Genealogy for non-geniuses
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 Continue Reading
It’s like the game but instead of Kevin Bacon, it’s with an elderly black woman. So a while back, I messaged a new new 2nd – 3rd cousin hit through AncestryDNA with my usual form letter: SUB: Can you help me, cousin? Hello, My name is Tony and it looks like Continue Reading
I stumbled upon an alt-right subreddit the other night (presumably because the universe wants me to get a stupidity-induced nosebleed before the year is up) and one of the posts on there caught my eye. Clicking on it sent me to an article the notorious red pill culture website Return Continue Reading
My favorite place to read is on the southbound Halsted 8 bus between 8am and 10am. I did it every weekday for the better part of two years when I worked in an office in the River North neighborhood of Chicago — finishing entire novels within the span of a Continue Reading
WHAT’S UP, PEOPLE? Sometimes I like to have a YouTube video play in the background while I work. If my editor’s reading this, I’m not just slacking off writing. It helps me concentrate. I promise! One vid that accompanied my writing for work recently was an episode of Finding Your Roots starring Continue Reading
So I’ve been keeping this under wraps for a while and feel like I should say it now: I’ve been invited to give a presentation on my journey to find my grandfather at the University of Iowa! I was invited by evolutionary biologist and undergraduate director Prof. Bryant McAllister to Continue Reading
A few months ago, I stumbled upon an article in the University of Iowa Alumni Magazine featuring a class called, “Who Are You: Revelations from the Personal Genome.” It was the perfect combination of everything I wanted from a seminar while I was at UI — free genetic genealogy research Continue Reading
Fun fact: It’s incredibly difficult to find my ancestor’s Vietnam War veteran military records. Wait. Did I say fun? I mean INCREDIBLY FRUSTRATING. So as it turns out, finding the military records for my grandfather is going to be a lot harder than I thought. Like WAYYYYY harder than I thought. Continue Reading
Texas950 made contact again — and this time, she’s got more light to shed on her Vietnam vet relatives. After replying to Texas950’s message to me, I felt hopeful about this lead…that is until another week went by and she didn’t respond. Since patience isn’t my strongest suit, I decided Continue Reading