In the beginning

 I have long wanted to start a blog simply to share interesting items I’ve found that my friends wouldn’t give two hoots about, for the random thoughts that pop up now and then. Even if no one reads them I wanted a place to write down sundry parts of my life. 

I got bitten by the genealogy bug years ago. Have had a tree on Ancestry.com for ages but decided to check out Wikitree 2 years ago to see if there were any family members I had missed or lines I didn’t have sources for. Found a lovely community of people that were just in the beginning stages of trying to build the Appalachia Project. With their support I got brave enough to also join the Civil War and the Notables projects. For notables subjects, I mainly stick to Golden Age of Hollywood actors. The Civil War explains itself and Appalachia is for my own family. 

For 2025 members of Wikitree, who were so inclined, were challenged to begin or continue a blog. I thought to myself, “here’s your chance.” The beginning theme is the title I used for this very first post. We were encouraged to share what got us started on our genealogy journey. Bear with me as I have multiple answers. 

1. There’s a longstanding joke in my family that a famous Academy Award winning actor of the 1940s-1960s was related to us. My biology teacher in high school even called me by his first name although I’m female. My siblings and I had a silly saying that he was my uncle on my brother’s side. Unfortunately, he’s not. 

2. Along that same line I wanted to find out if my family was in any way related to one of the former kings of England; a cadet branch of the Plantagenets. I am happy to say I DO descend from them probably. If all the connections are confident. 

3. When I was a kid one of my mom’s cousins researched mom’s paternal ancestors and self published a book about them. I would often pour over the pages and drink in the dates and some of the funny, old fashioned names. Saphronia, Pharis, Talitha. It was all so fascinating to find out where and who I came from. 

So, that’s my story. If anyone stumbles across this,  hang in for the next 52 weeks.