Why everyone has a Cherokee Grandma

#familyhistory #findingyourroots #ancestrydna #dnatest #louisiana #nativeamerican #cherokee #ancestry #familyhistory #genealogy
Do you have a Cherokee Princess ancestors somewhere in your family tree?The prevalence of "Cherokee grandmothers" in many American family trees can be attributed to a variety of factors. How do we know if it's real? And why are they all princesses? You'll be surprised at what the phrase can actually mean. Let's get to the bottom of this!
References:
Orrin: www.native-languages.org/princess.htm
timeline.com/part-cherokee-elizabeth-warren-cf6be035967e
Although the documentary series "Finding Lola" has been completed, my family history journey has only just begun.
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Want to look for your own family? Here are two places to start:
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Come join me on a new docu-series that explores identity, racial tensions in the South during the 20th century, and the unique experiences of those who historically called Louisiana home. My name is Danielle Romero, and all my life, I have romanticized Louisiana. Growing up in New York, it represented a place where I could step back the sepia-toned life of my great grandmother, Lola Perot, who died before I was born. Now, it was time to go back to Louisiana--although I had no idea what the truth would be or what questions to ask---who was Lola really? Who were we? Amazon links are affiliate links. If buy something through these links, we may earn affiliate commission. Thank you for supporting this project!

[@freetownmkteer]

It’s not on White Americans obsessing over Cherokee heritage. Black Americans caught the vulture fever as well. I think it has a lot to do w/the painful past of illegitimate pregnancy via rape during slavery as well as distancing themselves from Africa or plain ignorance due to again slavery.

[@JOSECARABALLO-e1n]

Indeed

[@daChosenone3]

Rite

[@SkyeID]

My mom has been saying her grandmother was half Cherokee and half Black for DECADES! Who knows if it's true, but I do NOT claim Cherokee ancestry. I'm Black and proud!

[@dv2033]

Cherokees owned African slaves, alot of tribes did. So there is a possibility that some do have Cherokee in them.

[@jgp7414]

I've been spending time in mexico and have noticed a reverse of this. So many people like to say "my great grandmother came from spain." Which might be true but i find interesting that they like to point it out.

[@nytn]

I’ve definitely heard this as well!

[@LOVE-JC777]

My grandma 👵🏻 was Mexican white red as a lobster 🦞 in the summers. She wasn’t from Spain. We do have short brown-olive skin relatives.

[@LOVE-JC777]

@@etruscancivilization Spain conquered with other indigenous tribes, like the USA . Without the help it was impossible to penetrate the interior lands.. doesn’t matter what Spaniards have to say. When they visit the country they leave amazed by the Spanish architectural, history and cities of their lost heritage. In the first 50 (1550) years of the conquest more than 40,000 males left Spain for wealth and fortune majority stay behind married the culture. That’s why they requested the classification of groups to the kings of Spain. Peninsulares, White Mexicans, Criollos, Mestizos,Amerindians,Others.

[@aoarecruiter]

My maternal grandpa came from Somalia. Not as popular but someone said I was lying about that.😆

[@bobfaam5215]

@@etruscancivilizationMajority of Mexicans are descendants of Spanish people who inter married with Natives . Mexican people are mix of Spanish and Native ancestry . In the South region of Mexico there are mostly 100% full blooded natives .

[@verilyxx]

My grandmother always claimed her grandfather Tetone was full blooded Cherokee. Growing up my mother and grandmother genuinely identified themselves as part Cherokee. In turn I grew up doing the same. My grandmother has a painting of herself dressed as one and a black and white photo of her claiming it's on the reservation....However....after a DNA test and learning more about how ancestry is passed on through DNA I still wasn't satisfied with that being the reason I was 0% so I started putting a family tree together and following the document trail of my family. If I'm correct in what I found, Tetone was actually Portuguese and came here on a ship with his wife in the late 1800s. 100% Portuguese and not Cherokee Indian at all. I wasn't disappointed so much as I felt embarrassed. I searched and searched and kept coming up with the same info. I never told my grandmother. She would either think I was crazy or it would hurt her. If what I found is correct, and I believe it is, I don't understand why identifying as Native American was preferable over just saying they were Portuguese. I may never know.... I have all this info, meanwhile a part of the family still believes they are part Cherokee and I wouldn't even know how to tell them if I wanted to.

[@truthoverfictionii5760]

How did you come up with them being 100%? Because from what we have learned, no one is 100% of anything. How far back did you go on your genealogy?

[@charlesbaker1628]

The Cherokee tribe ( like most tribes) is so heavily intermarried with white, Hispanic, black , that tribal members can not pass a DNA test to prove ancestry , so it is not used. If you can trace a family member back to the tribe( like your great grandfather) then you are Cherokee. Most tribal members on eastern half of county have less than 5% native blood and still call themselves Natives.

[@daChosenone3]

Same on you letting your die living a lie

[@marshajenakovichvania7785]

It's princess because no one wants to be descended from a serf, everyone wants to be descended from the king. Being a descendant of a power structure makes you "better" than others of the same social group.

[@tyronleung5276]

Indians were majority chattle slaves so the princess is an oxymoron

[@MoonLightOnWater1]

LOL…I think I’m the only person I know who NEVER claimed Native American roots because I learned decades ago that mixed race Black/White people were assumed or passing as Native American and later to be found to be of African and European ancestry. Once I did my DNA, yep, only African and European ancestry.

[@Dcain2]

You were very generous how you laid it out there. There were not enough full blood natives east of the Mississippi of any tribe for all of our great grand dad’s to have scooped a Cherokee young lady back then. Most people in these red states have never laid eyes on a family of natives (not including Central Americans/Mexicans of native DNA). People pass down legends and it’s funny to see people up in arms when the dNA says otherwise.

[@desertdetroiter428]

Lol…she really is being charitable.

[@MsBthepolyglotteacher]

I love your channel. Can you research: How can they find DNA of groups that have disappeared or been wiped off the map? Why do some South American and Caribbean people have North American DNA ? ( native American)

[@MsBthepolyglotteacher]

Also, I always wondered what happened to the natives they took over to Europe?

[@monroerodriguez]

not true at all.

[@cynthiapickett8577]

NOT really (other than hints)--even though I always knew that I have native American/indigenous ancestors. I've got Lumbee and Cherokee lineage (numerous Mid-Atlantic and Southern tribes like Nansemond and Saponi) as well as Mayan and Pima (ethnic Aztecs). I've never bought into that "Indian princess" crap.

[@josephstorm6093]

No rumor for us, my Grandmother was Tsalagi with Shawnee further back so it was always here. Some people who had Native Indian were always told they were Cherokee and found out later it was actually another tribe but Cherokees were popular so that was their story passed down. I looked up info for a co-worker who her whole life said they were part Cherokee & I found out their name was Chickasaw. Her brother called me the next day as this caused such ripples they started investigating more. One of my Greater Great Grandfathers left a yr before the forced march on the trail to OK. He saw the writing on the wall, packed his 5 daughters and wife & left GA. It was still under guard all the way but missed the suffering they had. Another informing good vid Danielle.

[@japeri171]

Jimi Hendrix was of Cherokee descent. Here in Brazil the same thing happens:many of us have indigenous ancestors.

[@apgeneticgenealogylover6601]

I don't think Jimi Hendrix had any more proof than most other celebrities who claimed it

[@daChosenone3]

😂😂😂😂😂

[@indigenousamerican3148]

I was really surprised that i came out 94% Indigenous Americas- Mexico in my Ancestry DNA test results. My grandmother came out 100%. My mother at 97%. We are from the heart of Mesoamerica.... México City and Morelos Mexico. Curiosily i do have distant cousins from the far north. I found a few Navajo and Apache cousins from arizona who live on their reservations. A few Ute cousins from Oklahoma and few cousins from South Dakota who are Nakota. Despite not having horses until the spanish reintroduced them, our people got around. My haplogroup is A2.

[@nytn]

That’s amazing that you had your mother and grandmother test!! I am not surprised that you have cousins up north of you. I have found many of ours down in Mexico. My haplo group is c1c

[@creoleexplained]

Mexicans are known for having significant amounts of indigenous ancestry. But 94% is impressive ! I’m curious, do you or your family speak any of the indigenous languages?

[@indigenousamerican3148]

@creoleexplained my grandmothers from both sides of the family did speak their native tongue. They spoke Nahuatl and Otomi. In fact, when my grandpa married my grandmother, he could not communicate with her parents. They only spoke Nahuatl and 0 spanish. I was surprised too that I have that much native blood since my family is pretty much Hispanized now, and most are Catholic and Christian. Most of us Mexicans grow up believing we are 50/50 spanish and native. My grandma from dad's side is from Cuentepec Morelos. It is one of the communities in México where Nahuatl is the predominant spoken language to this day. People there are a mix, remnants of what's left of the Toltec and Mexicah people.

[@mississippigod3938]

Hold on to your heritage the white Mexican have latch on to the native people culture and claiming as there on with all that European blood running through their veins

[@non-indexed2896]

@@indigenousamerican3148 I only got 72% and no one in my family knows anything about our Native American ancestry or history. Glad to see you were able to find out what languages your ancestors spoke in the past.

[@janetwestmoreland2754]

We live very near to the Cherokee trail in North and South Carolina so Cherokee ancestry is very prevalent in our area. Years ago I saw a photo of my stepmother in laws grandmother and I mentioned that she looked very much Cherokee. She told me that her grandmother did have a lot of Cherokee but if the grandchildren ever said anything about it, she might have " slapped their face". We got into a very interesting discussion about that. The Cherokee who were not forcibly taken on the horrendous Trail of Tears hid in the mountains and surrounding countryside and had to try to not to be identified as Cherokee in order to stay behind. This denial of Cherokee heritage was instilled in their children for survival's sake. Now the people with Cherokee ancestry can be proud without fear of being forcibly marched across the country.

[@klonoaorinos8454]

take a DNA test.

