Roots of Cypress: An Afro-Diasporic Familial Tapestry

Family histories can be very complex and shrouded in a lot of mystery and conflicting information. Some family origin stories are embellished or misheard or misremembered. Some are purposely rewritten for one reason or another. We know how common it is for people to falsely claim indigenous American heritage, this happened in my family as well; despite having apparently some kind of genetic relationship with indigenous Americans, I have no well documented evidence of any indigenous North American ancestry and if I do have any, it was likely through some of the free people of color that I descend from.  One of the most intriguing journeys I've been on with my genealogical research is my paternal grandmother's family, particularly her biological father's family. As discussed in previous post, my grandmother Victoria was the daughter of Lawrence Santos Jr , a man of Cape Verdean and allegedly Afro-Puerto Rican descent. When I began doing my genealogical research a few years ag...

This post was originally meant to be created little over a month ago but it's still topical given my previous post. The title of this article is Cape Verdean Creole for "Heritage of a Creole" and it's directly related to today's topic. Today I'll be writing about my great great grandfather Lourenço dos Santos, aka Lawrence Santos Sr. and my ongoing journey to understand him and my family history. Lourenço  dos Santos (Lawrence Santos Sr.), ca. 1930s There's a few things that we can attribute to Lourenço with certainty:  - he was born on the island of Fogo in Cabo Verde - he immigrated to the United States and married Myrtle Boston in 1923 and settled in Philadelphia - he died at some point in the mid to late 1940s. All other information is unconfirmed and I am actively in the process of researching. The information I provide in this post could be incorrect but it possibly aligns with my family history.  Some of the oral history I was relayed to...

Today in 1904, one of the most contentious members of my family tree was born. She would also be wedded on this day in 1923. That person is one of my paternal great great grandmothers, Myrtle Santos, nee Boston.  Myrtle Boston (1904-1977), ca 1940s                                    Myrtle's life is a classic example of the clash between family lore, documentation and genetic testing. What I know for certain that Myrtle was the mother of my paternal great grandfather, Lawrence Santos Jr . Everything else is contested. I'll start this post off with the lore I was given to by my relatives that I reconnected with. According to my aunt and cousins, my great grandfather described our family history as such: Myrtle Boston was an Afro-Puerto Rican either born in Santurce, Puerto Rico herself or her father originated from there. Her family somehow got to the US and assimilated into African-Amer...