The occupations of your ancestors? (Indian, find, blood, grandmother)

[Trimac20]

I can only really speak about my recent 'ancestors', which I guess includes my parents lol. My father was an accountant but hasn't practised for years. Since then he's just involved in a few different ventures like writing a novel and property investment. My mother is a doctor.

My dad's dad was actually the local manager of Volvo, his mum, I think was a housewife but weirdly enough I haven't actually asked him if she did anything else. She probably did. My paternal grandfather was an orphan and was raised pretty poor while my grandmother, who sadly I never met, came from a pretty wealthy family.

My mum's parents were solidly 'working class'. Her father was a bus driver and mum raised 10 kids, but, before that in the earlier years did whatever she could to make money. That included doing domestic chores for richer families, selling things, chopping wood, collecting cockles at the seashore. Mum had to work her way to become a doctor. My aunties are mostly teachers or nurses, I have an uncle who owns a hardware store while one is pretty wealthy.

I think going back then most of my ancestors were peasant farmers. Apparently some were peanut farmers, which is pretty cool. While I live a comfortable middle class existence I guess I'm glad they were 'salt of the earth' type people, not that I think people are better because of their 'class.' I myself am pretty lazy, so I can imagine what kind of lives they had. My mum's mum was really hard working, mum said she always woke up about 6 am every day, that she never woke up after the children and even when she was sick worked as normal. My maternal grandfather seemed a sort of melancholy character; he was a bus driver all his working life but he didn't seem very happy. He chain-smoked and fought a lot with my grandmother. He died recently, and I regret never really getting to know him. He was always silent and didn't seem very aware of his surroundings. In later years I think he developed Alzheimer's.

[Cali BassMan]

Poor Missouri Dirt farmers on both sides

[suzy_q2010]

Dad blue collar, mom stayed at home.

Further back, lots of farmers, a few merchants, a rare doctor, and at least one notable artisan, a silversmith.

[Mightyqueen801]

My father was an electrician until he lost the lower portion of both his legs in WWII. He went back to school and became an electrical engineer. His father worked for the railroad most of his life, but before that, he worked in the silk mills in Paterson, NJ, where he met my grandmother who also worked in the silk mills. We know that my grandfather's grandfather came to the US in 1863 to work in the silk mills when the English cotton mills shut down because of the Yankee blockade preventing southern cotton from getting to England.

My maternal grandfather was a plumber. There are carpenters in the family, but going further back, most were farmers on the Dutch side. They came to the US because land in the Netherlands was scarce and had to be reclaimed from the ocean, and there was very fertile farmland to be had in New Jersey. One Dutch ancestor that we know of worked in some kind of factory. His wife and children came to the US six months before he did because he was serving jail time for assaulting a coworker at a factory.

[bjh]

Here is the thread on that topic.

[CAVA1990]

My paternal great grandfather was a cowboy and he was actually listed as such on the 1900 census form. He promoted himself to "rancher" on the 1910 edition.

[diogenes2]

Originally Posted by Mightyqueen801

My father was an electrician until he lost the lower portion of both his legs in WWII. He went back to school and became an electrical engineer. His father worked for the railroad most of his life, but before that, he worked in the silk mills in Paterson, NJ, where he met my grandmother who also worked in the silk mills. We know that my grandfather's grandfather came to the US in 1863 to work in the silk mills when the English cotton mills shut down because of the Yankee blockade preventing southern cotton from getting to England.

My maternal grandfather was a plumber. There are carpenters in the family, but going further back, most were farmers on the Dutch side. They came to the US because land in the Netherlands was scarce and had to be reclaimed from the ocean, and there was very fertile farmland to be had in New Jersey. One Dutch ancestor that we know of worked in some kind of factory. His wife and children came to the US six months before he did because he was serving jail time for assaulting a coworker at a factory.

Mightyqueen,

Your mention of your grandfather working in silk mills in Paterson, NJ, caught my attention. My English grandfather worked in the Paterson silk mills as well. Like many English who arrived in the U.S. from Lancashire he followed the textile trade all his life, starting out in Fall River, Mass. Later, he worked in several locations in Pennsylvania and New York State. My father also followed the weaving trade.

My wife's grandmother worked in the the textile mills in Lancashire before emigrating to Massachusetts. It seems that weaving was an itinerate trade in those days, dependent on the vagaries of the economy.
About 25 years ago we visited Blackburn and other mill towns of Lancashire that I believe inspired Charles Dickens to write his book Hard Times.

[sherrenee]

My Dad (who only has a 3rd grade education) did blue collar work in a variety of forms. He started working when he was 5 years old vaccinating chickens he later moved on to a variety of construction jobs to finally end up running heavy equipment (Front End Loader and Bulldozer) for a logging company until he got hurt at work and became disabled.

My Mom is a CNA (been doing it for about 40 years)

My grandparents on my Dad's side also did a variety of blue collar/farming work as did their parents.

My grandparents on my Mom's side did the same (blue collar/farming) and my maternal great grandparents were Full Blooded Cherokee and lived on the Indian Reservation.

I guess the number of blue collar/farmers in my family explains my now avid support of people of both professions.

[Bette]

Maternal grandfather - owner of hardware store, pharmacy (Canada)
Maternal grandmother - homemaker

*Paternal grandfather - Worked for RH Donnelly, then started his own direct mail business in his late 50's and had it over 25 years (my dad took it over)

Paternal grandmother - homemaker

*Father - Owner/manager - country club, restaurants
***Mother - Homemaker

I did hear something that one of their (father's side) was a minister in Scotland. Unfortunately, I don't know anything further back but now I want to find out!

*College graduate
***College graduate, 2 MBA's

[SCGranny]

My father was a flight mechanic (made staff segeant three times!) and went on to be a locally (statewide) famous radio/news personality. He was one of the first 'talk show hosts' in the state, with guests like Louis L'Amour, Senator Strom Thurmond, and Julie Newmar. Mother was a shipping/procurement clerk on the Navy base. Maternal ancestors were coal miners and farmers, paternal were cops and rabble rousers (Irish, what else?). We did have one ancestor who was a Court Physician to King George; and somehow (through a convoluted path of cousins!) we are distantly related to Katherine Hepburn and a minor French duke. Our 'famous' ancestor was the youngest son of a shipbuilder; who, when his older brothers inherited, burned down the shipyard and fled to America with the insurance money. Some of us were upstanding citizens, and some... were not! It's fun to follow the trails...