[@josephstorm6093]

That is a little known truth, my Grandmother said she took her fathers whippings at times because she wouldn't keep quiet when they think she should've at all times. I always knew her to be very outspoken and had a laugh you could here across a field & know it was hers only. Her parents grew up with the fear of being found out even though they were born 60 yrs after the forced march . That dilema stayed with them a few generations & she told me to never be ashamed of who you are or deny your blood no matter what. She surely didn't.

[@patriciajrs46]

​@@josephstorm6093That's a great story. Thank you for sharing it with us. I think she was correct. Be proud of who you are.

[@artistinmotioncreations3887]

Exact thing happened with alot of my family. We are from the Appalachian

[@meb777]

It was against the law and forbidden for Black Americans (Indigenous people) weren't allowed to claim their lineage. The darker tone Indians were enslaved.

[@nycoleellis1295]

I'm Cherokee and Choctaw. From Oklahoma and registered to Cherokee Tribe at birth with blood amount card & tribal card

[@BronzeSista]

My family told us my Great Aunt Henrietta was part Native, but I asked my grandmother what tribe, she didn't know. A year ago, I found my great Aunt on Ancestry. She is listed as an Mulatto on the census. She looks native, so she could be part native because in the South, they classified anyone who had a Black parent as Mulatto, even some people who were native and had brown skin were classified as colored.

[@nytn]

That’s true, some of the census years there was no other option that would fit except “mulatto”. 🙃 same for my family

[@BronzeSista]

@@nytn My husband's grandfather was a Blackfoot Indian from New Jersey, but I know they had some mixed race people called brass ankles in NJ. It was a community of tri-racial people who looked white, Black and Indian. His grandfather looked like an Indian. He married a colored woman who looked like an Indian/ Black, from Virginia. The children's phenotypes are all different. 2 looked Indian, 2 white, one lightskin with an Afro, They are all classified as colored, which means Black.

[@glennr.8551]

You are too mixed up and confused.

[@tyronleung5276]

@@glennr.8551 how there is no confusion but what the census taker own ignorant biases claiming indians population numbers were depleting when in fact indians were absorbed into the negro population

[@tyronleung5276]

@@davruck1 native was a definition coined by the white supremacist claiming patriotism such as the nativist know nothings

[@baby.nay.]

I was told my whole life I was 1/4 Cherokee . My grandmother looked very indigenous , she’s only 44 years older than me so I knew her most of my life , and was apparently adopted or something weird. My family has very fishy stuff going on , but my parents did their tests and my mom was like “ the Cherokee didn’t show up” lol I was like it doesn’t work like that . But I think it was to cover African heritage in my case. My mom and I both carry sickle cell.

[@loki2240]

For the record, people of African descent aren't the only ones with with the sickle cell trait. Some other populations around the equator have developed the same or similar resistance to malaria.

[@M.Campbell-Sherwood]

It can. It depends on whether it’s from a straight maternal line or if a paternal line breaks it up. Plus not everyone gets all of their parents DNA. You only get half of each parent and that’s a quarter of each grandparent (grandmothers only if you’re female and 3/4 grandmothers while you get just about everything from your fathers fathers fathers fathers…etc. line) that’s a lot of splitting. Which means you won’t necessarily get it but a sibling might or none will but your parent or grandparent will. It’s what happened in my family. I didn’t get anything on ancestry (which is basically genealogy play play, use something like family tree D N A if you’re serious), but my mom did. Not to mention her paternal grandmother and grt grandmother are on the Baker list. So there is no refuting that. There is also a nasty trick that the gov did to us back then. If we, (those of us who hid and came back down and went back to our homes) wanted to stay there we had to “become white”. That’s why you see a lot of us marked as white on census’. If we didn’t agree to this then we were carted off to OK. A lot of members in OK still consider us white to this day and don’t accept the Eastern band as legit. I think they consider our ancestors traitors. I liken it to the survivors of the other side of my family. Those who ran 90+ yrs ago are traitors to those who stayed and suffered. What they fail to see though is that both sides suffered in their own way. They always do. It’s never easy, no matter what choice you make. Both gave up something. One gave up their land and rights. The other side gave up their rights as well but gave up their culture earlier than those who left. Many lives were lost while being moved west and in turn (as awful as it may seem) many lives were spared to keep the culture going on to this day, by those who hid and gave up their culture so soon. Eventually we did get everything thing back with the help of a white man who bought our land for us to freely live on. That way no one could take it from us while he was alive. It’s where the Eastern Band resides today in North Carolina.

[@josephstorm6093]

@@M.Campbell-Sherwood That was a lot of good info. Btw I didn't know if you were familiar but the Oklahoma Cherokee Civil War was from the 2 opposing sides killing each other for those reasons. One of my Greater Great Grandmothers who was on the Trail to OK left there with many other Cherokees for the safety at the time in TX. Today that same area is Cherokee County TX, just some info not many know but yes many good whites helped the Cherokee on the Trail and those who hid staying behind. They just aren't mentioned enough.

[@beautyonabarnbudget]

Sickle cell is also in Italian people

[@josephstorm6093]

@@beautyonabarnbudget It's been said that was from the Moors who had African bloodlines when they took over that country and mainly the Sicilians.

[@Myraisins1]

As you said using Cherokee /Indigenous ancestry was sometimes used to mask African ancestry. In the black community it was also sometimes used to mask white ancestry. But there are also some black American people with Indigenous ancestry such as the Maroons, among others. Also of note are those who bribed their way on to the Dawes Rolls,($5 dollar indian) posing as Indigenous and passing down that oral history over time.

[@apgeneticgenealogylover6601]

True but you keep context in mind. For whites covering black ancestry, it was because blacks were considered "inferior" and there were segregation laws against blacks and any white person who findable ancestry was considered "black" and subject to those laws. For blacks covering white ancestry, it wasn't because white were considered "inferior" or that they hated white people, but instead was a reminder of chattel slavery and how a lot of black women, not only by actual planters but other white men like overseers, etc., were systemically raped and forcibly impregnated with biracial children who were also typically made slaves.

[@VillageSuperstar]

Yeah I use to think that but I got on ancestry and all the paperwork pop up on my great grandfather side proving Cherokee and Choctaw like he said.

[@JOSECARABALLO-e1n]

You are between the $5.00 native, and the $5.00 wick.

[@unique37us]

Yes, my father said his father's mother was Cherokee. She taught her children Basket weaving and all about herbs and natural healing. Her daughter was a midwife and was listed on my father's birth certificate. My father was brought up around North Carolina and South Carolina. I am black.

[@stikupartist3698]

First they tried to eradicate them off the face of the earth and today they pretend to be them 😅

[@contribution741]

Who is 'they'?

[@stikupartist3698]

@@contribution741 white people. European Americans.

[@SoulWhisperer]

Yes, claiming the indian heritage was big when I was young. People were quick to claim that to reject their blackness, so problematic was race prejudice in those days. Yes, I am Cherokee, too, and it did not show up anywhere in the DNA. No Cherokee princess, but my great grandfather full-blooded Cherokee. There is also Blackfeet somewhere. I've heard white people say that they found out of some native ancestry later in life (when I was in grad school), but they were not allowed to talk about it. I don't remember if it was Cherokee, but it was N American, in general. ) For me, NA have told me they could "tell" I had Indian ancestry (as they called it) based on my appearance. Always been an interesting topic to me. Love how you research. Thanks for getting here. 😀

[@tyronleung5276]

Africa wasnt hidden from us the indian was censored and hidden white power was Actually pushing that african shit heavy on us. With the label afro american / african american during slavery and agian in the 1990s with Jessie Jackson who's cherokee indian himself, by the caribbean tethers fleeing their country to live in liberia and sierra leone or Ethiopia and white supremacy american colonization society pushing a black ethnostate agenda on free negroes who declared themselves american who had american indian blood such as paul cuffee wompanoag or austin curtis aniyunwiya for example, and free masons in the odd fellows scottish rite and Albert pike the father of the kkk Walter Ashby pleckeand other eugenist the daughters of the confederacy rewriting history, marcus garvey wannabe mason sell out ass who allied with the kkk whom never been to africa promoting a reheated back to africa himself richard allen robert Delaney absolam jones, prince hall, the ame church, the occult black woman beating fbi agent Ron karenga making up a africanized holiday stealing east african culture and appropriating it with West african culture and naming it after the kuanza river in west africa to give us a pagan commercialized holiday and a sense of a slave ship bantu sense of self, and also you had unesco walt disney beuna visa abc network and Alex haley put millions into fabricating the plagiarized roots playing off a fake griot kebba kanga fofana doing a photoop documentary with actors claiming to be descendants of fictional kunta kinte stealing from Harold Courlanders the african novel and Margaret Wallace Jubilee novel being sued in court for it and making up the goree island mansion of slaves door of no return with Joseph Bobucar N'diaye

[@johnnyearp52]

Native blood could also explain away problematic white blood.

[@CzarPanamera420]

If you read the race of the people on the Indian reservations, the people in Indian Territory, according to the 1820-1860 United States census records... it's ALL Black people! Even on the slave records ALL of the slave owners were Black according to the federal government! Indian and Native Americans aren't the same people. The Natives came around 1860 from Alaska. Remember the Eskimos? 😮😉

[@afonphoenix16]

Your great great grandpa being Cherokee doesn't make YOU Cherokee. There's literally no native blood left to pass on to you, sorry. Genetics just doesn't work that way.🤷

[@CzarPanamera420]

@@afonphoenix16 🤣😅🤣 Cherokees are the majority of the Black population sir. Refrence The Indian Removal Act and you'll notice 2 groups of people... Native Americans and American Indians. The 5 Tribes are the American Indians and you can refrence the census records from the time periods to verify what I'm saying.

[@vblake530530]

I was one of those folks who was told my great grandmother was an “Indian” . As it turns out, I no Native American blood at all. Learn something new every time with you.

[@milascave2]

Cher claimed to be one 16th Cherokee. She wasn't. There was no misunderstanding involved, she simply lied, to justify her creating and making lots of money from the song "half-breed," which was about a woman who was half white and half Cherokee.

