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Submission Date

Winter 2020

Abstract

Coming from an understanding of little to nothing about my ancient ancestors, yet alone my closer relatives, the study of Genealogy intrigued me. Through getting a closer look at my relatives, I was able to find my family lineage and got a glimpse of what my relatives experienced during their lives.

For most of my life, I have been out of touch with my family history and the lives of my relatives. Unfortunately, all of my grandparents passed away except my dad’s mother and I am very distant from any of my cousins. The cousins that I have met currently live in Canada and they are all on my mom’s side. With this said, maternally the information I received came predominantly from my mother who has also little knowledge of our family ancestry.

Before this point, I only knew that my mom’s dad left China as a child and moved to Trinidad where he had seven children with my grandma. I knew that my mother was born in Trinidad and moved to Canada when she was a child. Lastly, I knew that my mom later moved to the United States and now practices medicine. I had no clue why my mom’s side of the family moved so much or the struggles that my relatives faced.

When I looked online for documentation that could trace back to my relatives, I could not find a thing. It was specifically difficult because my mother’s family was predominantly either living in China or resided in Trinidad making it difficult to find any sort of documentation. However, finding information on my maternal side of the family, my mother and aunt were able to help me find pictures and tell stories of their parents. For my paternal side of the family, I mostly talked to my grandma who is my only living grandparent who was able to provide many images and documents from my relatives.

Another resource that I utilized was results from a genetic testing center called 23andMe. From this, I found out that I am 51.2% East Asian & Native American, 45% European, 2.5% Western Asian & North African, and 1.3% unassigned. My maternal line stems from the haplogroup F2 that can be traced back to a woman who lived approximately 18,500 years ago. The branch F stems from a woman that lived in southeastern Asia. My paternal haplogroup is R-M405 can be traced back to a man who lived approximately 10,000 years ago (23andMe)

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Abstract:

Coming from an understanding of little to nothing about my ancient ancestors, yet alone my closer relatives, the study of Genealogy intrigued me. Through getting a closer look at my relatives, I was able to find my family lineage and got a glimpse of what my relatives experienced during their lives.

For most of my life, I have been out of touch with my family history and the lives of my relatives. Unfortunately, all of my grandparents passed away except my dad’s mother and I am very distant from any of my cousins. The cousins that I have met currently live in Canada and they are all on my mom’s side. With this said, maternally the information I received came predominantly from my mother who has also little knowledge of our family ancestry.

Before this point, I only knew that my mom’s dad left China as a child and moved to Trinidad where he had seven children with my grandma. I knew that my mother was born in Trinidad and moved to Canada when she was a child. Lastly, I knew that my mom later moved to the United States and now practices medicine. I had no clue why my mom’s side of the family moved so much or the struggles that my relatives faced.

When I looked online for documentation that could trace back to my relatives, I could not find a thing. It was specifically difficult because my mother’s family was predominantly either living in China or resided in Trinidad making it difficult to find any sort of documentation. However, finding information on my maternal side of the family, my mother and aunt were able to help me find pictures and tell stories of their parents. For my paternal side of the family, I mostly talked to my grandma who is my only living grandparent who was able to provide many images and documents from my relatives.

Another resource that I utilized was results from a genetic testing center called 23andMe. From this, I found out that I am 51.2% East Asian & Native American, 45% European, 2.5% Western Asian & North African, and 1.3% unassigned. My maternal line stems from the haplogroup F2 that can be traced back to a woman who lived approximately 18,500 years ago. The branch F stems from a woman that lived in southeastern Asia. My paternal haplogroup is R-M405 can be traced back to a man who lived approximately 10,000 years ago (23andMe).

Peter Yee’s Legacy:

Peter Yee was born in Canton China on September 30, 1923, from two native people of Chinese descent. Peter was the youngest of five children. At the time, in China, the reign of communism started to form, which left many feeling uneasy of the strict dictatorial rule. Specify, with Peter’s family, his parents were uncertain of the future of their kids as many students with educations were being forced into manual labor and peasantry.

