Ancestry Bias
Thomas Leth-Olsen
Family Walk
My daughter gifted me an Ancestry DNA Kit after my husband’s
results solidified my in-laws’ insistence they were of almost pure Irish
decent. My tube of saliva connected our children to the other 50% of their
family history. It confirmed I was a bloody boring European mutt. My ancestry disappointment
was greater than my children’s whom I had feared were bitter that I diluted
their concentrated Celtic blood.
I admit I want a worldly background. With stories of ancestors
who improved society, even in a small way: an artist, scientist, grass roots
organizer, unsung underground railroad cooperative. And why is my lineage so blandly
achromatic?
My biases against relatives I never met changed when
ancestry research specialist and librarian, Barbara Walker Capoferri, started
tracking my genealogy. She confirmed that relatives of my father owned a
florist shop. It excited me to know that I had small business owners in my
family who possibly benefited their Philadelphia neighborhood.
That wasn’t enough for me, though. I perseverated on
mistakes relatives had made that kept our family in poverty. I even questioned
Providence why my family history is riddled with early death, physical and
other challenges, and health issues which disabled those who laid the
foundations of my financial situation as a child. I couldn’t understand how my
family could be so unlucky. After being in America for generations, they hadn’t
grounded themselves enough to create a building block for generations to come
(me) to spring board off to college.
No family vacation home. No property that is handed down
with an attic of treasures for my children to look through and know that they
were used by actual people they’re related to. We have few photos, and no
jewelry.
What all this whining means is that I’m jealous of other
families who boast these things. Do they deserve them more than me?
Barbara enabled me to turn around. I had thought of myself at
the end of my genealogy on tip-toes looking back. Facing forward on my blood
line, I see my responsibility to my children and grandchildren. I’m the one who
must create/do something in which they and future generations can boast, “I’m
related to Dawn Byrne.”
From my point on this line, I turn back again. My mother is
behind me. Family know her as the 28-year-old widow who raised five children
amongst poverty with dignity. As she passes on the story of her coal mining
grandfather caught in an explosion who died from black lung, or the one about
her disabled mother who learned to play the piano by ear, those people fade into
Mom’s shadow. They can’t compare to her story of childhood poverty and her amazing
self-empowered adult life. She is part of a lineage of marginalized, single
mothers who raised families by leaning on each other.
Thanks, Mom, for setting the bar high. Future family
researching us to complain about people who’ve tried their best, in their
specific situation, during their historic setting, and who may have just wanted
to survive, will find you. What will they see when they hit me?
