Ever had anyone turn up on the doorstep?!

[Meezer]

A neighbour down the lane had a visit out of the blue today from two elderly ladies researching their family history. We're in North Yorkshire and one of the ladies was from Devon and the other from Tennessee. They had a diary from 1911 written by a 17 year old ancester who had been disgruntled at leaving a "lively" town to come and live in a "dreary, desolate old farmhouse"! They also had photographs of the family standing in the doorway. It was fascinating for the neighbour to see the pictures and read some of the diary and I think must have been great for the visitors too as I suspect that neither the look of the house nor the area have changed significantly in the last 100 years.

Has anyone else experienced a blast from the past like that?

[LizzieW]

It's not happened to me but I was contacted by a very distant ancestor (via GenesR) who had turned up on the doorstep of a house in Cheshire where a mutual ancestor had lived.  The owner took her in and gave her some old photos he'd found in the house of our ancestors which, obviously, he didn't want.  The house had been modernised, but he had photos of what it used to be like before the builders started work on it.  I liked the photos of the ancestors, my g.g.aunts and a daughter of one of them.  The g.g.aunts were sisters of one of my g.grans so although I only have a photo of her aged about 12, I can imagine what she must have looked like as a middle aged lady. Little and dumpy if you're asking 

[elaine447]

Not on my door step but
One night my phone rang but thinking it was more PPI, I let the answering machine get it,
then checked, it was a lady who said I am so and so your dad was my cousin, I have been told you have done a family tree,I am in my 80's and dont have one of them new fangled things so  you can come and pick me up so that I can see it,lol,
Elaine

[coombs]

I visited an ancestral church and left a message in the visitors book saying what names and left an address. My dad's second cousin and her husband turned up a few weeks later on our doorstep. We have remained good friends ever since.

[clayton bradley]

We live in an old vicarage and some years ago a young man from New Zealand rang the doorbell. He was related to one of the vicars who had lived there and wanted to take pictures and see round.We gave him a cup of coffee and he took his pictures. Haven't heard anything since, claytonbradley

[chirp]

A few years ago we had a visit from an Australian couple who currently live in the US but who were on holiday in the UK. The lady was researching her family and her (several times) great grandmother was born in my house. She was pleased to be able to take photos and to chat with a fellow researcher, but  the date of her ancestor's birth would, I think predate the current house which I estimate at a little less than 200 years. This was interesting for me as it suggests there was another dwelling here before this one. We had a long chat over cups of tea but I haven't heard from them again. (Maybe they didn't like the tea?)

[Top-of-the-hill]

  In about 1960, when my mother and I were living with my grandfather in the family home, an elderly man knocked at the door and said he was grandad's cousin. They had been close as boys, but Ernie went to Canada in 1905, and apart from coming home to serve in WW1, had not been back since. Apparently he went to the village pub to enquire if any of the family were still around, and was told that grandad was still in the same house.
   They did keep in touch with us for some years, until they died. There were no children, so that was it. But I do have a photo of him with my mother outside the house.

[coombs]

The lady that turned up on my doorstep and my father were the offspring of two first cousins born in 1913 and 1914. We had a family gathering a few years after where we met cousins from the Titshall family from as far away as Australia.

[copperbeech5]

My parents have had it happen twice, the fist time by a gushing American lady with family in tow, they were very nice, and her Gt Grandfather had lived there before the went to the USA so she just wanted to have a look at the old house.

When my parents left that house my Dad mounted the old door knob on a plinth and sent it to them as a gift - she was thrilled to think her Gt Grandfather had held it!

The second time was a different house, and we had an old carved oak fireplace. 

This time a Canadian lady turned up on the doorstep, and said that her Grand father had lived there - and he had been  the village carpenter, and had carved the old fireplace in the house - when she came in she touched the faces in the carving and burst into tears!  Again, a lovely lady.