I’m a curious person and I always find it interesting to find out the meaning of people’s first and last names. When I look up the meaning of people’s last names I think to myself, “his/her family must’ve came from (Ireland, Russia, Sweden, Germany, Poland, Italy, Japan, etc.)” I’m also in love with history and I’m always wondering about people’s history, where they came from, etc.
One of my biggest brick walls is my 2x’s great grandmother. Her name was Helena Woznica. She was born in Poland circa 1860. I believe she was born in Brzyska Wola OR Brzeska Wola. I have seen both towns referenced and as they have similar spelling I understand it could be easy for them to be used interchangeably. She was Catholic. She immigrated to the United States in the 1880’s, settling with her husband (my 2x’s great grandfather) and children in Connecticut and then Chicago.
Jewish genealogy is really hard, first and foremost. I am the only person who seems to be researching some of my family lines at all, from what I can tell, for example, who were immigrants to NYC. And in many cases, there are few records, no burial information and many people with the same names in a given cemetery (with no online indexing), no living descendants with further knowledge, and name changes that are not possible to guess.
DNA tests just show all of my relatives as related due to endogamy, and few people of the 100+ I have talked with know more than their great-grandparents' names. I also rarely have closer than 3rd cousins, with one known 2nd cousin line who are related to everyone else in the family. It has been an incredible test to start to sort these families out, as all three GGparents are probably related as they lived in a 100 mile radius of each other, originally, where cousins did intermarry. So I have to turn to more traditional family tree building (which I have been already working on for 20 years; Ancestry.com has completely changed my ability to do this, along with FindAGrave, to some degree).
So I accidentally stumbled across two other families with my families' same last surname living on the same one block or so of Manhattan in 1920, which is somewhat common surname (but not as common as some) -- but my very aged-with-her-mind-going-now grandmother did mention to me that her families family all lived within a few blocks from each other, and this is that street.
I can't begin to figure out how they are related though? They could be cousins, brothers, uncles, I have no idea.
But if I could figure it out, it would be incredible! It is a VERY lost line whose living descendants might know more.
How would you proceed to figure out the relationships between them, if there are any? And I strongly think that there are.
I follow tennis, which has a lot of Czech and Slovakian players, and I've noticed many of them have German surnames:
Ivan Lendl, Leos Friedl, Eva Birnerova, Sandra Kleinova, Katerina Kramperova, Ludmila Richterova, Karol Beck, Anna Karolina Schmiedlova, Lenka Wienerova
What's the background? Does this mean they all have some sort of German/Austrian ancestry? Is it very common among Czechs and Slovaks?
I can't tell how many times in my short while here I've seen people spell it Aurelius instead of Arelius. :D
If still in use, are there any hosted by anyone other than Rootsweb?
Love Rootsweb, just curious
Like if Ms. Brown and Mr. Brown marry each other can it become Ms Brown Brown or only Brown despite her taking both surnames.
For example, someone being called Brian David, or Michaels, Andrews and Daniels being surnames just for an added s. Or as well, which I find incredibly bizzare, how did the coming about of people's surnames being named after countries? I've seen British and Ireland as someone's surname before.
I know Mussolini's granddaughter kept the family surname and is now a politician in Italy, but what about other countries? Are there any Hitlers in Germany/Austria? Quislings in Norway? Ceausescus in Romania? They don't have to be relatives; just people with the same surname.
I just watched HIMYM and a child said to Marshall Erickson, Mr. E. instead of Mr. Erickson.
I'm 39F and been estranged from my nuclear family of mum, dad and brother completely for about 3 years. There's a history of abuse by them toward me since birth. I've always felt like the black sheep in the family with them as a unit of three and me on the outside. Estrangement has been the best thing I've ever done.
But we have a really unusual surname. Maybe only a couple of hundred people worldwide. I've only met one person with it I wasn't related to. So the name connects me to my family of origin immediately and brings up the spectre of abuse/estrangement etc almost instantly.
As well, I've always hated the name. It's hard for people to spell and pronounce and it goes awkwardly with my first name (which actually I changed from my birth name as a kid because I wasn't comfortable the one my parents picked.)
So for my 40th birthday next year I've been thinking of changing my surname legally. It doesn't affect my career to do so but I'm wondering how people might react to a woman changing her name not through marriage?
Will it cause a total nightmare with banks etc? (I'm in the UK if that helps.) Will it look like making a bigger deal out of the estrangement and be like fanning the flames of drama? Will anyone take it seriously or see it as an affectation?
Anyone got any first hand experience of changing their name legally not through marriage who can advise? Or any advice on how to pick a new neutral name I like?
tl;dr: Thinking of changing my family name because I'm now estranged and it still links me to my abusive family. Any advice?
