What would you have been doing 150 years ago?

[Bud2998]

I would be fighting for the Confederates of the South (maternal). Either that or making barrels in London (paternal).

 

[Benderino]

Originally posted by Bud2998
I would be fighting for the Confederates of the South (maternal). Either that or making barrels in London (paternal).

There were no Confederates in 1854.

Only Know-Nothing Party members.

 

[Bifrost]

I'd probably be a rich serf or a merchant (merchant from Greece - most likely) - my mother's branch, but I know almost nothing about my father's heneology.

 

[rilnator]

My family originally came from England so I'd like to think I'd be a Redcoat, defending Victoria's name somewhere in the empire.

 

[IglooDame]

Probably in the US or British Navy, driving a ship around. Now that I think about it, not much different than now.

 

[Thorgrimm]

If following my mother's side i would have been a coal miner in Virginia.

Following my father's side probably in the Prussian Army, as my father's side come from Dresden.


Cheer's Thorgrimm

 

[Speedo]

Working on a farm.

 

[Drewcifer]

I have a few choices:

I could be farming land that my parents homesteaded in northern Illinois and/or owning and running the town bank. I would probably have been an abolitionist who was soon to become a Republican.

I could be a dirt poor peasant in the vicinity of Stavanger, Norway.

I also have Swedish ancestors but my great grandparents who immigrated never told my grandfather much about their lives or family there except that they were from Stockholm. Apparently they didn't like Sweden very much and changed their names in the process of moving so no one could find them. They may have been on the run from something. I could have been doing something exciting in Stockholm. Or I could have been a jerk who's son would later run off with his bride and never return.

Town banker in Illinois (Kankakee) would have been the best option. That side of my family was rural American pseudo-aristocracy at the time. They were among the first white people in that area and used that advantage to comfortable effect for 150+ years (my grandfather was minority leader in the Illinois lower house briefly in the 1950's).

 

[tossi]

Well i would live in Pommern (ex-german Poland) either farming or ... farming.

 

[MarineCorps]

Probaly wondering what I would be doing 150 years from then.

 

[dralm]

Originally posted by Thorgrimm

Following my father's side probably in the Prussian Army, as my father's side come from Dresden.

dresden never was a prussian city, but a saxony.
if i follow my fathers side i would be a headmaster in hamburg, if i follow my mothers side a carpenter near hamburg

 

[Thorgrimm]

Yeah but if i remember correctly Saxony was part of prussia by then.


Cheers Thorgrimm

 

[dralm]

Originally posted by Thorgrimm
Yeah but if i remember correctly Saxony was part of prussia by then.


Cheers Thorgrimm

as far as i know saxony always was an independent kingdom. but of course, it was a part of the german empire since 1871

 

[Drewcifer]

I think it is safe to say that most of us would have been farming somewhere. The exception would be Britain where many were working hellishly brutal low paying industrial work.

Thank God (or somebody) we don't live 150 years ago.

 

[The Person]

No clue. My mother is from Germany and my father from Norway, and my grandfather on my paternal side claims his ancestors came from Germany, too. But I don't know where in Germany.

Edit: My 150*2th post! Woohoo! Custom avatar, here I come! Or not.

 

[Margim]

Working on a farm in southern England, working in a shop in northern england/southern scotland, or in training as an Anglican Priest.

 

[Sir Oswulf]

I want to believe I would be courageously doing something non-warlike to improve the world around me, but it is probably more likely that I would be hiding under a rock somewhere.

 

[Archer 007]

Southern plantation owner.

 

[Tathlum]

150 years ago...Can't really think of anything big around then...
Oh yeah...

Probably starving to death...
Something kinda big happened here in the 1840's...
There used to be about 8 million people in Ireland, today north and republic theres about 6...
Saddest part of Irelands long history...The Famine.

If I wasnt starving I'd probably be heading off to Britain, America or one of the other many places we ended up. Whatever country your from you probably got a few Irish visiters around this time...

OK I'm out by a couple of years but I can't really ignore the biggest thing in our history.

 

[gael]

I said earlier in this thread that I proably would have gotten involved in the uneasy politics, as in not a politician but as an average joe, or paddy, fighting for his own.

The truth is I would have been an ignorant, poor, and hungry man looking to get the hell out of a country thats politics and alliances were not a clear cut as I'd like them to have been.

Given the option of fight of flight, flight would have made more sense at that time.