Luis Rivera

Finding Your Roots: John Legend and Wanda Sykes

African roots, ancestry, Finding your roots, Fula, Fulani, Genealogy, Guinea-Bissau, Henry Louis Gates Jr, John Legent, Mende, Sierra Leone /

This past Sunday there was another great episode on Finding Your Roots featuring John Legend and Wanda Sykes! (All of the episodes have been awesome though!) This episode was particularly interesting because it was able to trace their family back to free people of color that were able to break their families from slavery before the […]

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Finding Your Roots: Samuel L. Jackson, Condoleezza Rice, and Ruth Simmons

African roots, Benga, Cameroon, Condoleezza Rice, Finding your roots, Gabon, Henry Louis Gates Jr, jumping the pond, Kota, mtDNA, Puerto Rico, Y-DNA /

This was probably one of my favorite episodes from the Finding Your Roots series so far! Mostly because it helped three African Americans find some roots in certain Africa tribes. Granted, some could have other mixtures from other African slaves brought to the US which married into the family through other lines, seeing as how

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Tracing a Surname

Guadeloupe, Gustave, Gustavo, immigrants, Lobben, Lote, Loter, Lotett, Lotis, Lotiz, Lotten, Martinique, Puerto Rico /

There’s a pair of 4rd great grandparents that have been the topic of a few of these posts and the point of some of my frustrations with searching for their information. They are Juan Carlos Gustavo and Julia/Balbina Lotten (and all their many alternations/alter-egos included) who according to documents immigrated from either Guadeloupe or Martinique

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ReConstructing/DeConstructing Race

23andme, ancestry, Correa, DNA, Genealogy, Guadeloupe, identity, labels, Martinique, Puerto Rico, slaves, Spain /

So this post was inspired by my grandfather’s results from 23andme and my conversation with him while I had him taking the test. During Spring Break, I visited my grandfather in Puerto Rico who I rarely see and built up the courage to ask him to take the DNA test. I had to semi-explain (and I

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Paying my Respects

Alejandro Rivera González, Antonia Rivera, Gertudis Roman, Iris Rivera Ortiz, Joseph Rivera, La Perla, Mercedes Ortiz Marrero, Puerto Rico, San Juan, Santa Maria Magdalena de Pazzis Cemetery /

Early I posted about how my dad’s cousin found me online through this blog (technology is awesome!). She was able to provide me with pictures, stories and more information about my dad’s side which I had no previous knowledge about. It’s so crazy to think that just 2 years I had no idea about my

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