidou, and L'Orangerie - home to Monet's famous water lilies.  We visited two departments stores, two cathedrals, and, of course, the Eiffel Tower.  We ate at an amazing assortment of restaurants and took a Seine River Cruise.  All were wonderful.

On one of the days, we took the train to Bayeux, in Normandy, where we saw the 1000 year old Bayeux Tapestry which records the victory of William the Conqueror in the longest  piece of embroidery in the world. 

We traveled to Lyon to take a river cruise for 7 days.  We saw Roman ruins, sampled the foods of Provence, went to local wineries, saw the Papal Palace in Avignon and an intact medieval village dating back to the 1200s.  It was a remarkable week.

Then we rented a car and drove up to the Lorraine region of France.  Here is where the genealogy part of our travels began.  We had made arrangements to meet a very colorful Frenchman by the  name of Jerome.  Jerome has dedicated much of his life to helping people remember WW II and the sacrifice made by so many.  He has built a museum that houses countless artifacts from the war, and has created many replicas and miniature displays.

 Jerome spent the day with us and took us first to the bridge at the town of Flavigny where a cousin of mine, Ralph Brennan, died in September of 1944.  There is a plaque on the bridge with Ralph's name on it. 

Because I was the first of my family to visit the memorial, the mayor of the town and a few other dignitaries came out to greet us and have pictures taken for the local paper. 

 

Jerome then drove us around the area and introduced us to a 93 year old man whose father had been mayor of Flavigny when Ralph's brother, Dominican priest Father Robert Brennan, asked if he could have a cross carved into the newly rebuilt bridge where Ralph died.  Decades after the cross was carved into the bridge, a plaque was finally placed on the bridge in Ralph's honor and a new bronze cross inserted into the space where the old cross was once  the only reminder of what had happened on that bridge. 

Basically, the story of Ralph's sacrifice is this:  On the night of September 10-11, 1944, Lt. Ralph Brennan was leading a group of men to try to retake the only remaining bridge over the Moselle River. (Having been wounded a few months earlier, he had only been back at the front for 3 days.) The Germans had destroyed all the other bridges in order to prevent the Allies, who had landed in Normandy a few months before, from marching further into France and ultimately to Germany.  Lt. Brennan and his men crossed the bridge at night and were supposed to be followed by tanks and reinforcements. They hoped these support units would help them in fighting the Germans who were waiting on the other side.  As so often happens in the fog of war, the reinforcements never came and the young lieutenant and most of his men were ambushed and either killed or seriously wounded.  Lt. Brennan was mortally wounded, though he didn't die immediately.  Having lost an arm and a leg, he lay dying near the bridge when a fellow soldier offered him a last cigarette.  He died that night and was buried in St. Avold, at the Lorraine American Cemetery very close to the German border.

 

When my husband and I planned this trip, we had hoped we would have time to visit that cemetery, but our schedule was so packed that we simply couldn't arrange it.  However, the next day, when we were driving to a small town in Germany to see some distant relatives on my mother's side of the family, we got lost.  When our GPS finally got us headed in the right direction, we found ourselves in front of the cemetery.  Though we didn't have time to visit Ralph's grave, we felt that fate had somehow taken us by that cemetery.  And in finding myself there, looking at the final resting place of a man I never knew but have heard so much about, I felt a closeness not just to Ralph, but to the entire Brennan family who is proud to count this hero as one of them. 

 

 

Richard Lippincott (1613-1683)

I never imagined that I might have ancestors who came to America before the Revolution. 

I never imagined it because my parents and grandparents were all Catholic, and very few Catholics (especially German and Irish ones) made it to America before the 19th century.

But I forgot one thing.  My paternal grandmother, Kathryn Marguerite Shaw,  converted to Catholicism after marrying my grandfather, Keech Brennan, and none of her ancestors were Catholic. 

I'm putting together her family history, and I'm discovering ancestors of many different Christian denominations: Puritan; German reformed; Quaker; Baptist and more.  Many of these ancestors were quite religious, and others were religious as well as rebellious, moving away from one denomination as they were disillusioned by it, and joining another. 

For example, my 9th great grandfather, an English aristocrat by the name of Richard Lippincott, born in 1613 in England, came to the colony of Plymouth in about 1640 and joined the Puritan Church.  He married, had several children and moved to Boston.  (Richard moved around a great deal which tells me he must have had considerable wealth.) His children, like other children of the time, had interesting names including: Remembrance, Freedom, Restore, Increase and Preserved. 

While in Boston, Richard got into trouble with the church, believing they were too militant, and disagreeing with some of their dogma, and was excommunicated.  Eventually, he decided the atmosphere was too hostile for him in Boston and he returned to England.  There he met George Fox, the Founder of the Society of Friends, and became a Quaker.  He was imprisoned in England for his beliefs, and eventually decided to try the New World again, this time in Rhode Island, where Roger Williams had established a religiously tolerant colony.  Eventually, he helped to establish a settlement in what is now New Jersey and helped finance the building of  the Quaker Meeting House in Shrewsbury.

