Thread: Nature vs nurture in real time

I'm also very late to finding this thread - that's a pretty amazing journey of discovery Mike!

For anyone who is interesting in this genealogy thing, I'd whole-heartedly endorse Ancestry as a great place to start. I think they have free trials on offer from time to time if you're hesitant to lay your money down to try it out.

Through it, I've been able to trace my Mom's Dad's family back to (I think) the 17th century in the highlands of Scotland, and my Dad's Mom's family back to... well, thanks to an unexpected link discovered in the 15th century, as far back as European genealogies go. My Mom's Mom's family is tricky thanks to an abundance of Germans named Johann Meier in the 19th century (no idea which one is the right one) and my Dad's Dad's line comes to an end a few generations back as protestant records in Ireland didn't fare too well through the struggle for independence and subsequent troubles. However, the surviving records did let me know that my great-great grandfather was a saddle maker in Dublin, which I thought was pretty cool. Dad and I come by a love for working with our hands naturally I guess.

But through Ancestry, I've discovered I have Welsh and French roots I didn't know about, I know that I have ancestors from the wonderfully named "Blubberhouses" in Yorkshire that I really must visit one day, I discovered I am a distant cousin to an old friend from Newfoundland whose ancestors came from the same bit of Scotland as mine, and I know I am *very* distantly related to the guy who was the subject of my PhD thesis.

One warning though: it can turn into a *serious* time sink if you hit a run of results.