One of the coolest things you can get on ancestry.com sometimes, is a list of famous people to whom you are related. It is not something that is available for anyone in your tree. It is a service that ancestry.com provides for people using their Ancestry World Tree, formerly called the One World Tree. This is a compilation of all the family trees on ancestry.com since they started and is nothing short of amazing! Generally, I find that you are more likely to find a person born in the 1800’s or before in this resource. Also, I find the listings are generally more available for ancestors of English, Scottish, Irish, or French descent. It doesn’t seem that I find a lot for my German or Italian ancestors. With that in mind, lets take a look and see if we can find some famous relatives for me!
One of my favorite ancestors is my great grandmother, Evelyn Howell Langhorne, born in 1866. I think that as I’ve learned more and more about her, I’ve begun to think of her as a person, not just a name on a page. She was only 15 years old when she married my gg grandfather Walter Thomas Houchins. 15! Take a look at your fifteen year old daughter, or think back to what you were like at 15–we were babies! Instead, this young lady of a wealthy plantation-owning family in Virginia, got married and immediately had seven children , then died at age 34! Her husband Thomas was twelve years older than her, 27 when they married. Do you think he knew how to care for a fifteen year old wife? And Evelyn knew heartache and tragedy. One of her children died at about age 3. Another was blinded in a horseback riding incident. Their house burned down! All this before 1900! Upon her death, when she was only 34, a wealthy relative, Lady Nancy Langhorne Astor, first woman elected to Parliament, swooped in and sent the boys to boarding schools, and the girls each as they chose to nursing school and to study law. Thomas went on to marry again, and have two more children.
If you look up Evelyn Howell Langhorne in the One World Tree in the card catalog of ancestry.com, you can get a wealth of information. But you must be careful! Because this is a compilation of other people’s work, there are mistakes. I have found it best to check all information gained by as many historical records as possible–things like censuses, wills, church and court records. But you can have fun without doing anything more. If I click on the line item labeled “Find Famous Relatives” , look what comes up! (Quoted from the One World Tree on ancestry.com)
Famous People related to Evelyn Howell LanghorneBETA
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How Accurate Is This?

The Relationship Finder Tool is as accurate as the data we pull from OneWorldTree. The quality of each relationship shown is measured by stars (where 5 stars shows high probability of an accurate relationship).
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Isn’t this interesting! Lady Astor, her first cousin, is the first to come up. But there’s Mark Twain, and even Pretty Boy Floyd! You have to take the good with the bad! Look at the astronomer, politicians, actors, actresses, authors! I was blown away the first time I saw this list. With a little sleuthing, you can prove these relationships as well–a good idea if you’re going to believe them or brag about them! Ancestry does a lot of it for you, or at least points you in the direction you need to research. If you click on the “show relationships” above, look what you get:
Grandparent of Evelyn Howell Langhorne |
Great Grandparent of Nancy Astor |
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How Accurate Is This?
The Relationship Finder Tool is as accurate as the data we pull from OneWorldTree. The quality of each relationship shown is measured by stars (where 5 stars shows high probability of an accurate relationship).
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How about for Pretty Boy Floyd?
3rd Great Grandparent of Evelyn Howell Langhorne |
7th Great Grandparent of |
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How Accurate Is This?
The Relationship Finder Tool is as accurate as the data we pull from OneWorldTree. The quality of each relationship shown is measured by stars (where 5 stars shows high probability of an accurate relationship).
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The last yellow box on the right should have “Pretty Boy Floyd” in it.
Here’s Mark Twain:
6th Great Grandparent of Evelyn Howell Langhorne |
5th Great Grandparent of Samuel Langhorne Clemens |
If you notice, some of the boxes are empty, that happens sometime. However, once you start researching, its generally fairly easy to fill in these names. For one thing, these are all parent/child/parent /child. If you jump to a husband or wife in this chart, you nullify the whole thing!
Once you have filled in a few more generations, I find it interesting to check the famous people again. Just three generations later, my fourth great grandfather is John Scarsbrook Langhorne b. 1760. Here’s his list of “famous people”.
Famous People related to John Scarsbrook LanghorneBETA
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How Accurate Is This?

The Relationship Finder Tool is as accurate as the data we pull from OneWorldTree. The quality of each relationship shown is measured by stars (where 5 stars shows high probability of an accurate relationship).
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A lot of these names are the same, but look closely and there’s Queen Elizabeth II! Then look again, there are the Tilly brothers who arrived on the Mayflower! “Touch me” LOL, it makes me one of the first families of our nation! Not only that, I now know that the Tilly’s bring my kinship to the kings and queens of England, Scotland, and France! I have royal blood flowing through these veins, so how come I have no money! LOL
Let me show you a Tilly chart:
9th Great Grandparent of John Scarsbrook Langhorne |
Great Great Grandparent of Edward Tilly |
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How Accurate Is This?
The Relationship Finder Tool is as accurate as the data we pull from OneWorldTree. The quality of each relationship shown is measured by stars (where 5 stars shows high probability of an accurate relationship).
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Now look what it looks like in a relationship chart:
King Edward III of England Plantagenet (1312 – 1377)
is your 19th great grandfather
son of King Edward III of England Plantagenet
daughter of John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster Plantagenet
son of Joan Plantagenet “Countess Westmoreland” (Beaufort) (Ferrers) Neville
daughter of Sir Richard (5th Earl of Salisbury) Neville
son of Eleanor Neville
daughter of George STANLEY
son of Jane Stanley
daughter of Edmund Sheffield, 1st Baron Sheffield
son of Eleanor Sheffield
son of John 1st Earl of Clare, Holles
daughter of Robert Hollis
son of Susanna Hollis
daughter of Maj. Robert Beverley Sr.
son of Mary Beverley
daughter of Col. Maurice Langhorne
son of Elizabeth Langhorne
son of Henry Scarsbrook Langhorne
daughter of James Steptoe Langhorne
daughter of Evelyn Howell Langhorne
daughter of Katherine Steptoe Houchins
You are the daughter of Margaret Steptoe Kerse – (
not you
How much fun is that! I find it fascinating! I have learned a fair amount of history along the way as well.
I’d really like to know what you think of this, whether you are already acquainted with it and enjoying this information, or whether you had no idea this was available. If you leave a comment, you might be chosen to win a chart like this yourself. Don’t worry if you don’t know your family members back to the 1800’s, we can figure that out. If you know at least one parent or grandparent born before 1940 it would help. Looking forward to showing you more next post. What do you think? Helen
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Old enough to enjoy life, I am a Red Hatter, grandmother, gardener, and amateur genealogist. I am a retired clinical psychologist, master's level, who is disabled with heart disease, but having fun with family and friends. Married over 40 years, I have two grown daughters and three grandchildren. I have learned that grandchildren provide a joy one never knew existed---writing feeds my soul, gardening is therapy, and genealogy research makes me feel like a detective!