Sandy, You could spend years trying to solve this one :) These folk my well be ethnic Germans, or the wife of Herr Gentke may have been Polish along with lots of others ancestors as you look further back. (You will see that the land returned to Poland after WWII was originally Polish and some of the place names reverted from the German ones back to much earlier Polish names.) Someone recently posted an interesting reply suggesting that a family's traditions may well give a big clue to their heritage. If I can find it I will forward it to you. Kind regards, Bronwyn Klimach On 5/22/08, Sandy Meeks <susiem@cass.net> wrote: > > Listers: If one's ancestors were born in the part of Poland that was > eventually ceded to Germany after WWII, are you considered of Polish > heritage? The surname, GENTZ, is German. I understand that there are a few > Gentz's remaining in Poland, but most are in Germany. Sandy > ********************************* > Need to contact the list manager? Write to Marie at > Poland-Roots-admin@rootsweb.com > ---------------------------------- > Discussion of Polish food, culture, and customs are welcome on the list as > long as the discussion stays pertinent to the topic of this list: > researching our Polish roots. > ---------------------------------- > Browse the list's archives here: > http://archiver.rootsweb.com/th/index?list=poland-roots > Search the list's archives here: > http://archiver.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/search?aop=1 > > ------------------------------- > To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to > POLAND-ROOTS-request@rootsweb.com with the word 'unsubscribe' without the > quotes in the subject and the body of the message >

DNA test will assuredly answer any ethnicity questions. Dom. "Fire Sprinklers Are Green!" Save your building, save our environment. On 5/22/08, Sandy Meeks <susiem@cass.net> wrote: > > Listers: If one's ancestors were born in the part of Poland that was > eventually ceded to Germany after WWII, are you considered of Polish > heritage? The surname, GENTZ, is German. I understand that there are a few > Gentz's remaining in Poland, but most are in Germany. Sandy

On Thu, 2008-05-22 at 07:11 -0400, Dominick G Kasmauskas wrote: > DNA test will assuredly answer any ethnicity questions. > > Dom. Nah. We're all mutts. Ethnicity is more about your family beliefs and values than anything else. Given Poland's "rich" history, how many "children" were born of "soldiers" passing through, or "soldiers" deciding to stay. Or what about the more recent "forced" migrations of Galicians/Ukrainians to western Poland? How many "slavic" villages are really descended from Viking trade/conquer? Awful lot of blond and blue eyes? One set of my great-grandparents came from the Russian partition, but considered themselves Polish, even though my great-grandmother's maiden name sounds German. If they felt it in their hearts and acted Polish, who am I to argue? --Rob