Valencia Ellis

Prof. Presnell
Engl. 1103
28 Oct. 2014
Why Cant I Trace My Grandfather?
Grandfather Who?
The day my mother first spoke to me about my grandfather will forever be engraved into
my mind. Before that moment, I never really noticed that I didnt have a grandfather in my life. I
never cared to even ask because it never came up. When I was about 7 years old, I remember
overhearing my mother having a casual conversation on the phone with one of her friends in the
living room. I dont recall what the conversation was about in its entirety, however, somewhere
in that conversation I heard her say My dad. Hearing that phrase coming from my mother
stunned me because I never heard her say a word about this dad person.
I felt obligated to question that detail of her conversation because it sparked my interest,
but I had to find a way to do so without making it clear that I was listening to her
conversation. Are you on the phone with grandpa? I asked. Tell him I said hey! I
continued. My mother burst into laughter and told her friend that shed call them back. I was on
to something. She pressed on to tell me that she doesnt know her father because he died when
she was 3 years old. For a moment, although my mother did not get emotional, my heart began to
ache for her.
My Initial Intentions

Although I dont have the strongest relationship with my father today, I know him, and I
was very close with him as a child. I couldnt imagine not knowing my father at all; not knowing
what he looks like, if we shared similarities in appearance or character, or what kind of man he
was. I felt a sense of emptiness, as though there was something missing from the big picture.
From that point forward, I wanted to know who my grandfather was, not only for myself, but for
my mother. I couldnt help but believe that that emptiness existed inside of her too. My
intentions were to find out who exactly this mystery man was. I wanted find as much information
as I could about him, photos, an obituary, any public record of sorts, and bring him back to life
through words and photos. I even hoped to potentially find some people that had the opportunity
to be friends with him. I imagined that I could get into contact with them somehow, and they
could share stories about him, giving me an idea of what kind of man he was; at least enough to
form a decent story, even if all the pieces werent quite there.
At the age of 7, I wasnt too familiar with what steps to take in reference to finding out
who my grandfather was. The most I could do is ask my grandmother about it, and at the time,
she did nothing but avoid that conversation. Now, 10 years later, I have all of the resources. The
opportunity to find the answer to my question after all these years, has surfaced.
Introduction to the World of Caribbean Genealogy
I figured, Hey, all I have to do is figure out a name and a date and his whole life will
magically appear. How hard can it be? At the beginning of my research I wasnt too sure what
genealogy was, and how much work it required. Thus, I started by conducting a phone interview
with my grandmother, my primary source of information. Who better to ask than the mother of

his 3 children (4 children if she didnt miscarry after he died), the woman he planned to spend
his life with?
His name was Samuel Reid, born in St. Anns Bay, Jamaica, she began. I noticed that
the deeper the question I asked was, the more she lost hope in helping me.
After the interview was over, I studied the information I had obtained and tried to piece it
all together. She said he was about two years older than her, meaning that he was born in 1936.
He died in 1966 when he was hit by a truck while riding his bicycle to the market in Kingston
and was buried two days later in his home parish of St.Anns Bay. He was well liked by those in
the community and he built homes for a living. This was all I had. At the very end of the
interview my grandmother warned me that I may not find what I am looking for. She explained
to me, What you are doing is very nice, but I dont want you to be disappointed. Public
documentation in Jamaica was terrible in the 30s. I dont even have a birth certificate, but good
luck. I knew that the information I obtained may not have been enough, but I decided to utilize
a few free online genealogy tools just to see what I could find.
I started with the very first Caribbean online genealogy tool I could find, titled Roots
Web. I entered my grandfathers name, place of birth and date of birth. The response? Zilch. I
then decided to use his name, place and date of death. Still, the search engine would display
thousands of Samuel Reids who lived in the 1800s that migrated from England, none of which
were my grandfather. I then tried using another online genealogy tool known as Ancestry.com. I
entered the same information, and even tried to build a family tree. But I didnt stand a chance at
finding any valuable information unless I was willing to pay a monthly membership fee.