According to the histories of the time, in 1672 George Fox came to visit Shrewsbury and stayed with Richard and his family.

While this story is mostly uplifting, in that Richard was a man of principle who followed his conscience, there is one part of his biography that is troubling.  Richard owned a number of African slaves, having purchased them from the Dutch, who were engaged in a lucrative slave trade at that time.  However, upon Richard's death, his wife, Abigail, freed all of them. 

I am descended from Richard's son, Remembrance, who became a prominent Quaker in his own right.  After many generations of male ancestors, my 2nd great grandmother, Rebecca Lippincott, was born in Ohio to Morgan Lippincott and Mary Elizabeth Warner.  Rebecca was the mother of my great grandmother, Emma, who married Clifford Shaw.  Emma was the mother of my grandmother, Kathryn Shaw Brennan.

New Adventures, New Ventures

The Brennan family history book is with the designer and pretty much out of my hands at the moment.  So I am keeping busy with other projects.  One is immediate, one is long term.

The immediate project is preparing for my trip to France, coming up in just a few weeks.  This trip will mostly be for fun, relaxation, and immersing myself in culture and shopping.  However, there will be a few genealogical opportunities.  One will happen just across the border from the Alsace Lorraine area of France, in Losheim am See, Germany.  There I will meet with some distant cousins and see the town where my Schulien ancestors lived and built a small "castle."  I have been in touch with the cousins and am really looking forward to seeing where my mother's maternal ancestors once lived and raised their families.  I keep thinking how much my mother, were she still here, would love this.  It's so sad that I can no longer share these things with her.

Another opportunity will happen in Nancy, in the Lorraine area of France, where a cousin Ralph Brennan, died during a battle in World War II. We will be meeting with a gentleman who is a local historian and caretaker of the WW II museum there. This would have meant a great deal to my dad and I am sad that I can't share this with him.

Finally, we will drive through the tiny village of Turpange in Belgium, where other ancestors of my mother (her father's Mueller ancestors) once lived.  Each of these will give me opportunities to learn a great deal, visit with interesting people, and take plenty of pictures. 

The long term project is the beginning of another family history book.  This one will record the history of my paternal grandmother's family.  Her name was Kathryn Shaw and she has an amazing family history that goes all the way back to the time of the earliest American colonies and before.  One line can be traced back to the time of William the Conqueror (1066) in England.  Others can be traced to the Puritans and Quakers in the American colonies.

In the meantime, I wait for the design to be completed on the Brennan book, so I can send it off to the printer, and then wait to see the finished product.  I believe it will be worth the wait.  I hope all my Brennan relatives agree.

Update: Brennan Family History Book

I have completed the writing of the Brennan Family History Book.  The Book has 12 chapters and 4 appendices.  It will be close to 200 pages long. About 160 pages are text, while another 40 are pictures. Six of the chapters are the genealogies of the descendants of Ned and Mary Brennan, my great great grandparents who emigrated from Ireland in 1860.  There is also a chapter on the history of Ireland and another on the history of Ohio, where Ned and Mary settled, raised their family, and died. 

This is the third family history book I have written.  The first two were for my husband's family - his father's Croatian side, and his mother's Swiss-English side.  Both were great fun to write, but not as involved as this recent book.  The reason this one is more involved is because it contains the names of more people and because I have been in contact with so many of them to gather information and photographs.  With my husband's Croatian family, I was mainly working with the descendants of his great grandparents rather than his great great grandparents, which means there were fewer people to contact.  Also, most of them lived in California.  With my husband's mother's family, there simply were fewer living relatives to contact. 

In this book, I have made efforts to connect with branches of the family that either did not know about each other, or have been out of touch with each other for decades.   My goal was to learn the names of every descendant, both living and deceased, of Ned and Mary Brennan. This involved making phone calls, writing letters, and sending emails, often to people I had never met, and sometimes to people whom I wasn't even sure were part of the family. I had to wait until I received a reply to find out if I had reached the right person.  I was always a little bit afraid that when I sent a letter or made a call to someone I had never met, telling them I was writing a family history book, that they might not believe me or think I was trying to steal their identities or sell them something. But for the most part, they were quite welcoming and enthusiastic.  And while I may have not been able to find a handful of descendants, I ultimately learned the names, relevant dates and occupations of over 500 people, over 350 of them living today. And a good number of those people sent me photographs.

The next step is to design the book.  Designing is different than writing.  Designing a book has to do with all the technical details of how a book will look once it is printed: size of margins, page numbers, placement of photographs, decorative details, etc.  This is a time consuming process and one I am not equipped to do.  In the past, I worked with a professional designer, but that proved quite expensive.  This time, my daughter in law, who owns the appropriate computer program to do this,  has offered to help.  I'm hoping it won't be too much work for her. 

After the design is complete, the book will go to the printers.  There, it will be transformed into a beautiful hard back book with high quality paper and excellent reproductions of photographs. 

