Family Pride?

Every Tuesday morning I head to the local Family History Center to volunteer helping other people to discover their “roots”. This week, in particular, I was doing a bit of detective work to find my second cousin’s Barnes family.  Along the way, I found a Barnes family history book which is available digitally on the web.

I should point out here that all families tend to promote the positive qualities of their family members. It’s only natural to want to preserve for posterity the most endearing stories and traits.  For reality sake however, every family has their share of unsavory folk such as murderers and thieves, among other skeletons in the closet. Most would like to keep them in the closet if possible.

The Barnes Family Year Book, published in 1907, has an incredibly complimentary forward.  It is the most collectively aggrandizing and adulatory type of writing I have rarely seen. Wait- was that redundant? Read on:

“It is likely that the name, (Barnes) as transmitted to America, came by representatives of lines extending back many generations in England to a common ancestor.  Here they have borne their share of the adventure and hardships experienced in clearing, and building up a great country, in conquering a savage hoard, and exterminating wild beasts.  Coming early to our eastern shore, they have swept back with each succeeding wave of civilization, foremost in every hazardous expedition requiring nerve and sinew for success.  Foremost in cultivating and making productive the soil, foremost in preparing and protecting homes for the benefit and comfort of their posterity, they have permeated the whole land, have entered into all trades, and have been honored in all professions.  As a family they have been strictly industrious.  They have shunned speculative schemes as detrimental to the well-being of their fellowmen, and have chosen to render honest labor for their livelihood, rather than wring it from the neighbors in mercenary trade.  They have ever been loyal to the spirit of freedom, borne to our New England shores by the Pilgrim ancestors.  Obedient and stubborn soldiers, they have stood upon the field of battle in every hour of peril and sailed on privateers to meet invading foes.  The only places we fail to find the name is on the rolls of the prison and the almshouse.”

Holy Toledo- that is some family!  Single-handedly, it would seem, they colonized a country, and brought it into the 20^th century to be the power we know today. This is little hard to chew for the rest of us who come from pre-revolutionary stock and those of us who don’t.

As I’ve been painting my seemingly never ending 60 feet of shelving (plenty of time to ponder), I’ve come to think about this differently. Genealogists, one of whom wrote this extensive family history, tend to dwell not only in the past, but also into the future.  What if this was not only a statement of fact about the past, but also a wish for future generations?

I teach my children and hold self-expectation about many of these qualities of working hard, making a comfortable place to live and making the world better by treating my fellowman fairly and honestly. Loyalty and patriotism never go out of style. While exterminating wild beasts is strictly politically incorrect, conquering the hoards of individuals in the world who are savage to innocent bystanders is laudable. I’ll bet you know a few at work!  Finally, the goal of family members avoiding imprisonment for illegal activities and being fiscally responsible in this age of overspending and unrivaled debt is definitely something I would want my progeny to strive towards.

While the rest of us non-Barnes’ can’t expect to have such a whistle clean past, we can work towards helping families to have exceptional futures. As I have often counseled my family: “Every generation, a little better” Now that is what I call a great family!