[@jaiyabyrd4177]

I am a Black American andhave always felt that many Black Americans have used that story because some Black's looked at it to lessen their Blackness. I have never, ever gone along with this folktale. I am Black way back and happy 👍🏾❤❤❤

[@misstriciaskitchen8640]

You know I never thought about that but I think you might be right.

[@simonjusticier333]

For some, anything but black. Calling someone African was a fighting word.

[@thinkbeforeyoutype7106]

GREAT video as always.

[@dontaylor7315]

I had a Choctaw aunt but she was an in-law not a blood relative. After she and my uncle divorced she returned to her reservation in Oklahoma.

[@YumeBasil]

Similar thing happened to my mum's family, my nana told me that we had Canadian Indigenous blood down the line. And hearing that I didn't believe that (For the record I am actually half Mexican Indian from dad's side lol) one bit, UNTIL, my mum took a DNA test, turns out it was true lol, she had about 9% of some Indigenous Canadian blood. And then I took a DNA test and had about 45% Mexican Indigenous blood as my highest ethnicity, but I had a tiny amount of Indigenous Canadian blood. Honestly, this was really cool to find out!

[@carolinezervan6301]

Which DNA test did you do. I took 3 different test. Ancestry and my heritage and 23 and me. I'm Canadian indigenous on my mother's side and ojibway on my father's side. Both are white mostly. Ancestry and my heritage showed no indigenous DNA at all but 23 and me reveled Filipino DNA. I have no idea where that came from. I was always told there was a chief way back in the family. I suppose that might be like a princess or something along the line. I also have almost an equal amount of west African DNA as well.

[@pete6300]

I was surprised in the reverse. My dad's father was American "Mexican" meaning his family existed in and around the rio grande valley for as far back as can be remembered. My grandmother's family was also "Mexican" but they relocated to Florida in the early 1900s. My grandmothers family was oddly tall, light skin, and green eyes. My mother was a English heritage northeasterner. I thought my DNA would have contained a lot of European. I was surprised to get %60 native from the people in the rio grande valley. Eventually im gonna get my parents tested. My uncle did his and was 80% native. I thought it was really weird and we would have had more Spaniard genes. I read into it and a bunch of tribes surrendered to the Spanish in southern Texas. They wanted protection from northern commanches. Their culture and languages were lost forever. I think my family must have been from some of them. My grandfather says his family had always been vaqueros for as far back as he heard. So it also aligns with the tribes that ended up working for the Spanish land owners.

[@LOVE-JC777]

Rio grande where mainly cuahuila or Coahuiltecans they reach as far as San Antonio TX and the valley.

[@catmejia6109]

My family is the same , it sounds like you are confused as you used to”Mexican” in quotes and confused of indigenous roots in the rio grande…an area that was pure indios, then under new Spain , Mexico and later Texas, the mixture of euros with those natives could be why the light skin is in your family and the dna results show the farthest back in your lineage….ive studied mine decades ago and even the lady who makes these videos was shocked, dumbfounded and almost barely touches her “Mexican” heritage and leans more towards “Native American” ….its not hard to understand….not sure why dna tests confuse many especially considering they do not show one’s whole ancestry

[@JOSECARABALLO-e1n]

Stop lying, why would they move Mexicans from the valley fool, I am from the rio grande valley and nobody ever came and move anything here, besides why would you wanna move Mexicans to Florida, what power does the government have to go and move people around?

[@brianclark4040]

I think this is such a prime example of the complexity of race and ethnicity we have created in America. Behind a racial categorization, there is an agenda. I’m waiting to hear self-identified white Americans enthusiastically talking about their African grandmother who had beautiful skin and high cheekbones. That is much more likely and statistically more common. There is genotype, phenotype, culture, kinship, and ethnicity. People indigenous to what is now called the United States are descended from nations that predated the United States. As such, it is a political designation not a racial or phenotypical category. You can be Indian and not “look Indian.” You can be indigenous but not Indian because of the way the federally recognized tribal organization set membership criteria. (For instance, my wife’s tribe caps membership at 1/4 blood quantum. So all my nieces and nephews whose parents were 1/4 and did not have children with recognized tribal members are literally ineligible to get a tribal ID card. ) One of our family friends was European-American (RIP) and married an Indian man and had Indian kids and lived in that community. She did not become Indian, but she had kinship with that community. The Cherokee admitted (and expelled and Re admitted) freedmen into the tribal rolls. I always believe that who you are (in practice) is what community accepts and claims you. In the distant past, native communities intermarried with other native and non-native peoples. Affiliation was by kinship and community because the concept of race as we know it today did not exist for most native people. That is, people obviously had eyes and could see what you looked like, but your family and linguistic and cultural ties were more important.

[@elleanna5869]

I honestly think that race and dna and ancestry are kinda hysterya in the US. In lack, probably, of a long shared history. Sounds like identity crisis. In other continents a dna test is not that common few people really need to confirm their identity by genetics - their cultural, language, habits and community belonging fill the whole space.

[@nytn]

I plan a video about getting kicked off the Dawes roll (happened to my family, likely because they were mixed race as you said)

[@brianclark4040]

@@nytn I really value the content you put out there. It’s opened discussions with my kids and me. I am African-American (never formally explored my genealogy but I have been told-unsubstantiated-we have indigenous, Latin American, and Caribbean ancestors as well as Scottish). My wife is from central NY and her parents were French-Canadian and Mohawk. My kids don’t have a strong identity toward any of their ethnic backgrounds even though they have good ties to all their relatives. For them, they see themselves first as individuals. I am happy for them (because I didn’t have that luxury). Yet, I want to prepare them for what they might experience being racially “ambiguous.”

[@nytn]

This comment really made my day. I have three kids myself , two of whom are extremely ethnically ambiguous (skewing Hispanic/Creole) and I know they will deal with a lot of the same issues I did as a child. My husband’s background is pretty mixed as well as he is English, Puerto Rican, and Mexican heritage. These conversations are totally normalized at my house because i always talk about the videos I’m working on, but I’m realizing that for a lot of kids it’s either not something the parents need to talk to them about or no one feels prepared to do it. It seems each generation is getting more and more “mixed” as kids like mine and yours will have their own kids! I mean that in the best way possible. I hope it will bring more unity for future generations. Thank you for being here☺️

[@kellyroyds5040]

​@@elleanna5869For the most part, people in other countries know what they are. Western counties categorized people over and over again, told lies, etc., so that a certain segment of their citizens are unsure of their heritage. Nothing wrong with trying to find out. Plus for legal reasons in the US, it is in one's best interest to find out if possible.

[@loveblue2422]

I'm from all around America My uncle was born in Michigan when Michigan considered Canada😮 And they are called muskegee Native American tries married other tribes Because my grandmother is a Seminole Indian But they got her listed as a Cherokee And it's so many different tribes When you get a chance Google native Americans in Indiana That's where my grandmother was buried

[@rroadmap]

We were always told we had native American ancestry, but nobody knew what tribe. When I was a child, my brother and I made up that we were decended from a chief. Over 50 years later, my younger sister thought we really were decended from a chief because she'd heard us saying that way back then. 😂 When I started genealogy, I didn't find any native American, but the DNA in multiple cousins showed 1-3% African. Ah Ha! The native American story was likely a cover for Blacks passing as White. And as I study that area, it seems a very high percentage of families had an "Indian" ancestor story. My family lived in Northern Louisiana not far away from your Lola.

[@kdugg]

My entire group of people are part of the group of natives on the trail of tears who broke away and hid in the mountians. They formed the eastern cherokees. We are then but didn’t make the trip to NC. We remained in WV.

[@Volundur9567]

I am am tired of people claiming Cherokee. Nope, no other civilization, just Cherokee. And they're always white as snow. There's only one person who was legit Native that I knew. They lived on a reservation and married a white woman.

[@apgeneticgenealogylover6601]

Yeah, no telling when these claims will finally start going away. It's going to take a lot more people doing DNA tests and/or actually having their genealogy looked at, which probably won't happen for too many people.

[@bigrockydennis4216]

I'm slightly west of the Mississippi in Southeast MO Ozarks and I had a great grandfather who was half Cherokee. I live only about 20 miles from the trail of tears.

[@outrageousaistories]

I, too, grew up being told that we had significant Cherokee on my Mom's side - my great-great grandmother. There was even an old family photo of her from the 1800s on the wall in my great-grandmother's house. That was accompanied with a story about her having long black hair that she could sit on. She cut it when she got older and kept the braid in a drawer, but someone stole it, never to be seen again (pretty suspect, huh?). I've taken DNA tests from several companies and have come back with only 1% Native. On my FATHER'S side. My mother has none. I call the Cherokee myth The Great American Lie.

[@caniceedward]

How many people ever ask where the companies who are taking the dna, how old is the dna of the original Americans they are using to match with the modern Americans who are claiming to be the original inhabitants.

[@PHDWhom]

You would be partially wrong then. If your ancestor is listed on the rolls, and it is confirmed and proven, you qualify for citizenship for the Oklahoma Cherokee Nation.

[@heydeereman1040]

This may explain some things on my family's DNA test. Very good insights

[@tyronleung5276]

Dna should be taken with a grain of salt it's not definitive and it's entertainment horoscopes in fine print

[@heydeereman1040]

@@tyronleung5276 IDK, mine was pretty accurate down to the main percentages. I have family history for most of my family back to the 1400s

[@MasontheMarxistDog]

I am More Likely descended from Genghis Khan then having a Cherokee Ancestor

[@roachzero2952]

I love your channel so much & so glad it even exists !!! I just relate so much having Irish , Italian , Hungarian , Blackfoot Native Indian , French & more heritage that I haven't even traced yet . Seriously , THANK YOU for all your work !!

[@JustFluffyQuiltingYarnCrafts]

Never heard of the "Cherokee Grandma" before. I'm intrigued by this concept. Thank you for pricking my brain with all these new concepts and historical pieces of information. ❤

[@bamboosho0t]

I heard it often as a kid growing up in the 1980s.

[@creoleexplained]

It’s very common in the U.S. Interestingly, it’s a thing in blck and white families.

[@vblake530530]

Who else here like her video before even hearing it. Sista You ROCK!