So we still have a way to go before we see the finished product.  These things always take longer than we expect them to.  But the goal is now in sight, and I am looking forward to finally being able to share all of my research, writing and efforts with the rest of the Brennan family. 

Vacation of a Lifetime!

In 6 weeks, my husband and I will be visiting France, Germany and Belgium for 3 weeks. 

Most of the trip will be in France.  A week in Paris, a week on a Viking River Cruise in the south of France, and then a few days driving up to the Alsace Lorraine area.  There we will meet with a man who is in charge of the World War II museum in Nancy.  This is the town close to the location where a cousin of mine died during World War II. His name was Ralph Brennan and he and his fellow soldiers were attempting to take a bridge back from the German army.  In what can best be described as an ambush, most of the American men were killed.  The fighting was fierce, though, and that fighting distracted the German army, allowing the Allies to retake the town of Nancy.  Ralph died at the Bridge at Flavigny, and there is a plaque on the bridge with his name on it.  So we will see the bridge, visit the site where he died, and see the World War II museum, which they will hold open for us even though they normally close it for the season in September.  In this 70th anniversary of D-Day, it will be quite an honor to be so up close and personal to a World War II battle, and to visit the place where a relative of mine died in that war.  This trip will give me some final pictures and information to include in the Family history book I am writing.


Even as I'm working on my Brennan Family History book, though, I'm continuing to pursue leads in my other families, and so after a few days in Alsace Lorraine (including one day on the Route Des Vins) we will hop over the border into Germany to visit the town of Losheim, the town where my Schulien great great grandparents were born.  We had hoped to meet a 6th cousin, but our vacations days overlapped with his vacation days when he will be out of the country, so he has arranged for us to meet with an in-law of the family.  We will see a house once built by the Schulien men before they came to America, and will hopefully learn as much as we can about this family.  We only have one day there, but it is a small town, and hopefully will be very interesting. 

Then it's off to Belgium.  We will pass through a small town where my Mueller relatives are from, and then up to Bruges for two days.  Then we'll drive back to Paris for one day and fly home. 

I can't say what thrills me more - being in Paris, taking a river cruise, or learning more about my ancestors.  I guess it's the combination that is so thrilling to me. 

Two years ago, we went to Ireland to meet some relatives from my Brennan side - my dad's side.  Now we're learning what we can about my mom's side.  It's one thing to learn the names of ancestors on paper.  It's another to see the places they once lived, and to speak to relatives or people who know something about their lives.  I am so thankful that I will have this opportunity, and I will report back afterwards.  In the meantime, I continue work on the book and will report on that soon. 

Why I Love Genealogy

There are many reasons I love genealogy.  It combines my love of history with my skills at being a sleuth and my training as a therapist.  It makes me feel like I'm part of a much larger family.  It introduces my to so many people.  It appeals to my need for completion and organization.  But something I rarely talk about is that it helps keep those who have died alive - at least to those of us who write and think about them.

Right now I'm confronted with the serious illnesses of several people close to me.  I'm talking about the kinds of illnesses that will ultimately lead to death, though there's no way of knowing how soon.  I am, of course, hoping it will be far into the future.  But when you are faced with life -threatening illnesses in your friends and family you feel fear, sadness, and a sense of impending loss.  You know that at some point, you will have to say a final good-bye.  And as you heal from your grief, you find that you don't think about those friends and family members quite as often as you once did.  It's not that you don't still love and miss them, it's simply the nature of healing.  Life moves forward and the days have a way of being occupied with immediate concerns.  And while you will always remember your friends and family who have gone, the next generations who did not know them as well, or at all, may not even remember their names. 

When you do genealogy, you spend a lot of time learning about people who have already died.  You may even spend some of your days - days that might otherwise be spent outdoors with your grandchildren, or barbecuing with friends - tromping around cemeteries, in search of dates for ancestors who have been gone many decades, possibly even a century or more.   My husband and I have done that on many occasions.  And these trips have not only paid off in terms of finding long lost ancestors, they have been an opportunity to reflect on those lives - those persons who came before you, some of whom had to exist in order for you to exist. 

Those trips to the cemetery, those days spent in libraries poring over old records, those hours upon hours in front of a computer screen reading census reports that are over 100 years old, make me keenly aware of all the relatives of mine who have passed on.  These relatives were not so different from me.  They went to school, married, had children, laughed, cried, mourned, rejoiced, got old, got sick, and eventually died.  And today, they have been forgotten by most of their descendants - except for some, including those who do genealogy. 

So that is one of the important reasons I will always love genealogy. It is more than a search for names and dates, records and newspaper articles. It is a way of remembering, a way of keeping my ancestors alive in my mind, as well as in the minds of other family members. 

One of my Brennan relatives, Ralph Brennan, was a war hero in WW II.  He died in 1944 in the Battle of Flavigny near Nancy, France.  To honor him, there is an inscription on the bridge where he died.  It reads:

"Men die two times, once on the day of their deaths, the second time when no one speaks of them.  By this gesture, we hope that Lt. Brennan will not die a second time."

