Grandma's Granny's Family Album

When I was 14, I saw Roots on TV and knew that I wanted to do that too.  Trace my family back to the Old Country and write a book about it.  So when I was 15, my mother gave me a genealogical research trip to Germany as an early graduation present. Here are my mother and I at Sulzbach am Taunus on the way to the Hotel Sulzbacher Hof.  On  right ,  me at train station for Sulzbach am Taunus (Ts)

Before genealogy was popular, I was asked a lot why I liked it.  Because it's a puzzle, I said, and everybody likes puzzles.  Family history is a seek-and-find puzzle:  in these 100 random letters, can you find the names you want?  Sometimes they are easily found in the top horizontal line, and sometimes you have to catch a break to discover them bafflingly diagonal and backwards. 

 That's right!  I have been having so much fun with this, and you can too! Go to https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/ You can join for free, or you can just look.  Type in any ancestor's name and see who you are related to.  For best results, pick the furthest back ancestor you know. If you are a descendant of Phoebe Esther Rushton Spence (Grannie, Grannie English), or her mother Susan West, you have a ton of famous relatives:     Royalty!  Queen Elizabeth II - 20th cousins twice removed.  I always felt I was related to Princess Anne!   My bride dolls - Princess Anne  and Princess Diana And 21st cousins once removed from Princess Diana! As well as the last kings of France, Belgium, Romania, and Yugoslavia.

 The most fun part of the tree was....well I guess it was all fun.  But I really enjoyed finding a clipart for each person.   I was looking for something else when I saw this pipe. I felt all warm and cuddly inside and knew it just had to represent my father.  But he was an engineer too, so I added the tools.

Sorry I haven't posted in a long time.  I've been working on a long-hoped-for project, displaying my family tree on a wall in my house.  Here it is in all its glory!  Do you think it is worth the wait? I received the tree itself for Christmas, and started working on it the next day.  It was just finished yesterday!