Your family's progress up or down the social ladder.

[Barreldriver]

I thought it would be interesting to share some tales about our family's progress up and/or down the social ladder as to lend to context pertaining to the circumstances which may have influenced our perceptions of social stratification.

The general climb and descent went as such in my case (below will be a spoiler with more specifics):

Greive/Bailiff - Yeoman farmer and churchwarden - Yeoman farmer and clerk - Thief and cross Atlantic migrant - Respectable upper yeoman farmers - Respectable lower yeoman farmers - Petty land holders but with decent earnings - Tenants with prospects of rising back up the ladder once college education is completed.

The roller coaster ride up and down the social ladder has given me an appreciation for societal perceptions from the eyes of the economically sound as well as the economically destitute. I strongly support the ideals of reimbursement for honest labor but I also strongly disagree with how labor unions are manipulated to support the lazy (examples being state departments of transportation where there will be multiple workers on a job with only one or two working while the others stand around doing nothing, all getting the same job securities).

My own family started off in England as greives in what is now South Yorkshire, after leaving Hatfield we settled in Whitgift and did well as small farmers and clerks. After a family dispute over religion and inheritance my branch of the family left for Virginia (the way paid by dishonorable means, my patriarch stole what was supposed to be his inheritance from his father to pay way to Virginia for himself, wife and first born child).

Once in Virginia we purchased land from Sir Peyton Skipwith at a total cost of 40 pounds. The brother in law of my patriarch, also of Yorkshire, had been an indentured servant of Sir Peyton Skipwith who had violated the terms of his indenture by leaving early. Because of the knit nature of our culture we took him in resulting in a dispute.

After the death of our patriarch the family migrated to Rutherford County, North Carolina for a brief period afore coming to settle in the Mountain District of Middle Tennessee. Once in Tennessee the family came to own $300 worth of land bought at 12.5 cents per acre (on average) by 1850 (exact acreage is not known as the documents were destroyed in a fire, the estimate given the math is around 2,400 acres), the new patriarch served as elected Constable for Overton County, Tennessee. By 1860 the land holdings were valued at $1,000 with other personal property valued at $400, the patriarch was also father to two Confederate soldiers. In 1870 his land holdings were valued at $800 with other personal property owned being valued at $500.

During the Reconstruction the land was split between male descendants (one of whom was my great great great grandfather).

My great great grandfather's share of the land (again split between the sons of his father mentioned briefly above) was taken from him during the New Deal initiatives and is now part of Standing Stone State Park, my great grandfather as a result had to fend for himself and wound up purchasing 100 acres of land in Allons, Overton County, Tennessee. During the Great Depression he had to migrate to Ohio with his wife to temporarily raise his children while he worked in the rubber factories. After enough money was saved he was able to construct a proper home on the farm in Tennessee where he kept 40 head of angus cattle. After a fire in the 1970's the land was sold off, the family since split, some owning land in Tennessee still others owning land in Ohio.

My grandfather had abandoned the prospect of owning land in Tennessee after a while and resolved to build a home in Ohio on 4 acres of land, he wound up becoming superintendent for a large construction company and as such was able to afford to send his children to private school and also was able to afford to make regular trips back to Tennessee, time permitting.

Because my father did not pursue a collegiate education in changing times he wound up becoming a long haul truck driver while in Tennessee. The money was not great but he had prospects of purchasing land in Overton County, Tennessee as to settle down but a divorce got in the way. During the divorce my mother went through a period of insanity and we were evicted from our rental in Tennessee, she intentionally hid me from my father contrary to the law and we had to panhandle in Cookeville, Tennessee until I was ditched at a nanny's residence (my father eventually found where I was and reclaimed custody), I do not say this to slander my mother as she is now a charitable and upstanding citizen just to acknowledge a very real history. I was taken to Ohio at the age of 11 as my father could no longer work as a long haul trucker in Tennessee while having full custody, mind we made regular trips back to Tennessee as to not lose touch and I still hold a savings account back in my hometown.

While in Ohio I lived on my grandfather's property and had a decent life from then, I've worked and hope to work again in the near future as a day laborer for my uncle's construction crew, and am now pursuing a collegiate education in philosophy and potentially law (my paternal grandmother's cousin, from a West Virginian family, was a lawyer and former Ohio State Senator, through my mother I am also a descendant of the same family who founded Red Rose Tea Co. and the same Cleveland lineage as that of former US President Grover Cleveland).

