Dude, that is awesome. I spoke with my grandmother today & she is going to give me everything she has- the extra large "scroll" lining out the tree to way back, along with several photos from way back, including some WW2 & earlier pics of my great-great grandad, my great grandparents from in their heyday & my grandfather. Also documents in German, that she's never had translated, so I'll get that honor. Grandma's 90 & wants to make sure the torch is passed to the right person, so it looks like I'm about to become the family genealogist.
Dunno if you saw my post about a German friend from way back tracking me down, but he was able to contact my cousin Andreas. His dad's cousin was the guru over there, but passed in '91. His wife however, is still alive & a very sweet lady. I'm hoping he can put me in touch with her & see if can get a download of all the German info, including a copy of our family's coat of arms.
Slight detour- If I can get a copy of that, I'll be getting it as part of a full back piece featuring a Holy Roman Imperial eagle.
I don't have the details yet, but my grandma's peeps are Irish & apparently settled in Missouri in the 1830's, but split along blue & grey lines during the War of Northern Aggression & there's been no contact between them since then until recently when one side reached out to the other. I tend to think of "my people" as hard-bitten Krauts who came here in the 1890's to scrape a better life out of the soil, but it's very cool to learn that some of my other forebears have likely been getting it done since the War of Independence. I'm really looking forward to digging into that.
Need to find out how to track down every one of us who has served & find out period of service, branch, rank, campaigns & whatnot. I take it as a point of pride that so many of us from each generation have sworn that great oath & signed that blank check.