Lutovsky Project

  Summing Things Up...By the Numbers It's truly mind boggling how many ancestors we each have, and how quickly the quantity multiplies of our 2nd Great Grandparents, 3rd Great Grandparents, 4th Great Grandparents, and so on. I hadn't really thought much about it or paid much attention until I started working on discovering family history. I have no doubt that everyone is aware that they have 4 Gr andparents and 8 Great Grandparents, but above that, I don't think many people have given it much thought...and I hadn't either. The numbers multiply crazy quickly once we do the math. With each generation, the number of Great Grandparents doubles. Since we all have 8 Great Grandparents, that means we all have sixteen 2nd Great Grandparents, and thirty-two 3rd Great Grandparents, and so on...and I'll make a chart... So this means my 10th Great Grandparents are 13 generations before me...since I'm also adding me, my Parents and my Grandparents' generations to the mi...

Understanding the Czech Farm and our Farming Roots - You are What you Own One thing is for certain, we are descendants from at least 300+ years of farmers. I have records of ancestors dating back to around the very late 1600's/very early 1700's, and so far nearly everyone is a farmer...or should I say a peasant? Portrait of a Czech Peasant - Hans Tschelan Originally there was nothing derogatory about the word peasant. It originated from an old French word in the 1400's which was "paisant," which meant countryman, or one who lived in the "pagus," which was a Latin word for an outlying administrative district, or rural areas. Latin definitely had an influence, since Bohemia was an Imperial State of the Holy Roman Empire until its dissolution in 1806. Over the years the semantics of th e word peasant obviously has changed into something derogatory, but still back in the 1700's and 1800's, peasant could be interchanged with farmer. Most of the people...

  What are we? Czech or Polish? For most my life I have heard stories that we are actually Polish, or we might be Polish. I've also heard stories that the first Lutovskys actually spelled their name Lutovski because originally the family surname was of Polish origin even though the family lived in Bohemia. I've also heard that two Polish brothers fled Poland and changed the spelling of their name to Lutovsky with a "y" to blend in with the Czech people. There was another story which had something about two Polish princes fleeing Poland...now this one I could totally relate to being a person who identifies as royalty. I've spent my entire life in a state of bewilderment trying to figure out why the hell I have to work for a living and wash my own clothing...and why none of my servants have ever showed up for work? OK, back on track now....Well, whatever the story, they are all a bunch of nonsense. One thing about DNA is it does not lie. I have done a couple DNA tes...

  T he Etymology of a Name and Debunking Myths In the English language, we take the name of a city and turn it into an adjective by adding a suffix to the name. This is also known as a "Demonym," which is a word used to denote a person who inhabits or is native to a particular place. For example: Las Vegas. I live in Las Vegas, therefore I am a Las Vegan. By adding the suffix "an" to the end of the name of Las Vegas, it is now an adjective I can use to describe myself which explains where I live...or where I come from. We also have other suffixes that do the same thing. Some cities we add an "er" to the end of the city's name, such as Portland, and the people who live in or come from Portland are Portlanders. Or we can add the suffix "ite," such as Seattleite, to refer to someone who lives in or is from Seattle. In the Czech language the exact same suffix structure exists, except instead of using "an" or "er" or "ite,...

The First Arrival in America I was surprised to find out that when John Lutovsky emigrated to the US in 1891 that he wasn't the first to arrive here. The woman who was soon (and I do literally mean soon, which I will explain below) to become his wife, Katerina Broz (which is actually Brozova, but I will explain that in another post), was actually the first ancestor to arrive to the new country. Katerina, who Americanized the spelling of her name as well to Katherine or Catherine. The spelling changes often between being spelled with a "K" or a "C," with a few Katherina's thrown in as well as Kate and Katie...and on a side note, the fluidity of names is another topic I will be covering, because for me, who is trying to piece together the past, the changing of names as often as the wind changes direction, seems to have been very common back then...but more on that later. Katherine Lutovsky 1868 - 1930 Katherine arrived in the US in 1888, and unfortunately, she...

Arrival in America. One of the first things I wanted to discover is exactly when did the first Lutovsky ancestor(s) arrive in the US? This actually took a bit of time because the first arrivals unfortunately didn't come through Ellis Island. The record keeping there was amazing, and records are easily accessible on-line, but there were other ports from which immigrants could enter the country. Baltimore was an alternative to Ellis Island, which is a bit of a mess paperwork wise, and unfortunately, that's where our ancestors arrived. It doesn't appear that Baltimore was that organized at record keeping...or, if there even were records created, so I have never been able to locate any of the arrival paperwork. John Lutovsky 1863 - 1959 However, even without those documents I was able to find other documents which answer the question...when did they arrive? Below is the Declaration of Intent to become a US citizen from 1894, of the patriarch of the Lutovsky clan, Jan (pronounce...

This is such a great photo documenting the beginning of the Lutovsky clan in America. So, who are these people? This is Jan (John) Lutovsky and Katerina (Katherine) Broz Lutovsky, who are the two who emigrated from Bohemia in 1891 and 1888. Their 15 children can be considered as "Generation 0," by all of us who are descendants of the people in this photo, since all 15 of them were born in the USA. There will be more about John & Katherine and their family in upcoming posts. I don't know exactly when this photo was taken, but most likely it was in 1917 given two factors. #1: Rudy (born February 1915) was the last child born, and he looks to be about 2 years old or so in this photo. #2: Charles is in the photo and he had fought in WWI. His enlistment date was May 27th 1918, so this photo was obviously taken prior to then. I labeled everyone in the photo so we would all have a little familiarity of who is who as I go on to talk about our ancestors. The labeling of this p...