Darcy and I have pursued the hobby of genealogy with great zeal and have traced our roots almost back to Noah!  Mine are Swedish on my father’s side and Scots- Irish on my mother’s.  Looters, pillagers, and horse thieves, but no one real bad!  Actually, most of them seem to have been soldiers and pioneers in northern Sweden.

 

Although the north Baltic coast of Sweden has been occupied by Swedes since the time of the Vikings, from the fifteenth century, the Swedish government encouraged the development of land in the north by offering it to soldiers.  Therefore, many of my ancestors laid down there guns in favor of ploughs and pruning hooks.  Can’t say as I blame them since fighting with Russia over Finland can get a little boring after a few hundred years. 

 

I didn’t find any kings or queens and neither did I find any lost fortunes, doggonit!  I found a lot of hard workers, though; one fellow named Daniel Malm was famous as some kind of prophet and pioneer whom people consulted for advice.  On my mother’s side, the Scots-Irish Wilson’s emigrated from Northern Ireland to Canada in the 1800’s but present day relatives say that the Wilsons of County Armagh in Northern Ireland came from Scotland.  Then I read an article in the Vancouver Province newspaper that told of the seventy names that Carlisle, England has on record as being  rievers, or border raiders who were wanted dead or alive and the name of Wilson is one of them.  It is said that many who were captured were sent over to Northern Ireland as punishment.  I told my mom about this and she was not impressed…heh heh!

 

Darcy (Austin) Nord, my wife, has an amazing genealogy.  There was a man born in 1634 in Inverness-shire, Scotland named John McLean who probably was a criminal (in the eyes of England) of some sort and was put on a ship to the thirteen colonies in 1652.  he landed in Exeter, New Hampshire, changed his name to ‘Bean’ and so thanks to him, the United States and Canada are full of Beans. 

 

An incredible piece of genealogical work was done by one of the Beans, Andy, I think, and the result was a book called:  the descendants of John Bean of Exeter New Hampshire.  This exhaustive work lists the names of the thousands who descend from this man and Darcy is one of them!  Judge Roy Bean probably is too, and Alan bean, one of the astronauts who walked on the moon descends from the same John Bean and tells about it on his web page.  I told Darcy she was out in space long before Alan Bean…you should see the bruise on my arm!  Ouch!  

 

Thus, Darcy has an anscestor of very early arrival in North America, but she has one even earlier than ol’ John Bean.

 

Quebec city, Canada, is the oldest city in North America, yes, older than Boston and the thirteen colonies, and her ancestor, Jacques Lefebvre, from Normandy, France, arrived there in the early 1600’s.  Her father, Ivan Austin, was born in Quebec and moved to Summerland, British Columbia in 1949 as a youngster.  So, Darcy has French ancestry…hmmm….the name Austin is actually Scottish though, and on her mother’s side, the Holms came from Sweden so there is still some good in her….heh heh!  Uh oh…another bruise comin’?

 

Anway, we continue to work on our genealogies.  It’s a fun hobby to do in the winter especially, and you can meet many present-day, long-lost cousins who are into the same thing.  Actually, all of us are cousins anyway with Grandfather Noah to thank.

 

We hope you enjoy the genealogy pages, thanks for the visit and remember to please sign the guestbook.

 

Cheers,

 

Maurie and Darcy Nord