[@7channelstv]

Our supposed Cherokee grandmother , when I did the ancestry research , I found that she seemed to be adopted by a black family. But it wasn’t Cherokee she was tied to but Choctaw. She was a baby when the rest of her family left and she’s listed on the Rolls as a 6 week old baby.

[@lphillips6204]

Why is it always the "grandmother"? That's what I also find interesting.

[@CadeR48]

Maybe because it would be easily disproven if they said grandfather due to last names.

[@Melungeonpeople]

We had the same question so we tested 16 different families from the rural South East US. These families are from Alabama, South Carolina, Virginia, Maryland, West Virginia. We picked families whose families have no recollection of when their families moved to the areas. Over the last three years we have the following results from autosomal DNA. All participants have native American alleles which means they absolutely have native American ancestry. All had Jewish ancestry (Sephardic as they match locations where the Jewish Diaspora now live including Israel) All were Iberian matching Spain and Portugal and Mediterranean populations including Arab. Most had Slavic, Armenian. Deep ancestry shows Egyptian. BUT the most shocking result was that of all these white and black people none showed any or very little Western European DNA (except Iberian) and no or extremely little British (the story flipped because we expected to find large amounts of British and very little Native American). We are well aware that celts migrated from Spain to the British Isles but this test made allowance for this. There is a population for British and a population for Iberia in our testing. The whites in the Southeast are NOT of British descent but they are in fact Lumbee, Athabascan and Cherokee and Iberian Jewish and African as they match living populations and they all have the native American alleles which is very identifiable. The black participants have the exact same results. The whites and blacks of the South East are Iberian Jews with native American admixtures. When British DNA did show up it was less than the native American and Arab. I won't say which test we used because I don't want the readers or you to doubt my intentions and think I'm advocating a company. Our test results were so shocking that we have now started saying white presenting people and black presenting people because we are all one people from the same groups that were here. All black and white had African and all had Iberian and all had the specific native American alleles. Our history is very incorrect. I don't know the answer but autosomal DNA doesn't lie. We are Iberian (Mediterranean)and Native American and African and Jewish.

[@chandleryoung9515]

Was it like your own test or one of the main stream ones?

[@thebec8853]

I am from Alabama and yes, I also had that rude awakening. I was so dismayed to find that I am 99.9 to Infinity White. I am just lucky that I was already an Anglophile because I'm about 97% British. I have to say though I was truly heartbroken to find that I was just SO White. I wanted to be the lady on the commercial that was everything. I had always taken Cherokee Princess literally. the other meaning never occurred to me. When I had to break the news to my Birthmother that I had zero native blood she just couldn't believe it; but would not take a test herself. I have been pretty fascinated to learn from your video and the comments on this video, today.

[@nytn]

thank you for sharing this! So common. On the other hand..I LOVE British literature and the BBC and all that. Not a drop of English DNA. 😌But my husband is half so I live vicariously through him. I want to go visit Cornwall in England SO BAD. It's at the top of my bucket list. I would love to hear things you find and who you are connected to if you start that paper trail.

[@anthonymiller2546]

Maybe they are still trying to kill our dreams, just listen to your heart .. ❤

[@dancingnature]

If you Nstive American ancestor was a great great grandparent or older the ancestry might be accurate but you might not have any traceable DNA left . It gets halved in each generation

[@afonphoenix16]

At least you owned up to it. So many white people claim they're Cherokee because some great grandparent (always) was "half-Cherokee". Then they claim the DNA "didn't show up." Well yeah, because a half-Cherokee great grandparent leaves you with very little native blood if ANY. It's another reason there are so many fake Native Americans running around. They act like blood percentage stays the same every generation.🙄🤦

[@melissabrackin3790]

So interesting! I often go back to rewatch previous videos... I know a lot of AA people that claim the Cherokee Princess grandmother and have never been resistant to that idea. In my opinion, people back then did, Im sure, just as they currently do. Im sure there were many children with mixed heritage. It was inly as an adult that i realized how MANY people claimed that Cherokee Grandmother. The United States has proven to be a melting pot and im not surprised at those claims- many are, in all probability, true... Thanks for all your hard work, Danielle. Im looking forward to the next video!

[@apgeneticgenealogylover6601]

A lot of AA families who still believe in "Cherokee great grandmother" story to explain a matriarch with light skin and "good hair" ( that most likely came from a white planter/son or other relative of planter/overseer) probably have absolutely no idea whatsoever of Cherokee history, and also can't name a single chief or prominent member. They probably dont even know that (mostly) the mixed white elite of the Cherokee nation were planters and took their slaves with them on the trail of tears and it's not like there were really any more than a few thousand slaves anyway. Not to mention how racist Cherokee laws were to blacks that were not the same way to whites. You can't blame them too much for not knowing.

[@marvinabigby5509]

My GG grandmother was the daughter of a settler in Virginia.The family was murdered house burnt daughter taken.Years later 2 little native girls were found in a canoe by white people.The girls were thought to be 8 and 10 approx they knew mother's name.the missing girl from years before.A family adopted them.One of those little girls was my great grandmother.

[@donnag7908]

Wow! That is a fascinating story! You should write a novel about your great grandmother

[@engineerjac]

There was only 1 chief but multiple tribal leaders

[@jcortese3300]

Still going through your brilliant videos -- the only people I've ever known who have actual Tribal ancestry who know about it are Mexican Americans, and it's never Cherokee. It's always some super-obscure Tribe no one outside of one sparsely populated county in the southwest has ever heard of. The depth with which you've researched this topic is impressive.

[@whigrose9753]

It probably takes about 5 to 8 minutes to get to the start of the trail of tears from where I was born along the ga/tn line (red clay park). And yes, my grandpa always told me there was a Cherokee connection in our family. But based on where we grew up, it made sense. We have never been able to find proof of the connection. Still, I know my grandpa wasn't lying. He believed it completely.

[@patriciajrs46]

Wow! You look a lot different with your hair loose and down. Very pretty, still, just different. I didn't know it was you until you said your name. Thank you for sharing all that you know, tricks, tips, etc., on finding out about dna results and genealogy quirks and difgiculties.

[@nytn]

Lol! Yah I tried to give my hair a break 😆

[@FrankBrocato]

Great video! I hadn't heard the term "high yellow" in many years, but it triggered some memories of my grandmother. She grew up in northern Louisiana, and she used that term to refer to people of mixed race. I suppose the term came from what we in southern Louisiana called "Yankees from north Louisiana." I'm looking forward to your video about Tallulah, Louisiana. I might see some of my relatives there

[@brawndothethirstmutilator9848]

It’s so entertaining how the word Yankee means different things depending on where you’re standing in the world. There’s an old saying from E.B. White about the word: “To foreigners, a Yankee is an American. To Americans, a Yankee is a Northerner. To Northerners, a Yankee is an Easterner. To Easterners, a Yankee is a New Englander. To New Englanders, a Yankee is a Vermonter. And in Vermont, a Yankee is somebody who eats pie for breakfast.” …I guess now we can add, in Southern Louisiana a Yankee is someone from Northern Louisiana 😂 (which I had never heard of).

[@FrankBrocato]

@@brawndothethirstmutilator9848 yes anyone north of I10 is a Yankee

[@ThisIsMyYoutubeName1]

@@FrankBrocatohey now. I think the line between north and south Louisiana is Opelousas . I’m in northern St. Martin, not even 10 miles north of I-10. Originally from New Orleans West Bank, but been out here for 30 years.

[@loallis]

I've heard of the term "high yellow" as well..used to describe a black person with light complexion. Also the term "red" has been used in the same manner.

[@misstriciaskitchen8640]

I don’t hear the term very often now but In the south high yellow referred to a light skinned black person with a yellow skin tone. Black people with a reddish skin tone were called redbone.

[@skyking8420]

I would assume that the DNA test is the best route because , along with false claims, there is also the issue of Native ancestry being both hidden and denied. Also many records have either been lost, are entirely inaccurate or never kept at all. As many of your topics have illustrated, unless you were WASP, discrimination of some sort was inevitable for much of our history.. Great Video!!

[@dorianduka]

a DNA test is only comparing your dna with samples (often only modern samples) and from them we simply do not have sufficient in north america

[@GuajiroLungi]

@@doriandukaif you have indigenous American dna it will show up on your test, the science is there

[@dorianduka]

@@GuajiroLungi a test is only comparing the DNA with samples we ourselves define that in itself is problematic after (depending on definition ) up to 25%-50% of Amerindian dna is of ANE origin Take the very beginning of populations we define today to be Amerindian ...can you define me fossilis like that of Afontova gora (that is the oldest fossil we have with blonde hair) was it similar to modern Amerindians with "European " admixture ? how do you want to define that "European" admixture? Is the same dna in ancestors of a population not "European" but in descendants is "European"?

