I received news from Ancestry this week that I am sure has made my father and his father turn in their graves. Ancestry did an updated genetic analysis using new data techniques. Despite that fact that my last name is Dutch (Boomgaarden), and that the family immigrated from Ostfriesland, just across the River Ems from Holland, there has been a long standing legend in the family that the Boomgaarden’s are really French, and are the descendants of Huguenots who fled to Ostfriesland in the 16th century due to religious persecution. They could sometimes begrudgingly admit that they were probably a little German, but certainly not Dutch. They had a lot of animosity for the Dutch Reformed Church and the way they were treated by the Dutch authorities when they lived in Ostfriesland because they were Anabaptists and followers of Menno Simons. That animosity continued even when they settled in Northwest Iowa in the 1800’s and lived amongst hordes of Dutch immigrants.
The old analysis suggested that the family was mainly German with some Swedish and Norwegian thrown in. Those Vikings got around, you know, and invaded northern Germany and the Netherlands. The new analysis indicates that my father’s genetic make up is 68% Dutch, 7% Danish, 1% Baltic (Estonian, Lithuanian, Latvian), 1% Central and Eastern Europe, with the rest German. Not one bit of French ancestry to be found! It makes the most sense of any of the previous analyses.
I don’t know the science behind these Ancestry analyses, but I can hardly wait for the science to become more and more precise. Perhaps it will eventually turnup some French DNA, but I am not going to hold my breath.
Ever had a DNA analysis? Any unsupported legends in your family? Was there ethnic animosity where you grew up?
Trail Baboon 
I was born in Los Angeles in 1951. So far as I have generally been concerned, that’s when the world began. I’m a Californian. I knew that my father was from Oklahoma and my mother from that Dutch colony in SW Minnesota and NW Iowa, but those things didn’t matter to me, in fact, they never have.
The myth that I told myself was that on my father’s side, his people were “sooners”, who invented their history when they came over the line into Indian Territory, so I could be anything.
My offspring got interested and had the DNA test. I’m grateful that they haven’t shared details with me beyond someone else’s genealogical research that traces them, through me and back through my paternal grandfather, to Alabama, which means Confederate.
That word stopped me. I’m not going there.
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That Dutch colony you mention is exactly the one my father’s family lived near. My dad even took to spelling his last name with only one “a” instead of two so that no one would think he was Dutch.
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Good strategy!
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But what about the two “o”s?
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No DNA here, and no legends. Some characters – Grandma Duea was actually my dad’s great-aunt, who helped out my grandma when she came over from Norway at something like age 12, when her dad had died and her mom struggled to keep the family together. I regret so often how I never asked to hear her stories.
Grandma Duea had married a much older man, a Civil War veteran Jonas Duea. I’ll bet there was another missed opportunity for stories, and my dad didn’t seem to know many.
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Easy answers to the questions today: No, no, and no. 🙂
Chris in Owatonna
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I won’t say I grew up there but racial animosity was a given in Selma, Alabama. My Dad was in the Air Force. As he explained it, segregation was given a wink and a nod on the base but his two best buddies were black and I was named after them.
No DNA test for me.
I AM THE LEGEND!!
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Love that last bit…
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I did 23&Me, because I am adopted and was curious about my birth father’s background. I found out that I was mostly English and German, a bit of Polish and Swedish, and a tiny smidge of Ashkenazi. My bestie also did 23&Me and found out that her family has a lot less Spanish in it than her grandmother claimed, but includes a little bit of Chinese (she is Irish-Filipina).
–Crow Girl
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Wow! Did you have any inkling before you did the 23&Me?
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I knew that my birth mother’s family is English and German-speaking Swiss. Presumably the Swedish, Polish, and Jewish come from my birth father’s side, about which I have minimal information. I wonder about the solitary Jewish person in the family tree; was it a man or woman, and was it a positive choice (marrying outside the faith or deciding to make a better life) or a negative choice (fleeing a pogrom)? Or even another adoptee like myself? Since the DNA enters way back in the 1700s, there’s very little chance of finding out.
–Crow Girl
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Our son was quite amused to see that he resembled so many of the Dutch guys in the paintings in the Rijksmuseum when we visited Amsterdam
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I did some kinda DNA test through Mayo Clinic that was a research project looking for medical issues. I don’t remember much of the results except that I shouldn’t like Cilantro, which I don’t.
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Before we went with Ancestry, Husband had his DNA tested by a company called Tribes. They indicated that, among other things, Husband was part Slovak gypsy. That group ls very prone to glaucoma, and that runs in Husband’s family
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No DNA testing. English and Scottish on my dad‘s side — Halls and Carters. My mom side a lot of German — her maiden name is Von Rump. Her family had trouble during World War II with name-calling and some low level vandalization of the house like egging.
The family legend is that the family name was Rumpf and when they came over to US they changed it to Von Rump when they came through Ellis Island . To make themselves seem fancier, I guess. I’ve looked into this just a little bit because it seems unrealistic, but it turns out that there aren’t any Von Rumps in Europe and that every Von Rump on the planet is a fairly close relative of mine. So maybe it’s true.
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My dad’s family name changed at Ellis Island, from Ingebritson to Britson.
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Too close to 45’s real name!
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Never thought of it that way. My mother does say (only somewhat jokingly) that she was partly attracted to my father and his very plain last name because she was looking to dump hers.
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I had some genetic testing, I’m pretty much European ancestry – German and Austrian, mostly, I had a great grandmother who was Romani, so there is a little Northern India in there.
Ethnic diversity wasn’t really a thing where I grew up, so I don’t think there was much discussion of it. The only incident I remember was one kid using a slang term for an Italian person, and getting remonstrated by a teacher.
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