I now live as a tenant in an apartment, temporarily I may add.

[Methmatician]

My family began as villagers who then left Bosnia to start our lives in Australia where we live like kings (compared to my relatives in Ex-Yu) and as normal people (compared to other Australians).

[Barreldriver]

My family began as villagers who then left Bosnia to start our lives in Australia where we live like kings (compared to my relatives in Ex-Yu) and as normal people (compared to other Australians).

How has that influenced your perceptions of social stratification, if at all?

[Contra Mundum]

Before, and even after the Civil War, my paternal ancestors were wealthy land owners. The Great Depression was a struggle though. They still had their land, but not much money during that time.

The land was divided up and none of them farm anymore, not on a full time basis. Today, most are middle and upper middle class.

My mother's family were also land owners, but not as much land as on my father's side. My mothers side did thrive during the depression though. My maternal grandparents had a thriving farm and restaurant business during the Great Depression, despite them giving away a lot of food and money to the poor.

This was all in southern Alabama.

[Vixen]

My maternal grandparents were poor immigrants from Portugal who came to Brazil in the 1940´s. They were born in a small village near Braga, both from humble families. They had to marry in secret because their families didn´t get along and forbade them from seeing each other. When My grandmother´s parents found out she was pregnant, they kicked her out and she had to go live with her aunt and uncle. My grandfather decided to move to Brazil so they could have a better life, but he didn´t have enough money to support a family so he had to go by himself. He opened a small grocery store in Rio and a few years later he sent for my grandmother and my uncle, who was already a toddler when he met his father for the first time. As the years passed, my grandfather´s business grew, he opened more stores and eventually he became owner of one of the biggest and most successful supermarket chains in Brazil. By the time my mother was a teenager they were already very wealthy. The stores have all been sold and now my family owns several trade/business centers.

[Barreldriver]

Before, and even after the Civil War, my paternal ancestors were wealthy land owners. The Great Depression was a struggle though. They still had their land, but not much money during that time.

The land was divided up and none of them farm anymore, not on a full time bases. Today, most are middle and upper middle class.

My mother's family were also land owners, but not as much land as on my father's side. My mothers side did thrive during the depression though. My maternal grandparents had a thriving farm and restaurant business during the Great Depression, despite them giving away a lot of food and money to the poor.

This was all in southern Alabama.

Interesting to see the perspective of a lowland family, seems y'all had similar circumstance to uplanders.

I am curious about one thing, ye also mention as I did the division of property amongst multiple heirs.

Within my kingroup we see things agnatically when it comes to culture/ethnicity, sons inheriting their ethnicity from their father, but when it comes to property we deviate from the agnatic norm by engaging in a system similar to gavelkind where the property is divided amongst any eligible males of the kingroup regardless of chronological position (to be clarified, the male doesn't have to be the eldest son, but any or all of the male siblings and sometimes male cousins with a dower or other minor allotment for the females).

Such a development is a bit puzzling to myself from a mechanical p.o.v.

[Contra Mundum]

Interesting to hear the perspective of a lowland family, seems y'all had similar circumstance to uplanders.

I am curious about one thing, ye also mention as I did the division of property amongst multiple heirs.

Within my kingroup we see things agnatically when it comes to culture/ethnicity, sons inheriting their ethnicity from their father, but when it comes to property we deviate from the agnatic norm by engaging in a system similar to gavelkind where the property is divided amongst any eligible males of the kingroup regardless of chronological position (to be clarified, the male doesn't have to be the eldest son, but any or all of the male siblings and sometimes male cousins with a dower or other minor allotment for the females).

Such a development is a bit puzzling to myself from a mechanical p.o.v.

My maternal grandparents divided their land up equally among their 4 children(3 sons, 1 daughter). On the paternal side, it wasn't so equal. 2 sons got all the land, the rest received a small amount of money. The two sons had large families of their own and split the land equally. I don't think anyone owns more than 200 acres today, and most own less than 20, some own no land other than the lot their home sits on. People down there don't seem to care about land anymore. Few of them farm, or even hunt and fish.

[Methmatician]

How has that influenced your perceptions of social stratification, if at all?