I quickly grew fed up with the online genealogy tools I had tried. I finally began to
understand what point my grandmother was trying to make. I began to think that maybe she was
right. But this experience brought about new concerns. I hear of people tracing their ancestors
back to centuries ago, so what was the big deal with me trying to find a little something
something on my grandfather who was born in the 1930s? Why couldnt I trace my
grandfather?
New Prospective
I thought to myself, Well this changes everything. I decided to do away with actually
trying to find information on my grandfather. Although it is a very possible task, its nearly
impossible to do by simply sitting behind a computer in the U.S. Proper investigation would
require going to Jamaica and speaking with authorities, however, I care more about the person,
and finding out what kind of man he was, I want to bring him back to life through my research
paper in a sense. Thats something I will never get from a police record.
I began to focus more on why I wasnt finding any information on him. Is the lack of
public records in Jamaica in the 1960s to blame? Do the privacy policies of the online
genealogy tools Ive tried to use play a role? What was going on in Jamaica in the 60s that made
my grandfathers accident irrelevant? Why would it be hard to find people that knew him,
perhaps living friends? If I could find those friends, where would they be? Does migration play a
huge role? When did they migrate and why were they migrating?
The Real Research Begins
I started by checking the privacy policies of the genealogy tools I used. The main
online genealogy tool that I figured would help me was Ancestry.com. Their privacy policy is

basically a long list of what their privacy principles consist of. It explains what may be
discovered while using the website and explains that the information about living relatives is
very sensitive and hidden. It goes into great detail about how they collect process and store the
data they receive and how a lot that data is either drawn from stories and information family
members have personally put up, or public records. There is also segment in the policy that
explains what kind of information they collect and how they collect it. They provide names and
contact information, however to fully access that information, there is a membership with fees
required. What you find on the website is all based on the information you provide. As a user of
the website, personal information such as interests and your background as well as personal
documents you have decided to save can be shared. The information provided is stored,
processed and transferred to different countries which can result in a different level of privacy
depending on your place of residence. Being that I still pl
As I mentioned previously, this sites provided information is based on either what an
individual personally provides them as a user, or via public records. This brought me back to
what my grandmother was trying to explain to me. She said that I probably wouldnt find much
on him since in the 60s, Jamaica wasnt the best on public documents; she didnt even have a
birth certificate. This gave me a better understanding as to why I couldnt find anything on my
grandfather since Ancestrys info is based on everything Jamaica is lacking; public records. It
also wasnt very common for anyone to have a computer back then. The only way youd have
one is if someone in America sent it to you, so I highly doubt that anyone in my family took it
upon themselves to create an account with Ancestry and pay the monthly membership fee just to
upload information about this man I wanted to know so much about. After all, my grandfather
died when my aunts were too young to remember, and my uncles werent even born yet. My

grandmother couldnt remember the names of any of his friends, and even if she did, it wasnt
like I could go to Jamaica, knock on a door and say Hey, tell me all that you know about
Samuel Reid.
Most people were leaving Jamaica around the time of my grandfathers death. That was
my next concern. If I did decide to try to trace people who knew my grandfather and formulate a
story based on the information they provided me with, where would those people be? Why
would it be so hard to find them? Since people were leaving Jamaica at that time, where were
they migrating to?
Next Stop: The U.S Census
I know that a majority of my family members from Jamaica have migrated to either
England, Canada, or the U.S. Overhearing conversations between my mother and her high school
friends, Ive discovered that most of them live in the main places I hear Jamaicans speak of
migrating to the most; New York, New Jersey, and Florida. This gave me an idea of where the
people who may have known my grandfather could be. I decided to check the most recent U.S
Census data to determine where the largest populations of Jamaicans were living to verify my
assumptions, and they were indeed correct.
Using the American fact finder, Ive find a few tables of my interest. One of them
displays that according to the U.S Census Bureaus American Community Survey, there is an
estimated 965,355 Jamaicans living in the U.S. As of 2010, New York had the highest
population of Jamaicans with 305,285 people. Florida had 246,478 Jamaicans, and New Jersey
had 55,351 Jamaicans. Amongst those thousands, someone has to know something about my
grandfather. In the event that I wanted to find them, Id have to commit to a great deal of travel. But

if my grandmother couldnt remember much, I cant imagine them remembering enough to give me a
good story.

