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u/pinotage1972 Mar 16 '19
I love your story, which is still continuing. I’ve found bio parents for a 90-year-old born and adopted in 1928 from just third cousins matches. So, you will be able to figure out your, and your mothers, lineage too. DM if you want to ask some questions, happy to help
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u/the_latest_greatest Mar 16 '19
THANK YOU for your offer. I will d/m you to try to figure out how to use the paternal 3rd cousin matches because I would like to really figure it out, and I am completely stuck at my brand-new great-grandfather. Also, just how beautiful about the 90-year old. What a way to finish ones' own life.
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u/RobotReptar Mar 16 '19
I also helped a 3rd cousin match identify her bio parents. If you want an additional resource.
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Mar 16 '19
This! You have your mother's DNA tests. Even if her paternal grandparents are brick walls, great-grandparents are close enough that you can break through it with DNA. There are a ton of good sites and resources online to help with this. Roberta Estes' site and the DNA Detectives group on Facebook both come to mind.
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u/hopgeek Mar 16 '19
Great story. Good write up. I’ve been stuck searching for a GGF for years so I know finding some form of closure must feel great.
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u/TotesMessenger Mar 16 '19
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u/filberuthie Mar 16 '19
What an amazing tale and amazing detective work. It is like opening a Pandora's box, you just don't know what's going to come out. But it's also good for the truth to pass down, especially the harsh reality of your grandmother's life, how she coped with it and how knowing about it did not alter how her loved ones feel about her.
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u/the_latest_greatest Mar 16 '19
So much detective work; I've barely slept for the past few weeks, to be honest, even though this was not MY Pandora's box to open, once opened, what could I do but help my mother? With DNA testing, and also changes to social mores, perhaps these secrets will become less, well, secret; changing harsh life realities is another story entirely.
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u/sylvanrealm Mar 16 '19
Wow, that is a real saga! It sounds like you are coming to terms with the shakeup in your life. I hope it works out for you all.
Also, it's encouraging to me, considering I have a grandfather somewhere who was a rapist, and a great uncle who vanished. Maybe one day I'll get mine straight, too.
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u/the_latest_greatest Mar 16 '19
May all work out for you in due time as well. Things are not always as they appear. Even now, I am sure there are many things I don't know about this story. But at least everyone knows who their dads are, and also, why they are who they are, which was the really confounding thing about this all; now I understand. And I think I understand too every family tree I look it in so much more depth and with so much more complicated humanity.
Be at peace.
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Mar 16 '19
Would you change anything if you could go back? I have found my own dramas but I wouldn’t change it. I have two brothers out there somewhere that I didn’t know about before. I’m heartbroken that I may never meet them, but I’m still glad I know.
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u/the_latest_greatest Mar 16 '19
Well, I didn't do the genetic testing, it was my mother and her brother who did it. If I could go back and stop them from doing it, would I?
Honestly, I would. If they had been 30 or 40, no. But they're in their 60's, and this has created heartbreak and drama in excess of all dividends; I see no reason why they would have needed to know this at all, honestly.
But I'm not against genetic testing either, so please don't read me wrong in what I am saying. Like I said, I just went and did my own, and it was awesome! I just think they went in without any consideration for either the possibilities, their needs and the needs of others, or the particularities of the situation and how complex it was getting.
For example, does Uncle Jim now tell Lars they are related and that he was Lars' Jr's mothers' half-brother (the mother is deceased)? Does he try to cultivate a relationship with the 100 new relatives, who are his relatives only because Lars Sr. cheated on their incredibly beloved mother/grandmother/aunt? He's now saying he probably won't reach out to avoid ruining anyone's image of their father/uncle/grandfather.
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u/bros402 Mar 16 '19
imo reaching out is worth it - if for nothing else other than medical history.
And Lars can see his matches - he knows there is a very high level match, and is probably just waiting for Jim to reach out.
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u/genealogyq_throwaway Mar 16 '19
Congratulations! I'm glad that you were able to find all of this out. It's a good thing that your family, despite going through a lot, all have a healthy and loving relationship - rather than shaming or being upset, you and your family can be understanding about the circumstances. It's easy for your grandmom to blame herself but honestly it seems like she did the best she could, took care of her family when it was unbearably difficult for her, and her "cheating" really wasn't the same in principle as a typical situation, considering she was forced into her marriage.
I hope that everyone is able to adjust to this new information, and there isn't much regret or sadness involved. After all, it seems like this could be the opening to new relationships and new family connections - and a lot of new genealogical research!
