How did you get where you are?

[hbelkins]

This thread was inspired by my afternoon trip into southeastern Kentucky; specifically to the area where Rothman has frequently said his grandparents were from.

If anyone is interested, I took KY 80 east out of Hindman, briefly detoured onto KY 777 to cross the one-lane bridge at Garrett for the first time, then onto KY 7/KY 550 and back onto KY 80, then across KY 680 to Minnie. After I drove the new KY 3680 (which will be renumbered KY 680 once the construction is completed on the Harold-Minnie Connector) and checked out what is said to be the longest bridge in Kentucky, I took KY 122 to Martin where I rejoined KY 80.

This made me think of Rothman. He's often mentioned that his grandparents were from Floyd County, and I think specifically the Minnie/McDowell/Wheelwright area, and he's talked about going there to visit. It made me wonder how he ended up in upstate New York.

I've frequently mentioned my West Virginia roots. My paternal grandfather was from Lincoln County, WV, and he moved to Kentucky as an employee of Petroleum Exploration when this area experienced an oil boom. He met my grandmother, who was from here and as I understand it, her family had moved here from western Kentucky as part of a logging boom. I know little about my mother's side of the family but I know both my grandfathers worked in the oilfields for the same company. My dad had four siblings; all of whom moved to the Louisville area. My mother was an only child. My dad sought work in Louisville but after being drafted for Korea and losing a leg in the service, he came back home and got his teaching degree. He was the only one of his siblings to stay in his native county, and I stayed too.

[Max Rockatansky]

My family is Detroit, particularly on my Mom's side as they emigrated there from Germany.  My Dad's family moved to Detroit with General Motors via transfer out of Baltimore.  The bulk of my Dad's family is from Maryland and West Virginia.  My understanding is they emigrated from England out of fear of being deported to Australia.  This apparently involved a last name change.

After I was born my dad moved my family around quite a bit.  We ended up living in Connecticut, New York, Illinois and even Michigan a second time (I did also spend a couple summers in North Carolina).  I graduated high school in Michigan but had no intention on staying, so I left for Phoenix during 2001 on money I saved.  I ended up taking a new job in Florida during 2013 and transferred around the state a couple times.  I took a job transfer to California during January 2016 and moved to Hanford.  I started dating my now wife shortly after and moved to Fresno during December 2017. 

[Hobart]

I have a very interesting background that builds to a very boring result.

My mom and dad both grew up in the southwest suburbs of Chicago; my mom was from Oak Forest, my dad was from Burbank but his family moved to Tinley Park at the age of 5. They met each other at a Honda dealer in Oak Forest, where my dad was a mechanic and my mom was a cashier. She still work at a Honda dealer, my dad fixes trucks for another suburb.

Things get spicy further back. On my mother's side, my grandpa grew up in Chicago, but was adopted; he eventually joined the Marines, and later became an electrician. His mother passed away in a tuberculosis hospital, I think, and his dad gave him up to some relatives. My grandmother on that side was born in Chicago, but her parents immigrated (possibly illegally) from Mexico; she did warranty at the Honda dealership for at least a stint.

On my dad's side, my grandma grew up in Oak Lawn when it was a farming community, and her parents were off the boat Polish. She worked a bunch of odd jobs, and retired doing clerical work (some time in her mid sixties actually). My grandpa on that side was born in Iola, Illinois, put in an orphanage because of family issues, and was pulled out by his sister at the age of 4. He eventually ended up in Oak Lawn. He joined the Air Force, somehow ended up as a dentist, and after discharge he became a contractor who made golden tooth fillings in his basement.

I was born at Christ Hospital in Oak Lawn. I lived in Tinley Park, Illinois until pretty much this summer. I'm relocating to Milwaukee; I already go to school there, and I picked up an internship at We Energies for the summer. Geographically, almost nothing changed, but in regards to personality, college encouraged me to bring out the parts of myself previously considered the most degenerate, to great benefit! Right now I'm eyeing up places to try to get a job to after graduating. Minnesota is near the top of that list.

