The story goes that a very Jewish looking gentleman was named "Shane Ferguson". When asked how a person so obviously Jewish would have such a Scottish name, he replied: "Before I came to this country, I wrote to my cousins who were already here and asked them to find me a good American name. They gave me a name to use, but it was very foreign to me. I repeated it to myself over and over on the ship, afraid that I would forget it. I knew it when I landed at Ellis Island, but when the clerk asked me my name, I had to tell him "shoyne fargessen" [Yiddish for "I forget already"]." Gary On Mon, 12 May 2003 23:01:53 -0600 NJUNION-D-request@rootsweb.com writes: > The story goes that a very Asian looking gentleman was named "Hans > Schmidt". When asked how a person so obviously Asian would have such a > germanic name, he replied: "I was in line at Ellis Island, and the man in > front of me was Hans Schmidt, and the clerk put that down for him. I was > then asked my name and I replied 'Sam Ting', and the Clerk recorded 'Hans > Schmidt' and I have been Hans Schmidt ever since." ________________________________________________________________ The best thing to hit the internet in years - Juno SpeedBand! Surf the web up to FIVE TIMES FASTER! Only $14.95/ month - visit www.juno.com to sign up today!