I guess I've learnt that different countries have different class/social structures.

[Barreldriver]

My maternal grandparents divided their land up equally among their 4 children(3 sons, 1 daughter). On the paternal side, it wasn't so equal. 2 sons got all the land, the rest received a small amount of money. The two sons had large families of their own and split the land equally. I don't think anyone owns more than 200 acres today, and most own less than 20, some own no land other than the lot their home sits on. People down there don't seem to care about land anymore. Few of them farm, or even hunt and fish.

What do you think lead to this method of passing on inheritance?

I cannot seem to explain it on my own behalf, the practice doesn't seem to fit with the agnatic aspects of my own kingroup's culture yet we still engage in it.

[Barreldriver]

I guess I've learnt that different countries have different class/social structures.

Has your family's history played a role in how you perceive laborer vs. management conflicts? Do you have a loyalty to one plight or the other or some other stance?

I can only presume within the context of my own situation, but I tend to think that those who have come from families that have been on both sides of the social ladder are more suited to consider these issues with a more eclectic perspective.

[Methmatician]

Has your family's history played a role in how you perceive laborer vs. management conflicts? Do you have a loyalty to one plight or the other or some other stance?

Both sides of my family are villagers, so there's no difference between my mother's family and my father's family.

[Albion]

It's been a definite decline in the past 60 years. My family used to own a farm in a village not too far away and all our relatives did too.
My family and the two other families closest to ours by marriages and relatives practically owned most of that parish. Now only one of the families still owns a farm there and it's not ours.

It all started going bad when my grandfather who was a farmer became ill. It wasn't a temporary illness, it was permanent so he couldn't do that sort of work any more and they had to sell up. At that time land was worth peanuts and so my grandparents joined the lower classes in a nearby town.
Meanwhile land prices went up again in recent decades and no members of my family any longer own land. We've progressed slightly from lower class to lower middle class but I feel sad for all that we've lost.

One of my aims in life if possible would be to restore us back to being a farming family again. Both me and my father have laboured on farms in the past and so know what it entails. Sadly the wealthy have started buying up land to escape from the towns so unless the economies goes particularly bad it won't be easy to start up again.
In a church yard in that parish around 50% of the headstones belong to distant relations of mine. It's sad to see our presence there so diminished, know the only members of my family there are my grandparents and they're in the ground. Across the road from the church is the farm where one of them grew up.

So far I've found records back to 500 years ago. We may be related to other families in the Midlands or Welsh Marches but I haven't proven it yet.


As for my mother's family, well they've worked their way up from poor Irish and English merchants and labourers to the Middle Class. Some of them were officers in the British Empire, but today they're mainly trades persons.
On that side my aunty left quite a rut across here and moved to Austria where she's got quite a better quality of life now.

Farming in other countries tends to be seen as a lowly profession, here that's only true of farm labourers. Farmers themselves can easily have millions of £ tied up in assets and today many of them even attend private schools.

[StonyArabia]

My maternal family belonged to the nobility, but eventually reverted back to their nomadic ways due to tribal wars and the British policies in the region. They are now highly successful owning several tracts of lands, many are engineers, or wealthy businessmen. They never climbed down the social ladder, and have always been nomads by heart.

My paternal family was relatively from poor humble origins in Southern Russia. Russia is land where very few opportunities happen. My father worked so hard in school so he can get a scholarship to the U.S and leave without ever wanting to return back. So this what happened. He went to Colorado and their studied and finished, this also where he met my mother and married her, then eventually I was born. Lived several years in the U.S and then decided to migrate to Canada, and this what happened. It has been a blessing and happiness for him, in his case he did climb up the social ladder especially by becoming a professor. His other brothers eventually did the same but in their own homeland. His father was a blacksmith and mother was just a house wife and often had a lot of struggles in their lives.

Now we are just normal middle class family, but many people on my maternal lineage are powerful and wealthy.

[Aces High]

For the purposes of this thread i have put my family crest up as my av.

We came over with the Normans,and i have my direct family link to these times from a bible that has been in my family since the 1100's noting all the births marriages and deaths in my family.
I have the bible after many a struggle and will pass it on to my oldest son.

The crest says this.

The red background means blood and was given in time of war 1066.

The golden chevron means it was given by a king for services rendered.

