Famous Relatives

I had to chuckle when I read Randy Seaver’s post about being related to Mitt Romney. I’ve been researching family history for over twenty years, but I don’t think I’ve ever looked up to see how I’m related to any political figure. I don’t say that to brag, though. My chuckling comes from the fact that I just recently had a tidbit to share with my daughter. She’s a big science fiction fan, loves Dr. Who, the Lost series, Harry Potter. Most recently she’s gotten into Star Wars.
A portion of my children’s ancestry is out of Ontario, Canada and I recently ran across a website on the ancestry of Mary Margaret Bouk who married Wellington Smith in the town of Thorold in Ontario. I first found mention of this family line on the WorldConnect project of the trusty Rootsweb.com site (may it ever stay free) and contacted the submitter about some of his sources.
The submitter, Bob Keith, graciously provided me with information and directed me to his website on the Keith family. Mr. Keith also wrote a fictionalized version of the family history and I promptly purchased a copy from Amazon.com. Both in the book and on his website, Mr. Keith notes well-known individuals who are connected to this large German family. One of them happens to be George Lucas, the creator of Star Wars.
Now, mind you, I have been studying genealogy for longer than my children have even been on this earth. So far, none of them have even been remotely interested in what I have found. They are gracious enough to listen to mother when she goes on about dead people, but that’s only because I’ve raised them to be polite.
I finally garnered a bit of interest when I shared with my sci-fi fan that she was related to George Lucas. “Cool!” she replied and went back to texting. A minute later, she looked up and asked how she was related. “Oh, you’re probably like ninth cousins* or something.” Back she went to her texting. “Are you sharing this information with your friends?” I asked. “Well, of course!” she replied.
Wow, for a brief moment, family history garnered a bit of attention from the teen crowd. Cool!



*It turns out when I did the math that they are seventh cousins one generation removed.

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