My Family History

My Family History

My family name, Schultz, is a german name. My mother's family name, Schwarz, is actually Dutch name according to my Grandmother. My maternal family has a long history in the United States. They originally immigrated to the US in the 1620’s. William Bradford, the first governor of the Plymouth Colony, was the first of my maternal side to set foot in The New World, America. My Great Great Grandmother followed our family history back to our European roots and hand wrote a book that outlines the entire Schwarz family tree. Both sides of my family originate from mostly German and English roots, however, that is all we know about my fraternal side. My family’s ethnicity/race is Caucasian. Our race does not play a role into our family traditions as much as our religion. We are a christian family so we celebrate Christmas and Easter. We are also proud Americans so we celebrate the Fourth of July, Independence Day, Halloween, and Thanksgiving.

My family ended up in the Chicago area because my mom went to Northwestern and meet her first husband, my brother’s father, at Northwestern. They moved from Evanston to St. Louis, then moved back to Evanston to raise my brother. Eventually my Mom divorced. She then meet my Dad, they got married, moved to Wilmette, and raised me. My father has been a chicagoan his whole life. He was raised in Buffalo Grove and Chicago, went to college at NIU, the first in his family to go to college, and continued to live in various Chicago suburbs. 

My mothers side is packed full of entrepreneurs. My Mom is directly related to Charles and J. Frank Duryea, the first people to invent the gas powered automobile. In fact, my Mom’s full maiden name is Wendy Duryea Schwarz. Currently my maternal family boasts 7 consecutive generations of entrepreneurs. I hope to be the eighth. Most of the companies my family started were small businesses. For example, my Mom’s business is a small LLC with one employee, herself.