By my work on this Brennan family history book, it is my hope that my ancestors, and all the descendants of Ned and Mary Fahey Brennan, will long be remembered, and will not die a second time. 

Progress

Time to report on progress on the Brennan Family History Book. 

I have sent out numerous letters and received many responses.

I have spoken to about a dozen or more second and third cousins, and first cousins once removed, and have nearly completed each family tree.  In other words, I have nearly all the names of the descendants of Ned and Mary Brennan, whose first child was born in 1861.  Considering that I started with about 10 percent of what I have now, that represents a lot of effort.

The book is divided into several sections; six of those sections are reports on the six children of Ned and Mary and their descendants.  All I am missing are a few dates.

I decided a couple of months ago that in addition to reporting on names and dates, I wanted to include states of residence and occupations.  I still have a few more families for which I need that data, but I am getting close. 

I have also gathered quite a collection of vintage photographs to include in the book. 

I don't want to spoil the surprise, so I won't share all the other things I've put in the book, but I think everyone will be pleased. 

So I have a few more nagging phone calls to make and emails to send, but I'm hoping to have everything ready to go within a few weeks.  Then I'll need to prepare the word document for the printer by putting it into a design program, find a printer, and finally send it off to be professionally printed.

So it's still probably a few months off, but I am starting to get excited to see the finished product.  I hope everyone else in the family is too. 

Miracles

I don't really believe in miracles - at least not the kind that break the laws of nature.  I don't believe a supernatural being can stop a hurricane, or a tornado, or a tsunami, nor do I believe that God reverses a terminal diagnosis if only there are enough prayers lifted his way. Prayer does give us strength to fight disease, and helps our immune system, and with the right doctors and the right attitude we can definitely overcome the odds, but I believe there is a point at which even prayer does not change the outcome. 

On the other hand, I do believe that things happen in life that we can't explain by science, things of a less dramatic nature perhaps. You run into a long lost relative in a theater or at a store, and are unexpectedly reunited.  You find a valuable item, perhaps something handed down to you from your great grandmother, that you thought you had lost.  You are given a second chance when you thought you would never be able to save a relationship or a job.  I don't know why these things happen, but they do.  In my case, I've always had an uncanny ability to go to a bookstore, hoping to find a book that would address some problem I was having, or help me finish a writing project, and mysteriously, the very book that is sticking out a bit on the shelf is exactly the one I need.  I can't even count how many times this has happened.

And in my genealogy, I have encountered this type of small miracle on many occasions.

The one that is on my mind right now involves a diary.  First, I should give a little background.  On my dad's side of the family (specifically the Brennan side) there was a priest named Robert Brennan (which is also my dad's name). He was quite an amazing individual. He spent time in China as a missionary, learned to read and write Chinese, had several advanced degrees, was a university professor, wrote 11 books, and in his later years was a mystic.  The family is extremely proud of him and many of us have at least one of his books, and many pictures of him.  For much of his life, he kept a diary, filled with his own thoughts as well as family pictures.  The miracles that I am writing about today all involve Father Bob, as everyone called him.

The first miracle occurred in 2010, about a year after my father died.  My dad was the genealogy enthusiast in the family, and I didn't even look at his files until after his death.  It was then I studied his charts, emails, letters, and anything else he left behind.  And then I started building the family tree on ancestry.com. 

One day, I was looking under my bed for something I had stored there in a container, when I saw a box I didn't remember putting there.  But obviously I had.  So I opened it up and found a number of items that had belonged to my parents.  One was a box that looked like it had once contained typing paper, or copy paper.  It was heavy, so I knew something was inside and I opened it. Inside was a typed diary of Father Bob's.  Now it wasn't the original, it was only a copy, but it was amazing.  There was so much information of a genealogical nature in it that I couldn't believe I was only now finding it. Besides a lot of typed information, it was full of pictures of the family from long ago.  This was an old Xeroxed copy, so you can imagine how poor the quality of the reproduced photographs was.  But it was still incredibly valuable to me.

With some investigating I found out that my dad had received his copy from a third cousin (Kathy), who had received her copy from another cousin (Chuck), who had received his copy from a nun who was a friend of Father Bob.  The nun is still living, so I contacted Chuck to find out if he thought the nun he got his copy from might still have the diary, and if it was the original.  Sadly, I learned from Chuck that the copy belonging to the nun was also a copy, and she had gotten it from another nun, who happened to be Father Bob's sister.  The diary that had once been in the hands of Father Bob's sister (now deceased) may also have been a copy, or it might have been the actual diary itself, with the original pictures pasted in.

So I decided I had to look further and see if I could track down the original.  If I could, then I might be able to use all those pictures in the family history book - and these are pictures no one else has.  So I contacted Chuck again to see if he knew who might have the original and he gave me the name of another cousin, Paul, now deceased.  I contacted Paul's former wife, with whom I have a good relationship, and she knew nothing about it, but she said she would contact Paul's widow (his second wife) and see if she had it.  So I am waiting to hear back.  In the meantime, I have written a letter to the nun to see if she has any idea where the original diary is. 

