Ethnicity and Race

As I researched my family history, I was amazed about the much different and somewhat conflicting information my family members had. My family identifies as African American. According to my older sister, my late grandmother stated that her father was Caucasian. His name was George Vanriper and his family was descendants from the Netherlands. The Vanriper family migrated to America in the mid to late 1600s abroad a ship called the Spotted Cow.  However, one of my aunts stated that she believed her grandfather’s family was from the New Jersey area and never heard that they were descendants from the Netherlands.

While doing my research I found out that the Lyon family comes from Scotland, England, or France. There are some variations with my last name. Some families spell it with or without an “s” at the end. My grandfather and some of his siblings added an “s” at the end to make our last name Lyons.  My father’s family is a little harder to trace. I do know that they settled in Oxford, North Carolina.  Some of my relatives on my father side where Native American as well.