Ancestry.ca discovers the roots of Colbert's passion for hockey
TORONTO
,
Dec. 2
/CNW/ - He's accused
Canada
of cheating at the upcoming Winter Olympics. He's referred to Canadians as "Godless" and "Syrup Suckers." He believes
Canada
is Obama's America, and supports an American-based Ontario Hockey League team, claiming a war of Good vs. Evil between his beloved Saginaw Spirit and their Canadian adversaries. But what
Stephen Colbert
may not know is that he's as Canadian as the Maple Tree and universal healthcare.
Ancestry.ca, Canada's leading family history website(1), made the shocking discovery that the right-wing pundit of "truthiness" and opponent of social welfare has not one, but two paternal relatives that lived, worked and even passed on, in the Great White North.
James Quinn
, Stephen's great-great-grandfather, was born in
Ireland
in 1830. At some point James, like millions before and after, set sail for a better life in
Canada
.
According to his 1851 Census record,
James Quinn
lived and worked as a labourer in Frontenac County near Kingston, Ontario, which coincidentally is a noted hotbed of hockey and home to proud Canadian and hockey icon,
Don Cherry. James
' daughter
Angeline Quinn
married
George William Colbert
, Stephen's great-grandfather.
Mary Skelton
(nee
Mary Ann Gurry
) is another paternal ancestor of Stephen's. Also born in
Ireland
, she was Stephen's great-great-grandmother. She immigrated to the
United States
where she would meet her future husband Creighton Skelton.
What happened next is unclear, but at some point Mary ended up moving north of the border, where she would live out her last days.
According to her Ontario death certificate,
Mary Skelton
passed away on
June 29, 1880
in Haldimand County, near the shores of Lake Erie.
Mary and Creighton's daughter
Elizabeth Skelton
married
Hugh Tormey
. Their daughter
Mary Tormey
married James W. Colbert Sr. - Stephen's grandfather.
Karen Peterson
, Marketing Director, Ancestry.ca, comments: "As Stephen himself admits, he has little time for facts, logic or information... he prefers to feel the truth rather than look it up in historical records.
"However, we are confident that if he searches his soul deep down the truthiness of his Canadian heritage will be too powerful to deny."
This intriguing discovery highlights the fact that most people have family origins in many different places: information that can be lost or forgotten with each passing generation. Thanks to the online preservation of historical records this information is now readily available and easier than ever to search.
To discover your personal family history story, visit ancestry.ca
ABOUT ANCESTRY.CA
Officially Canada's leading family history website, Ancestry.ca has 126 million Canadian records in such collections as the complete Historical Canadian Censuses from 1851 to 1916, Ontario and British Columbia vital records from as early as 1813,
Quebec
vital records (The Drouin Collection), Canadian Passenger Lists and U.S. /
Canada
Border Crossings.
Ancestry.ca was launched in
January 2006
and belongs to the global network of Ancestry websites (wholly owned by Ancestry.com Operations Inc.), which contains four billion records. To date more than 12 million family trees have been created and 1.25 billion names and 26 million photographs and stories uploaded. 7.1 million unique visitors logged on to an Ancestry website in
September 2009
.
The Ancestry global network of family history websites - www.ancestry.ca in
Canada
, www.ancestry.com in the US, www.ancestry.co.uk in the UK, www.ancestry.com.au in
Australia
, www.ancestry.de in
Germany
, www.ancestry.it in
Italy
, www.ancestry.fr in
France
, www.ancestry.se in
Sweden
and www.jiapu.com in
China
.
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(1) ComScore, 2009
For further information: INTERVIEWS, IMAGES, CASE STUDIES: Media Profile: Patrick Erlich, Jeri Brown, (416) 318-3821, (416) 504-8464, [email protected], [email protected]
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