So right now, I am waiting for a genealogical miracle.  It has happened before.   All of a sudden, I will find a record  for which I had been searching for 4 years.  Or I get a letter from out of the blue from a relative who has just the bit of information I need to solve a mystery.  So I'm hoping for such an event to happen again.  If it does, you can be sure I'll write about it here.

CHRISTMAS EVERY DAY

Lateley, I've really looked forward to the mail arriving.  In these days of much more contact via email, there just isn't that much that arrives anymore by snail mail, except bills and junk.  My recycling bin runneth over.

But in the last month or so, something exciting arrives about every other day.  Once in a while there's a bonanza - like last week when I received four different items in one day. 

What are these exciting pieces of mail?  They are letters, cards, and photographs from my 2nd and 3rd cousins, responding to my letters or sending me something regarding the family that I can use in the family history book.  I have received stories about long deceased relatives that makes them come alive, as well as precious photographs from the 1920s. I've also received partial genealogies and lists of family members from various branches of the family.

And finally, after searching for 5 years, I was able to get in touch with two women from a branch of the family that had been hiding in New Jersey.  Well, they weren't really hiding, at least they didn't know they were hiding.  But the family moved to New Jersey in 1895, came back to visit relatives in 1920 and again in 1950, but when the older members of the family died, the newer members knew very little about their relatives in Ohio, and contact between the branches was lost.  There was a vague memory on the part of some in New Jersey of talk about the Ohio origins of the family, but that was about it, except for some photographs collecting dust in closets.

So when I was finally able to locate one great great granddaughter (and thus  my third cousin) of my immigrant Irish grandparents, I was elated.  She put me in touch with another cousin, and we have been exchanging emails for the past several days.  I can hardly believe it.

The internet, of course, has made this possible.  I was able to find the name of the cousin after finding an obituary online for her father, whose name I had in my family tree.  However, he was only a name, and nothing more.  When I found the obituary, with the name of his daughter and where she lived, I used Google to find her, wrote a letter, sent her my email address, and waited.  She contacted me and was quite enthusiastic.  Then she sent me the name of her cousin, whom she said had much more information.  And for the first time, I have actually seen a picture of Mary Ann Brennan Ryan. 

Besides making contact with the Ryan branch of the family, I have also been speaking with some of my father's first cousins and a third cousin from another branch of the family.  Yesterday I spoke with two cousins and learned a number of interesting stories about family members.  Today should bring a few more phone calls, and hopefully, a wonderful surprise in the mail. 

Stay tuned.

ODD DUCKS

One of the things you get used to when you get bit by the genealogy bug is that many people think you're a bit of an odd duck.  I have to admit, I share that view to some extent.  I've been to genealogy conferences and some of those people are a bit odd.  Not all, of course.  Not me, of course!  Or maybe I am.

I certainly was not interested in genealogy when my dad was all caught up in it.  I thought I had better things to do with my time, or maybe they were just more urgent:  going to work, raising children, welcoming grandchildren, remodeling my house.  But once my parents were both gone, my only brother having died over 40 years before, I began to feel a little untethered to the past and my family - what we call in psychology the "family of origin."  Of course I had my husband, children and grandchildren, but since the age of 10, I've been mostly disconnected from my aunts, uncles, cousins, etc.  A few visits, a few letters, some correspondence relayed from relatives to me through my parents, but no contact on a  day to day or at least regular basis.  No feeling of being part of something larger. 

And that started to feel very lonely. 

So I got out my dad's genealogy charts and notes and went to town.  And it has become an addiction, one that has gained me some wonderful cousins I never knew I had - cousins who share my philosophy of life, my political views, and my interests.  Some have surprised me in that regard.  Other cousins may not share all of my views, but they are fun and interesting and I love talking to them.  I think my life would be poorer without them - it's certainly richer with them. 

One think I have noticed among some relatives and friends who share my interest in genealogy is that most (though not all) of us are in similar circumstances - separated from other family by distance, or coming from a smaller family.  Those who come from larger families, or those who see cousins and other family members on a regular basis, don't seem as interested.  We all tend to be older as well.  I don't think genealogy is something younger people have time for.  They're too busy living their lives to think about the past. 

Trying to gather all the data I need to make this family history book as comprehensive and complete as possible means that I have to contact a lot of people I don't know.  I worry that I'm bothering these people, especially since I know some of them have little interest in family history.  As I sit down to write each letter, I wonder if they'll respond or simply throw the letter away.  Will they think my request is legitimate, or will they worry that I'm a fraud and simply want to steal their identity?  Will they brush off my request as something they care very little about, or will they simply humor me by answering my questions, or better, will they actually welcome the letter? 