[Hot Rod Hootenanny]

Scotland & Hungary.
Actually, on my mom side her family roots are mostly east coast. Both her brothers live in Suburban Main Line Philadelphia.
My granddad (mom's dad) I guess had ties to Port Deposit, Maryland (I hear there's a roadmeet near there, next month) while my grandmom side had family stretching from Bucks Co. Pa to Kentucky to St. Louis.
---
As for my dad, I believe most of the family stayed in Ohio. All his brothers live in Cleveland. My great-grandfather immigrated to the states, from Hungary, after WW1. Going from Hungary to Canada (with a stop or two along the way, I'm sure) then to Akron, Ohio. Not sure if he met my great-grandmom here in Ohio, or brought her with him from Hungary. They had two boys, my granddad and great-uncle. After WW2, both took their wives and attempted to live in Hungary. My granddad couldn't make it (his temper caused plenty of family issues through out his life) and brought my grandmom (and my then infant dad) back to Ohio (Uncle Julius stayed in Hungary for the rest of his life).
My grandmom's family might go back to Scotland. Of immediate family, most either live near Akron, or out in NW Ohio. Though a couple did retire to Florida, before they passed away in the last decade.
---
Me?
Buckeye by birth
Bayou Tiger by choice
Philadelphian in my heart.
(But those of you who've been at this, since the height of the MTR days, knew that already about me)

[GaryV]

I come from Grand Rapids. Almost all my ancestors moved there from the Netherlands (paternal grandparents, maternal great- or gg- grandparents). The exception is my maternal grandfather; the family was from England and Germany. We haven't firmly nailed down the lineage, but it may have come from the time of the Mayflower. If the line is correct, my ancestors were on the Speedwell, the boat that was supposed to accompany the Mayflower, but it leaked and had to turn back. They eventually came over in the late 1620's.

[pianocello]

I feel like my signature and this thread were tailor-made for each other.

My most recent stops (Evansville, Gainesville, and to an extent Orlando) are due to my wife's job and schooling; her career path is far more location-specific than mine.

Ames and Valparaiso are my grad school and undergrad, respectively.

I grew up in Davenport, my parents moved there when I was young because of my dad's job. My grandparents and previous generations were almost entirely farmers in mid-Michigan (one side of the family) and central Illinois (the other). And before that, they all came from Germany.

[JayhawkCO]

My ancestors came from Germany, Sweden, Denmark, England, and Scotland and all settled either in Minnesota or Wisconsin. I was born in Minnesota and moved several times as a child due to my dad being in the banking industry. I went to three different elementary schools, one middle school, and two high schools. I graduated from high school here in suburban Denver and went to the University of Kansas. I ended up moving to suburban Kansas City and living there for the larger part of 11 years afterwards (with one quick year in Seattle when a girlfriend and I felt like moving to see something different.) After working in the restaurant biz in KC for a long time, I accepted a position back in Denver working as the GM of a fine dining steakhouse. A couple moves later, including getting furloughed twice in 2020, I now work from home for a large tech company and still bartend a couple nights on the side just because I enjoy it.

[bandit957]

My grandmother on my mother's side always talked about how she grew up in Detroit. All of my grandparents grew up in the 1920s and always talked about how poor they were. They always mentioned how they couldn't afford electric fans, how they had to eat stale bread, and how their only recreation was to wait for a giant hole in the ground to fill up with rain and swim in it.

A lot of people act like the 1920s were very prosperous before the Great Depression hit, but people actually were very poor. It was sort of like the 1990s but without Super Mario Bros., in that everyone acted like it was a prosperous time, when really it wasn't.

[Rothman]

My father's side immigrated from Germany in the late 1600s into the Bath area of Pennsylvania.  They eventually moved north into the Scranton-Wilkes Barre area, violating treaties with the American Indians that they would stay south of Blue Mountain.  My great-great-great-great-great-great grandfather's tombstone reads that he was "Killed by the Indians."  My grandparents moved from PA to NJ, where my father was born, and then, due to vacation trips they took out west and after converting to Mormonism, they moved to UT (although originally considering CO).

My mother's family, where records are much more sketchy, since people burned down courthouses and the like when they got mad, German and British ancestors immigrated into eastern KY (around Floyd County), probably in the mid-1800s.  They were miners and then somehow my great-grandfather owned a country store.  He was a Klan member, but got on their wrong side when he started turning in moonshiners out of Old Baptist religious fervor and objected to one particular lynching.  The Klan burned his store down, economically destroying the family and scattering them.  At the time, my grandmother was the youngest of 17 kids (she didn't think this was odd, since the neighbors had 18 and my great-grandfather would marry someone with four or five kids and have three more kids, bringinf the number up to 25 -- my mother has a half-aunt around her age).

My mother's paternal grandfather abandoned the family and my grandfather grew up dirt poor.  He and his half-brother took a miraculous $500 donation from their high school gym teacher (!) and eventually started a Federal department store in WV.  My grandfather eventually established his own Ben Franklin 5-10.  My grandfather had converted to Mormonism with his mother when he was a pre-teen (I've suspected so they could receive assistance), while my grandmother converted later on separately.