[@GuajiroLungi]

@@dorianduka trying to make sense of what you’re saying but can’t really find the revelance or point. DNA tests are designed to capture the last 200-500 years of your ancestral ties. When you look at the great majority of people, their results are accurate. Science is never perfect, but 23andMe and ancestry are highly accurate. If you didn’t like you’re results just say that, but the tests are legit

[@robertlewis6797]

​@@doriandukaagreed. DNA tests have been debunked by biologists at least 5 years ago because there's only 3 kinds of tests: mitochondrial, y-chromosome, and autosomal. The first two can only take you back straight down the maternal or paternal line which means if NA ancestry is broken by different maternal/paternal lines, then it show up even though it's there. Autosomal testing is only reliable for about 5 or 6 generations back and they look at about 1% of your genome. On top of that DNA tests, as already stated, compare your DNA to samples taken from modern populations, there's no way it could be correct even 50% of the time. Populations have changed so much because of wars, migrations, trade, and generally historically significant events. There are very few countries where the population is racially/ethnically the same as it was 200-500 years ago. The only way to accurately determine your ancestry is through paper trail and talking to your family members. And obviously problems can arise with paper trail but it's still more reliable than a DNA test

[@manuelsteele7755]

I am Apache from rural AZ. I am enrolled as "4/4" on the reservation. I learned Apache first as a child. I have the brown complexion, jet-black hair, and athletic build of a college linebacker at 6'1". So, I do look like a "Rez" guy. In places like Phoenix or Albuquerque, older Navajos who normally keep to themselves come up to talk to me. The same goes for Northern Plains tribes like the Lakota. They talk to me too and assume I am from one of the reservations in the Dakotas. Out in the Four Corners, the tribal members who are registered as "full-blooded" and speak the indigenous language generally see the Cherokees as "wannabes" - meaning "fake" - or "not real natives". That is usually the perception in these remote reservations out west. With that said, I prefer a more nuanced view with realism. I befriended mixed-blooded Cherokees since childhood, and in my sophomore year I did a large report on Sequoyah of the Cherokees - a half-white member who saved the Cherokee language. In modern times, I lived in the FL Panhandle for over 13 years. I met many white southerners who definitely look to have some degree of indigenous ancestry. One time I went hiking up in North GA. I used to like to hike Mt. Enotah, which had been the Cherokee capital until the 1830s. I went into a small store and noticed that the young woman at the register could pass for Zuni Indian from the Four Corners except she was really pale-skinned. But she definitely had indigenous features that were distinct and could almost pass for Zuni near Gallup, NM. She told me she was 1/16 Cherokee. I met "white" southerners like that a lot. I have studied biochemistry with DNA metabolism. I also studied statistics for public health and population analysis. So, statistically, a fair number of "mixed" descendants are likely not real. DNA would prove that. But I am 100% confident a fair number of them are genuinely part Native American. I figured out why many Cherokees are mixed. The white southerners intermarried with Native Americans for hundreds of years. In childhood, the south was often shown on TV as virulently racist with the Civil Rights Movement, Jim Crow laws, etc. Old Western films often made the Confederates as the enemy. But there was one exception with realism - "The Undefeated" by John Wayne. It was about a former Yankee colonel who helped a Confederate family fleeing to Mexico after the Civil War. John Wayne's adopted son was a Cherokee scout for the US Army. The scout found the trail of the Confederate family. They met, and the Confederate Colonel's daughter fell for the Cherokee scout. The movie ends with the mixed relationship. That is very real in my experience. I, a brown Apache Catholic from rural AZ, had a blonde, white southern girlfriend I met at the FSU gym. When you see those southern white college girls of FSU at football games cheering for the Seminoles, some of them really are willing to date Native American guys. Go figure. The white southerners intermixed with Native Americans a lot. It's still like that. A lot of those mixed-blooded descendants are real.

[@nytn]

thank you for sharing!

[@SassyV-h2v]

I've certainly been told that my great-grandmother was Indigenous, but no one in my family knew what tribe, but I did happened to look her name up on the Dawes Rolls, and she was on there under Cherokee, but she has the same name as a 6 year old Cherokee little girl who died...which I thought was very weird 🤔

[@nytn]

That sounds like a path worth following! Bet it’s a great story either way

[@shaunlove7293]

Foreigners taking on the identities of others is something that was very common. In most cases that I’ve seen, there is a paper trail of immigrants moving from place to place regardless of it it were voluntary or not.

[@starventure]

Oh no, be very careful with the Dawes rolls. There was a ton of fraud involved with it, including people declaring themselves to be Native American just to acquire land in the territory.

[@maryevans453]

My grandfather was Cherokee and I am thankful to be a woman of color!🙌🤲🏼🙌🏾

[@afonphoenix16]

Is that verified? Because blacks claiming bullshit Cherokee blood is ALSO rampant.🤷

[@starventure]

I recently created a family tree for a friend of mine who was adopted at birth, with no knowledge of his parents at all. Using AncestryDNA, Gedmatch, and MyHeritageDNA, I was able to determine his father with certainty (an only child - easy) and tracked down his mother to being either one of two sisters. While examining his DNA, I noticed on his ethnic chromosomal paintings that there were a few areas that indicated as solidly meso-american in origin. I was able to resolve through DNA triangulation a few of the segments, and no joke...every darned one backtracked to an individual typically back in the 1700s who was either of confirmed or alleged Choctaw or Cherokee descent. Every single one. So, the likelihood of a significant number of modern day Americans having Native American ancestry is actually quite good, depending on the geographic area of ancestry. My personal opinion of ancestral indian mythology is that where there is smoke, there is fire and if there is enough assertion that someone in the past was of indian descent, it is worth investigation and should not be discarded out of hand.

[@johnnyearp52]

If Native American DNA doesn't show up maybe your 100% Native ancestor was farther back than you thought. It could be an invented story as well. My mother speculated we had a little Black and Native blood because of a French name we have in our family. The only person she met with this name was French, Black and Cherokee. But only tiny bits of Native (less than 1%) showed up in my family's DNA and has since been removed from our admixture list on the website. It is possible we had a Native ancestor like in the 1600's or 1700's but that blood is almost nothing or gone now. Maybe it never happened.

[@doylecole]

On my Father's side we can trace our lineage back to a soldier in Jackson's Army that forced the relocation of the 5 Civilized Tribes. He took a bride of one of families that was being marched. They ended up in IL, MO, then AR, then TX. My dad moved our family to AZ to get fair pay as a Union Miner in a copper mine in the late '50's. He dealt with racism his entire life.

[@williamriley5118]

Cherokee is like the default Native American tribe with a lot of people. My Great-Grandmother was a member of the Lumbee Tribe and I used to spend time with her when I was a kid.

[@patriciajrs46]

It's truly a pity that the government refuses to federally recognize the Lumbee because they are all seriously mixed races.

[@SaltySteff]

Not American but I belong to a Metis nation in Canada. The Metis are one of three indigenous groups in Canada. I'm a federally registered member of an indigenous nation with strong roots in the Metis homeland of Manitoba. There is a similar phenomenon of people self-indigenizing in eastern Canada similar to the "Cherokee princess" phenomenon within the US. Thousands of people of French descent falsely claiming Metis roots and even calling themselves MORE indigenous than actual indigenous people. The government refuses to acknowledge them and they are consistently called out by legit Metis nations in the west and First Nations groups as well. It's a fascinating thing to behold as someone who does have legitimate claim. I have pale skin and green eyes. DNA wise my Indian contribution is likely very small. In fact, most Metis don't have a distinct "look"; some are paler like myself, and others look like the Pointer Sisters (like my grandmother and her siblings and some of their grandkids, my cousins). But anyone who knows anything about being indigenous knows that blood quantum and DNA are generally rejected by bands and nations because they're misrepresentations of what being Indigenous means. So you take a DNA test to find trace amounts of native DNA. Congrats, you along with millions of other white Americans, as there really are no "pure" Indians anymore anyway. Most Indians have white DNA. Blood quantum is a colonial invention used to keep tabs on registries with treatied lands. Generally speaking, unless you have a legitimate family ancestral connection to a tribe, band or nation, and are also RECOGNIZED as having historical ties to that group (which means acceptance by that community), then your small amount of Indian DNA is meaningless. I also have Jewish ancestry dating back to the mid 19th century. This means I have Jewish heritage, not that I'm a Jew. There are differences. Having Indian DNA does NOT make you an Indian. The stories of "lost records" is also total bs. Indians wrte METICULOUSLY registered as per the Indian Act in 1876 (Canada) and other similar legislation in the US. That means that even if a birth certificate was somehow "lost"n it should be the easiest thing in the world to locate an original document proving yoir family ancestral connection via treaties or other similar documents, such as birth records. It's a convenient story when evidence is lacking. We need to start focusing less on "DNA" and more on kinship and community affiliations to these tribes and nations.

[@niamtxiv]

Lol metis are basically Europeans

[@JSAwesomeGuitar]

I don't know about the princess part, but one of my great-grandfathers on my dad's side had a Cherokee mother and an Irish father. One of my brothers got a dna test that confirmed Native heritage. I want to obtain authentication as to her identity. A major hindrance to this is the fact that back in the day, people were embarrassed to be "half-breeds," so these matters weren't talked about. It was only my father's mother's deathbed confessions that clued us in as to the reason for her dark phenotypical traits. My great-grandfather always listed his race as "White." Of course things are different today, with people taking pride in their differences. My great-grandfather was from West Virginia, so hopefully I can get the full story and fill in the blanks

[@tanelise4673]

I too, was told my great grandmother was part Indian. My DNA test though Ancestry did not reveal any. My sister has Indigenous South America but Ancestry couldn’t break down whether it was from my maternal side or not. I’m going to test my two aunts to see if any was passed down to them. I realize that it can be in my ancestry but not in my DNA.

[@nickd4310]

My great-grandmother told my mother that my great-grandfather (born 1839) had native American ancestry. I didn't believe it and thought nothing of it. Recently, I found that my gggggg grandmother, Eva Classez (born 1680 in Schenectady, NY) was described as "mulatto" and was an interpreter with the Indian Department. In fact, it is documented that many of my family spoke Indian languages in 18th century upstate New York. Extensive DNA research on Eva's descendants have shown that her mother was an African from Senegal, owned by her father's family, who were Dutch.

[@waltond1127]

Personally, I think what it is is this. .. the grandma lived in the region that was formerly the Tribal area. And when they became sun weathered from the sun and elderly.....the younger generations tried to pass her off as "Cherokee". (My kids dad's family tried to do this. Lol)

[@CC-yj8vp]

Remember the actor Iron Eyes Cody? He was Sicilian American, but he passed as Native. Because of that, he played many movie parts in Hollywood. His most memorable was the "crying Indian" of the 1970's PSA's for keeping the earth unpolluted. He was even honored by a Native group for representing Natives well in movies/shows and making opportunities for real Native actors. Maybe he did it primarily for the chance to play Natives in movies or maybe primarily economic opportunity. Not sure why he "passed" for something he wasn't. I think that people like him and Buffy Ste Marie are hard to understand, when they keep denying family heritage into their old age, in spite of family members "outing" them, as well as DNA testing that's available today.

[@SkyeID]

oh yes, I remember Iron Eyes. When I found out he was Sicilian, my jaw dropped to the floor. My jaw went sub-terranean when I heard that a Native group honored him for representing Native people. Huh?

