I know for a while in the late 90's the bogus geneology trade was booming, but has anybody traced it back legitimately? This is as far back as I get, oddly enough, my dad's nickname in Brooklyn growing up was "Duke" it is this that I bring up being father's day and having the 'talk' about why there are no grandkids running about yet. I distracted him with where we come from as opposed to where we are going. 769, Aquitaine and Gascony broke into rebellion. Charlemagne was forced to try to crush these rebellions without his brother's assistance. Charlemagne marched his army through Bordeaux and defeated the rebel leader, Hunold. Duke Hunold was to flee to the protection of Lupus, Duke of the Gascons. But Duke Lupus agreed to give up Duke Hunold to Charlemagne, and was granted peace. Hunold was not executed, but was returned to monastic alive. After the reconquest of Aquitaine, his mother tried to get Charlemagne to reconcile with his brother, but he was already making treaties with rulers that surrounded Carloman's kingdom. To try and seal the peace with Lombardy, he married the daughter of the king of Just bored silly with a sprained left calve muscle so I figured if anybody has done better research on their own families, I would like to start doing better research on my own.
I know my complete family history back to hte 1500s. My grandfather had a huge book created researching our family in the early 70s. GREAT information. I was at a scottish festival a month ago and also managed to find my family's clan crest and tartan. One of the most prominent mebers of my family's geneology is John Witherspoon...He signed the Declaration of Independence from New Jersey, was a president of Princeton University, and helped organize the Presbyterian churchin America. Here is some info about him: http://etc.princeton.edu/CampusWWW/Companion/witherspoon_john.html
Ummm i think McIlvaine goes gack to the 1700s, my uncle did a geneology a while back but it probably got lost in my move from NY to Pa
On dad's side, great-grandfather Vito is as far back as I can go. Via my amateur radio license and the international callsign database I know there are at least three guys in Italy with my last name, maybe there's more than that. On mom's side I can go back a little further.
Take a look at here... Great source of Info! http://www.familysearch.org/Eng/Search/frameset_search.asp
