Weekly column sharing genealogy-related things that I’ve learned or found.


Found, Unfound, Found Again?  If you are on Facebook, you may have seen my status earlier in the week saying that I learned I was a Mayflower descendant.  However, a source led me astray, having me think that my tenth great-grandfather, Stephen HOPKINS, came to America on the Mayflower!  In truth, this is NOT the case.  Heck, he wasn’t even born when the Mayflower set sail!!  Further investigation has me wondering if the Stephen HOPKINS, who did arrive in America via the Mayflower, is instead my twelfth great-grandfather.  I trace this line back to my eleventh great-grandfather, John HOPKINS.  A variety of sources reviewed so far are contradictory:  some say John is Stephen’s son, others say no.  There doesn’t seem to be any proof either way at this point.  So for now, it’s unclear whether I am in fact a Mayflower descendant or not.  Hoping to unravel the mystery, perhaps on my research trip to SLC in September.

Article  There were actually two articles in the July 2009 edition of Reader’s Digest.  The first is, “This Land is Your Land.”  It’s an article about our National Parks (U.S.) from the perspective of filmmaker Ken Burns, who produced a documentary, The National Parks: America’s Best Idea.  The second article is, “You Named Your Kid What?!,” written by Pamela Redmond Satran and Linda Rosenkrantz.  It’s an interesting read about the names given to children today, with a bit of history about naming conventions.