OT: Your family claim to fame

Submitted by MichFan1997 on

So I wanna hear what your family can make as their claim to fame? I have 3 things. My great-grandpa was offered a contract by the New York Yankees. He sported a 96 mph fastball (it didn't get passed down) but he never made MLB. Also, i am related to Conway Twitty (he is my grandmas cousin. her last name was Jenkins. go look up his real last name). She was also related to Richard Burton. So technically, I was related to Elizabeth Taylor by marriage. How about your families, Mgobloggers? Let's here it.

aawolverine

June 16th, 2011 at 10:49 AM ^

It was a pretty dominating performance. Uncle Flip is down there on the ground, and my dad's just standing over him, all like "get up motherfucker, I dare you!"

swamyblue

June 16th, 2011 at 10:51 AM ^

He finished #2 in his class. Mom's cousin is a former Secretary of State. There's a few pro athletes (past and present) on my mom's side as well. Second and third cousins. One has 6 rings! Huge fam on mom's side! She has 14 siblings.

Noahdb

June 16th, 2011 at 11:05 AM ^

My great-great-great (many times repeated) grandfather signed the US Constitution. Going back six hundred years before that, we rolled into England with William the Conqueror.

 

So we went from being badasses to being poncey bureaucrats. (looking in mirror) Yeah...that's about right.

Moleskyn

June 16th, 2011 at 11:31 AM ^

My dad is first cousin to Mark Messner. I have no idea what that makes my relation to him, but my dad always said that when Mark and his brother would get into wrestling matches, it felt like the house was going to collapse.

Yonkers

June 16th, 2011 at 11:46 AM ^

My father was captain one year in the 1970's, then coached throughout the 80's. He was a decent player. But kids at school ask me if he was all american or won a heisman, I just tell him what my dad tells me "I sucked."

MaizeAndBlueWahoo

June 16th, 2011 at 11:47 AM ^

One of my great-something-grandfathers was with Cadillac on the expedition that founded Detroit.  My grandma once had the family tree done (like, way done, into some major detail) and there are names all over it, great-something-uncles and whatnot, like Gratiot and Beaubien.

gordify

June 16th, 2011 at 12:04 PM ^

Thomas Hooker was one of the founders of Harvard. His house was located on what is now Harvard yard.  He then founded Connecticut. Then there was General "fighting" Joseph Hooker from the Civil War who lost to Lee at Chancellorsville.  FDR is also distant in the tree. 

As for me, I once got into a fight with Ric Flair in a bar in Battle Creek and almost one with Thunder Dan Majerle (they started both) over a pool game but me and my boys where bigger than him and his boys so he wisely backed down.

Oh, and Brian once referred to me as a "12 year old" from sackcarr on one of his posts during the Christian Wilson recruitment.

 

 .

BigCat14

June 16th, 2011 at 1:07 PM ^

what bar did this happen at?  do you live in Battle Creek?  back when i was 19 i was a bouncer at a night club/bar in Kzoo where we did an after underground fight night with Dan Severn and his boys against some local yocals who thought they might have something for "The Beast"

 

GO BLUE beat WMU

BlueHills

June 16th, 2011 at 12:51 PM ^

i'm a direct descendant of the Baal Shem Tov ("Master of the Good Name"), the guy who founded Hasidic Judaism. He was supposed to be a direct descendant of King David.

If the King David part is true, then I'm Jesus' cousin.

This would feel a lot cooler if I wasn't an atheist.

BlueDragon

June 16th, 2011 at 12:55 PM ^

Steelworking, industrial engineering, and coalmining.  Post-c.1960: newspaper writing/art, MDs and veterinarians, engineers, lawyers, and one ferocious Wolverine (that's me).

Noahdb

June 16th, 2011 at 1:12 PM ^

i am open to suggestions as to how best go about finding out this info!?  i have heard that The Church of the ladder day saints (seventh day adventists) have a huge stockpile of info on geneology? 

 

This is mostly correct. It's Latter Day saints. The ladder-day saints are entirely different. And they are Mormon, not Seventh Day Adventist. The archives in Salt Lake City are enormous and a huge resource for people doing genealogical work.

My mother likes doing that sort of stuff and has taken numerous trips to SLC to further her research. They collect family bibles which often have very accurate family trees in them. 

If you want to know if you are related to someone, just go ahead and assume that you are. You and I are related. You and a chimp and a dolphin and a rat and a jellyfish are also related. You just have to go farther back for each one of those things. 