So, my mother was born in WV, but then the family moved back to Floyd County when she was a baby.  Although my grandfather was never active in the religion, my grandmother and the kids were.  My mother came to despise eastern KY, especially after a "Pretty Woman" incident..in Huntington, WV of all places (IIRC) where my grandmother and her were told in a store that the items were "very expensive" due to their different accents.  So, my mother strove to lose her accent and move away.  Her older sister had gone to BYU and my mother decided to follow suit.

My father also ended up at BYU, eventually met my mother (after breaking off an engagement to another woman), and they eventually headed off in IN, where my father pursued a Ph.d.  Then, my father got a post-doc in MA.

After I graduated from high school, I bounced around to ID, Russia, CA, DC, WI, MA, and then got a job in NY after grad school.

That's my history, more or less.

[hbelkins]

^^^

There aren't a lot of Mormons in this part of Kentucky. Most of the LDS members I've encountered are the missionaries from elsewhere. You'll find a few churches scattered here and about, but they're not anywhere as common as Jehovah's Witnesses in the mountains.

Now, Old Regular Baptists ... most of the Baptist churches in this area are affiliated with the Southern Baptist Convention, but you'll find a good number of Old Regular Baptist churches around here.

And Floyd County is certainly not a place where one would expect to find the populace exporting students to BYU.

Some have mentioned ancestors much farther back than grandparents or great-grandparents. My paternal grandmother was a DAR member and also traced her ancestry back to the Mayflower. I have all that paperwork somewhere, but I have no idea where it is.

[Roadgeekteen]

My mom immigrated from Taiwan to America when she was 6, first settling in Pittsburgh for a year before moving to the Lowell area, where my grandparents still live. My dad's family was also from Taiwan, they moved to America before my dad was born. My dad was born in Brooklyn, and when he was little they moved to Beaver County, PA. My parents met during grad school at Carnegie Mellon University, and they moved close to my mom's parents and decided to buy a house in Needham. One of my ancestors was a Chinese general in the 1800s, and one of my relatives fought for Japan during WW2. My mom's dad was a chinese person living in Vietnam. He left Vietnam to go to school in Taiwan, while many of his other family members had to escape on boats when the North took over. Many of them ended up in Australia, while some ended up in California.

[Rothman]

^^^

There aren't a lot of Mormons in this part of Kentucky. Most of the LDS members I've encountered are the missionaries from elsewhere. You'll find a few churches scattered here and about, but they're not anywhere as common as Jehovah's Witnesses in the mountains.

Now, Old Regular Baptists ... most of the Baptist churches in this area are affiliated with the Southern Baptist Convention, but you'll find a good number of Old Regular Baptist churches around here.

And Floyd County is certainly not a place where one would expect to find the populace exporting students to BYU.

Some have mentioned ancestors much farther back than grandparents or great-grandparents. My paternal grandmother was a DAR member and also traced her ancestry back to the Mayflower. I have all that paperwork somewhere, but I have no idea where it is.

Remember that shortly after New 80 was built that a LDS church building was built along it in Martin.  Before that, the LDS Church rented some sort of space in Allen (which I barely remember).

But yes, my grandmother, great-grandmother and grandfather all bumped into LDS missionaries by happenstance.

Although I focused strickly on my paternal and maternal lines, I am also a direct descendant of John Alden and Priscilla Mullins of the Mayflower through General Betterly from the Revolutionary War.  Had a grandmother of some sort marry into the line.  My family has a tea set gifted by George Washington to an ancestor who worked for him as a maid in his HQ in Morristown due to the family relationship.

ETA: When my grandparents died, we had family friends who were Old Regulars that were afraid to step into a Mormon church for the funerals.  They came after some coaxing.

Perhaps Floyd County has a cluster of Old Baptists?

Still, my favorite church in KY is the Pony Express Holiness Church in Berea.

[Takumi]

I haven't dived that deep into family history, but I do know that on both sides of my family I'm from the same area that I live in now dating back to at least the very early 20th century.

[TheHighwayMan3561]

On mom's side, Grandpa's family came from Sweden I believe in the 1880s, with Grandma's arriving from there closer to the end of World War I. My great grandfather abandoned the family shortly after Grandma was born, which I believe he was of central or eastern European descent. Of my grandfather and his three brothers, he and one other stayed in Minnesota while two left for the Sun Belt. We have very little contact with the various trees within my grandpa's family, and it's actually looking very likely that our grandpa's bloodline will die out as neither of my blood-related uncles had kids and my brother and I have no interest in having kids.

