MELTING POT

 4186

Pt. 1

 

I grew up during the 50's and 60's, in a time that might be referred to as "The Last Gasps of the Age of Segregation." (Funny, while I have never seen that phrase in print, it certainly characterizes that particular era very well, I think).

 

My parents employed a young lady of color whom all of us kids loved and respected. And yet, it wasn't unusual for my peers, and my brothers and I, at times, to use "the N word." Of course, I regret having ever used such language, and if I were to characterize that period in my life now, I would call it "My Personal Age of Ignorance."

 

Thankfully, while I was still an adolescent, segregation gave way to integration. When I was in the 10th grade Union Academy, the formerly Negro high school, began sending their best and brightest to Summerlin Academy. I can tell you that, almost without exception, these students were readily received, and liked by virtually all the teachers and students.

 

Fast forward half a century, and my mother had been rapidly declining, and had been admitted to a local nursing home several months earlier.

 

Well, since I, and my dad before me, were amateur genealogists, and neither my mother, nor I, had ever taken a DNA test, and since the former was in poor health, it seemed good to me to "get on with business."

 

Pt. 2

 

As a result, I ordered DNA tests for my mother and me; hoping "23&Me" would expedite the test kits. Within days, I had the kits in my hands, and arranged to drop by the nursing home the next afternoon.

 

The DNA test required my mother and me to spit into a small tube, which once I explained the process to mama, she began to do. I say, "began to do," since my mother struggled to find enough spittle to contribute. I worried that she would "run dry" before she managed to reach the red line with enough of the bubbly white liquid that had been emanating from her mouth, and that we would waste the cost of the test.

 

As mama went into what was perhaps her third round of spitting, she suddenly said,

 

"You know, when I was a young lady, people used to ask me if I was part black."

 

And it immediately occurred to me,

 

"Mama is prepping me for the possible eventuality that her DNA test results may indicate that an African-American bloodline exists."

 

Granted, my mother was dark complexioned, and her mother, and maternal aunts and uncles even more so; (something the Chaney family always explained away by telling people they were part Native American).

 

Eventually, mama reached the red line, handed the tube to me, and I capped it, slipped it, and my own test kit into the prepaid envelope, told her goodbye, drove up to a nearby post office, and dropped the kits into an inside mail chute.

 

Pt. 3

 

The DNA test kit literature informed me that the results would take approximately six weeks to process and return.

 

...Three weeks into this waiting period, my mother went on to her reward.

 

She would never know the results of her DNA test; at least not on this side of heaven.

 

A few weeks after my mother's passing, I retrieved two official looking envelopes marked "23&Me" from my PO Box. Hurrying back to my car, I drove home, walked through the door, sat down, and tore one, and then the other envelope open, and began to survey the results.

 

What I read on my mother's and my DNA testing results simply amazed me.

 

But to regress a bit, a decade and a half ago, I taught a course in a local university with the impressive title of, "Educational Psychology." One chapter, in particular, referred to the United States as a "Melting Pot" of dozens upon dozens of ethnicities. Even today, we have China Town in San Francisco, Harlem, the predominantly black area of New York City, a large population of Cuban immigrants in Miami, and the descendants of Scottish and Irish immigrants in Appalachia.

 

Little could I have realized when I taught this course that I would qualify as a self-contained melting pot of ethnicities and nationalities.

 

Although 70 percent of my own ancestral bloodlines originated on the two large islands of Ireland and Great Britain, the remainder flowed out of a myriad of other countries.

 

Scotland, Ireland, England, Wales, Sweden, Austria, Italy, Greece, France, Spain, Israel, North Africa, Sub-Saharan Africa, Iran!!!

 

European, Spanish, Jewish, Arab, Black and more

 

Pt. 4

 

I have always been interested in my family origins, as I have previously inferred, and as my father before me, I have researched my ancient ancestors and their stories.

 

My ancient 17th century Grandfather Philippe de Lannoy of the Spanish Netherlands (now Belgium), who was also a direct ancestor of Pres. Ulysses S. Grant, Pres. Calvin Coolidge, Pres. Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Astronaut Alan Shepherd and Actor Robert Redford; (my distant cousins). De Lannoy's Grandfather was Catholic, while Philippe converted to the Protestant faith. It is believed that before all this, the Delano's (eventual spelling) were Jewish; with their roots in Israel.

 

My 9x Great Grandfather Robert Ring of England, an indentured servant, who borrowed money from someone wealthier than himself for passage to the new world, settling in Massachusetts, and, ultimately, becoming one of the wealthiest citizens of Salisbury. Only to be remembered for two of his errant sons, Joseph and Jarvis, who testified at the Salem Witch Trials, and, as a result, an innocent woman was put to death.

 

My 5x Great Grandfather Elias Jeanneret, a Swiss immigrant to Louisiana, a speaker of French, and who may have been thought of as a Cajun. His descendants found their way to North Carolina, and, ultimately, Georgia.

 

My 4x Great Grandfather Captain William Cone, a Scottish descendant, who fought in the Revolutionary War, and was captured by pro-British American forces, and was imprisoned in the Castello de San Marcos in St. Augustine, Florida; from whence he escaped.

 

My 3x Great Grandmother Mary Elizabeth Stewart of the Isle of Skye, Scotland who immigrated to Georgia; leaving father and mother behind, never to return.

 

Pt. 5

 

And countless others whose names I don't know, but whose countries of origin and ethnicities have become clearer than they ever would have been without the advent of modern technology.

The likelihood that some ancient Italian soldier, during the time of Christ, fathered a boy or girl child with an English woman when stationed a thousand miles from home, and thus, added his DNA profile to my bloodline.

 

The explanation which alluded my mother's grandfather's family for so long which required two centuries, and the creation of a technology unknown to their forebears. "No, thank you, you aren't Native American. You are African-American." The first half of the 20th Century when my mother was growing up. The One Drop Rule which would have prevented her, and her mother before her from attending a white school; had the powers that be been remotely aware of it.

 

The hideous involuntary confinement of black men, women and children, their below deck transport on sailing ships, sun up to sun down 6-7 days a week, toiling in cotton and tobacco fields, the unwelcome nightly "visits" of plantation owners to their female slaves, the birth of half white babies, children of the "Massa"' who would toil in the fields next to their mothers. The eventual release of slaves who were "too white" and carried the blood lines of succeeding generations of fathers, sons, and grandsons, and who had carried on the hellacious family tradition of "going out back," the explanation for my mother's and grandmother's complexions; (and my personal belief that our percentage of African-American bloodlines are much higher than the DNA tests have revealed). Of course, I am absolutely mortified that any of my ancestors of any color were subjected to such treatment! (And, of course, with the passage of time, consenting relationships between white and black increased leading to the birth of children).

 

And what cannot be explained.

The presence of Spanish, Arab, Greek and Iranian bloodlines in my mother's and my DNA test results. (And what may never be understood 'til the other side of eternity).

 

Melting Pot? Yes! I passed by the U.N. on a tour bus over 50 years ago, and thought about all the peoples and nationalities represented there. Based on my own personal family research, and the results of DNA testing, I am a walking, talking, self-contained 5'9", 220 lb. United Nations!

 

And, you know, I wouldn't change a thing. (Well, perhaps a few things).

 

I am better for the presence of each and every one of my ancestors who have contributed to the richness of my chromosomal tapestry.

 

I hope I make them proud... since the only way they continue to live is through me.

by Dr. Bill McDonald, PhD