Question of the Week: Is there an occupation that was in your family for generations?

Question

Was there a certain profession or occupation that was in your family for generations?

Tell us about it with an answer below. You can also answer on Facebook or share the question image with friends and family on social media to get them talking. 

Answer 1

Yes, oil field workers. Both of my grandfathers learned the oil well drilling business in Pennsylvania. My paternal grandfather came to Oklahoma in 1909, and he started out working as a pumper. My maternal grandfather came to Drumwright, Oklahoma in 1914, and he worked all the major fields in Oklahoma and Kansas. He had other family members that came, and he also hired all six of my grandmother’s brothers, so that made six grand uncles. 

My uncle Scott MarvIn Jr. followed in his father's footsteps and spent his life drilling in Kansas, Colorado, Nebraska and Wyoming. Growing up, my summer vacations were usually spent where the oil wells were, since my mother had a very close relationship with her brother and his wife. 

Both of my only first cousins were also involved in oil well drilling. Jeffery worked the wells like his father and grandfather, and Carolyn worked for a rig supply company in Wyoming. 

Comments

Alexis:

            Only in Oklahoma.  I particularly like the Pennsylvania connection because it's how the Oklahoma oil industry was built in the early 20th century.

                               Roger

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Roger, I still have a bunch of second cousins in Pennsylvania and Ohio, and I have never seen any of them. I have only gone to Columbus and Philadelphia, but first I will come to see you and the eagle.

Answer 2

My paternal grandfather started a printing business in 1901. My father continued the business and today my brother and I continue the business.

Comments

That is nice, that you are able to keep the business going even today!

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My paternal greatgrandfather was a compositor; his son, my grandfather was a travelling salesman in stationery; my father bought a failing printing company after he was demobbed after WWII, and ran it with the help of his stationer father. I started my apprenticeship there as a letterpress machinist in 1963, switched to litho as it took over, and we finally dissolved the company as computers largely wiped out the stationery industry. When I started I learnt to print in basically the same way as Gutenburg had 500 years earlier, and later, spent several years teaching print apprentices and writing training manuals and qualifying exams for the trade.I loved the industry, and I  fear for its future.

Answer 3

In my maternal grandmother's family, the von Oppens, they were all military officers and, to a lesser extent, civil servants. My great, grandfather Matthias (1873-1924) served in the Prussian Army before entering the Prussian civil service, his father Karl (1824-1895) was a Lieutenant General in the Prussian Army, his grandfather Adolf Friedrich (1762-1834) was a Lieutenant General in the Prussian Army and his twice great grandfather Georg Wilhem (1692-1748) was also in the Prussian Army, That doesn't really capture it because they had lots of sons, all of whom were in the Prussian Army, and lots of in-law, all of whom were in the Prussian Army.

I have told my wife over the years that the reason that her family left Germany in the mid-nineteenth century was to get away from mine.

Comments

Roger, I am so impressed with your wonderful photos and how much you know about your family. I especially like the uniforms and how distinguished the men look.

That is so funny about your wife’s family and your family.

Answer 4

Easy one: farmer, farmer, farmer....

Some of my family left the mountains of North Carolina for jobs in the textile mills around Gastonia. I was a fourth generation linthead (and proud of it).

Lumbering seemed to run in one particular family. Some branches of this family immigrated out west (Washington, Oregon, Idaho) for lumbering jobs.

Comments

A linthead is a textile worker? I've never heard that term before.

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Yep, because we'd walk out of the mill with lint in our hair. In other textile industries this is not a problem. I worked in the spinning and winding rooms; lint floating around everywhere. Technically, a disease long-term textile workers can get is called Byssinosis. We called it brown lung disease. I, however, didn't work long enough to get that, but both my dad and grandfather had the effects of it.

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I had 19 years in the textile printing business, mostly synthetic fabrics, so the lint wasn't as severe as in the cotton mills, but it was still a constant.  Controlling static electricity was a constant concern, with synthetic fabrics running through machines.  Catching an arc could be a hair raising and painful experience.  The plant was festooned with copper static tinsel.

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Mark, at least they had a air hose for us to use after work!

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Until OSHA came around.

Answer 5

My GGF John C. Pomeroy was involved in a few businesses in northern Mi. He became involved in several local enterprises one of which was a Soda company; The Pomeroy Bottling Works. There were three generations employed there (that I'm aware of).

Answer 6

Both my paternal and maternal ancestors were farmers from way back in the 1600-1700's all the way down through my grandparents on both sides. Did I say Southern? That is what southerners did along with a bit of lumber work thrown in along the way. And, there were a few ministers but they were also farmers.