I've lived in the MSP area except for when I went to college in Superior, WI. I need to move around more, honestly. But I've found work in what I want to do here.

[J N Winkler]

Most of my ancestors of the relevant generations were in Kansas by 1900, but for those who immigrated, it was never their first stop in the US--those were in places like New York, Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Maryland.  The part of my family that has been in the US since before the Revolutionary War lived in or near Bucks County, Pennsylvania.

[JayhawkCO]

I've lived in the MSP area except for when I went to college in Superior, WI. I need to move around more, honestly. But I've found work in what I want to do here.

My cousin was a goalie on the 2002 UW-Superior national championship hockey team.

[Henry]

AFAIK, my family has had several generations live in the Midwest, and primarily in and around Chicago.

On a side note, I once had my great-grandfather tell me the story of the last time the Cubs won the World Series; he died when I was still in grade school, but he made me promise to thank him the next time they won the Series, which is the first thing I did in 2016.

[Bruce]

My family has been in the Pacific Northwest since the late 19th century, but that hasn't stopped them from a few countries into the genealogical mess.

A few of the places that my ancestors have called home for an extended period of time, based on census records:

Spokane, WA
Salem, OR
Eagle Point, OR
Victorville, CA
Honolulu, HI
Moose Jaw, SK
Aomori, Japan
Geoje-do, South Korea
Buhlertann, Baden-Wurttemberg, Germany

Unknown locations in Switzerland, Sweden, and Ohio are not listed.

[kphoger]

My great-grandfather Hoger was an immigrant from Germany who settled in Chicago.  My grandparents moved, when my father was one year old in 1953, from Chicago to the Kansas City suburb of Mission, KS.  At that time, there wasn't even a street in front of their brand-new house.  He met my mother, who lived in nearby Merriam, in high school.

My dad became a pastor, and the process entailed several moves:  junior college in Winfield (KS), senior college in Fort Wayne (IN), seminary in Saint Louis (MO), a vicarage in Charleston (IL).  By the time I was born, they were living in the Chicago suburb of New Lenox, IL.  When I was in third grade, they decided they wanted to be closer to their family, considering that my grandparents were getting older.  So my dad asked for a call to the Kansas District, and we ended up in the town of Atwood.  Driving from there to KC takes more time than going to O'Hare and flying, but whatever.

After high school, I went to college in the Chicago suburb of River Forest, IL.  I slacked off and flunked out, and in the meantime got my girlfriend pregnant.  I moved out to the Wheaton and enrolled in community college.  My girlfriend and I broke up shortly thereafter, and I went online to find new love.  The lady I met online moved up to Naperville (IL) within the year, to be closer to me and make our relationship work.

Four years later, we were married and moved downstate to Herrin.  My plan was to continue on to university at Carbondale, but I never did.

When our first baby was born, we decided we wanted to live close to family.  My parents had since moved from Atwood to Wichita (KS), so we moved into their basement for the first 1½ years.  We've lived in Wichita ever since.



New Lenox, IL → Atwood, KS (1990):  I don't remember the route, other than that the end of it was I-70 to K-25

Atwood, KS → River Forest, IL (1999):  US-36, K-383, US-183, US-34, NE-44, I-80, I-88, I-290, IL-43

River Forest, IL → Wheaton, IL (2000):  public transportation

Wheaton, IL → Herrin, IL (2006):  public transportation to Matteson, hitchhiked from there to Johnston City (I-57), then my wife picked me up

Herrin, IL → Wichita, KS (2008):  IL-148, I-57, US-60, MO-360, I-44, US-71, MO-96, MO-171, K-171, US-400, K-96

[kphoger]

... Four years later, we were married and moved downstate to Herrin.  ...

Wheaton, IL → Herrin, IL (2006):  public transportation to Matteson, hitchhiked from there to Johnston City (I-57), then my wife picked me up

I should clarify.  When I actually left Chicagoland to move downstate, I hitchhiked from Matteson down I-57 (switching rides at Peotone and at the Main Line rest area near Buckley).  However, a week and a half earlier, my fiancée/wife had taken all our stuff down in a moving truck, then I went back north to Chicagoland and lived out of a backpack until closer to the wedding, while she went west to Branson and got things ready for the wedding.  The route we took from Naperville in the moving truck was Weber Road → I-55 → IL-47 → I-74 → I-57 → FAS-908.