This portion of the history presents genealogical facts of known members of Nick’s and Joan’s ancestors. We trace their lineage through “direct descent” to ancestors in their patrilineal family groups. Direct descent tracing means that we start with Nick and Joan and go back in time, verifying blood relations, from child to parent through as many generations as possible to specific ancestors. In this history we do not trace “indirect lineage” to great-aunts, great-uncles, and cousins. However, we include some indirect-descent ancestors in important cases, or in cases that better illuminate the family story.
Our approach in identifying and presenting family groups, by their generations and individual members, is through the genealogical writing convention known as Register Style . Register style is one of the most widely used genealogical writing styles, in use since 1870. It was formulated by editors of The New England Historical and Genealogical Society (NEHGS), as a way to present vital statistics and biographical data for family history purposes.
Through Register Style format we present eight family groups that Joan descended from, and six family groups Nick descended from. All their family members (siblings, parents, grand-parents) and ancestors who were first or later generation Americans fall into these 14 family groups.
These family groups are best identified by patrilineal surnames. Joan ‘s ancestral family surnames on her father’s side, going back to the first generation of immigrants are: Cribben, Ryder, Kernan and Donahue. Her respective first generation ancestral family surnames on her mother’s side are Gillespie, Sennett, Riley and Walsh. Nick’s ancestral family surnames on his father’s side, going back to the first generation of immigrants are: Georgatsos, and Velisari. His respective ancestral family surnames on his mother’s side are: Kehres, Scherer, Petry and Backes. The Backes family is listed here last, in reverse-chronological order for good reason.
Notably, the Peter Backes family was the first of Nick’s and Joan’s ancestral families to emigrate to America. The eight members of the Peter Backes family emigrated from their home in Weiskirchen, Merzig, Saarland, Germany and arrived in Wisconsin in the spring of 1842. This was six years after Wisconsin was designated a territory, and six years before it gained statehood.