In 1995, a reunion was held in Winter Park, Colorado, for the descendants of John William McGee and Mary Elizabeth Parr. John and Mary had five children, and John was adamant that his children provide him with 25 grandchildren. To everyone’s amazement, there were precisely 25 grandchildren. Sadly, we lost two of them to breast cancer.
Reunion History
The first reunion was held in Colorado by the Colorado branch. The second reunion took place in 2001, and the same branch hosted it. In 2004, the third reunion was hosted by the Washington branch at Fort Worden in Washington. It is worth noting that the only member residing in Nebraska, Mary, hosted the 2013 reunion at North Platte. The first reunion after COVID-19 was hosted by the Florida branch in June 2023 at Black Mountain, North Carolina.
Although the five children of John and Mary were born and raised in Omaha, Nebraska, they all scattered across the country, and then the next generation did the same. Without these reunions, we would not have the connections and comfort of being together.
1995 all five siblings and their spouses were alive, but by 2023, only my mother survived.
The people of my generation suddenly appeared older, while those of the younger generations resembled us in 1995.
Talents and Interests
Keiera brought a puzzle, and that was a great draw for all ages. Piece by piece, it went together and was completed before the end of the reunion. So many of us regularly do puzzles of all kinds.
I noticed that we had a lot of engineers, accountants, teachers, chefs, artists, musicians, and entrepreneurs through all the generations. No one followed Grandpa into medical school, but we do have a Dan in Dental school.
I noticed that throughout the generations, we’ve had many professionals, such as engineers, accountants, teachers, chefs, artists, musicians, and entrepreneurs. Although no one followed Grandpa into medical school, we have Dan in dental school.
History Presentations at Reunion
At the reunion, some of my cousins shared a collection of documents and pictures they had gathered over time. Among them, two items caught my attention. The first formally recognized Dr. John McGee’s valuable and unpaid support to WWII by providing physicals for drafted soldiers. The second was a letter from Mary Parr McGee to one of her sons, where she referred to me as “baby Elizabeth”. Although that was the name on my birth certificate, it was a shock, as I was always called Liz or Lizzie, and I don’t recall anyone else using Elizabeth except for a teacher.
I presented a family history overview to new generations and with some new information collected over the years. Terry created a video history of the past reunions and showed that.
Due to my health issues, I ran out of energy before all the questions were answered thoroughly, so here are more complete answers.
Margaret
Margaret was the primary caretaker of her two youngest siblings for ten years, from nine until she married at nineteen. It remains a mystery why Mary Parr McGee compelled her nine-year-old daughter Margaret to care for her younger siblings from birth. When asked, Margaret didn’t have a clear answer, and she said that every time she tried to bring up the topic, her mother would start crying.
Slave Auctions
See https://explorewithliz.com/when-people-were-property-auctions-in-america/
Nigerian DNA?
For many years, my “ethnicity estimate” on multiple DNA sites has a 1% attributed to Nigeria. Lately the DNA websites are tuning their estimates and assessing which parent provided the DNA.
But my Mom also has 1% and that same 1% is now attributed to her mom. So what does that mean? This is not the simple version of DNA inheritance where it is assumed that you get a proportional amount of DNA from each of your ancestor. Click here to see Roberta Estes’s detailed explanation about inheritance.
In the simple version, if I inherited 1% from Mom, then she should have inherited 2% from her mom, and it keeps doubling up until you find the generation from Nigeria. Based on what we do know a full-Nigerian ancestor is at least 7 generations back and before any of our ancestors came to America.