Why They Were Migrating

After discovering the places where significant numbers of Jamaicans reside, I pressed on to
find an explanation for their migration. During my research I stumbled upon an amazing article titled
Jamaican Americans by Professor Nathan Samuel Murrell that tied all of my information together
between the interview with my grandmother and the census information. This article gave an

overview on the history of Jamaicans, their background, the modern era of Jamaica, the
significant waves of immigration at certain points in time, reasons for immigration, and facts
about Jamaican culture.
It is said that the first wave of immigration from Jamaica to the U.S occurred from the
early 1900s to 1920s. The article also explained the circumstances surrounding the McCarranWalter act which discriminated against black immigrants and only permitted 100 Jamaicans into
the U.S annually. This occurred in the 1960s which is significant to me because this is the time
frame where my grandfather died. Due to the act, a larger number of Jamaicans migrated to
Britain instead of migrating to the U.S due to the new restrictions. This would make it even
harder to track those who knew my grandfather since this leaves the possibility that they could
have stayed in Jamaica, or that they decided to migrate.
People were leaving Jamaica because of socio economic issues. Migration was heavily
encouraged during the time of economic hardship caused by lack of economic diversity,
plantation agriculture, poor land distribution and high unemployment statistics. This migration
increased in the early 1970s when the standard of living in Jamaica decreased and Jamaicans

fled the country for safety as a result of political turmoil. This also explains why my
grandfathers accident didnt make it to the news. So much had occurred in that time and I can
imagine that the stories of political turmoil managed to take over headlines. Stories like those
would definitely supersede my grandfathers story in relevance.
Conclusion
In conclusion, a lack of public records and Jamaican migration both play a huge role in
stunting the process of me finding information about my grandfather. Online genealogy tools are
a great source to use when dealing with your ancestry, but the sites ability to help finding
someone depreciates greatly when the person you are trying to find lived in a small area, outside
of the U.S, that wasnt very big on public records and documentation. Finding people who may
have known him wouldve helped form a great story for the purposes of filling an empty void in
my mothers life that my mother wont admit is there. But that would also be difficult since my
grandfather was born during the most significant waves of migration from Jamaica, and died
during times of political turmoil. It seems that I probably wont be finding out who my
grandfather was as a person at this point in my life, but doing this research has a least given me
closure on why I couldnt find the answer to something Ive always wanted to know about, and
thats the life of Samuel Reid.
A Look Into The Future
Although I cant find any information on my grandfather presently, I do intend on
continuing the search for my grandfather and making each and every piece of information I find
a part of a story, until I have the big picture. Now that I have a lot of the information on why I
couldnt find him, I now know what I would have to do in order to. Traveling to the Jamaica in

the near future is definitely possible, and if Im lucky I can conduct an interview or two with
someone who knew him. Usually after making one connection, making more gets a lot easier.
From there I could probably travel to England, perhaps some of the main places in the U.S that
Jamaicans tend to migrate to. I almost positive that I would find someone there via my first
connection. I would go on, and conduct interviews, one by one, with those who knew my
grandfather as I find them. The end result should give me enough of what I was looking for to
begin with; closure, that big picture.
Of course when that picture is complete, I want to share it with the world, with my
family, and those for generations to come. I want my grandfathers story to be available. I want
to be the one to update those genealogy websites with information Ive gathered on my own.
Even then, if I dont find every bit of information that Im looking for, I will still get the pleasure
of knowing that thats where a part of me lies, like everyone else; on one of those quirky free
online genealogy tools. Knowing that Id be the reason that a piece of family history is available
for the generations to come is just enough motivation for me to pursue my search.
Work Cited
"2010 American Community Survery." American FactFinder-Results. U.S Census Bureau, 3 Feb.
2011. Web. 23 Oct. 2014.
Murrell, Nathaniel. "Jamaican Americans." Countries and Their Cultures. Web. 23 Oct. 2014.