BBC "Who Do You Think You Are?" Frank Gardner (WDYTYA Series 12 Episode 7)

[groom]

I enjoyed this programme as well, although I expect that a lot of us would have struggled to get back that far without all the help he was given. He came over as a really nice person who was genuinely interested in his background, unlike some of the previous subjects who seemed to play to the cameras. I particularly liked the ending, where he said that he wished his mother had been around to learn that what she'd always said was true. How many of us have said the same thing?

[Rena]

I couldn't help comparing it to a former programme about Matthew Pinsent (Olympic rower) who had an ancestor in the tower and additionally was descended from William the Conqueror.   Unless my memory is playing tricks, I'm pretty sure his heraldic chart showed he was also descended from God.

[Romilly]

I couldn't help comparing it to a former programme about Matthew Pinsent (Olympic rower) who had an ancestor in the tower and additionally was descended from William the Conqueror.   Unless my memory is playing tricks, I'm pretty sure his heraldic chart showed he was also descended from God.

Haha, - yes I remember that one!

Same scroll I think?

http://www.rootschat.com/links/01g78/

Romilly

[Ruskie]

I have no idea who Frank Gardner is but am looking forward to seeing this programme (I've come to realise that who the celebrity is of no consequence).

Yes, I remember the Matthew Pinsent episode - I have no interest in the Olympics or rowing but enjoyed his story and thought he came across well. He even joined rootschat to comment on the comments about his episode. 

[lizdb]

I enjoyed this episode.
I rarely know who the "celebrities" are, but I'm not watching it because it is a particular person, but for the Family History research interest.
This one just underlines what records and archives there are out there, if we really dig and take the time to contact different organisations.

The part when he was reading the notes on Grace's time at the asylum reminded me of when I found similar notes at the archives about a distant ancestor of mine who was in an asylum, detailing his state of mind and the "treatment" they gave him.

[LizzieW]

Frank Gardner is a British journalist and war correspondent who was shot whilst reporting in Saudi Arabia, his cameraman was killed.  Here's a good link about him.  www.rootschat.com/links/01g79/

[Mowsehowse]

The part when he was reading the notes on Grace's time at the asylum reminded me of when I found similar notes at the archives about a distant ancestor of mine who was in an asylum, detailing his state of mind and the "treatment" they gave him. 

I have also had reason to search through asylum records, but sadly I learned far less, regarding condition, cause or treatment, and no physical description of the male ancestor in question.   

But when Frank Gardner remarked on the number of his grandfather's siblings, I was suddenly struck by the thought that before birth control, women's hormones hardly had a chance to settle from one pregnancy, before being unbalanced again by the next.  No wonder perhaps that Grace started wandering in the "twilight zone".

[Romilly]

Complete coincidence, - (I didn't know he was going to be on 'WDYTYA') but I had just finished reading Frank Gardner's book, 'Blood and Sand' this weekend. Really gripping read, & of course, absolutely tragic what happened to him & Cameraman Simon Cumbers... What really came across, (both in the book and 'WDYTYA') is his fortitude and courage in the face of adversity, and the positive way that he deals with his physical problems. Very impressive...

Romilly.

[Vengeur]

I couldn't help thinking though... that there must be an awful lot of people in the UK who are decendants of William the Conqueror. It's just that most of us can't prove it!

Romilly

That is the problem indeed. I thought the chap at the College of Arms was a bit disingenuous when he talked about Frank's ancestors being like a queue for the bus! - true, but it ignores ALL his other ancestors.

To give us a bit of comfort for our own hopes for royal ancestors from kittycooper.com:

"Very simply, if you postulate that 1000 years was 30 generations ago then your theoretical number of ancestors is two to the 30th, or just over a billion: 1,073,741,824.This is impossible as nowhere near that many people were alive back then. Plus not everyone who lived a thousand years ago has descendants today...

...Kenneth W. Wachter came up with an interesting mathematical model for this, described in Stephen Lewis’ blog post How many ancestors do I have. To somewhat paraphrase, “Going back 30 generations… Wachter’s model calculates that [an Englishman] would have 952,279 distinct ancestors in 1077 – only around 0.09% of the maximum but representing fully 86% of the total estimated English population [at that time] of 1.1 million" "

So a pretty high chance for many people...if only we can prove it!