Amateur Historians & Family Trees

I have a confession to make. All my friends know me to be an avid supporter of public broadcasting, however, what they may not know is that I recently began a love affair with two PBS shows: Antiques Roadshow & History Detectives. I love it when the woman with spiky hair and thick rim glasses uncovers a dark secret of congressional proportions simply by researching the origins and curious intersections of antebellum coinage and Nordic royalty... Intriguing eh? Recent episodes of this show plus a timely visit by my paternal uncle, have inspired me to do some family-history sleuthing myself. I've learned some fascinating stuff:

[the following revelations were inspired by a family photo taken in 1954]

1. I can now trace my paternal line back to the mid 1700s!
2. Turns out that my oldest known great^nth power grandfather was an important revenue collector of a medium sized kingdom.
3. My great-grandfather died in 1901 of the plague during the bubonic plague of the late 19th and early 20th, century, also known as the Third Pandemic.
4. Aforesaid great-grandfather died around his son's (my grandfather) 1st birthday.

The last fact is rather exciting to me, because it suggests that I may not exist today had my great grandfather died around 1899 or earlier. Of course, my excitement presupposes that I'm not a determinist and that I believe in free will. Free will? Now there's a silly thought!

Do you like either Antiques Roadshow or History Detectives? Are you interested in tracing your family roots? I'd love to hear specific or intentionally vague details about where YOUR ancestors hail from.*

*So long as you don't write that you're 1/32nd native american or that Wyatt Earp is your direct maternal ancestor.