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Poll: How many generations removed are you from immigration?

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Re: Poll: How many generations removed are you from immigration?

#91

Post by estel »

davidcuddeback wrote: post #78

My great, great, great, great, great, great, great, great grandfather immigrated to New York from France in 1685 to escape the religious persecutions of King Louis XIV. I think that makes me 10 generations removed from immigration. There's a town in Normandy, France that bears our name (Caudebec was our French name before immigrating): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caudebec-en-Caux and a small town in New York that be…

But you know that every single one of your 256 great, great, great, great, great, great, great grandfathers were at least second generation immigrants?

I'm sorry, but I find that hard to believe.

Re: Poll: How many generations removed are you from immigration?

#92

Post by jballanc »

weavejester wrote: post #71

The problem with this poll is that it has a strong bias built into it. Those with recent ancestors who immigrated (such as parents or grandparents) will be able to answer this question fairly easily. Those who do not will find this question difficult to answer unless they have good records of their family tree. I'm not aware of any immigrants in my family tree, but I'm only aware of my ancestry two generations back,…

Certainly if I wanted to be more scientific about this, there is a lot I would do differently...

That said, if you go through history, there has seldom been a time when one location or one state remained the dominant force in the world for more than 3 or 4 generations (especially looking at more recent world history). So, another way of posing the hypothesis might be: Is there a "migrant" sub-population within the human species that is both willing to travel to wherever opportunities are to be found and, at the same time, increase the prosperity of those locations when they arrive?

Re: Poll: How many generations removed are you from immigration?

#93

Post by waterlesscloud »

davidcuddeback wrote: post #79
rmc wrote: post #68

French Hugenot (prodestant refugees from France) is the closest I've gotten.

Same here. I'm 10 generations removed, so you might be about the same.

Me too, from paternal grandmother's line back to Jamestown in 1701.

Re: Poll: How many generations removed are you from immigration?

#94

Post by MrKurtHaeusler »

The description doesn't match the poll options. Or perhaps the term "first person" is ambiguous. I think you mean the "last" person, as in most recent right? As in looking for the smallest number of generations back before one ancestor immigrated.

It seems by the comments people are focusing more on the the "chronologically first known" immigrant in their family trees.

I answered 0, but in my known family tree the first (as in least recent) immigration occurred around 30 generations ago, (have to dig out the papers to get the exact number).

I suggest rewording it so instead of "first" you say "most recent" or "least recent" depending on what you actually mean.

Re: Poll: How many generations removed are you from immigration?

#95

Post by jballanc »

kr1shna wrote: post #15

When is one be considered an immigrant? Is it: 1) simply living in a land that one was not born in immigration; or 2) giving up one's citizenship at birth for another? Going by the first definition, I've lived in 2 foreign countries for lengthy periods, so have I immigrated twice? But I still am a citizen of where I was born (India) and I do intend to eventually move back to home country, so am I not an immigrant at…

I think immigration is very much in the eye (and heart) of the beholder. For example, I know of a good number of Brits living in Australia who would not consider themselves immigrants. I also know of people from the deep south of the U.S. who now live in NYC and probably do think of themselves as immigrants, of a sort.

Re: Poll: How many generations removed are you from immigration?

#97

Post by jballanc »

Mz wrote: post #46

My mother is not only an immigrant to the US but when she was an under-aged teenager (either 16 or 17), she escaped East Germany with forged papers, with her infant niece in tow to return the child to it's rightful mother who had been denied the right to take the baby home after a visit. She claimed the baby was hers. I have heard that the only reason it worked is because the baby threw up on one of the border guards…

The stories (much more than the raw numbers) are what make this poll fun. Thank you for contributing!

Re: Poll: How many generations removed are you from immigration?

#99

Post by ethank »

Depends on which direction in my family tree you go, but my great-grandma on my maternal-Grandma's side (her mom) was born in Lithuania. Most other forks of the family tree are four generations back.

We still have some family (cousins) that went to Israel post-Holocaust, but most of the family is in the US.

My wife's grandfathers were both born in Europe though, but generationally they are parallel with my great-grandparents.

Re: Poll: How many generations removed are you from immigration?

#100

Post by arethuza »

rlander wrote: post #87
arethuza wrote: post #32

I would guess at least 40 - I'm Scottish and I was raised in small village where part of my family had been for about 400 years. However, another part came from Orkney and the last mass immigration there was probably by the Vikings in the 8th or 9th centuries. [Edit: Of course the reality can't be as simple as that - I have a slightly Asiatic appearance that is fairly common in the part of Scotland I am from - a Chin…

I've always been amused by family trees in the old world. I was born in brazil but my great grandfather came as a war refugee fron Sweden (he had two brothers: one stayed in Sweden and the other fled to the Us). At that time there were refugees from all over europe arriving in latin america so it is very common where I live for someone to bear family names from 2 different countries (my wife has german and portuguese…

Our family name was "corrected" by some over-zealous Church of Scotland minister in the 19th Century - it was originally "Sclater" and was changed to the much more common "Slater". Just to confuse things, some of my ancestors really were originally Slaters as well!
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