LA Public Library: Uncovering Family Secrets: Forming A New Identity

Los Angeles CA

07 March, 2022

10:29 AM

Description

Press release from the Los Angeles Public Library: Janice Batzdorff March 7, 2022 Imagine discovering that the man who raised you is not your biological father. That your mother's race differs from how she presented herself. That the person you are attracted to is your sibling. That you are the descendent of a renowned individual. A monstrous one. Unknown details about blood relationships surface through DNA testing, genealogical research, an adoptee meeting a birth parent, or a confession made, perhaps after a loved one dies. Learning the truth triggers feelings ranging from betrayal to outrage over privileges denied, to joy at meeting new relatives, to a sense of peace in connecting to one's heritage. Novelists have the latitude to develop a backstory for family secrets, whereas historians and memoir writers generally don't have access to such information. Are the fictional narratives about lineage less plausible? To decide, consider the following true stories. From the 1920s up until 1950, the Tennessee Children's Home Society in Memphis kidnapped thousands of mostly poor children to sell them in profitable illegal adoptions. This scandal is the basis for Lisa Wingate's novel Before We Were Yours. Some surviving adoptees of the orphanage who read the book contacted Wingate who collaborated with Judy Christie to write Before and After: The Incredible Real-Life Stories of Orphans Who Survived the Tennessee Children's Home Society. Madeleine Albright was told that her family had moved from her native Czechoslovakia for political reasons. Two weeks after she was sworn in as the first female U.S. Secretary of State, the Washington Post reported that more than a dozen of her relatives, including three grandparents, had been killed as Jews during the Holocaust. Albright writes about this astonishing discovery in Prague Winter: A Personal Story of Remembrance and War, 1937-1948. Anais Bordier, an adoptee born in Busan, South Korea, and raised in France, saw on social media a video of someone who looked just like her. The other woman, Samantha Futerman, also born in Busan but raised by her adoptive parents in New Jersey, turned out to be her twin. They tell their story in Separated @ Birth: A True Love Story of Twin Sisters Reunited. One of the most enduring family identity sagas pertains to the descendants of U.S. President and author of the Declaration of Independence, Thomas Jefferson. After his wife, Martha, died, Jefferson and his slave, Sally Hemings, had four children who survived to adulthood. Denial about Jefferson being the father persisted in some circles for more than two centuries. Two of Heming's four children who entered white society were even forbidden to divulge their father's identity as a condition for being freed from slavery. Finally, in 1998, DNA testing confirmed the biological relationships. African Americans who descend from slaves are usually unable to ascertain the name of the country where their ancestors were born. Records of that information weren't kept, and genetic data does not go back enough generations to reflect the time in history when Africans were taken as slaves to America. Los Angeles Times columnist Sandy Banks wrote in 2019 of the "excitement, wonder, pain and pride" she felt upon learning from a DNA test that she was 24% Nigerian. Two years later, however, she was informed that due to a reinterpretation of data, while she was still 46% African, she was only 1% Nigerian. Recommended Reading The Vanishing Half Bennett, Brit View on OverDrive View in Catalog Passing Larsen, Nella View on OverDrive View in Catalog Passing The President's Daughter Chase-Riboud, Barbara View on OverDrive View in Catalog The President's Daughter Sally Hemings: A Novel Chase-Riboud, Barbara View on OverDrive View in Catalog Sally Hemings: A Novel The Tea Girl of Hummingbird Lane See, Lisa View on OverDrive View in Catalog The Tea Girl of Hummingbird Lane Before We Were Yours Wingate, Lisa View on OverDrive View in Catalog Before We Were Yours The Orphan Collector Wiseman, Ellen Marie View on OverDrive View in Catalog The Orphan Collector Learning to Speak Southern Cook, Lindsey Rogers View on OverDrive View in Catalog Learning to Speak Southern Heart and Seoul Frederick, Jen View on OverDrive View in Catalog Heart and Seoul Little Pieces of Me Hammer, Alison View on OverDrive View in Catalog Little Pieces of Me The Song of the Jade Lily Manning, Kirsty View on OverDrive View in Catalog The Song of the Jade Lily Little Fires Everywhere Ng, Celeste In the author's home town of Shaker Heights. Ohio, the arrival of a single mother and a family's attempt to adopt a Chinese American baby upends the status quo. View on OverDrive View in Catalog Little Fires Everywhere In the author's home town of Shaker Heights. Ohio, the arrival of a single mother and a family's attempt to adopt a Chinese American baby upends the status quo. The au pair Rous, Emma View on OverDrive View in Catalog The au pair Mother Daughter Widow Wife Wasserman, Robin View on OverDrive View in Catalog Mother Daughter Widow Wife Separated@Birth: A True Love Story of Twin Sisters Reunited Bordier, Anaïs View on OverDrive View in Catalog Separated@Birth: A True Love Story of Twin Sisters Reunited Three Identical Strangers View on OverDrive View in Catalog Three Identical Strangers Before and After: The Incredible Real-Life Stories Christie, Judy Pace View on OverDrive View in Catalog Before and After: The Incredible Real-Life Stories The Lost Family: How DNA Testing is Upending Who We Are Copeland, Libby View on OverDrive View in Catalog The Lost Family: How DNA Testing is Upending Who We Are The Lost Daughters of China Evans, Karin View on OverDrive View in Catalog The Lost Daughters of China In Search of Our Roots: How 19 Extraordinary African Americans Reclaimed Their Past Gates, Henry Louis, Jr. View on OverDrive View in Catalog In Search of Our Roots: How 19 Extraordinary African Americans Reclaimed Their Past White Like Her: My Family's Story of Race and Racial Passing Lukasik, Gail View on OverDrive View in Catalog White Like Her: My Family's Story of Race and Racial Passing Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood Noah, Trevor View on OverDrive View in Catalog Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood Inheritance: A Memoir of Genealogy, Paternity, and Love Shapiro, Dani View on OverDrive View in Catalog Inheritance: A Memoir of Genealogy, Paternity, and Love Tomlinson Hill Tomlinson, Chris View on OverDrive View in Catalog Tomlinson Hill Reclamation White, Gayle Jessup View on OverDrive View in Catalog Reclamation This press release was produced by the Los Angeles Public Library. The views expressed here are the author's own.