Most of them have had a positive response. Some have actually enjoyed our new connection.  A few have not replied, and I can't blame them.  As I said, there was a time when this would have meant nothing to me, and perhaps it means nothing to them. As I said, there are those of us who love genealogy and those of us who think genealogists are odd ducks.  When you have lots of contact with family on a daily basis (whether it's your parents, children, siblings, nieces, nephews, or cousins)  you are probably going to be less interested.  Family is right there every day, so why search for more?

The same seems to be true for Europeans vs. Americans.  I don't know the actual statistics on how many Americans vs. non-Americans sign up to build a family tree on ancestry.com, but my guess is that far more Americans do.  When I was in Ireland 18 months ago, I noticed that the Irish seemed uninterested in genealogy. Now maybe that is because so many of their records have been destroyed that they could find very little even if they tried, but it may also be because most of them live in the same townlands where their ancestors lived, and all they have to do is visit the nearest cemetery to remember their family members.  We Americans, on the other hand, have only been living here a few generations and there is a great curiosity about the land where our ancestors lived. 

Knowing this - that so many people I contact help me out even when they have little interest in genealogy - is touching to me.  I'm sure it is a bit of an annoyance for some, but they help out nonetheless.  There are a few, though, who seem overjoyed when they get my letter.  I cherish the new connections I have with them. 

And just yesterday, I got a letter from a woman I feared I might never hear from.  Am 89 year old woman who was my dad's 2nd cousin and a friend of my mother (it's a small town) - a woman who has 12 children, 31 grandchildren, and 21 great grandchildren.  And she not only sent me a lovely note, she gave me the names of every one of her family members.  She really  made my day! 

So if someone contacts you that asks for  help with a genealogy project, even if you think they're an odd duck, help them out. They are usually coming from a place like me, one of a severe shortage of family members.  And if you are on the other end and are looking for your family, never give up. Reach out, write letters, send emails, take a chance that someone will write back.  Because when they do, it's magic and suddenly, you don't feel so odd or alone. 

MORE CONTACTS WITH BRENNAN DESCENDANTS

It has been a good week.  Besides my children coming to visit for my husband's retirement celebration, I have heard from a number of Brennan descendants. 

First, I heard from the ex-wife of a deceased Brennan descendant.  She did not have to call me after I wrote her a letter, but she did.  I didn't think I could laugh so much with someone I had never met.  She was such a fun and delightful person, and she had some pretty funny stories to tell me - some that could never be included in a family history book.  Though she had been divorced from this descendant, she still had fond memories of him and of his family. 

As I type this, I'm waiting for a call from another wife of a deceased Brennan descendant. 

My paid research at the Family History Library did not produce any new information.  Several hundred dollars for nothing.  But in the meantime, I took a chance and sent a letter to someone I thought might be a descendant of Mary Ann Brennan, the eldest child of Ned and Mary Brennan, the original immigrants from Ireland.  She was the correct person, put me in touch with another descendant, and I'm on my way to finally learning something about this  lost (to me, at least) family. 

And several family members suggested I sign up for Facebook to connect with other family members.  I had joined Facebook several years ago but terminated my account for a number of reasons, including spending too much time on the computer reading posts from friends and family  members.  I really didn't need to know who was eating at what restaurant at any given time, who was having a bad day, whose children were acting up, who  wanted to argue about politics, religion, or whatever.

So I was reluctant to begin again, but I did.  I signed up under my maiden name so my Brennan relatives would at least have a clue as to who I was.  I plan on using this particular account just to correspond with my Brennan, Mueller, Schulien and other relatives.   Since I have never met some of them, or may have met them once as a child, I was worried that they would ignore my friend request.  But using the name Brennan seems to have done the trick and every family member I have reached out to has accepted my friend request, while others have sent me a request.  It is wonderful getting to know a little about them. 

So I'm connecting with members of a very large Irish family, as well as some of my German relatives from my mom's side of the family.  Soon the book will be written, and everyone in the Brennan family will know what I know - the result of over 5 years of research, building upon the decade of research my father did before that.  I'm really pleased, and so excited to meet so many wonderful people that are part of my family.   

CONTACT

Well, I've been hearing from some distant cousins and am learning more about my extended Brennan family.  A few contacted  me by email in response to the blog, and a few emailed or phoned me after I sent them letters. 

I had been somewhat reluctant to send letters to those family members who were only names on the family tree, thinking they might not want to make a connection, or wanting me to mind my own business, so to speak.  But since all I had were addresses (no phone numbers, no email addresses)  and because I really wanted to complete as much as possible of the family tree and find out more about the lives of my distant cousins, I went ahead and took some chances.

And besides learning the names of more people, I have made some very valuable connections with people I wish I had known all my life.  While I can't complain about the fact that we moved away from the family when I was ten years old (who can complain about moving the California with its wonderful weather and great opportunities?) I do regret not having more contact with some of these family members. 

