When I was writing my new book, The Stranger in My Genes – about the DNA test I took that shockingly suggested my father wasn't really my father – I thought my story was unusual, if not unique. Boy, was I wrong.

After the ebook version was released on August 23, I..

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[Editor’s note: This blog post originally appeared in Vita Brevis on 29 June 2015.]

Over the years I have had the chance to discuss the subject of ethnicity (and identity) with avid genealogists and..

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[Author’s note: This post concludes the series of excerpts from the Regina Shober Gray diary which began here.]

Mrs. Gray’s [1] summer was winding down, and while autumn impended she could..Continue reading →

My maternal grandparents were born in 1932: they were just nine years old at the beginning of World War II. They grew up blocks from each other in the Bronx: Nana in The Alley, and Papa on the other side of..

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I have sometimes mentioned how much stuff I inherited from my mother and her family. Mother left it all to me with the cheerful instructions that I was to figure out what to do with it.

For years, decades, I have intended to catalog and arrange, describe, and account..

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It may surprise you to read (or not, if you’re family) that I have squirrels in my closets. They nest in bins, and hide under papers, books, or textiles when I want to find one, or shout for attention when I don’t. But I like living indoors without wildlife, so these..

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A nice example of genealogical good fortune came my way as a result of a past blog post I wrote regarding my search for family photos.

The comment, written nearly a year afterward, was from Nancy Chapin:

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[Author’s note: This series of excerpts from the Regina Shober Gray diary began here.]

In 1880, Regina Shober Gray [1] became a grandmother (in January) and a widow (in February). The Gray..Continue reading →

Many family history researchers are hard-pressed to find personal information, photographs, memorabilia, or heirlooms to treasure and preserve. I am not one of them, and yet I seem to have a remarkable supply of “memories of things..

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[Author’s note: This series of excerpts from the Regina Shober Gray diary began here.]

With the end of the summer in sight, I thought I would finish up this review of the Gray diary between..Continue reading →