[@lisaobrien4898]

My mother will swear on a stack of bibles that her grandmother was full blooded Cherokee. She died around the time I was born, so I didn't get to know her. But every one of her children were as white as snow, with either red or dark blond hair. I haven't done a DNA test yet, but hope to soon. While I do hope to find that I'm Native American, I would also love to have African ancestry. My dad's family has been hard to trace, but I do believe they may be Melungeon.

[@AmandaFromWisconsin]

I'm a white American and I know loads of white American people who have absolutely no stories about any Native people in their family trees. I was always told that my mother's side had some Native ancestry, and both the DNA tests I took (Ancestry and 23andMe) and the genealogy prove that it's actually true. They were probably originally from Canada. Beyond the superficial curiosity about who the person was and to which specific group they belonged, I never really took an interest in that part of my ancestry.

[@jeromemckenna7102]

When I worked for the US Census Bureau in NJ I would hear claims of Indian ancestry from quite a few black people. I would also hear people who said they were related to the Ramapo Indians (who are recognized by NJ), those claims were probably true.

[@Poweredbylinux]

I took an AncestryDNA test to find out more about our family lineage since there was a story about a great-great grandfather on my mom's side of the family (father) who was supposedly from Italy. I learned that I have indigenous ancestry in both my mom (Durango, MX) and dad's (Zacatecas, MX) side of the family. In fact, it came back to the tune of 44%. There was even 1% Indigenous - Yucatan Peninsula. It was a nice surprise because I wasn't expecting it. As for the story about Italian bloodline; the only thing that came back for that part of Europe was for Spain and Portugal. If there was a great-great grandfather from Italy then my guess is he was born in Spain or Portugal, but raised in Italy before migrating to Mexico. Pretty fascinating stuff.

[@muurishawakening]

Last year, one of my paternal cousins found out that our great-great grandmother and her twin sister escaped from slavery. They were full-blooded Cherokee. My dad decades earlier mentioned we were Blackfoot. I responded to my cousin that everyone was called a Cherokee but she informed me that my great-great grandmother was a certified Cherokee.

[@SeasideDetective2]

Both of my grandmothers, who grew up in the 1930s and '40s, claimed Native ancestry, but as it turned out, only one of them - my father's mother - was right. A DNA test proved that one of Grandma's great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandparents had been (probably) either Cherokee or Algonquin. Actually, she had a little more West African (possibly Wolof or Fulani) blood than she did Native blood. So that makes me well under 0.1 percent Native American - far too small of a percentage to be evident from my facial features. (I do have high cheekbones, but that trait is associated as much with Northern Europeans as it is with any other group.) I think much of White America's ambivalent Indophilia arises from a weird mixture of envy, resentment, and reluctant disgust. Whites were proud of America and wanted to have a true ancestral claim to it. At the same time, they romanticized the Indian race by applying unrealistic stereotypes, and were disappointed when they encountered actual Indians and saw that those stereotypes were not true. It was just another example of the phenomenon of "Don't meet your heroes, because then you'll hate them." Also, Whites were intrigued by the "back-to-nature" lifestyle that Indians supposedly represented, but were too committed to progress to actually want to live that way themselves. So they reasoned, if they couldn't be like the Indians, then the Indians would just have to be like them - and thus the crusade to "civilize" them began. It's an interesting example of how guilt and fear can create a feedback loop, only generating more guilt and fear.

[@patriciajrs46]

What you say here rings true. It's all quite sad. For generations it wasn't cool to be who you were. Very sad that we have to invent someone' interesting'.

[@SeasideDetective2]

@@patriciajrs46 That said, it WOULD be convenient if, like the Mexicans, we white Americans were truly "native" to this continent. It's very ironic that American whites have spent centuries wanting to be Indian and have now more or less given up on that idea, while the genuinely "native" Mexicans insisted they were Spanish for a long time but today feel almost no kinship with modern-day Spain. In fact, I would argue that Mexico is now more unlike Spain than the USA is unlike England.

[@johnnyearp52]

​@@SeasideDetective2Actually white Americans went through periods of hating and demonizing Native Americans mixed in with periods of idolizing Native Americans. This mostly depended how much fighting was going on between the two groups.

[@shaunlove7293]

Good stuff. I’d like to recommend some in-depth study of the Virginia Statutes at Large, the history of the Census instructions to the enumerators, historical newspapers (but be careful to get them from more than one source, many have been altered and it’s usually very noticeable), the native American political party (which I believe that you touched on briefly), population demographics and the racial integrity act. Very good points made as usual.

[@nytn]

this is a great idea

[@jeanheard4615]

My mom married a Cherokee which was my dad and she was black once they got married they were not accepted into the tribe my dad was put outta the tribe once you step out you cannot come back that was how it use to be later on in life I permitted to go on the reservation I love it there

[@doubleutee2100]

There is another form of potential evidence to use that though a person may not have inherited Native DNA, that doesn't prove that it's not in their direct lineage, cause it could've been bred out. MyHeritage DNA indicates that if you believe you had a certain ethnicity, but it's not found on your DNA test results, visit their "Overview" page from your results, scroll down, and look at the list of from your relatives ethnicities. If you see that ethnicity on that list, it could mean it's in your family's lineage, but you didn't inherit it. That's likely due to the genetic distance involved, or the double random 50% produced by each parent failed to provide you any of that ethnicity to make up your 100%.

[@Taurche]

Thank you so much for touching on this topic. Especially black people being Native American. People were literally jumping down my throat because I stated I have 1% Native DNA. It would have to have been at least 2x 3 generations back. And we do have a lot of “High Yella” people in my family 🤣🤭 especially the women. My grandfather always told me that we were black foot Native American he stated that it’s from his mom. My great grandmother. But his dna said indigenous Amazonian. So i really don’t know how this could’ve came into play. Along w my 3% Inuit and 7% Middle Eastern and of course 31% European 🤣 thank you for this video !!!

[@trxphywaifalt]

This is relatable as a dark skinned black woman I constantly get dragged and called whitewashed or insecure for acknowledging that as a black American/Caribbean woman, i am not 100% black. It’s fine when lighter skinned ppl say that but when ppl your complexion or mine do, we’re just “lying for attention”

[@Taurche]

@@trxphywaifalt baby they don’t understand that two black people can make a light skinned baby 🤣🤣 you don’t need another ethnicity i.e white, Hispanic, etc to make a light skinned baby!!! But because we don’t fully know what is in our genetic makeup that’s why we have ranges of browns and tones in our families. No black family is all the same shade. White america has truly falsified the image of what black people are “supposed” to look like. No black person looks the same 🤷🏽‍♀️

[@apgeneticgenealogylover6601]

"1% Native DNA" is probably a false positive. Especially since black Americans' African ancestry is too genetically variable for the algorithms since there still isn't adequate reference population data. Even if 1% were legit ancestry, it would be way way way farther back than 2 or 3 generations. Former presidential advisor Valerie Jarrett has genealogically verified evidence of a Native ancestor from the late 1600's, and her DNA test shows around 3%, which is outside the "noise range"

[@Taurche]

@@apgeneticgenealogylover6601 I honestly think that no ancestry DNA database is going to be 100% accurate. Even taking two test from two different companies I can say that the only consistency was 5 ethnic groups out of 11 or 12. But even then I know that each database varies on ethnic origins. Ancestry said I have some parts of my DNA that couldn’t be read ( which I know inaccurately gives me a 100% dna ) & MyHeritage gave me a more accurate match. And i only know that by actually doing genealogical research and connecting to family members through the database. However even like you said before, it could be a false positive because trying to find other family members in these databases it doesn’t connect to anyone.

[@SkyeID]

There are a lot of light-skinned people in my family, and Cherokee ancestry has been claimed amongst my mom's side of the family for over a century. If the ancestry goes as far back as 100 years, I see no point in claiming it. I don't feel like taking a DNA test to find out if it's true. I'm black! What's wrong with just being black? Nothing.

[@sandranewkirk4]

My great grandfather told everyone, wife and children included, that he was Cherokee. We all believed him. He even told stories about his mother and sister. DNA says he was probably English. No Native DNA was found in me or my mother. We were very disappointed.

[@handyman3526]

yes my east texas AA parents were led to believe they had some NA heritage. this was due to color and facial features. dna testing proved not a drop on NA existed. we had plenty of W dna. i guess, having to admit to a past non-consensual relationship was nothing to brag about.

[@johnnyearp52]

That is hard.

[@almightyswizz]

I was told of my grandmother’s mother specifically, and that she was a quarter Cherokee which supposedly explained my grandmother’s caramel or “Lightskinned” complexion… when I was younger kids in grade school told me I had Asian eyes they used to make fun and call me “basian” or “blasian” for black Asian, plot twist my father’s side is from the Caribbean Panama & Barbados so I often identify as Bajan 😂 🇧🇧🇵🇦🇧🇧🇺🇸🇧🇧

[@cat_daddy]

being from Northern Minnesota between 3 Indian reservations, we were Scandinavian and various N European. Gramps, having many Indian Friends. he was a known moonshiner and was very popular.

[@Ama94947]

Its like Filipinos who claim to have a Spanish grandfather lol, DNA results: 100% Asian (no I dont talk for everyone but the majority has at the end 😲)

[@niamtxiv]

That's because Filipinos that work in government under Spanish rules forced and changed most of the population to adopt Spanish names for census reasons.

[@JOSECARABALLO-e1n]

Spain owned Philippines

[@cheleftb]

My paternal gmom was born in 1854. I am 44. This journey is amazing.

[@nytn]

I love the work you are doing!! Incredible to start finding out where we come from

[@starventure]

Do you mean great grandmother? A grandmother from 1854 is a bit incredible.

[@charlynegezze8536]

🤣🤣I didn´t know it was a "thing" but we were told that too and very disappointed when it didn´t show up on DNA tests. Our great-grandad was a real card.

