Oui Just Say "Eh" - "Yah O.K"

Much has been made about the distinctly Canadian habit of our using the word "eh" to punctuate our sentences. i.e "Great hockey game, eh ?-or "Let's blow this pop stand, eh ?" I'm personally guilty of the excessive use of "ya" in my speech, rather than taking the (much extra) time it takes to say "yes". However , as a genealogist and family historian, it has occured to me that we as a people are not guilty of sloppy English, but are the products of our predominant ethnic heritages. According to the 1971 census, the majority of Canadians were of European descent. More than 44% of the population at that time traced their origins to the British Isles, and 28% were descended from French settlers . Among the European ethnic groups with sizable representation in Canada were Germans.
My own genetic background is comprised of 48% Scottish, 48% German and 2% French Canadian. Why wouldn't I use the expression "yah" (jah) or the word "eh" (aye) ? They are part of my cultural and my linguistic family history. Our McLachlin family spoke Gaelic as late as 1900 in Southern Ontario. My grandmother and her family immigrated to Canada in 1906, and used their German as much as they spoke English . I must admit, I rarely say "oui"- but then again my French ancestor was a great-great grandfather, and he married a German girl , and his daughter married a Scottish guy so by the time I was born the Scots and Germans were the prevalent cultural influence in our family.
So don't make fun of the way I talk, eh . And yah, I'll continue on talking this way to keep in mind my ancestors who said yes to the call to leave behind their homelands and come here to build, and fight for the land we love- Oui ! Canada !

German Ancestors from Eastern Europe

I have known many people, who have grandparents parents and great-grandparents who emmigrated to North America from Eastern Europe in the late 1800's and early 1900's , and as one 3rd cousin put it , "Seem to have forgotten where they came from when the moment they got off the ship". Many of these immigrants remained so closed mouthed about their origins that it gave way to the notion that there must have been something so terrible about their pasts that word could not be uttered about it. As this was the case with one of my sets of great -grandparents , it has been an absolute miracle that I have been able to trace my maternal family line as far back as 1733 !
Just by "googling" one particular surname led me to a fellow who I discover later to be a 6th cousin. This gentleman has actually travelled back to what is now part of the Ukraine at least half a dozen times, and has obtained the birth, death and marriage records for the ENTIRE VILLAGE where my grandmother was born !
These records span over 100 years !
I recommend to anyone searching for ancestors from the Austrio-Hungarian Empire to check out the Eastern European Genealogical Society on the web if they have the same kind of challenges that I had in this area of family research.

The Magic of Your Name

When Mike and I were choosing names for our first child together, I had a leaning toward the name Luke for a boy.But Mike felt very strongly about the name Matthew and although it was not a name in either one of our families I deferred to my husband on the name Matthew. We got our boy and as he grew from baby to toddler I found myself calling him "Matts" "Mattsy" or "Matty" most of the time.
When I started researching my mother's ancestors a few years ago I little to go on as she and her family were pretty tight lipped on my grandmother's background. Grandma's family immigrated from the Austio-Hungarian Empire to Winnipeg in 1906, and it was assumed that they were Polish. I have since learned that they were actually German colonists to the area around Lv'v (which is now in the Ukraine) . When I was able to access the birth , death and marriage records of their little colony of Muenchenthal , I was amazed to find that I have a great -great-great grandfather who was named Matthius, as well as his son Matthius, my great-great grandfather ! His son Johan-my grandmother's father -also named one of his sons Mathius. My mother had told me her uncle's name was "Max".However I found out recently from one of my mother's cousins that his mother called him "Mutsy". Huh ? But of course ! With her German accent, "Mutsy" translated to "Mattsy", the same nickname I had bestowed on my own son !
I'm grateful that I didn't force the issue with my husband and demand my choice of name for our son. I never knew my great grandmother, and have only one picture of her taken when she was elderly. But I feel close to her in a "magical" way when I think of her calling her "Mutsy" to come to the table for dinner !

The Blood of This Ilk Runs Through Me Veins !

SCOTTISH GENEALOGY :
. . . And so ye see, auld Pittoddles, when his third wife dee'd, he got mairrit upon the laird o' Blaithershins' aughteenth dochter, that was sister to Jemima, that was mairrit till Tarn Flumexer, that was first and second cousin to the Pittoddleses, whase brither becam laird efterwards, an' mairrit Blaithershins' Baubie -- an' that way Jemima becam in a kind o' a way her ain niece an' her ain aunty, an', as we used to say, her guid-brither was mairrit to his ain grannie.
-- Book Of Scottish Anecdote : Hislop (quoted in The Scots Book, by Ronald Macdonald Douglas, published in 1995 by Senate / Tiger Books International plc, Twickenham, UK).

Forever Young

Ironic and somewhat amusing is the number of my Scottish female relatives who fibbed about their ages on census records and even their marriage registrations. One great grandmother consistantly reported herself as being born in 1862, when she was clearly recorded in the 1861 census as a two year old. Usually female age fibbers did so in the instance that their husbands were 5 to 15 years younger than themselves, and closer to the age when their ability to produce offspring might come into question. Understandable, when marriage and family was almost the only career option for women until the 20th century. Amusing is the part where , as they grew older , the age gap between them and their younger husbands ususally grew smaller (as in census records) and when they became elderly they often started telling the truth about their birth year.
Ironic is the part where, in my family, the the most blatant and habitual "offenders" were the girls of the Young family !

Our American Cousins

Two hundred years ago the vast majority of immigrants to the New World came from Europe, most from Great Britain, France and Germany. Many of my ancestors first came to Canada, and later relocated to various areas of the U.S. I find it fascinating that over the past century and half , is the difference in the way Canadians and Americans use the English language. For instance, I find quite puzzling and would love to have someone explain to me ,is the phrase I hear all the time on American television :
"I'll FIX you a sandwich" or "Let me FIX you some breakfast" or "I'll FIX lunch".
As far as I know there are two definitions of the word "fix" :

1. To mend something which has broken
2. To fasten something down in order to render it unmoveable

So an American about to PREPARE lunch might be saying that they are going to first repair the broken roast beef sandwich and then nail it to the table so that it does not get away??
Maybe that is where the expression "fast food" really originated !

Does It Pay Good To Be Crazy?

While searching for a relative in the Ontario death records, I noticed a record for an individual who died in the London Asylum for the Insane. In the box where the "occupation of deceased " was noted, it read : "Insane person" !