Happy St. Patrick's Day! These are my great-grandparents Thomas Keys Foster, born in County Tyrone on September 5, 1852 and Eliza Ann Job, born in Fintona, County Tyrone on August 18, 1852. Thomas came to Canada in 1876 to join his older brother, George, on his farm near London, Ontario, Canada. Eliza came the following year and worked on the same farm. Thomas and Eliza decided to move out west where they got married in 1882 in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada.
The couple obtained a land grant near Salcoats, Saskatchewan, a few miles south of Yorkton, where they build a sod house and later on a wood frame house that they named "Fairview" after a hill in Ireland overlooking the house where Eliza was born. That's where my grandmother, Ella, was born.
Other ancestors in this line came from the nearby counties of Donegal (surname Foster) and Fermanagh (surnames Keys, Emerson, Moore) and possibly Londonderry (surname Job).
One of the cool things about studying your genealogy is that you can find connections to almost everyone. This means you can celebrate dozens of special days. In my case it was easy to find other ancestors from England, Scotland, Netherlands, Germany, France, Spain, Poland, Lithuania, Belgium, Ukraine, Russia, and the United States. Today, we will be celebrating St. Patrick's Day. It's rather hectic keeping up with all the national holidays but somebody has to keep the traditions alive!
It's nice to have an excuse to celebrate, especially when it means you can drink beer. However, I would be remiss if I didn't mention one little (tiny, actually) problem. Since my maternal grandmother is pure Irish, I should be 25% Irish but my DNA results indicate that I'm only 8% Irish. That's probably because my Irish ancestors were Anglicans and were undoubtedly the descendants of settlers from England, Wales, and Scotland who moved to Ireland in the 1600s. This explains why they don't have very Irish-sounding names.
I don't mention this when I'm in an Irish pub. Instead, I focus on my mother's maiden name, which was Doherty, and her ancestors on her father's side who were O'Doughertys. The O'Doughertys were a prominent Irish clan from Donegal and they were fierce enemies of the English invaders. Unfortunately, my ancestor was Donald O'Dougherty (1760 - 1810) who came to Canada in 1803 from the Isle of Skye in Scotland where his family had been for several generatons after fleeing Ireland in the 1600s. His wife was Anne Stewart and she wasn't Irish.
I don't mention that part either.
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