When you are thinking about generations, think about the power of two. You're Gen Zero...so 2^0. You're parents are the first...2^1 = 2. Your grandparents are the second generation...2^2 = 4. And so on and so on. A generation is about 20 to 25 years. So, 20 generations is only going back 400 to 500 years. So we're talking ROUGHLY about the time of Jamestown, yes? My relatives weren't at Jamestown, but they reached the new world shortly after. That's cool, huh? Except that there 2^20 people between me and that guy 20 generations ago. 2^20 is about a million. Me and 1,048,575 all get to make the same claim. : \

You (and me) and a chimp are more closely related than a mouse is to a rat. So...if you are really interested in genealogy, it's a good way to find out how your family got here, what they did, who lived and who died. It's a time consuming hobby, but it beats the crap out of hanging out on Facebook or watching reality shows. (it is NOT better than hanging out Mgoblog or watching porn, however). 

Start slow and start small if you're really interested.

EJG

June 16th, 2011 at 1:33 PM ^

My father singled off of Jim Kaat in college and I singled of of Jim Abbot in high school.  Let it be said my family can hit major league pitching (ok, before they made it to the major leagues, but who really cares).

Ray

June 16th, 2011 at 2:07 PM ^

My father is one of the non-Jews saved by Oscar Schindler.

My dad (now 87) was a B-24 crewman whose left wing was hit by three dud anti-aircraft shells while flying a resupply mission for the 101st and 82nd Airborne near Arnheim, Holland in September, 1944. (A bridge too far).

I always thought the odds of three dud shells in succession was an unbelievable coincidence. When I saw Liam Neesom say "not a single piece of live ammunition will leave this factory" I had a moment of recognition. When I asked my dad about it, he said it was the first thought he had when he saw that scene. I've since confirmed that among a wide range of armaments, Schindler's factory turned out that kind of AA.

Maybe it's coincidence? But I prefer to be grateful.

Champeen

June 16th, 2011 at 2:18 PM ^

Darth Vader is my father...NOOOOOO

On a serious not, going back to the original poster, if your grandad had a 96mph fastball back in the 20's/30's/40's .....  I think he would have been the hardest thrower in the history of baseball at that time, no?

jmblue

June 16th, 2011 at 4:04 PM ^

I'm part French Canadian.  Since not that many French colonists actually settled down permanently in Canada (only around 5,000 did over the whole 150-year period), and as those who did were very, very prolific,  I'm more or less related to the whole lot of them.  Deitan Dubuc FTW!

Y0ST

June 16th, 2011 at 7:38 PM ^

I had five uncles serve active duty in WWII. My grandmother had one of the very few five star door hangers in the US.

BTW, they all came home from the war.

will

June 17th, 2011 at 1:34 AM ^

My grandfather got his doctorate from UM, served in WWII and was part of an Army Corps Engineers squad that shot down a plane using carbine rifles from telephone poles in northern Africa. (have the pic to prove it)  He then went on to found numerous AA chapters across Michigan, co-founded the head start program in Toledo, and then served as the head of the Department of Health until his retirement.

Or - we are direct decendants of Daniel Boone.

VicVal

June 17th, 2011 at 3:53 AM ^

An ancestor on my mom's side was in the Boston Teaparty.  There's no official list but we know it's true, because hooliganism still runs in the family (my grandfather was a politician and it doesn't get more hooligan-ish than that).

On her side of the family, a relative has been in every war since the French and Indian.

On my dad's side, his dad donated the first calf from Michigan to the Heifer Project.  And his family have been pacificsts going back to ... before the French and Indian War.

Bluegill22

June 17th, 2011 at 4:25 AM ^

I did the flooring in the locker rooms!

I went to the space capsule to do my thing and when I came back in to work, everyone was standing around talking... Bo walked through and I missed it.  I did get Chris Perry to sign my print though.  haha

 

One of the ceramic guys put Ohio State real big on the cement board before he installed the tile. I blame him for the last 10 years.

saveferris

June 17th, 2011 at 9:55 PM ^

My great uncle was Los Angeles Times sportwriter, Jim Murray.  Always liked when he visited, he had the best stories.

My grandmother also claims that our family is a distant relative of Mary, Queen of Scots.

Yeoman

June 21st, 2011 at 12:29 PM ^

My great, great, great, great grandfather founded the first successful manufacturing business in Columbus, OH, an iron foundry specializing in agricultural implements.* He was also the inventor of the five-cent handshake and was the controversial figure at the center of the famous early athletic scandal, Plowgate.

 

*That part's true.