Comments

Ginny, we've got to be closer related than WikiTree says. Your family sounds like mine.

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I have wondered what we are missing in some unconnected ancestors. How can two southerners not be related??

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Not limited just to the south, I'm from Atlantic Canada, and that's my tree. Farmers and logging and forestry.

Answer 7

Fishermen. So, so many fishermen.

Also a number of Halifax (Nova Scotia) harbour pilots.

Comments

I have a lot of connections from Vlaardingen in the Netherlands, which was port for herring fishing. Often, in the birth records, it says the father wasn't able to register in person, since he was away at sea, and so a midwife or somebody would do it. Early deaths at sea weren't unusual, although they'd often manage to have about 10 kids by the age of 35, with many dying in infancy.

Answer 8

I have shoemakers, gardeners and agricultural labourers in my tree.

Labouring of some kind or domestic service were the norms in my English working class family.

Answer 9

Lawyering for at least four generations and perhaps one in college coming on board.

Answer 10

My third great grandfather Påhl Johan Boström was the son of a master tanner, and studied to become a pastor and teacher.

 He had 10 children, and one of them, Henrik Boström became a pastor too.

He in turn had six children of which 4 sons became pastors too.

But more commonly in my family there are lines of farmers and farm workers. Also thrown in, fishermen, teachers, mineworkers, soldiers, lawyers, restaurant and hotel people etc etc.

Answer 11

Up until the last part of the 1800s, when I found G Grandfather Hogan , a sailor who jumped ship and became a fireman, I swear virtually every one was a farmer.

Answer 12

Yes, 8 generations of metal workers from William Richards, a nailer born 1625,  to Samuel Richards born 1866 died 1902 a salesman for the family metal working business and his nephew William Henry Richards born 1890 died 1967, who was the chairman of Richards and Sons bolt and nut manufacturers.

In 1970 they were the biggest privately owned nut and bolt manufacturers world wide.

Answer 13

Yes! Coachbuilders! My maternal 4th great grandfather John Hutton started the coachbuilding business in 1779 aged 22. His sons joined the company and it was called John hutton and sons until Henry ford offered to buy them out in 1920 i believe, they refused, and went out of business in 1925, a number of generations later. My 3rd grt grandfather Thomas Hutton born 1788 took over from his father and built the queens irish state coach she uses to go to parliament in, then my 2nd grt grandfather Thomas Maxwell Hutton born 1821 took over. He died in 1896 and then one of his sons took over until 1925.

Answer 14

Farmers. Lots and lots of farmers and one lone wheelwright.

Answer 15

There were two or three generations of clockmakers who were part of a guild in Germany long, long ago (which explains why I learned to precisely count seconds without a watch or a clock. I counted aloud and watched second hands on watches and clocks for fun when I was a kid — no pun intended, but I've found it... handy).

Another possible one is barrel maker/repairer. Why? The last name of Cooper!

Lastly, it's possible that Smittle came from a line of smithies. This is inconlusive, however.

Comments

My Schwenningen ancestor, Johannes Schlenker, was an uhrenmacher (watch or clock maker). https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Schlenker-218.  His son, Jacob, became a blacksmith in Scarboro, Ontario.

Answer 16

While there are a great many farmers among my ancestors, my recent family boasts many teachers.  My dad and two of his three sisters, one of their husbands, dad's grandmother and her brother, and my mom were all teachers, not to mention my brother and two of his daughters.

Comments

Thank you, Brian, for the star.

Answer 17

As I discover my ancestors, I am finding many ministers! Since I'm a minister too, it pleases me to see where I might have gotten some of my passion for the ministry!

Answer 18

Farmer, farmer, farmer, farmer. Both of my parents were the first generation that moved off the farm.

My great grandfather George Sands did diverge a bit after his oldest son became old enough to run the farm, and went to work at the Auburn and Sing Sing prisons. His obituary described him as "a man of strong personality". Both prisons followed the Auburn system.

Answer 19

Coal Miners for the most part. And then a handful of farmers. My grandpa died only a short drive away from the same coal camp he was born and raised in.

Answer 20

My parental side were coal miners or in the coal business in Scotland, PA and Iowa.

Comments

Coal Miners on both sides of my families, Ayrshire and Durham.  I was raised in a mining town where my father was an underground miner.   My parents met in a coal mining here in Canada where they had both emigrated with families to work in the mines.    Mutual cultures back hundreds of year's.