In recent days, I’ve been exchanging e-mail with my (Université du Québec à Chicoutimi) linguistics colleague Luc Baronian about ethnic and linguistic history, with special reference to the Welsh (and the Welsh language, Cymraeg) in Pennsylvania and the Pennsylvania Dutch (and their language, Pennsilfaanisch Deitsch); and about tracing ancestral history. Three pieces of background here:
First, Luc is an Armenian-Canadian, the way I’m a Swiss-American. Luc is by recent paternal ancestry Armenian (as you can tell from his surname), by upbringing French Canadian; I am by recent paternal ancestry Swiss (as you can tell by my surname), by upbringing (and maternal ancestry) Pennsylvania Dutch (a descendant of primarily 18th-century immigrants to southeastern Pennsylvania, mostly from the Palatinate region of southern Germany).
Second, some years back, Luc — whose ancestry-search competence is vastly better than mine — helped me trace connections on my mother’s side and correct my misrecollections of several facts.
Third, Luc had gotten interested in the history of the Welsh language in Pennsylvania, which begins in colonial times, with late 17th-century negotiations over the Welsh Tract as a landmark event, and then apparently vanishes, leaving only place-names in its wake.
