There have been numerous calls for inclusion of an Obama family tree in my new book, America's Half-Blood Prince: Barack Obama's Story of Race and Inheritance.
Does anybody know of a website that generates polygamous family trees? This co-wife thing (e.g., Obama's Kenyan "Granny," who is not his blood relation but is actually one of his grandfather's other wives) is a little confusing to diagram.
Does anybody know of a website that generates polygamous family trees? This co-wife thing (e.g., Obama's Kenyan "Granny," who is not his blood relation but is actually one of his grandfather's other wives) is a little confusing to diagram.
My published articles are archived at iSteve.com -- Steve Sailer
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http://famiva.com/
You can create the tree and interact with it. Not sure about generating an image though... but its free.
You should be able to find all kinds of blank family tree maps at the Mormon genealogy web sight:
http://www.familysearch.org/eng/default.asp
For something one-off like this, genealogy software would be a hindrance, not an aid. Get out a sheet of paper, and write the names on it and lines connecting them. Try different arrangements to see what communicates well. Then draw it up with a graphics program to look nice. Here is a chart I drew using PostScript to trace the relatedness and inbrededness of the biblical patriarchs. Wikipedia has a chart that someone created for the Darwin-Wedgwood family. The polygamous Obama family will be relatively easy to chart unless there is some cousin marriage to deal with.
Using a Mormon tree for Obama's African relatives might be an interesting exercise.
You'll have to look up agnatic kinship charts to figure out how to do it. I've seen quite a few of those from Qing China (particularly from southern provinces like Fujian and Canton), where polygyny was the norm among the literate elite and Confucian ancestor veneration encouraged meticulously compiled genealogical records. I don't know where to find them online, but if you'd like I'd be happy to scan one and send you a jpeg.
Do you really need some dedicated software? Just use MS excel or Word. They can draw and link text boxes. This isn't rocket science steve.
Lo and behold, here's one for B H Obama, Sr. Just plugging "Obama" into the WorldConnect database gives 313 hits.
1 Barack Hussein Obama b: 1936 d: 1982
+ Kezia of Kenya
2 Malik Obama b: ABT MAR 1958
2 Auma Obama b: ABT 1960
+ Unknown
3 Akinyi Unknown
2 Abo Obama b: 1968
2 Bernard Obama b: 1970
+ Stanley Ann Dunham b: 27 NOV 1942 d: 7 NOV 1995
2 Barack Hussein Obama b: 4 AUG 1961
+ Michelle LaVaughn Robinson b: 17 JAN 1964
3 Malia Ann Obama b: 4 JUL 1998
3 Natasha Obama b: 2001
+ Ruth Nidesand b: ABT 1940
2 Mark Ndesandjo
2 David Ndesandjo
+ Jael of Kenya
2 George Hussein Onyango Obama b: ABT 1982
(Indentation makes this clearer; click on the link, as it didn't carry over.)
Polygamy would not affect an ancestor tree-- you have one mother, regardless of how many wives your father had.
The only difference between a serially monogamous and a polygamous descendant tree is that the children's ages in the latter would overlap. Remember, many, many people married two or more times in earlier centuries, after the deaths of their spouses. Many such descendancies are posted online.
It will be interesting to see how the roots of Obama's poligamy tree get tangled up with Gay marriage and Muslim immigration. In California where I live, Prop 8 is raging. The pro-Gay marriage types have assidiously avoided the larger implications of opening the floodgates of allowing anyone to marry whom they please. So far the rhetoric has cleaved closely to the "two consending adults" line but who is to say that gays and lesbians are so special? Obama might try to avoid this but it might end up getting shoved in his face.
Wow, all this analysis of family trees and the like. Sounds like the "vast rightwing conspiracy" is chugging away, dusting off the manuals on how to make war on a person's character, and setting up for a Clinton-style battle against Obama.
My question is this: if people didn't go for the same old tactics to during the election, what are the odds they'll pay attention once he's elected?
Have fun guys. The rest of the adults will be paying attention to the management of the republic.
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