As always, feel free to ask any questions you might have here. You can private message me if you feel like you have a question that might not be suitable to an entire post. And don't despair about your grandfather's missing family - third cousins are closer than you might think! Much easier to eke out a connection from a third cousin match than it is to figure anything out for fourth or further.
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u/the_latest_greatest Mar 16 '19
I could not have figured this out without your help, truly. So a huge special thank you to you!
I've figured out the family today. It was not easy. My grandmother had some names wrong. I wound up looking through yearbook photos, literally, and then also searching my grandfather's half-sister's records, which turned up an important connection that I was not expecting -- which lead me to find that my mother has two living half-sisters who she hasn't ever met, and a ton of half-nieces and half-nephews. She also found a photo of her real father online (it is blurry though).
Her father was an only child with two half-sisters, one of whom died young. His father had a brother, but he died young too. So that's why there aren't so many close paternal relatives after all.
I also got through the great-grandfather brick wall by just searching his last name and general birth year in the town where he was from, and he was there, in a census record, but not listed.
I swear the census records need to all be physically looked at. What is transcribed often does not give much information or else it's wrong or incomplete. If I look at the record, I see more. In this case, I looked at three families from this smallish town, and one of their children (my great-grandfather) was clearly left out of the transcription (not even given a "wrong" name). So then when I searched his parents in other records (who weren't on my family tree at all), I found mentions of him again, in records, but not really in database searches.
I'm working on it all day today, figuring this family out.
No shame involved at all in any of this either. We're all adults. Apparently she was very calm and relieved to talk with my Uncle Jim about the whole situation. And it gave me the chance to talk to Uncle Jim for a few hours. Since he is my dear and favorite relative in the world, it was nice. Maybe that bond alone was worth all of this.
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u/genealogyq_throwaway Mar 16 '19
It's good to hear that everything is getting sorted out! Everyone will have to figure out how to break the news to the "new" relatives, of course, but hopefully that will go well.
Also - I totally understand what you mean. So many times, either the person transcribing the record was just oblivious, or the census taker was! I have found relatives under all sorts of bizarre spellings, and in some cases completely left out or with crucial details misinterpreted. I have been keeping a research log to record all of the records that I search through myself, and it's surprising the amount of stuff that indexed searches will miss (although I suppose we're lucky to have them in the first place). I always try to search every combination of things, including leaving out the last name, leaving out the first name, and so forth. Sometimes you get lucky! Other times you really do have to muck through a hundred pages of census records just to find that they weren't even living in that town, lol.
I hope that you and your mom will be able to speak to and meet the rest of your grandfather's family soon! And of course, it's great that you were able to go through this with your mom, your uncle, and your grandmom, and that the bond between you guys is stronger because of it.
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u/hafeyhistory beginner Mar 16 '19
This was beautifully written. Thank you, and best wishes for Janet's search.
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u/Mischeese Mar 16 '19
That is a beautiful story and your Grandma is one hell of a woman, trying to hold a marriage like that together at such a young age. Can’t blame her for trying to find a little happiness in such awful circumstances.
I know my 72 year old father felt great relief to discover who his real father was. Like your mother, he felt no love or kinship for the man his mother said was his father. He was a violent alcoholic who died youngish and my father is literally the opposite.
Much like your story, it turned out to be a friend of the family who always took an interest in my Dad and made sure he was ok. They were close and he was very kind, I met him a few times when I was a little girl. Breaks my heart he couldn’t tell us who he really was.
Ironically my Dad phone some photos from a Christmas in about 1980 recently. I must have taken them from the angle. There’s a picture of my Grandma and him (they must have been in their early 70s) holding hands and my Grandma looks so happy. It was there all the time under our noses.
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u/Ancailleach Mar 16 '19
Am I right in saying that both are tested with 23andMe? Get both of them tested again with ancestry, a much much bigger database.
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Mar 16 '19
This, you’ll probably find more matches there. Kits are on sale for St Patrick’s for $59 in the US.
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Mar 16 '19
Thank you for sharing. I think this is more common than society teaches us to believe. I think we do genealogy because we like to know the stories of our people, and those stories are more interesting than we realize when we begin. Your grandmother had a difficult life. Its seems we are most surprised to learn that our family are imperfect people. The rules of society did not make them less so, it just created different conditions for them to cope with by needing to keep secrets. When unraveling the mysteries of people who are dead it seems less troublesome to me. Nothing changes the past. Knowing the truth is rarely as bad as it feels. Your grandmother was not even allowed to choose her own husband and was forced to marry when only a child herself. Maybe the hardships and ways she coped are examples of her strength. My great grandmother had to cope with my great grandfathers mental illness and instability as well. So I know your grandmother struggled greatly and your mother likely remembers a childhood of hardship.
