Kim (Thornton) Reardon

Ancestors

Problems/Questions Profile manager: Kim Reardon [send private message]

Biography

I was born in (private) 1987 in (private) to Jeffrey Lynn Thornton (1955-2012) of Clinton, Missouri and (private). My mother, siblings, and step-father moved to Colorado when I was 8, with the last time seeing my biological father - Jeff - the Christmas before. We had no contact until around 2009, but I refused to speak with him partly because I didn't want to "betray" the man who became my father, and partly because I was angry that he didn't try to contact us more. Then in 2013, I learned that he passed away in September 2012.

I started my genealogical journey around 2014 for my maternal grandmother. She was trying to track down her own biological relatives, and I wanted to help her by utilizing my own love of history and my research skills. Naturally, I drifted to my biological father's side of the family - the side of the family I never knew. Quickly, I learned that I had several uncles and an aunt, several cousins, etc., all whom were eager for contact. Then I started tracking both of my biological father's sides of the family back in the hundreds of year prior.

PATERNAL LINEAGE

Thornton: I hit a brick wall at about my 3x ggf's line. He lived, worked, and died in Albia, IA. Her married Margaret Dyer, whom immigrated from Wales when she was 8. On their marriage record (they married in 1891), he claims he was born in Ashley Falls, MA to a Richard A Thornton and Ann Hennessy. I cannot find any birth records for him in MA. In fact, I cannot find any records of him at all in MA until he's about 19 years old. I searched for his name alongside his parents' names in FamilySearch and census records came up for Prince Edward Island, CAN. After some time trying different routes to disprove my theory, I am now convinced James was in the US illegally from Canada. Until I have evidence to prove otherwise, I have accepted that my 3x ggf was in the US illegally, and is a descendant of the PEI MacDonalds, whom immigrated to PEI from Scotland, whom were lairds in Scotland and fought in Culloden.

Hoffman: My paternal grandmother - Thelma - was born in Camden, NJ in 1922. According to census records, her parents were actually step-siblings. Both sets of her grandparents immigrated from Germany, but I haven't got past that yet.

MATERNAL LINEAGE

Caves: I have been able to trace my Caves line back to ~1799 Tennessee. My 4x ggf was illiterate, but mentioned several times in a court case involving a Cherokee Indian - Pathkiller - and a land dispute.

Schroor (grandma's maiden name): My great-grandfather immigrated to the US in 1920 from The Netherlands. My grandma said that she met her Dutch aunt and uncle a couple of times in the 1960s, though her father passed away in the late 1950s. My ggp Albert was a lion tamer with the Dodge Bros. Amusements. My ggp's were married in the late 1930s/early 1940s in Idaho, and grandma assumes they married so far from OK (Nellie was born in Coweta, OK) because they were traveling with the circus. Grandma has so many pictures of her as a baby with lion cubs. I don't know how Albert got into the circus business, but on his immigration paperwork through Ellis Island, he states that he was going to live with a cousin.

Edwards (grandma's mom's maiden name): I struggled for a time trying to get any information about the Edwards side for my grandma. She actually got me into contract with a cousin of hers who had quite a great deal of information. It was fantastic when I was able to find him on my AncestryDNA match list and I followed his tree back to Clan MacGregor of Scotland (became McGeHee in VA). This is a more recent discovery that I'm trying to verify and research a bit more.

Sources

• First-hand information. Entered by Kimberly Thornton at registration.