Yes, family can be a double-edged sword.  Sometimes there are fights, grudges, and misunderstandings, and sometimes people become separated and never reuinited, and I have a hunch that such things happened in this Irish family.  I don't know for sure, of course, but I know families pretty well (having been a family therapist for 30 years) and I suspect some of the separations between branches of the family are the result of hard feelings.  Other separations may be because some families felt they had nothing in common with other families, while still other separations may be because families moved away.  That's what happened with my small branch of the family, and that's what happened with the oldest daughter of Ned and Mary Brennan.  Her name was Mary Ann Brennan and she moved to New Jersey with her husband Tom Ryan and their children, and her branch has been the most difficult to track down. Right now, the search is in the hands of the researchers at the Family History Library in Salt Lake City. I hope to hear from them soon.

I have no illusions that everyone of the Brennan descendants will reunite as one big happy family, but I would like to see everyone's name and perhaps a few details of their lives included in this book. 
So I'm forging ahead in my quest to reach out to as many people as I can.  I still have a few letters to send out, and my dream is to include every descendant of Ned and Mary Brennan in this book. 

I'm keeping my fingers crossed.  

BRENNAN FAMILY HISTORY

Well, it's time to finally put together everything I have gathered regarding the Brennan family (my father's father's family) and write a family history book.  Since I've been unbable to trace the family back before my 2nd great grandparents, Ned and Mary (Fahey) Brennan, even with a trip to Ireland, I've been studying Irish history so as to give my readers a flavor of the country where Ned and Mary's ancestors lived.  That has enabled me to write a brief history of Ireland, which will be included in the book. 

But before I go any further, I want to make one last attempt to contact some family members that have remained elusive.  So I'm using this blog to appeal for help.  My hope is that a few Brennan descendants may come across it in a Google search (as others have) and contact me.  So this is what I am looking for: Information regarding the families of:

Mary Ann Brennan (1861-1889) who married Thomas Ryan and had 9 children.  After living in Ohio for several years, they moved to Jersey City, New Jersey, where they seem to have disappeared into what was apparently a vast Irish community of many Ryans.  Tracing them past the 9 children has been impossible so far. The children's names are:  Edward, Patrick, Thomas, Mary or Mae, Raymond, Sarah or Sadie, Anne, Joseph and Rita. Mary married Samuel Francis Pierce.  The other girls married as well, but I do not have their married names.

Michael Brennan (1863-1939) who married Elizabeth McGrath. They also had 9 children and remained in Lima, Ohio for their entire lives. The children's names are: Lenore or Nora, Alice, Rose, Irene, Edward, Paul, Elizabeth, William and Clement. Lenore married Russell Young.  Alice married Wilbur Hanthorne.  Rose married Charles Frese.  Irene married William Cole.  Paul married Lillian Meurer.  Rose married Louis Fleck.  Elizabeth married Neal Grant.

Bridget Brennan (1870- 1951) married Matthew Carrig and they had 5 children., Marie married Paul Christy.  Angela married Bernard Kennedy.  Raymond married Lenore Barton. 

Edward Brennan (1871-1943) married Bridget O'Brien and they had 8 children.  The children's names are:  Robert, Cyril, Mary Cecelia, Margaret, Alfred, John Joseph, Catherine and Ralph.  Cyril married Margaret Harter.  Mary married Paul Abt.  Alfred married Helen Fellows. 

John Brennan (1875-1953) married Theresa Graff.  These are my great grandparents and I have the most information about this family. John and Theresa had 7 children.  Their names are Camilla, Margaret, John, Cletus, James, Eleanor, and Richard. Camilla married Lee Blackburn.  Margaret married William Furry.  Cletus (Keech) married Katie Shaw.  Eleanor married Loren Allen.  Richard married Lois Hannan. 

So there you have it.  I do have a great deal of information about many of these families, but there are a few - especially those who moved away from Lima, Ohio - who I've been unable to contact.  I would dearly love to hear from any of you who may come across this blog.  The more complete we can make the family history, the more valuable and interesting it will be.

So I'm waiting to hear from you. Make a comment or send me an email (ellenterich1@verizon.net) and I'll get back to you right away.  Thanks.

DNA and GENEALOGY

I've been reading up on DNA and how researchers use it to help them learn about where a person's ancestors came from and what migration routes they might have taken over thousands and tens of thousands of years. 

The most interesting thing I have learned so far is about mitochondrial DNA or mDNA.  DNA, as I'm sure you know, is a coded message, in the form of chemicals attached to each other, that tell the cells which proteins to make. Every cell nucleaus contains a full set of DNA.  Half comes from the father, half from the mother.  But there is another type of DNA.  This is called mitochondrial DNA or mDNA and it exists in the liquid cytoplasm surrounding the nucleus of the cells of the body.  This type of DNA comes only from the mother and it has to do with the size of eggs compared to the size of sperm. During fertlization, the small amount of mDNA in the tiny sperm is destroyed, while the amount of mDNA in the larger egg is much higher.  Thus, you inherit MDNA only from your mother. 

