All of these Actors are showcased as having interesting ancestors with moving usually dramatic stories...when in reality most of people's blood lines are poor immigrants or farmers or miners who were born lived and died in dull obscurity
I have feeling most people go in wanting Pirates and princesses and come out with Joe Johnson who just up and died of old age after a life of toil planting turnips.
Yes, its true that they always seem to come up with dramatic stories, but that doesn't mean they didn't live and die in dull obscurity. Look at the recent episode where they found a pattern of the men abandoning their families. As I recall there have been a couple like that. Sure we have seen an ancestor who was the architect to the King, and another who (if I remember correctly) helped found Wells Fargo, but many were regular people who had some dramatic moments in their lives. I think if you look at 3 or 4 generations of just about any family, and you'll find those moments.
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Helen Hunt had the Wells Fargo connection. :)
I've seen every episode, and there have been remarkable connections, and like you said, there have been commonfolk...which to me is just like life.
But sometimes the show informs us of the silliness of all of it...according to royal genealogists, because of Valerie Bertinelli's direct relation to William the Conqueror, she is also considered related to Jesus, God and Adam and Eve.
Haha! ;-)
Yes, I found that ridiculous especially when you consider that according to the Bible, every single human is descended from Adam & Eve.
shareevery single human is descended from Adam & Eveand is the product of incest! share
But they aren't siblings.
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But they aren't siblings
Actually most of the stories from the celebrities on this show were not connected to royalty or pirates. Many were common people who either abandoned their families or had vices (think Sudeikis, Kim Cattrall).
We go into genealogy for different reasons. Those common people (immigrants, farmers, miners) all have their own stories to tell. Some may only be interested in royalty but those are truly interested in genealogy. I know some people just click on leaves on ancestry to just about every shaky connection to royalty they can get. Fine for them. For me its about those common, everyday ancestors. I was fortunate enough to find a lot of information on them. Not just passenger lists and census records, but newspaper articles, probate records, which shed a lot of light into how they lived. I found interest even in how they named their children. None were famous nor infamous but they were all of interest to me.
Mr. Grady, you were the caretaker here.
The producers are obviously looking for compelling storylines. So they go back and focus on one ancestor, usually, who has a compelling storyline. But each of these celebrities has many other ancestors, who probably lived much more mundane lives.
shareeach of these celebrities has many other ancestors,
Not to mention the fact there don't appear to be any genes for character values. The whole "it's in my genes!" nonsense is just the current manifestation of the old "It's in your blood!", which was the excuse for both good and bad behavior for at least a few centuries.
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