[@Me-lp1uj]

I am African American and I do remember my mom telling me about her grandmother on her father's side being part Native American/Cherokee. I did my DNA (after mom's passing) and found that I am 74.1 % African, 23.8 % European and 0.6 % Native American. Trace ancestry- 1.2 percent: Egyptian, Bengali, Indonesian/Thai/Khmer/Mayama. My cousin on mom's side did some digging and it's most likely Choctaw and not Cherokee. We are from Kentucky, Arkansas and Tennessee. Now, I spoke to my aunt on dad's side and his grandmother was from St. Croix; maybe that’s where the Asian comes from.

[@apgeneticgenealogylover6601]

"0.6 % Native American." for an African American especially is probably just 0.0% I wouldn't even say that 1% is absolute definite ancestry. And if you legit did have absolutely any actual Native ancestry at that minute of a result, it would probably be from maybe the early 1700s at the latest and maybe a Native slave, maybe, and this would have been maybe somewhere in one the colonies. Well before your family would have gotten to Kentucky, Arrkansa, and Tennesee. It sure wouldnt be Choctaw because that would have happened WAY LATER, oh, and the Choctaw were in Mississippi before the trail of tears. And again, that's assuming it is actual definite ancestry. The companies have not explained for sure just how serious to take any results of less than 2-3%. People have theorized that for African Americans in particular, their African ancestry, because of slavery, has high genetic variety and not enough reference data for the algorithms of some of these companies and admixture calculators.

[@Krishicher]

All of my ancestors in the States settled in Southern Appalachia (NE GA, Western NC, and Upstate SC). My hometown has creeks, roads, and mountains named for Cherokee legends. So, I have fraternal twin brothers. One is blond, blue-eyed, and super fair skinned. The other is brunette, brown-eyed, and has much pigment-he can appear African American if he has two or three days in the sun. I was looking at our family tree, and I saw that my grandmother’s mother’s name was Indie. I queried my grandmother about whether that name would have been related to Indian or Cherokee. She was usually hard to pin down, but she posited that that (Cherokee somewhere back there) would be why my brother was so dark. Many years later, she seemed to backtrack on this, but I still held onto to likelihood. I received my Ancestry and 23&Me reports several years ago. The original reports had a few wild card trace results like Iberia and Turkiye. Over time, likely genetic answers for my brother’s appearance kept disappearing from subsequent revisions. The current percentages are almost 99% Northwestern Europe with 94% Britannia and Ireland (extremely typical of my geographical area). My reports have had trace results for some communities that might have explained my brother, but they’re now almost all erased. I know that siblings can have varied results, but my brother has never gotten a test done. I’ve never seen any Sub-Saharan Africa on my reports-just trace North Africa. My dirt poor hillbilly ancestors would have been fully incapable of purchasing a slave, so the Sally Hemmings storyline could hardly apply. An escaped slave might have been in our area, but still my lab results suggest no inclusion of DNA from US slave populations. Anyway, in 2023, the last 23&Me results included, for the first time anywhere, .2% Indigenous American. I expect it to disappear by next year.

[@johnnyearp52]

There are some darker looking Europeans. I always thought that our family was mixed with something. 23 and me told us traces of Native and Asian blood (less than 1%) but has since removed them. My father has mostly German blood but people would try to speak Spanish to him in Mexico. He looks pale in the winter but has dark hair and brown eyes. He tans well in the summer. It could be that our idea of Northern Europeans as all being super pale is wrong.

[@creepypuppetspresents5605]

My Cherokee Grandma story turned out to be true: my great-great-grandma, her siblings, father, and grandmother were all on the Dawes rolls. Cherokee by blood. I think my great-great-grandmother held religiously motivated anti-miscegenation views, which may be why she hid it. She did live until the early 1980s though, when my dad was a teenager, so its a relatively recent connection.

[@a.taylor8294]

My Dad was one of those stories. Seemed to make sense with that side of the family being from North Carolina. Then DNA testing didn't list this. Not too distressed to not have Cherokee ancestry, but, yes, disappointed to have it as the reminder of why my African-American lineage couldn't easily be traced.

[@tyronleung5276]

Dna ancestry test are a joke they will not reveal it because it's guessing

[@kingkoopa2334]

my great grandmother was dark skinned with bone straight hair, her father was the same & buried with 2 long braids down to his waist. When we did my grandmother's DNA, the results say she was little to no native lol sometimes have to remember who's doing these tests..

[@johnnyearp52]

​@@kingkoopa2334 Why would some company care if you are part Native?

[@elainegoad9777]

I asked my mother if her maternal grandmother had any Native American ancestry and she wouldn't answer me. This great grandmother of mine was from Madison County NC ( a long history) and near the current Cherokee Qualla Boundary ( they own the land). I haven't been able to find information. I do know , from ancestry records and the Dawes List ( Oklahoma land allotments, Indian Territory/now the State of Oklahoma) that James Ledonia Goad ( great, great, great, uncle)married Eliza (Elizabeth ) Mae Leader (Cherokee/Chocktaw) in Hopkins Texas,in the later 1800's. I found Eliza Mae Goad and 8 children in the book of Military Records, at Talking Leaves Book Store, (Cherokee owned) on the Qualla Boundary, Swain County NC ( Eastern Band Cherokee) and I did the research because I wanted to find out how this Western Band Cherokee family got my sur-name (Goad). I haven't found any direct Cherokee direct descent for myself but I guess I have a bunch of distant cousins who have Cherokee heritage/ancestry. These Cherokee people with a paternal Goad ancestry also have, on the Goad side, ancestry from Cornwall, England. Goad's came to Virginia in the late 1600's, were mostly tobacco farmers/farmers. Some migrated to West Virginia( WV only became a state at the time of the Civil War) and then I think it was James father who traveled to Texas territory. I don't think Oklahoma became a State until the early 1900's and known as "Indian Territory" ( This is where the Military forced marched the 5 civilized tribes ( Cherokee, Choctaw, etc..) front the southeast states (The Trail (s) of Tears) to what is now Oklahoma.) I hope people will always be respectful of others ancestry/heritage. Let's try to be honest with ourselves. Sharing, learning and respecting all of our ancestries is a good thing but we shouldn't try to claim what is not ours. Aho !

[@DaraDione]

Just found your channel and it’s interesting, thanks! Knowing that we only inherit half our genes/dna from each parent, I’ve never cared much about getting a dna test done. I do find it all fascinating, of course, and have spent the past decade deep diving my family history, but ultimately just consider myself an American. 😊 I’m more interested in the stories and journeys across the continent (I’m in my 60s) than the dna. 😊

[@AnthonyAcriaradiocomix]

Well, my grandmother was from the town where the women were all gathered together and raped mercilessly by the Spartan invaders, so does that count...?

[@RicardoRoams]

I'm 73 years old. When I was in Jr. Hi our Social Studies teacher gave us an assignment where we were to go home and ask our parents, grandparents, etc. what our ancestral heritage was. My grandmother told me that my grandfather, who I never knew, was descended from Indigenous people somewhere in the mid west. This was the first time I knew anything about this and I was the only student in the class that claimed Native American lineage. We lived in western NY state at the time. As I got older I became more curious. But many of my older family members had died so there wasn't anyone to ask. I never thought I looked Indian, but my brother in law is half Mohawk and you'd never know it to look at him. I decided to do the DNA tests. I tried 3 of the most notable companies. The results were inconclusive. I discovered that when it comes to Native American DNA there is not as much data. Native peoples are very private and reluctant to share their history for such things. Since I was a history major in college, and there was no documentation to support the claims of my grandmother and other relatives, I remain skeptical. I did discover that my grandfather was born somewhere in Michigan. So if the claim is true, he might have come from the Sault Tribe of Ojibwe (Chippewa) Native peoples, the largest group in Michigan. But at this point, I'll probably never know.

[@derlingerardclair6252]

No,I've never heard any mention of any Cherokee ancestry in my family.however,my brother-in-law David is supposed to have some Cherokee ancestry.23&ME seems to confirm this,as it finds that my in-law has some distant Native American ancestry at 0.4% DNA.

[@jojohns1949]

I remember many many years ago north west of New York City in the Rampo mountains There was a race of people called the Jackson Whites They was supposed to be Native Americans and Europeans mix and live in there own community Also in Towanda PA there was a race of people mixed with European and native Americans called themselves Towandapools Those are the only times I ever heard of mixed race native Americans and Europeans Thank you for a great video keep up the great works

[@kingkoopa2334]

Similar story with the haliwas in NC

[@rezsurfer2808]

at 6:35 the run away slaves or freed but still hunted down by state who refused to acknowledge the freedom papers was takin in by the tribes in the south. They was allowed to hide there and live. In time good amount lived with them and stayed to marry. Census never asked nationnality they came to the Reservations and counted people in the homes and said "you are all part of this home and tribal members" took name and that was done. They cared none if you was NOT part of that tribe or a member at all. They cared none to care. They counted got names and that was it.

[@kahlilboi]

Unfortunately you're telling half truths 😂 Indian tribes owned black slaves, you ever heard of the 1842 slave revolt in the Cherokee nation? Where black slaves rose up against their Cherokee masters? The chickasaw Indian slave owner Jackson owned 61 slaves and 20 ran away from him. Another example would be the Jim jumper massacre!

[@EyeOfTheWatcher]

I find it funny there is so much talk about the Cherokee and in some case the Cherokee was not even in the area where the family has the roots at. The place I grew up in is named after one of the specific Native American tribe from that area and it was not the Cherokee. My great grand mother, who was born in 1905, was the only one in the family that specifically stated that we did not have any Native American in our family and turns out she was right as after some research and dna testing we had a white woman in the family that had a relationship with a black man in the 1800s (this is where the straight hair that she and her brothers had came from). My family has a history of living in isolated black communities and some were free way before the civil war.