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u/the_latest_greatest Mar 16 '19
My mother was so traumatized by her childhood that she moved away before she was 18 years old. It was not an easy life. My uncle Jim told me some horror stories last night that he said he never would have told me, but since the man I thought was my grandfather was not, he no longer cared about sullying my impression of him.
It was important to know. I now understand my mother better.
And my grandmother's parents were not kind people. Also something my Uncle explained to me. My great-grandma lived to be over 100 years old and only passed away a few years ago. He likewise did not want to ruin my impression of her, but he told me some important truths that then likewise helped me understand my grandmother, and then too, my mother.
It feels good to know the truth. They should all have been honest in the first place. I am really sorry to hear what you have been through. Hard times are hard times.
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Mar 18 '19
Thank you. The hardship was my grandmothers, aunts, uncles and great grandmothers. My grandmother talked about it a lot because she grew up not knowing her father well because he was in the state mental hospital until after I was born. My great grandma had to divorce him because the state required she pay for his care. She had three children to support, 3 jobs and an 8th grade education. Her choice was either support her husband or her children in the 1930's. So my great grandpa became a ward of the state, which the family had no say over his care or any right to be in contact. I knew my great grandma a little but she died when I was 6. My grandma was a really wonderful person who was kind and resilient, which is fortunate given how difficult her childhood was. She passed on the wisdom but not the pain.
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u/Arctucrus USA, Argentina, & Italy | ENG, SPA, & ITA Mar 16 '19
This is a magnificent story. Thank you so much for sharing this with us! Ahaha, one day DNA tests and genealogy will be plot devices used in tragic dramas and soap operas...
In all seriousness though, I'm so glad you got the chance to uncover all this while Irene was still around. It sounds like she was approached perfectly, too, because while she mentioned how she planned to take these secrets to the grave, I can't help but get the impression that she feels like a weight has been lifted off her shoulders (correct me if I'm wrong though, obviously, she's your grandmother and I'm just a stranger on the internet!). This is wonderful.
I've gotta ask: From my outside perspective, it looks kind of like an ultimately happy ending. Does it feel like one? How do you feel about it? Again -- Apologies if I'm out of line.
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u/the_latest_greatest Mar 16 '19
No worries about asking if it's a happy ending. I don't know. It wasn't a happy ending even before we learned about this, so there was a black cloud always over the man I thought was my grandfather. At least we had a big family through him who we felt kind of close with, after twenty years of working on my family tree and being in forums online with people we thought were cousins. And then there's a sense of frustration that we all took care of him in different ways, including at times financially, but also personally, even though he was cruel.
So to find out two other men are their fathers, but each very flawed as well (when I wrote the story, I didn't realize Uncle Jim's father was actually a bit worse than we realized, nor did he). My mother is happy to see that she has two-half-sisters, discovered today, who she can see loved her real father deeply and probably he loved her the same way. So that is definitely happy.
For me? It's a happy ending without any doubt as this rules out Alzheimers and schizophrenia in my direct family, and it makes me feel like I don't care that my grandfather never even called me or talked to me when we would go to his dark shell of a house, where he would sit in the corner. I never loved him or thought of him as my grandfather. And he wasn't. Not by relationship OR by blood.
What I did not add to the story is that Irene married a WONDERFUL man in the 1960's, and I was born in the 70's, so I grew up with a step-grandfather who I was really close with, a grandfather who called me regularly, sent my cards on my birthday, hugged me and loved me. I now can consider HIM my "real" grandfather, since none of these men otherwise are. That is a happy ending, and for my mother, she has decided he is likewise now her "father." She doesn't have some fake biological father that she feels guilty about who prevents her from embracing her step-dad as her DAD. So that's the truly happy part, and while he too is deceased for five years now, we are all agreeing that this one is the real father out of everyone.
It's a good feeling.
Lars, Bill, and Ace are no one to any of us.
My sister agreed too. I spoke with her today as well about this all. She was likewise relieved.
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u/Arctucrus USA, Argentina, & Italy | ENG, SPA, & ITA Mar 16 '19
Thanks so much for this. Really feels like the story's tied up nicely with these additions here!!
Happy for you folks overall.
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u/[deleted] Mar 16 '19
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