Three lions or in this case leopards means three brothers....mercenaries...who came over with their men in service of their lord in this case William I king of the Normans.

We were given land in the county of what is now Kent,which we still own.

We have been involved in just about every war and conflict that England has been involed in form then until now,and i have relatives in all corners of the world in various military cemetaries.

I have three sons and so do my two brothers....for some strange reason we seem to reproduce in three's just like our forefathers.....as did my parents...grandparents....great grandparents etc.

The family regiment is the coldstream guards.....although a few of us have been in service in the parachute regiment and the Rhodesian light infantry.

I have realtives in Canada,Australia,South Africa,New Zealand,Texas where we have a county named after us....and a few other places.....and that about all the info im giving over for now.:D

[Barreldriver]

We came over with the Normans,and i have my direct family link to these times from a bible that has been in my family since the 1100's noting all the births marriages and deaths in my family.
I have the bible after many a struggle and will pass it on to my oldest son.


Such a relic must be every genealogists holy grail! :D Lucky son ye are. Most of my family's trinkets of that sort tend to get destroyed either because of historic local skirmishes or "accidents" like farm fires (I honestly doubt that the fire which killed my grandfather's brother and destroyed our cattle farm was an accident). :p

[Aces High]

The bloody things falling to pieces tbh.....what with all the pressed flowers and letters stuffed inside of it.

Much more precious to me is a tiny little prayer book that my great grandfather had with him through the first world war.
He made out an aluminuim plate a sort of cover for it and scratched onto it the family crest and 1914-1919....he was there until 1919 filling trenches in and doing all sorts of work.
My grandfather had it with him when he was killed at Arhnem,my father had it on him all through the Rhodesian bush war and i had it with me through my skirmish's in the army.

Whats amazing is that in 1914 my great grandfather was only 15 yrs old when he went to the front,he lied about his age and managed to survive the carnage.He went through three or four regiments because they were all wiped out and ended up in The Black Watch of all things....in a kilt.

[KidMulat]

This was all in southern Alabama.

May I ask what your family surnames are from 1790 to 1870?

[KidMulat]

My father's father's side unofficially begins with a Foshee (anglicised foucheaux or Foches) the year of the Adams-Onis treaty; born free he was the son of a very wealthy "Octoroon" though socially white plantation owner part of the French Upper-classes and his mixed race mistress. The Foshee boy apparently was very well established and his progeny showed it being important figures of Mobilian society and the Creole/Free People of Color Community

It seems as though every ethnic group in Southern and Central Alabama are taken into attendance in my family Scots-Irish, English, French men, thier mulatto and mestif children, Mulatto and Mustee (Using virginian colonial terminology a half black person oft used to describe black/Amerind) men and I think 2 or 3 relatively "full" black men and women

From them on my ancestors on that side ranged from small farmers, craftsmen, and business owners to pharmacists & slave owners themselves.

My father's mother's father's side begins with a mustee slave girl from Virginia by the name of Fannie Lee her husband a local slave and their daughter Nellie and George Marshall the son of slave owner Bill Marshall and slave Ann. I still do not know what George did for a living but Nellie taught herself to read, write and learn arithmetic, passed the teaching exam and became a teacher and bought land in addition to the 40 acres her slave mother bought after the Civil War.


They too left up for Ohio from the 1890's to the 1930's; a good 1/8 of my extensive family on my father's side passed the colorline and moved east and west leaving with a good piece of the families wealth.

The remaining who stayed in the city they all migrated to became the cornerstones of the black community. One of the 3 first business owners My great-great grandfather had lines of people mostly black and some white who would wait at his door to get sugar, flour and deer meat he and the men of the family hunted at their lodge in West Virginia.

My great grandfather was the head of a black workers union and a force to be reckoned with, he worked also in the factors as a foreman of a intergrated (though still most black) work crew.

His wife Matriarch of the family was also in control of the purse strings of the family; she was a diligent and astute woman who invested in Real Estate and was a founding member of the Jack and Jills society local chapter. Their children got education.

The went to Xenia, Willberforce and Tuskegee along with other HBCUs in the East Coast and South. There were AKA's and APA's.

My grandfather didn't go to University; but he still owned real estate, had several businesses and worked for the last remaining tire factories.

