We found my grandfather.

January 29, 2018January 29, 2018 Tony Tran

We found him.

My ong ngaoi.

My grandfather.

His name is Keith Brown. He lived in Houston, Texas.

And he’s dead.

There is a lot more to this story — but here are the fast facts:

• My mom’s uncle (Keith’s brother) appeared as a relative match. His name is Clifton. He’s just a few years older than my mom. It was from this match that I was able to find my grandfather.
• My grandfather has two daughters. The daughters were born in the early-60s just a few years before my mom was born. They’re still somewhere out there. 
• My mom knows. I told my mom when she visited Chicago last week — it also happened to be her birthday.

Before we dive into the frantic emails, the family tree triangulation, and the tears (ohgodsomanytears), there needs to be a quick DNA lesson on the humble centimorgan. Trust me, it’s important to know about.

What the heck is a centimorgan?

Centimorgan (cM) is a unit of measurement used to describe amount of DNA information in a single chromosome. Each of your 23 chromosomes contains different amounts of cMs. For example, chromosome 1 has 281.5 cM while chromosome 2 has 263.7 cMs.

In the context of these DNA tests, a cM is used to describe how much DNA you share with your “cousins” or relative matches. It can also reveal a rough estimate of how you’re related with that person.

The higher the amount of cMs shared, the more closely related you are to that person. This can help reveal a TON especially when you’re trying to zero in on what part of a cousin’s family tree you’re a part of (as was the case with my mom and Andrea).

Which brings us to…

Uncle Clifton and his 925.2 centimorgans

On New Years Day, I checked on my Family Tree DNA account following a hunch that I might have gotten new cousin matches from the holiday season.

I did have a new cousin match — and it came in the form of Clifton Brown.

Only my DNA is uploaded into Family Tree DNA’s database though. That means that the 443 cMs that he and I share could only be much higher if my mom was in the database.

Unless my dad happened to be Black — which he isn’t. I know because my cousins on my dad’s side also had their DNA tested and they were more Asian than a sack of tea.

I checked GEDMatch to see if Clifton uploaded his information onto there and discovered that he had. He also shared a staggering 925.2 cMs with my mom.

Per the above chart, this puts him in prime position to be the following to my mother:

• First cousin (1C)
• Half Aunt / Half Uncle / Half Niece / Half Nephew
• Great-Grandparent / Great-Grandchild
• Great – Aunt / Uncle / Niece / Nephew

Knowing Clifton’s birthday from his FTDNA profile, I could safely rule out Great-Grandparent relationship as well as the Great-Uncle relationship. That left first cousin and half-uncle.

Luckily, FTDNA also had his email address, so I shot him a message.

And I waited

And waited.

And waited.

Two days passed and he still hadn’t replied.

So I decided to check Ancestry.com to see if I could find him and to my surprise Clifton was already on my family tree. More specifically, he was on the tree that Mrs. H — my partner in crime — built out.

Now Andrea and Clifton were confirmed cousins AND I knew where each of them stood on my family tree. This meant that I could FINALLY begin the process of triangulation — finding a most recent common ancestors using both of my cousins.

I was able to trace back their ancestry back to one couple: Kendell “Kit” Christopher Brown and Virginia May Harris.

Both were my great-great-grandparents.

Which felt amazing. I had great-great-grandparents. I felt the shivers of goosebumps crawl across my skin as I read their profiles.

Two Black Americans from the Deep South. Both born in 1884. Both born in Texas. Together they had three children. One was Andrea’s mother.

The other was Clifton’s dad.

I discovered from there that Clifton already had an Ancestry.com profile (though he hadn’t taken a DNA test yet).

And so I sent him the following there:

I made a silent promise to myself that I wouldn’t get my homes up the next day, so I invited my friend Miguel over for a heated game of chess to get my mind off of things.

As we played, I still couldn’t help but check my email between turns … which was good because I received a message in my inbox that very day.

When I read who it was from, my heart jumped into my skull: Clifton Brown.

“My brother, Keith Cornell Brown, was born in 1939 and served in Vietnam. He is likely your grandfather. As far as I know he is still living in Houston, TX.”

Holy. Shit.

Here it was. Near 100% confirmation of what I had been searching for for two fucking years.

My grandfather. My mom’s dad. His name. His identity. My identity.

Keith Cornell Brown — and he’s in Houston.

My grandfather: Keith Cornell Brown

Here’s the kicker: Keith was already on the family tree Mrs. H built out. I must have passed over his name a hundred times and never thought anything of it.

Keith was born in 1939 and from a different mother than Clifton. 

As a result of that, Keith and Clifton didn’t have a very good relationship as he “resented” Clifton for their differing maternal heritage — which is absolutely laughable considering the great lengths I’ve gone through to connect with my cousins.

Some more digging revealed that Keith had actually been married to a woman named Monica shortly before the war began. He also had two daughters by her in the early-60s. This means that my mom has older sisters.

Absolutely bonkers.

Finding her father is crazy enough — but to think that my mom has sisters? That I have even more cousins out there that I never knew about? My heart felt on the verge of exploding.

After receiving Clifton’s message, I quickly relayed the info to Mrs. H on Facebook. Five minutes after sending her the information, I got a phone call from her.

“Tony,” she said when I picked up the phone. “Now I don’t want to upset you … but I found Keith’s obituary.”

Damn.

“Mr. Keith Brown entered into eternal rest…”

Here’s my grandfather. Keith Cornell Brown.

According to his obituary, he “entered into eternal rest” on August 11, 2013. I went through Ancestry.com to find an corroborating evidence and discovered the obituary linked to the same Keith Brown on my family tree.

Confirmed. My grandfather, Keith Brown, was dead.

He’d been dead for almost five years — which felt awful.

“But Tony, why? There’s no reason to feel bad. You couldn’t have known!”

Here’s why it cuts: 23andMe, AncestryDNA, Family Tree DNA — these tests have been around for almost a decade now. I could have bought one of these tests while I was in college and discovered my grandfather’s identity much sooner … possibly before he even died.

I know. It’s unreasonable. I really shouldn’t feel the way I feel about it … but I do. I’m a little racked with guilt and the fact that I didn’t get started with this sooner.

But still, it still doesn’t deter from one salient fact: I did it. I found him, you guys. I fucking found him. 

Next time . . .

Mom’s reaction: I told my mom about finding her father. Things got real. I’ll tell you guys all about that in my next post.