Native American Ancestry help!?

Question

It is said in my family that my great grandfather was 1/2 Native American. I am trying to trace my ancestry but I get stuck on him. All I know is my grandfather said he was born in Clifton, Arizona. I found information from his social security info on Ancestry.com and it says he was born in Arizona but nothing regarding the names of his parents. When I input his info on the state website to view birth documents it says nothing exists for his name and birthday. Any suggestions on what I can do? Could it be perhaps he doesn't have a birth certificate?

Answer 1

Your comment about viewing birth documents is very intriguing. NORMALLY a birth certificate is confidential info, and not online. In addition, every state has a different date, mostly in the early 1900's, when birth certs were legislated as a requirement. Depending on his date of birth, this could be a factor.. OR he might have been born on a reservation in Arizona.
His death certificate would be a more recent document, and it should have his parents names. Assuming he died in the last 50 yrs, go to rootsweb.com, searches, and pull up the social security death index. I also suggest that you do a search for his SURNAME alone in advanced search for just Arizona.. the goal being to find possible siblings.
With specific names and dates, you can estimate which census he might have been in, as well as his parents. The census started in 1790, is taken every 10 yrs, and is available up through 1930. The 1890 copy was lost in a fire. Obviously, there was no Arizona in 1790... this is where you get to dip your toe in fitting your family location to history. You will want the most RECENT census first..and work backwards.
I googled Clifton Arizona, and one of the interesting sites I found was this one...
http://www.rootsweb.com/~azgreenl/clifton.html
You didn't mention his name, so I could not tell if any of the names here matched his..
This is a great article about Clifton's past...
http://www.hcn.org/servlets/hcn.Article?article_id=262
And don't overlook www.usgenweb, which has volunteer (free) web sites for every county in the US. You may find his family there, or just background info.

Answer 2

First. It is very possible there is no birth certificate. Many Native people had their records burned or disposed of. Some people will never be able to trace their ancestry and become enrolled. If this is the case it is best to just become involved in ones culture, on can obtain several benifits just by being involved.


Information on how to become enrolled is listed below:

To become enrolled in one's tribe is often a difficult process. Once one is enrolled one will have certain rights as a Native person. It is true that no one needs to prove their ethnic identity but to have full access to rights for Native people one must be enrolled.

To become enrolled one must first should call one's tribe and find out the enrollment requirements. They are different per tribe.
For most tribes you have to prove descendency and have a certain blood quantum. To prove descendency one needs to have some record of her belonging to a member of the tribe that was recognized by the tribe at some point, hopefully an individual that was enrolled at some point. The average blood quantum standard is 1/4. Unless you are Cherokee, their blood quantum standards are much less.

If you don't have contact with your tribal member then you can ask the tribe to look for his last name. They can look this up and see if his family line is registered. If so then your in luck. If they don't immediately find it then you can use the tribal newspaper and submit an article asking if anyone has lineage to your tribal member . Submitting an add in the tribal newspaper might work especially well for you if there is no record of a birth certificate. Maybe someone will know of a link to your Grandfather, this should work just as well as having his birth certificate.

Many Native people can never become enrolled because standards of enrollment are high and were set up by the White government to oppress Native people and Native people have yet to change them.

To become more involved in one'sculture one might want to look up local Native organizations or local tribes. Try going to Pow-wow's (because they are easy to find) and talk to community members there. Many colleges/universities have a Native student union where one can get involved or get more information.

Please remember ancestry is very difficult for many Native people.

By the way, I am Native, so I have some knowledge pertaining to this.

Answer 3

I don't remember when they started the certificates, or when they started it for everyone, but it is possible he did not have a birth certificate.

I wish I could offer more help, I'm equally stuck on some people I'm trying to find. Just don't give up and try everything you can think of, you never know when something will be the key to pull it together and hopefully one day you will find the info you seek.

Answer 4

He probably doesn't have a birth certificate which is why you can't find his birth in Arizona records. Have you tried baptismal records from churches in the area? Census records? His marriage license or death certificate? All of those records would lead you to his parents.

I'd contact the funeral home that buried him and ask them to share the information from their records with you. They have his death certificate, military service dates, place of birth, obituary, etc....in short they have everything you need to research him and it's all sitting in a file cabinet.

My own dad never had a birth certificate. They weren't required in this state until 1930. My grandparents lived on a farm in a very rural area and just couldn't afford to pay to register the births of all of their kids. So they didn't. He used his baptismal certificate to get a passport, apply for his pension, etc. It was pretty common in that era.