Family Tree finds
First of a very big THANK YOU to my beautiful bride for my brithday present of an ancestry.com subscription! :)
Although for the last few years I havent done a lot of research , I have been working on my roots for nearly 20 years now and was at a end of finding anything else substantial. I knew very little of my father’s family as my parents were divorced when I was only young. But as soon as I got my subscription back I was delighted to find a census record that showed my great fandfather Pierce “Perceval or Percy” Weikel! And on that record was his father and mother, Isaac and Amanda Weikel. Again I have to thank my wonderful wife for her help in “decodong” the writing, as some of these census takers back in the day had terrible handwriting! She was able to figure out his name was Isaac and from there it opened up a great deal of info eventually leading to the finding of my 10th great grandfather Hans Wageli (1610-1663) born and died in Lampertheim, Bergstrasse, Hessen, Germany! I’ve got so much information now that it is a bit overwhelming trying to add it all in to my genealogy program, but I do enjoy it immensely. I’ll be posting much more of this info as soon as I can, including some photos I’ve managed to find of some of my ancestors,
Maude_Pierce Weikel grave in Sunnyside Cemetery in Lavelle, Pa
I often find some very interesting things I wasnt expecting as well, but they always bring a smile to my face, esepcially when its something like this… I discovered that it was my 6th great grandfather, Johan Christopher Weigel, who immigrated to the US in 1736 with his father John Michael Weigel. The info I found on him was that he was born in Pfungstadt, Darmstadt-Dieburg, Hessen, Germany. I was curious about where this was in Germany so a quick search of it found me this map. Aside form seeing the genral location the next thing I noticed was a town just to the west of Pfungstadt… Hahn. It wouldnt mean so much to anyone else, but for me it brought a huge smile to my face and my heart. Why? Because my beautiful Alison’s family name is… HAHN! :) click the image below to view full size
Perhaps just a coincidence in the end, but to me just one more sign in a long list of coincidences that Alison and I were destined to be together since the dawn of time :) Love you wife!
That’s cool! It does seem like destiny! Regardless, you two were meant to be together.
I’m also descended from Germans on my paternal grandmother’s side. Not sure when they came over, but I used to have a great-uncle named Berlin Hinkle – that always sounded German to me.
My dad’s family roots trace back to England and like yours, immigrated here well before the US was a country. I used to think my surname was odd, but when I met elle I found out her daughter’s best friend also shared my last name and that it wasn’t all that unusual there. My ancestors lived for a long time in N.C. before moving to Oklahoma and Texas.
I am so glad you appreciated your Birthday present , well I think I am , seems like you have been stuck in front of that pc since last week ;) but really I am glad you have managed to find out so much information of you ancestors in such a short time , amazing seeing even some photographs of them ,finding out that the place some of them lived near was named HAHN really bowled me over , and I had to smile when I saw that your 7th greatgrandfather was named John Michael the same as my own son , had you adopted Johnnie he would have had the same name ! although my John swore down he wouldn’t have accepted just because of the whole name sounding hillarious John Michael Weikel does sound rather humorous ; )
When we update the subscription to worldwide searches it will be interesting to see what part of Germany my own ancestors came from , wow , we could be relatives , well thats ok , common here in NC anyhow ( wink )
and Mike I didnt realise you had English roots , and german , well one day we will search where your uncle Berlin Hinkle came from .
Oh, I know Grandmother D.’s family was from Germany and I think they came over around the turn of the last century or a bit before. We went to a family reunion and I found out more about my Grandfather’s side of the family. Like I said, they were English and came from Debenham. (too bad I am not in line for any of the dept. store money!) That’s where the derivation of my name came from and in fact, the three sons of the original settler all spelled the name differently. I sure was shocked to find out some of my ancestors owned slaves when they lived in N.C.
Didn’t mean to hijack the post, sorry. Sure was interesting to find out about your heritage, Chester.
You haven’t hijacked the post at all my friend! love hearing from you always.
Just had a quick look at ancestry for the Hinkles, and low and behold someone has a tree started and found a couple of pics you might be intereted in, if this is indeed the right family which I am fairly sure it is, but you can verify it first. Were your grandparents Stirling and Irene Dedmon? found a newspaper article about their 60th wedding anniversary and also found an announcement of your mom and dad’s marriage along with a pic! pretty cool really! You may have them already but in case you want them let me know and I’ll send’em on to you!