Afterall, that was my maiden name, Youngblood, I always thought it was an interesting name.  Just in case you never heard it–I just had to include the old song–“Youngblood” by the Coasters, recorded in 1957, when I was eight years old! However, my sister was 14, and just entering high school! Oh my gracious did she get teased about it all through high school!  Guys would sing it to her, tell her they couldn’t get her out of their minds, If she wore a yellow ribbon in her hair–well, she just couldn’t! LOL  Wow, how pop music can affect teens especially!

I was named for my paternal grandparents, shown above, Helen Spear Youngblood.  As a child, I was sure that Youngblood was an Indian name. Youngblood, and my middle name is Spear!  What’s a child to think? We lived in Richmond, Virginia amid the tales of Indian massacres at Jamestown, and right beside Cherokee Road and Comanche Drive! But the name Youngblood is actually German, originally Jungblut.  Who would have guessed?  As a college student, my name was easily remembered apparently, and I’d hear all the way across campus, “Youngblood! Hey, Youngblood, what ya doing?”

Now that I’m grown, and have been a Holshouser longer than a Youngblood, the meaning of family and heritage is more important to me.  Four years ago I started a family tree which now has almost 25,000 family members in it!  My brother and I have both done dna for genealogy studies, and we’ve learned that there are five distinct lines of Youngbloods in the US!

You can look in my blog catergories and see that I have written several stories about my ancestors, the Youngbloods of New Jersey and the carpetbagger great-great-grandfather who moved to Petersburg, Virginia just after the Civil War. Just last week I got to see and tour the church he belonged to after he moved South, I am looking forward to writing in more depth about that in a future blog post.

Today is meant to be a lighthearted and fun post, hope the song brought back memories, or was just fun for you to hear!