Most American families have a similar story--their ancestors fled their homelands due to hardships and came to America to have a better life. Some family trees are really simple, like my dad's family tree, and some are more complicated, like my mom's. I have always been intrigued by my family's history and I've always been proud to say that I am Italian, Irish, German and Polish. As I gotten older, I began doing my own research and started asking questions about my heritage and so far, I've learned a lot.

When I was younger, I asked a lot of questions about my dad's Italian heritage and would go around telling people that I was mostly Italian. As I grew older, I realized I didn't really know anything about my mom's heritage except for being Irish, Polish and German. I began asking my Gram, my maternal grandmother, questions about our family history. My Gram was born into a blended family in 1939 in Port Richmond, which was the Polish neighborhood in Philadelphia. Her mother had three children--Gertrude, Eugene, and Dorothy--from a previous marriage and her father had a son named Valentine, who was also from a previous marriage. Her family then moved to Pine Hill, NJ when she was about 14 years old. My great-grandmother was Irish and her name was Annie Martin and she was a little crazy. Her parents were born in Ireland and I'm not sure when they came to America. My great grandfather, William Binkowski, was Polish and his parents were born in Russia to Polish parents before coming to America. My grandfather, who I called PopPop, died in 2001. When asking my Gram about his family, she said that he was German and Irish and that his parents were born here as well. Some man in my grandfather's family was apparently adopted from an orphanage in Lithuania, but we're not sure if that's true.

I would love to find out more about my family history and uncover family secrets before it's too late.