A tribute to my dad...

My dad was the last of his direct male line, a line which he traced back to 1637, to Richard Osborn, who fought in the Pequot War.  I also have a Pequot ancestor, but that's another story.  Dad served in WWII, in New Guinea.  I haven't been able to locate his military records because I don't know the dates he served and he never talked about his service, although at one point, he did mention that the troop carrier which left before his was torpedoed and sank.  He brought back some of his Army equipment like his ammo box, some belts, and other small items (I used to play with them), but he didn't talk extensively about his service.  I know he enlisted after Pearl Harbor.

I am an only child, but being female, I have NO male relatives to check his DNA.  I do, however, have a couple of distant male relatives from the same common ancestor and their DNA haplogroup has come back I1a, which is Norse.  And, as far as I can research, we have many FEMALE families that go back to the Plantagenets, especially the Nevilles.  Nobody can confirm our ancestor's whereabouts or family before 1618, however, as our ancestor's family hasn't been proven.  I keep researching this every summer and I have a pretty good idea of which Osborn line ours came from, but I can't prove it.  It has been an interesting journey.  I spend my summers research various female lines that married into the Osborn male line and frankly, the female ones are MUCH more interesting!