UPDATED 5-18-07
Hello:
I began adding articles to Wikipedia in December of 2005, reading the encyclopedia since probably 2003. You'll see changes to this page as time progresses and I learn more. My user name comes from my grandfather, John Wallace Rich, who was KIA December 15, 1944, in or near the German city of Aachen, near the Belgian border. He was 20-years old, and my mother was his only child.
I was blocked for over 6 weeks resulting from a problems with those who haven't had an account on Wikipedia as long, and I've now requested Community Enforceable Mediation regarding one of the cases. I still feel attacked, and I'm working on it. As previously stated, I do also have other things to do and value my time. Hopefully, I'll manage it well, and I say that a lot.
As far as ancestry, I've got German, Mexican-American (Spanish and a little Yaqui), and probably French on my dad's side and, at least biologically, British, Austrian, Dutch, French Canadian, and German on my mother's side. I do believe in civil or human rights, so I mention it here, and as far as religion, right now I'm pretty much Protestant, Lutheran/Episcopalian, baptized in an Episcopal church (in a joint Lutheran/Episcopal service), but my family genuinely believes in freedom of religion. I also first completed a book, A Course in Miracles, back in 1990 and still use ideas from it today.
The ancestry goes back a long way in CA for my father's side, with Bartnings coming here from Europe in the 1880s and Yaquis being in this region of the U.S.A. for 30,000 years. My mother's side has British and Dutch going back to the 1600s in New York, Austrian (half Austrian-Hungarian, some at least probably Jewish who converted to Christians generations ago) going back to the turn of the 20th century, and a little French Canadian and German besides.
There was at least one adoption on my mother's side, and I still research my family tree, making my mother call me the "genealogist" of the family. For biological ancestors, I've rediscovered my Loyalist, major-landowner ancestor in New York who died at 30 on Long Island during the Revolution, something that could give me a UE or UEL title in Canada. Biological ancestors also include those who were First Defenders, first to respond to President Lincoln's call for 75,000 men to defend Washington, D.C. at the beginning of the Civil War.
I have other ancestors who fought in the Civil War as well. However, so far I've found no ancestor who fought for the Confederacy. I do still actively search for ancestors who fought during the Revolution, and my mother's siblings all belonged to groups honoring their ancestors from the American Revolution because she was legally adopted after her father was KIA in World War II, and her adoptive father's family had ties to organizations such as the Daughters of the American Revolution.
I am also the firstborn, born November 1964, with 3 (2 brothers and 1 sister) full and 2 (brothers) half siblings in my mother's third marriage. My parents married in early 1964, my mother's first marriage and the year I was born.