Descendant or not?

[brumer]

At an upcoming huge family reunion we are going to handout medallions to descendants.

Each medallion will be engraved with the descendants NAME & TNG ID No.

There has been 'some' suggest that the partner of the 'blood' descendant should (could?) be entitled to receive one as well.

What is your opinion?

Do you think deceased person's medallions should be also released?

Do you think it OK if several for the same person should (could?) be available? (Grandfather's?)

I can see where someone might want a medallion for each ancestor in their tree whether dead or alive to create a 'set'.

[cressie]

Hi Brumer

At an upcoming huge family reunion we are going to handout medallions to descendants.

Each medallion will be engraved with the descendants NAME & TNG ID No.

There has been 'some' suggest that the partner of the 'blood' descendant should (could?) be entitled to receive one as well.

What is your opinion?

If there are children to the relationship then I always include the partner, otherwise no. The only exception is where the partner's prior children have been adopted into the family.

My eldest son lived with a girl for six years and was very upset that I would not include her in the family tree or family tree photo display. I said, "Have a child or marry her then she is part of the family"! He married her and now I have two great granddaughters!!

Regards

Allan

Western Australia

[brumer]

BUT!!!

The real question is whether the 'partner", regardless of marriage or not is regarded as a descendant?

The person in fact does not have any family "blood" in them and as such, surely shouldn't be classed as a direct descendant?

[theKiwi]

BUT!!!

The real question is whether the 'partner", regardless of marriage or not is regarded as a descendant?

Of course they are not a descendant.

The person in fact does not have any family "blood" in them and as such, surely shouldn't be classed as a direct descendant?

This would be entirely correct.

[arnold]

IMHO, I think that "gene" in the word genealogy is important. We have lost sight of this little factoid.

No blood = no genes = no descendant. Q.E.D.

Please, no flames in response.

[wvoigt]

At an upcoming huge family reunion we are going to handout medallions to descendants.

I guess I would question the premise of this. What was the real intent? If it truly was to be pure blood lines, then spouses are not descendants.

However, if you want to recognize descendant families, then you must include spouses. From past experience, you will have some angry spouses if it is felt they are not included. If someone is married into the family for 40 or 50 years, they feel like it is their family too.

What are the goals/reasons for doing this? Is this truly for blood line "Genealogy" or more for "Family History". And remember that those spouses sometimes hold key family information -- not someone you want to excluded. They are on the tree as well (even if only to give 1/2 the genes to the next generation.)

And if the wording on the medallion is the problem, perhaps add the word "spouse" or something similar before or after the name.

- Wendel

[xray]

I too just returned from a large family reunion and we never consider those that marry into the family as descendants. Considering the genealogy, they are not descendants, but if there is issue, they are ancestors.

However, you most certainly don't want to exclude them from the family. At our family reunions we recognize them as the outlaws. (It's a cute and fun term.) They're the in-laws but are considered outsiders as a descendant, hence outlaw. If this were our family, we wouldn't issue them medals and call them descendants, but we'd issue them completely different medals (they do deserve some sort of family recognition). Actually, we had an Outlaw Cookbook whereby all the outlaws contributed various favorite recipes. We also had a special award (for a particular Outlaw who did much of the reunion planning this year) with a tag that said 'every tree has its sap' hee! (Although if your family is not close knit with a good sense of humor I wouldn't recommend that particular phrase.)

Thus, I recommend you honor them albeit in a different way. They are not descendants but are part of the family tree.

p.s. regarding the deceased, if they have a spouse/sibling still living, present the medallion to them but consider how many generations to go back.

[theKiwi]

owever, you most certainly don't want to exclude them from the family. At our family reunions we recognize them as the outlaws.

In my wife's family here in the USA, the inlaws of the inlaws call themselves the Outlaws - ie my wife's cousin's wife and I are Outlaws )

And I have a tee shirt that says:

"What's the difference between Inlaws and Outlaws?"

"Outlaws are Wanted!"

Cheers

Roger

[Russellgs]

BUT!!!

The real question is whether the 'partner", regardless of marriage or not is regarded as a descendant?

The person in fact does not have any family "blood" in them and as such, surely shouldn't be classed as a direct descendant?

I agree, the medal should go to the direct descendant.

as far as the other two questions number 2 is yes only if number 3 is the reason "to complete a set".

russ

[brumer]

Thankyou everyone for participating in this Poll.

Your opinions have been very open & welcome.

[JustTheFax]

At an upcoming huge family reunion we are going to handout medallions to descendants.

Each medallion will be engraved with the descendants NAME & TNG ID No.

There has been 'some' suggest that the partner of the 'blood' descendant should (could?) be entitled to receive one as well.

What is your opinion?

Do you think deceased person's medallions should be also released?

Do you think it OK if several for the same person should (could?) be available? (Grandfather's?)

I can see where someone might want a medallion for each ancestor in their tree whether dead or alive to create a 'set'.

You may consider having medallions for the non-descendants too. Maybe one color for the blood line and another for the ones who choose the family.

Maybe all the people could have a copy of the Medallion for the progenitor, and allow descendants to have a copy of the Medallion for any of their ancestors.

Maybe use RED for Blood Line & BLUE for the spouces.

A reunion is a time for people to join together not be seperated.