Being the youngest in the family, Peter was sixteen years old while the rest of his siblings were much older. At the time, children under twelve years of age were able to leave the country and live with a relative, but the youngest member of the family was Peter and he was sixteen. Unfortunately, it was impossible for anyone in the family to flee the country, however, Peter’s mom thought that it would be best to try and send at least one of her children out of the country in search of a better life. With this said, Peter’s mom and family decided that the only way to escape communism was to have one family member leave the country and to do that they had to alter the age on Peter’s passport to say that he was twelve instead of sixteen. After doing so, it was planned that Peter would live with his ‘auntie’ in Trinidad, West indies, who gave Peter a place to stay in exchange for free labor. Even though it wasn’t ideal, the family thought it best to sacrifice letting their son go in order to give the family hopes to escape communism one day. Years later, he was able to apply for his mother and two of his siblings to leave China. However, it was at a great emotional cost, especially to Peter as he was only sixteen at the time and would be forced to be separated from his family thousands of miles away.

Upon arriving in Trinidad, Peter was very nervous as he had never traveled anywhere much less thousands of miles away. When he reached Trinidad, the auntie gave him room and board and he had to work long hours in her shop. It is unknown what type of shop this was, but Peter did not know any better and got into a habit or working tirelessly. In those days, especially in Trinidad, there were little to no child labor laws. Much is to say that he did not receive an education in his teen years but working in the shop gave him insight on how to run a business. After working for many years, Peter got the idea that in order to start making money to bring the rest of his family to Trinidad he could run his own shop.

During the years that Peter worked for ‘auntie’, there was a lady named Daisy who came to the shop frequently. She took notice of Peter and described him as a mature young man, and she thought that she would make a perfect husband for her daughter Enid. So, one day Daisy invited the auntie and Peter over for dinner to get a chance to introduce Peter to Enid. At the time, Enid knew nothing about Peter and was very surprised to see him at the dinner table. After the dinner, Daisy asked her daughter Enid what she thought of Peter in terms of getting married. Enid did not know how to respond so she just said yes. She was seventeen at the time and got married at eighteen in the year 1949.

For Peter to launch his new shop idea, he had to find the money. For a while, he had been contributing to a Chinese Association that selected one person a month to get a lump sum of money, and after years, it was finally his turn and he received the money. With this money, he invested in a storefront shop with Enid. A year later, on April 11, 1950, Enid gave birth to their first-born son, Jeffery. Peter and Enid continued with their shop and sold general groceries and rum. The business flourished for many years and Peter and Enid were also kept busy and had six more children. They had three boys and four girls. Franklin was the next child born May 14, 1953, followed by Victoria who was born on August 14, 1954, then Louie January 22, 1956, Elizabeth October 20, 1961, Margaret September 1, 1965, and lastly Alexandra March 20, 1968.

My mother was Margaret Yee. She was seven years old when Peter and Enid decided that it would be best to move out of Trinidad due to the crime rate. To deter burglars from harming the kids or the business, Peter and Enid had three guard dogs that surrounded their property. It was common for many drunks to show up at the shop late at night from the tavern across the street and try to cause trouble. They threatened to damage the property and they feared for the safety of the children. In 1972, the Yee household sold the entire business and moved to Toronto, Ontario.

Peter and Enid chose to live in Toronto because citizenship was easier to acquire than that of the United States, and distant cousins also lived in Toronto. In Toronto, the family had to adapt to a new lifestyle as well as harsh winters. Due to the success of the shop, Peter retired while Enid worked part-time at the post office. Both Peter and Enid still had to care for seven children which is no easy task. After spending many years in Canada and when the children were all grown, Peter and Enid moved to Clearwater, Florida to retire. Here, Peter invested in real estate and made enough to live off of.

Peter passed away on November 26, 2001, due to multiple strokes. His legacy lives on through his seven children and then their children. He was always a generous and family-oriented man. Even though he spoke very little English, he was proud of raising his family in English speaking countries. He was loyal to his family and would do anything to ensure their safety and wellbeing. This legacy continues in the generations beyond him. His sacrifices started in his early childhood and youth, and his sacrifices carried on until the day he died.