By the time my father was born their was a great divide among the family as the Matriarch died and bitterness insued regarding the Will and teh family never came back since.

My father went to Kent State got drafted, went all over Asia, and got in the Oil Industry for about 25 years. Retired before the economic crash, got screwed over and now works as a consultant and advising/administration.

My mom's side is much simpler because no one know much; my mother's father was an illiterate, poor, black child of many born in Alabama born to other's of that sort

His father fled to Louisiana after a murder and meet my grandmother at 17who's father was a electrician and mother a stay at home wife in rural Mississippi on the border of Louisiana.

They both died before she was 10 and went to live in the Creole Country of Lousiana on 50acres of farm land that after the grandparents died her husband sold to buy land in a parish north of NOLA. My mother was one of 13 children who live on 26acres her father squandered all chances to excel and they were raised poor.

[Barreldriver]

The bloody things falling to pieces tbh.....what with all the pressed flowers and letters stuffed inside of it.

Seems to be a female habit, family relics relevant to my family have been likewise destroyed by female members, aside from what gets destroyed in tragic events like farm fires. :p


Much more precious to me is a tiny little prayer book that my great grandfather had with him through the first world war.
He made out an aluminuim plate a sort of cover for it and scratched onto it the family crest and 1914-1919....he was there until 1919 filling trenches in and doing all sorts of work.
My grandfather had it with him when he was killed at Arhnem,my father had it on him all through the Rhodesian bush war and i had it with me through my skirmish's in the army.

Whats amazing is that in 1914 my great grandfather was only 15 yrs old when he went to the front,he lied about his age and managed to survive the carnage.He went through three or four regiments because they were all wiped out and ended up in The Black Watch of all things....in a kilt.

I would likewise hold such things to be the most precious as those are associated with individuals who are more recent and would have been involved in an individuals upbringing, nonetheless I still have interest in the relics of older family members if anything to satisfy curiosity.


On another note, given your familial status how would your kingroup perceive peoples of lower classes? Namely farmers, construction laborers and labor force leaders (superintendents and foremen who despite rising up the occupational ladder know their job because of starting on the bottom and working up as opposed to those silly project managers).

[Grumpy Cat]

I come from a long line of fishermen and coal miners. My grandfather was a professional hockey player (though he too did a stint as a coal miner, and after hockey, was a firefighter), that's how we moved up, even though when my grandfather was playing hockey they didn't make very much money.

This song makes me emotional, reminds me of my family:

EkOteYufGOg

[SilverKnight]

Father's side: They came from the countryside, humble people living in decent homes. They all had their own little plantations where they sold fruits and vegetables to the local markets and also used it for domestic consume as well. They where more then 10 kids in a single home.

After a while, my grandfather met my grandmother (which also came from the same village), had my dad and his two other siblings when they moved to the capital (Santo Domingo). There my grandfather joined the military, he graduated with a degree on communications/ radio engineering. He saved enough money and built both our present family house and his own little grocery store. My dad always tales how the American soldiers use to visit his grocery store and eat canned fruits and cigarettes and joke around, that was during our civil war where US intervened (like always ) . Afterwards he died in the mid 80's, never met him unfortunately...

My dad then went to university of Santo Domingo (UASD) and did a degree on electronics. Afterwards he did classes on architecture, and after graduating worked with some colleges on their own architectural business for a while.

My mother's: She didn't grow up in the same village, as my dad's family, more south, in a small town closer to the capital. There she grew up with her 5 sisters. Her father (my grandpa) was a hard working person, he wrote books and sold property, he moved to New York for a while in the 70's. Then he died of heart problems sadly. My mom, she graduated from secondary education and became a secretary in a bank in the capital city. There she went to church and met my dad, got married and had my sister and me.

Today: My grandmother still lives in the same house my grandfather built on his own 4 decades ago. The neighborhood has changed a ton ever since with a booming economic city. She's retired, and rents an apartment on the second floor my dad sketched/ designed for her. My dad now has his own business in south Florida. Is a cleaning business he recently made.

Meanwhile, I moved with my mom here to PA two years ago, lived with my sister as well and graduated from high school in 2010. I had my first job afterwards, saved for a car and bought one. I then moved by myself, and then with my fiancée at age 19 where we still live. We both work and study, she wants to be an elementary teacher and while I'm studying science in business and marketing.