My older brother was born before our parents were married . That's really the only family drama I am aware of .

Forgot one- I found out my father wasn’t my mom’s first husband while watching old super 8 film my cousin had converted to digital a few years back.

It’s like ‘well you never asked’ in my family. Who the **** knows what else is out there.

At least I don't have any Uncle Dad or Aunt Grandma stories ... this thread is interesting!

One of my ancestors was charged with some type of muntiny on the ship over 3 centuries ago. When one of the brothers moved to this area shortly after the rest settled further north he changed our last name .... similar, but very different.

Now why would one do that? No one knows...

Other side (also from around Stuttgart) changed just the spelling when arriving too... legit :)

Turns out .... I come from a land baron ... granted 500 acres from the King ... acquired another 1500 ... well known and prolly right up there with George Washington in these parts.... I dunno...

I know where his grave is .... a couple miles from my ponds. Why there? I dunno... his 2K acres were in the next county... I drive by them all the time. They haven't been part of mom's family for over 250 years :(.

We lost two civil wars .... NO one has a clue how it got "out of the family" ....

Mom grew up with 3 houses on 120 acres (purchased by 3 brothers)... a few miles away .... purchased in the late 1800s....

You start over .... that's my family :)

Life wasn't easy.... but it was great.

Still is .... compared to most ... Lucky US :D

Great thread!

Our family mystery; somehow in the closing days of 1944 my father somehow left occupied Denmark with the the help of the underground movement to Peru. He soon after established himself as an engineer with a mining company up in the Andes.
The mystery is the multiple trips back to Peru doing my youth, fast forward 50 years and find my eldest cousin who told me my Dad helped hunt down Nazi war criminals.
He would borrow my uncles .45 and pack it in his luggage. Got to see the gun and then rocked the family with the story.
The money he got funded the families move to California to start his business and the rest is history.

That's pretty cool Ted.

Dang that is a very cool story!

Right up there with chopped up neighbors!

I guess this is my 15 minutes of fame that I'll get in my lifetime :(

back when Nazis were unacceptable. .......... those were the days. :)

Ted's Dad for the win!!! Awesome.

Amazing history. That story is worthy of a Tom Hanks led biopic!

About 8 years ago my wife got a call out of the blue. "I think were sisters". Ancestry.com strikes! One thing led to another and she now has 2 "new" half brothers and a sister. My wife also has 3 full blood sisters and a brother. All 8 are close in age at 70ish. Turns out her father started 2 families at the same time in secret in the '50s and skipped out on both when all of the kids in both families were quite young. Her half sister has lived 20 miles away from us her whole adult life! and her 2 new brothers live in Connecticut. A family reunion was organized out here in CA which was fantastic but almost info overload. A lot of catching up to do is an understatement.

My grandfather had a couple cousins who worked tobacco auctions in the 20-30s. Evidently, Canada's auctions were different times of the year than the South East US. These cousins had a family in North Carolina and then they would hobo on a train to Canada for those auctions where they would visit their other family. Upon one of the brothers' deaths, the second wife and children were discovered for both.

My husband's great grandfather immigrated from Greece in the early 1900's. He came through Elis Island and we can look up his entry in the logs there. The village he provided as his home in Greece does not exist, as far as we can find. A few years ago, we were in Salt Lake City and went the the Genealogy Library and sat down with someone who specializes in Greece. She was so upset when she could not find anything on the Great-grandfather prior to his arrival in the US. The family has no idea where he came from or what his reason were for coming.