Finding out what it means to be Boricua through a genetic & genealogical journey through my family history
Puerto Rican Civil Registry [Ancestry] Recently, Ancestry released the Puerto Rico Civil Registry within their records. Even though I have been using these records for five years now, the Ancestry version of these records allowed me to something I was previously unable to do: Search records by a inputting names, places, and dates option like …
Ancestry.com Introduces the Puerto Rican Civil Registry Read More »
My 23rd post will focus on my 5th great grandfather Manuel Santos Marrero. Manuel is from my mother’s side of the family and finding him was interesting for a few reasons. At first, when I began to trace the Santos family, I started with my my 2nd great grandfather who was born in Morovis. His …
52 Ancestors – #23 Manuel Santos Marrero (1814-????) Read More »
Post #20! These posts are going by very quickly! Today I want to focus on Valentin Múxica (also written as Móxica and currently as Mojica). He was my 4th great grandfather on my dad’s side of the family via my grandfather Felipe Rivera. Valentin Múxica would have been born, according to his death certificate, around …
Happy 10 Year Anniversary! Who would have thought that 10 years would have flown by this fast!? It feels like just yesterday I began talking to my relatives, asking them about my ancestors, and typing names into Ancestry.com to begin my search. I have definitely come a long way since then! Equally, this also marks the …
April 25, 2014 [DNAart] I know I am a day behind with this post but I still wanted to publish it! DNA has truly changed the way I view myself, my culture, my history, and my view on the world. I wanted to share a bit why taking a DNA test was important to me. …
It’s probably only been just about a full year that I have known about my 5th great grandfather Bartolomé Dávila Cantos. Having returned to New York City from college I was able to visit the FamilySearch center more and got to use more microfilm rolls for the churches of Puerto Rico. One of the towns …
One of the mysteries that I’m currently facing (one of the many, of course!) is the name of Julienne Malvina’s father. Since Julienne was born a slave in Martinique, I was lucky to have found the birth record of my 4th great grandmother in 1844. Julienne was recorded as a négresse which most likely means that …
Recently while searching through ancestry’s database I noticed there was an update on the “San Juan, Puerto Rico, Passenger and Crew Lists, 1901-1954” and even though I didn’t have many different ancestors that traveled to the US and elsewhere I decided to search for my Charles/Gustave ancestors who indeed traveled a bit. My first and main …
When looking through records for my family in Puerto Rico, I have been fortunate that many of my ancestors have lived either in the same town or a neighboring town for many years if not generations. Some of the migrations across the island in my family happened early when many of the towns were being …
52 Ancestors – #16 Cayetano Mercado Cajigas (1855-1905) Read More »
I write today about my oldest male ancestor from whom I inherited the surname Rivera, my 4th great grandfather. I don’t know too much about him, so I’ll just add what I do know and see where it goes from there! When I first began my research at the age of 14 (yup, I was that …