Vita Brevis

Last year, the Boston Globe interviewed my colleague Sarah Dery on the ancestry of recently confirmed Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, and myself on the “Boston Brahmin” ancestry..

Simply put, Irish research is difficult. Beyond missing and incomplete records, there are many obstacles that can frustrate even the most seasoned genealogist. In my opinion, an obstacle that is often overlooked is the variation of Irish surnames.

Recently, I was..

Death certificates can add depth to a family tree, but when the parent names for the deceased are documented incorrectly, it can lead research down the wrong path—especially..

I recently solved a long-standing family mystery after discovering a new DNA match to other descendants of my..

For a country which gained its independence from the United Kingdom just 155 years ago, Canada has gone through a significant number of changes to its internal structure and boundaries. The..

My grandfather, Salvador Sanchez, was born 15 February 1921 in Mexico. It was there that he met my grandmother, Rosa Fonseca, and started a family before immigrating to the United States in 1957.

Belo, as we called him,..

With the recent return of the second season of White Lotus, a few friends have asked me if the actress Jennifer Coolidge is related to President Calvin Coolidge. While this was a kinship I had discovered years ago (back when she appeared in the American Pie movies..

As a student of family history, I've learned that “old white guys” like me generally know next to nothing about African American ancestry. This isn’t to say that we can’t follow a census record, collect a newspaper clipping, or attempt..

Regardless of the outcome of Super Bowl LVII, history will be made Sunday when two Black quarterbacks lead their teams for the first time in NFL history. This will be the first Super Bowl appearance for Jalen Hurts, but not for Patrick Mahomes, who has been to the big..

Two years ago, I wrote a post about some of the maternal ancestors of Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes, using research I had begun the previous year after his team’s Super Bowl victory. The post followed some..