So like some of you may know and many do not, I never knew my relatives. I never knew my aunts or grandparents on either side. I never had a chance to go play with cousins, or nieces or nephews. A few years back I started to search for my ancestors. Most people my age are not into doing genealogy research. I even took classes in college to figure out where our ancestors came from, because no one knew if we were French or German or English or what! Well like I said a few years ago I found some cute short letters in the news paper from my relatives asking for nuts, a new pair of boots, roller skates and dolls from Santa. It brought such a great feeling to know that my Great Great Great aunts and uncles were asking for thing from Santa. Since then I have found a US patent for a wood column design that my relatives received. I have found books that show where they lived, naturalization records, land plot records, marriage certificates, and many more historical documents. But until this weekend I had never been closer to them then a sheet of paper. This past weekend I flew to Fort Wayne Indiana and spent a couple days researching every thing Barrand, my last name. I have found where they lived, worked, traveled and even buried. Now I know I am French, and have a huge list of French ancestors like Parent, Parrot, Pequignot, Pattee, Pichon, Barrand, Grosjean, Urbine, Jobelin, Perriquey and so many more.
The main ancestor I searched for is Pierre Francois Barrand, who became Peter Frank. I have looked far and wide to find not only him but where he came from. This past spring I was able to find this missing link and now know where he came from in eastern France. Avoudrey is a small town where 70% is Barrand. It is a small town in eastern France about 40 miles from the Swiss boarder. I also hooked up with a fellow genealogy buff who is in France and is a Barrand and a distant cousin. He too has been trying to find how his ancestors came to the USA. When I told him of my find and that it was a Pierre who I found in his list that was of the same profession as a teacher, born the same year and in my distant cousins list he also had no death date. That is because Pierre came to the USA and they lost track of him. My cousin also has some 24,000 names of Barrands all the way back to 1520.
Anyways – I just wanted to share with you all my excitement and to thank my loving wife for watching the kids, taking care of our house and the blog, all while sick.
Thanks So much Sarah I love YOU!!!!
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