The Life of Joan Dowdy:

Joan Francis Dowdy’s parents, Zora Humphreys and Fredrick Reid gave birth to Joan on July 30, 1942, in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. Joan is the youngest of three siblings whose names were John and Douglas. During the time of birth, Joan’s family was getting hit pretty hard by the Great Depression which shaped the environment that she was raised in. Joan’s father, Fredrick, was a painter for most of his life. Unfortunately, at the time the paint used contained lead which caused him to get cancer and pass away on April 11, 1970, at a relatively young age. Joan’s mother, Zora, worked as a nurse’s aide for most of her life and she lived from October 13, 1914, to December 26, 1999. Being the only girl in the family, it was hard for her to communicate with her other siblings which caused her to adopt a more shy and quiet personality. Joan’s oldest brother, who she looked up to the most, was born in 1933 and he was known for always working outside. Later in his life, he enjoyed his work of driving trucks and cabs. Joan’s other brother, Douglas, was the funny child and always made Joan laugh. After adolescence, he worked for a company called Westing Housing that sold household appliances.

Once Joan completed high school, she felt free and loved spending time with her close friends. Being a 19-year-old girl at the time, one night she and her friends decided to go to a local bar. They all knew that they were underaged, but they still decided to go to the bar just to have some fun. At the bar while Joan and one of her girlfriends were heading to the restroom, her friend heard a man say something to Joan, however, Joan did not hear what the man said and the other girl said to the man, “You are old enough to be her father!” Then the next time that the two met again was at a local Beach in Hamilton. To get the guy that she saw at the bar's attention one of her friends was walking a duck on a leash and Joan asked her friend if she could walk the duck. Her friend let her and sure enough, this caught the attention of the man. Here she found out his name, Jack Dowdy and they planned to go on a date.

When it came time for the date, Joan became a little apprehensive to go and ended up sticking him up. She was skeptical because she was a 19-year-old while he was 34 at the time. However, Joan apologized and the two hit it off. Two years later, the couple ended up getting married on June 13, 1963, and had their first child Denise on November 27, 1963. Since Joan was a quieter individual, this is how she expected Denise to act, but in reality, it was the opposite. Denise always challenged the norm and enjoyed the outdoors and physical activity. Four years later, Jack and Joan gave birth to their second child, Paul, my father, on February 1, 1967.

As a child, Paul was a very active individual. It was very hard to keep up with him or entertain him, however, what did catch his interests he loved. He was a very bright individual from a young age. Joan remembers many days he would come home from pre-school and say that it was too boring. Unlike most kids that would say it is boring and not pay attention, Paul absorbed material like a sponge. Since he would finish his schoolwork so quickly, he had plenty of free time and gravitated to sports. When he was five, he saw a group of kids playing street hockey and he asked if he could join in. The group of boys was much older than him and said no, so Paul sat on the side of the street and watched the boys play for hours. Once Paul turned eight, he asked Joan if he could join a local hockey team. Joan said yes, and in his first year, Paul became the defensive player of the year. Paul played many sports and always outcompeted opponents. Academically, he would always finish he work in school and this would cause Joan to worry, however, after checking in with the school Joan found out that Paul was doing fine and keeping up with everything. Paul skipped the 4th grade and later went on to do two years of undergrad and went to med school and became an orthopedic surgeon.

Currently, Joan still resides in Hamilton, Ontario where she lives alone in a condo. Joan is very proud of both the children that she has raised and is happy in knowing that all her grandchildren are doing well. She has considered many times moving down to Florida to be closer to family, however, she has never lived outside of Hamilton and it would be a very big change for her. In the future, she hopes that her grandchildren grow up to enjoy their lives and do what they enjoy and love.

The Life of Mark:

I was born on March 24, 2001, and my parents are Paul Dowdy and Margaret Yee. My dad is a retired Orthopedic Surgeon and my mom is a family physician. Due to the hard work of my parents, I have lived a relatively easy life with little outside stress other than academics. After analyzing my family tree, I took advantage of my upbringing as many of my relatives were not as financially stable as my parents. Listening to the travels and sacrifices my family members have made has put many things in perspective for me and has motivated me to work even harder because I know that they did not have it as easy as me. I would like to learn even more about my relatives, and I am sad that I am not as close to a lot of them. In the future, I hope that I can form better relationships with my relatives and especially my cousins. After analyzing my family lineage, I am very glad that I was able to finally communicate with some of my relatives and I hope that one day I can impact others through stories like Peter Yee and Joan Dowdy.

References

23andMe. (n.d.). DNA Genetic Testing & Analysis. Retrieved April 15, 2020, from

https://www.23andme.com/

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