I tried. I did. I really, really tried to avoid jumping on the Woodstock 40th Anniversary bandwagon. But the simple truth is this… it was a seminal moment in my life (git yer mind outta the gutter!) and there’s no guarantee I’ll be around for the Fiftieth Anniversary. I’m just sayin’.

What, you may ask, does Woodstock have to do with family history? Some of you youngsters may indeed ask, “What IS Woodstock? And that, my friends, is exactly my point. To me, the largest gathering of human beings on the planet had significance.

A quick glance at Leonard Statistics shows us to have a fairly decent record for longevity. We have no fewer than a dozen ancestors who lived past the age of 95. Pretty incredible, when you think about it, given that most of them lived when life expectancy hovered around 35.

This might be a good time to mention that the title “Till Death Do Us Part” has nothing to do with weddings and love songs and 60th anniversaries. (Are you new here?) No, my friends, today we’re going to discuss the many and strange ways our brave ancestors DIED….

Independence Day is nearly upon us (or is wa-a-a-y off in the future, depending on when you read this). And what kind of Leonard would I be if I didn’t take note of our illustrious Revolutionary War ancestors?

As we celebrate the outcome of the Revolutionary War, let’s just ignore the fact that the Star Spangled Banner was written during the War of 1812, shall we? It’s our patriotic duty to go along with the star-spangled theme…

As a child of the fifties, nothing could be more exciting than the possibility of an ancestor who might’ve crossed paths with the heroes of black-and-white westerns…

Some of you are no doubt familiar with the legend of Samuel Leonard, and some of you are not. No surprise, really, since his story was essentially hijacked (no offense) by the family of Hannah Duston/Dustin…