Scientists use mDNA to trace matrilineal lines.  And, although all humans have mDNA in the cytoplasm of their cells, only females can pass on that type of DNA.  So my great great great grandmother, Anna Maria Elizabeth Gerdemann, passed on her mDNA to my great great grandmother, Maria Bernadina Wrocklage, who passed it on to my great grandmother, Mary Gertrude Frecker, who passed it on to my grandmother, Mary Bernadine Schulien, who passed it on to my mother, Frances Joan Brennan, who passed it on to me.  I, in turn, have passed it on to my daughter, and she to her daughters. 

Just for fun, I decided over the weekend to see how many descendants of my great great great (or 3rd great) grandmother are living with her mDNA.  I was quite shocked that there may be only two lines remaining that carry her mDNA - mine and that of one other family.  And this is quite remarkable, as I have many female ancestors among the descendants of Anna Maria Elizabeth Gerdemann.  I will only report the female descendants below.  Keep in mind there are also many male descendants, but they cannot pass on the mDNA.

Anna Maria Elizabeth (1801-1840) had three daughters.  One never married.  One had two daughters, two granddaughters, and one great granddaughter.  The female line stops after that.  The third daughter was my great great grandmother, Maria Bernadina Wrocklage Frecker.  She had three daughters.  One of those daughters  had three daughters herself.  Of those three daughters, one became a nun, one died young, and the third had one daughter.  The line of daughters ends at that point. The second daughter of Maria Bernadina had three daughters, all of whom had only sons, so the line of women stops there.  The third daughter of Maria Bernadina is Mary Gertrude Frecker, my great grandmother.  She, too had three daughters.  One had no children, and another had one daughter who is still living.  This daughter has four of her own daughters, and they produced several granddaughters who are all living.  The third daughter of Mary Gertrude was my grandmother, Mary Bernadine. She also had three daughters.  One never married and one had only sons.  The third daughter, my mother, had one daughter - me.  I have one daughter and two granddaughters.

So even though Anna Maria Elizabeth had a large family, including three daughters, 5 granddaughters, 11 great granddaughters,  today there are only a handful of women and girls who have passed on or will be able to pass on her mDNA.

While this tidbit of genealogical information may not seem all that exciting or even relevant, it was very interesting to me.  In a time when sons are still valued more than daughters, at least in many parts of the world, and in a time when the male surname is still passed on much more than the female surname (though that seems to be changing a bit) it is comforting to note that some things only women can pass on - and one of thse things is their mDNA, which gives researchers some of their best clues as to where our ancestors came from.  I think that's pretty nifty. 

2014

As the New Year begins, there are new genealogy projects.  I hope to spend some time on several family history books, but each of them will require some deeper digging to find information and lost ancestors.  As I've noted before, there is one branch of my Brennan family I have been unable to locate, and so I am considering a trip to the Family History Library in Salt Lake City with a group of experienced researchers to see what I can find.

I'm also planning another trip - this one in October.  My husband and I will be traveling to France, Germany and Belgium.  We will be starting in Paris, then moving on to Normandy where we will visit the memorials to those who died in WW II, and also visit the town of Bayeux, where a 1000 year old tapestry chronicles the Battle of Hastings and the victory of William the Conqueror, Duke of Normandy.  Then we'll travel on to the South of France where we will spend 7 days on a Viking River Cruise, visiting vineyards, small towns, Roman ruins, and more history.  After that, we'll head up to Nancy, France, in the region of Alsace-Lorraine, then hop over to a small town in Germany for a day, drive up to Belgium, through the small town of Turpange and on to Bruges, a lovely medieval town, and then back to Paris before heading home.

While our main goal is to just enjoy the culture, history and people, the final leg of our journey, from Nancy to Turpange, will be to indulge my genealogy interests.   Nancy is a lovely town in the eastern area of France where my ancestor Ralph Brennan, a 1st lieutenant and commanding officer of Company F of the 134th Infantry Regiment during WW II, died in the Battle of Flavigny. In July, 1944, Ralph Brennan was wounded in battle and after recuperating in England, returned to the front in September.  His job three days later was to take the Government Bridge at Flavigny,  and retake the town from German occupation. The mission was successful, but Ralph died in the battle and today there is a memorial plaque honoring him and his men who died to save the town.  I have been in contact with a woman whose father also died in battle near Nancy, and she is putting me in touch with residents of the town who will greet us and show us some of the sites and memorabilia associated with the battle. 

After spending two days in Nancy, we will be heading across the border into Germany to the small town of Losheim am See where my Schulien relatives lived before immigrating to America.  Some relatives still live there, and I hope to meet them and learn more about the family.  Following a day and night in Losheim, we will leave Germany, drive through Luxembourg and into Belgium.  In the south of Belgium is a small town named Turpange.  This was where many of my Mueller ancestors were born.   I suspect there is  nothing there to see, but it will be interesting to drive through the area, just knowing some of my ancestors once lived there.

After that, we will head up to Bruges to experience a few days in that lovely medieval town, and finally return to Paris for the flight home. 

I am looking forward to the trip for so many reasons, but obviously one of the biggest ones is to experience something of a connection with ancestors I never met, and to see the towns where they were born and/or died.