[@mattpotter8725]

I think the explanation as to why many Americans from the South that may have had a Native American ancestor is that if the story passed down from over a century ago is true then if you think about it in generic genealogical way then one ancestor who say was a great grandparent to someone alive in the 1840s or 50s would have been reasonably distant then and will be much more distant now to the point that even if it does show up on your Ethnicity Estimate then it will at best be very low (and anything around 1% is extremely questionable and can't be trusted) and most likely won't show up at all. I'm English (with quite a bit Irish in me, and some Scottish as well that I think is really Irish, but that's another story) and on MyHeritage it says that I have 1% Inuit ancestry. I think this is extremely improbable since I have no direct North American ancestors of any kind, European emigrants or native so it must be a misread. So I would say unless the % is over 1% or you have paper trail based evidence to just discard these readings until you know otherwise. Now just because you haven't inherited any DNA from a certain ancestor doesn't mean they aren't your ancestor, that is entirely possible, genetic inheritance is a lottery of which genes get passed down when you get the 50% from each parent. Siblings when they get DNA tested have some matches that the other doesn't have (unless they are identical twins) so you can just be unlucky (or lucky as some might see it) not to have gotten certain genes passed down to them. So the story about having Native American DNA could be correct but you just haven't inherited any. Lastly I will say that I think a lot of this Cherokee grandmother is that it is probably quite enticing to some to have this backstory to your family. As with Chinese Whispers (can we still call it that these days, apologies to anyone or that ethnicity who I've offended beforehand) stories and especially their meanings get changed over the generations so what is being told now won't be the original story which may not even have been true back then, as the video suggests. A lot still have been about legitimising themselves to the land they now occupy (more so back in the 1850s, but somewhat today as well), which is ironic as a large number of Southerners don't/didn't want equal rights for those that aren't/weren't of their skin colour and/or social class. Keep doing what you do. I haven't watched all these videos but I think there are a lot of uncomfortable truths in what I've seen that many people will just want not to be spoken about and swept under the carpet because it changes the view they have of what at least used to be their first thinking, perfect country, and to talk about it is anti all that, and anti American, which is ridiculous.

[@mbutterfly4180]

I want to share what I call a sad and traumatic story. To start, I am adopted, so my ethnic story has always been a little complicated. My adopted parents felt it was important for me to know about my identity, which was black on my father's side and white and Cherokee on my mother's side. I won't go into the details of why this was traumatic, but I will say that in my youth, I was so proud of my Native American heritage until it was challenged. I then rejected this part of me, thinking it was just something popular to say in the 70s. However, I was surprised when I read the narrative of my biological white mother. It said her mother was a full-blooded Native American, specifically Cherokee. This left me feeling lost and uncertain about what is true. I am fine with being half white, but if I am also Cherokee, I would like to know. Unfortunately, I cannot contact my biological mother, as she is most likely dead or is so ashamed of me that she will never acknowledge my existence.

[@katt8526]

I’ve never had a Cherokee family story. My family were proud Hunkpapa Lakota Sioux.

[@Thomas_Oklahoma]

Most Cherokees did not support the Confederacy, they were split with some supporting the Union, some supporting the confederacy and some resisted settler colonialism. Yes, a few Hundred Cherokee, which is a tiny minority of Cherokee, owned a few thousand Black Slaves. The majority of Cherokee had nothing to do with mislabeling Afro Indigenous Cherokee, although there were a few in the Cherokee Tribes who did support mislabeling, that was almost entirely the BIA who tried to commit paper genocide on Natives, Afro Indigenous People to reduce treaty money being paid out, but the BIA did support increasing light skin mixed blood enrollment into the Cherokee, Choctaw, Creek, Chickasaw and Seminole citizens to get land or infiltrate these Nations. Back to the slavery, the Five Tribes made reparations to Tribal Freedmen with 2 million acres of land via 1866 Treaty, now should Black People make reparations to Native Tribes for what the Black Conquistadors and Buffalo Soldiers did? Maybe we Natives should point the fingers and generalize too?

[@nytn]

I plan to do a video on the Buffalo soldiers. I think it’s a good topic to cover.

[@Thomas_Oklahoma]

@@nytn It's good to be honest about both the Native slave owners, the Buffalo Soldiers and the Black Conquistadors (slaves of the Spanish to do their dirty duties). We can be honest about all their wrong doings of the past, but we should also be aware that most encounters and associations between Blacks and Natives has been allied ship. Many Native communities of the East and South often sheltered Black Folk or allied with them against settler colonialism (literally assisting them on the Underground Railroad), and several Native and Black American orgs and civil-rights groups sometimes built coalitions to fight institutional racism and support each other's movements. The Black Panthers and American Indian Movement sometimes allied, and some Natives do support both the BLM and reparations movements, and some Blacks support Native American Land Back and Sovereignty.

[@nytn]

I’m planning on doing a video on land back as well. Thank you for taking the time to contribute here!

[@nytn]

@@Thomas_Oklahoma What do you think about the folks who are saying those who we call African Americans are really the indigenous people of America? Always struck me as a grift but I am a person who is willing to be wrong and learn.

[@Thomas_Oklahoma]

@@nytn I would say most content creators/authors such as The Research Guy, Dane Calloway and Clyde Winters on social media are leading the charge to brainwash or pimp on Black American self-hatred and identity crises. They do it for clout, for grifting, for racial supremacy, for uplifting, to compensate inferiority complexes, to gain a foundation in North America and to get at Indigenous funding, treaties or get federal funding directly to their groups. I'd say most of them actually believe what they preach, or atleast try to convince themselves (someone like Tariq Nasheed does it for Grift, for money donations) They have seen some States give some fake white tribes recognition, and the fake aboriginals and such want to mimic. All the self-hate, wishing to be other and identity crises is fueled by Eurocentrism that has historical undermined Black African and Black American history, it's a pseudo response to a pseudo downplay. These 2-3 million pseudo Hoteps, pseudo moors, pseudo hebrews and wannabe copper aboriginals argue with the Pan Africans, proud Black folk and reparationist too.

[@savinghistory642]

I have proof my new to America Scots-Irish ancestor married a Creek woman in Mecklenberg Co. NC after she went there to avoid being relocated out west by Andrew Jackson. They returned to Alabama and founded a county there. Tons of documentation but what does that make me? Just another American girl. DNA shows less than 1% Native American but when I am around NA they always remark on my facial features especially my cheekbones. Even had one guy tell me I looked like his mother when she was younger. Plan to meet some of my Alabama relations when it gets cooler. Am in contact with other descendants of the couple and am excited to see them. Our lineage is just another link in a chain that makes us what we are today. Nothing more,nothing less. You create what you are remembered for yourself.

[@tinyturquoise94]

I have a similar story except exact opposite 😂 my grandpa was always told they where spain spanish which made zero sense to me because we dont look Spanish at all. I got my great aunt a dna test and it came back as 98 percent native american from new mexico. Apprently her parents where enrolled members of the Pueblos until they got married and decided to lie to their children about their ancestry for unknown reasons. The family is back to being enrolled.

[@brandillysmom]

However wild some the comments have gotten, at least people are talking about these issues. I thank you for this KZbin channel…. I have no idea if I or my husband’s family have Cherokee or any other Native American ancestry. My husband’s maternal grandmother was said to be Filipino. His paternal grandfather was said to be white or ashkenazi Jewish. I may take DNA tests, just for curiosity’s sake. Whatever admixture comes up, I identify as Black-American…..

[@LindaKC-w4g]

My grandfather's grandmother was Cherokee. She lived with his grandparents until she died. He said she never spoke a word of English and no she was not a "princess", lol. But she and 2 of her friends married into a large whit family, 3 brothers. This was after the Trail of Tears and my family then and now live in Oklahoma & Texas. There were not enough white women to marry back in those days & Ok. And Texas was pretty rough territory. All of the brothers had big families with their Cherokee brides, 8 to 10 children. They socialized back and forth with both white and Cherokee relatives. My grandfather (her grandson) married an Irish immigrant, my mother's mother. When I was small , age 5-9, my grandfather taught me to ride, hunt, fish and shoot . He would take to to the reservation from time to time and I would play with other kids and eat bread baked in outside adobe ovens. After he got old, those trips stopped, I grew up and of course gravatated to my caucasion family. I never visited the rez, after age 11 anymore. I went to college, married a Caucasian man, became a nurse and had a blond haired son..Both my grandpa and I had jet black hair. When I was born my hair was said to have been about 4 inches long. My son's hair, though fair when he grew up, was very dark brown and about3 inches long at birth. I am 73 yrs old now, but my grandfather influence and trips to the rez when I was little still feel like yesterday. I tell you this only because sometimes where there is smoke, there really is fire. Regards.

[@PHDWhom]

Regardless of dna testing and racist bullshit, if my ancestors recognize me as one of their own, then so am I. Specifically that my ancestors were on the Dawes Rolls, fulfilling Cherokee Nation requirements for tribal and national citizenship.

[@jamescorvus6709]

I loved this video. A lot of context I never knew about. Also I don't know if you heard of the Black Aboriginal or Black Indian community in Black Community? Their beliefs are that We Black Americans are "Indigenous" to the Americas and the Transatlantic Slave Trade never happened or happened in reverse where they took Indigenous Americans to Africa as slaves and the slaves brought here were really Slavic Europeans. Also they say that Native Americans are "fake" and took their identity. Some of these weirdos also say English is an Indigenous American language, that they wrote the constitution and the Civil War didn't happen. Its craziness to the upmost degree. Some of what you talked about may be a historical clue as to how some fall into this problematic beliefs.

[@apgeneticgenealogylover6601]

THese are extreme weirdos. I bet if you asked them how the hell their families got European names or something, they wouldn't have anything to say.

[@daniellenicole1980]

😂😂😂

[@meredithwhite5790]

I am white, mostly Irish. Growing up there were rumors of a native American ancestor on my Mom's side of the family. Her maternal grandmother was from South Carolina. My Dad is really into genealogy and he did find that ancestor, but he also found that her husband was part black (this was pre-civil war). Nobody in my family knew about it. I think that side of my family probably used the native ancestry to cover up the black ancestry and generations later the history was forgotten.

[@blkindians7974]

oh wow

[@SandfordSmythe]

Common

[@judy6371]

I am descended from Cherokee Chief Attakullakulla who married a Natchez woman. He was adopted by Chief Moytoy and eventually became Chief. He was white and originally from Canada. Chief Moytoy's last name was Carpenter. He was sent to North America by King James to organize and help the Cherokee people survive. That was many years ago and the descendants now are a mixture of all races and most were not originally from this country.