Finding Your Roots

Oh, I love the PBS television series "Finding Your Roots."  I've watched series 2 on Netflix and waiting for series 3.   I'm not able to watch the programming live, so I've got to wait until the series come out streaming. The format of the show is the same nearly every episode.  It brings three celebrities and delves into some of their family trees, exploring a theme (Greek heritage, Jewish, African American, British, etc.).  As much I've enjoyed the show, I feel like so much of the stories are cut.  You really only see a part of the tree and you don't appreciate any of the behind-the-scenes research.  Lo, and behold, there is a companion book!  One for each series.

The book is fantastic.  It delves in a little deeper and explores a little more of the trees and really is an interesting read.  I found the book at the library and actually read the book before I watched most of the episodes.  Before reading the book, one of the my least favorite aspects of the show is the DNA analysis.  I've been really on the fence with DNA tests.  I haven't really understood them and, as neat as it is to say that you're 16% Irish, I don't see that it's seriously that helpful.  Until I read the book.  My outlook on things has changed.  Henry Louis Gates Jr., the host, makes the repeated observation that a lot of people claim to have Native American ancestry, but it is almost always not the case.  He is able to determine Native blood in a few of the guests, but most do not and so many think they do.  In my family, my grandfather's grandmother, from North Carolina, is listed as "mulatto."  As is her father.  Lore has been passed down that perhaps the family is part Native American as mulatto simply can mean mixed race.  As I was reading the book, I realized that it is much, much more likely that this family is African American and descended from slave ancestry.  So, I ordered my DNA test through Ancestry took the test a month ago and am waiting for results!  That should help me get a better idea of my ethnicity percentages.  For a complete spoiler alert, I once again did some research on the mulatto line and her grandfather and other family members are listed as "free black" early in the 1800s.  Really very interesting and I'm enjoying learning what it was like living as a free person of color two hundred years ago.  More about that on another post.  Also, more about the DNA test when I get the results.  I have my mother's results already so that will be super helpful in navigating all of the "cousins."