John Keller told us about his journey to the Mayflower. John told us that his grandfather would tell him stories about his family coming over on the Mayflower which got John interested in digging deep into his family roots.
There were three doctors in his family and with old photos he has learned to scan and process some of these old photos. In the last 20 years he has found relatives through internet searches (Ancestry, Family Tree, etc.) and through social media. One of his relatives in 1915 actually took the Liberty Bell on a tour. His grandfather in 1917, a doctor, lived in Fort Oglethrope, GA. Twenty-six years ago, John discovered relatives of his father-in-law and that they had been in Iowa and showed us a picture of the family at a hotel in Iowa taken in 1940.
John used another website and discovered Fred Thompson, who is a member of his wife’s family. The Mayflower left shore along with another ship named Speedwell, which had some problems and had to return to shore and in turn the Mayflower returned getting some of the passengers from Speedwell and docked in Plymouth, MA in 1620. John started his research going backwards toward 1620.
The Mayflower Society has a branch in Nebraska and if you want to discovered relatives who might have come over on the Mayflower you need documentation such as photos, birth certificates, death certificates, etc. to go along with your application. You can get the application through the website and each state does things differently. John is on the Nebraska Mayflower Society board.
John has sent his DNA to Ancestry, which has a specific lab which doesn’t necessary look at close relatives like Family Tree does. John found maternal links to his mother and back to other relatives who came on the Mayflower. John showed us how we could get documentation that shows linkage back to families.
John showed us a photo of a wedding dress dated back to 1888, which he hopes to store in a storage box so that he can display it. Sometimes you found unintended and surprising consequences when you start to do your research on family history. John found a relative that was relative to Dr. John H. Lock that he didn’t know about. Using Social Media he discovered several cousins that were related but once removed. Sometimes you can use Grave Markers to discovered a relative. His grandfather was a doctor in Philadelphia and many of his grandfather’s relatives died in Philadelphia.
The Mayflower staff in Plymouth, MA are paid, but the Nebraska staff are all volunteers. John has used the “Reunion Genealogy Database program (McIntosh) to transfer a lot of his data. This can be transferred to Windows also. John did get a surprise when he sent in his DNA and discovered he was not at all German, but some Irish, European, and other. He did find a mystery that he was not aware of and that when in college he dated a lady, which had a daughter and it was his. He now has a great relationship with his newly founded daughter.
John was planning to attend the 400th anniversary of the Mayflower (which happened in 2020), but due to the Pandemic everything was canceled.
Thanks John, for taking us on your Journey of the Mayflower!