This is an update of the story how my McKenzie brick wall was broken by DNA. Genealogists trace a family and then get to a point where is seems very difficult or maybe even impossible to get beyond. These involuntary stopping points in genealogy are often called “Brick Walls”. I have several and I suppose a good many people doing genealogy have brick walls.

I had been able to go back as far as my great grandfather Malcolm McKenzie and his wife Emma Cash McKenzie. My earlier post on this McKenzie brick wall will give some details about how a comment on this blog guided me towards Malcolm’s family in Cape Breton, Nova Scotia, Canada and much more.

Malcolm’s parents were Alexander McKenzie and Isabella McGregor of Cape Breton. We are still trying to work out some of the details. DNA matches are a big part of the story but we are also looking at historical records.

So far we have identified 5 children of Alexander McKenzie and Isabella McGregor of Cape Breton. There also are a few we are still working on because we are not sure they belong in this family. There are probably more but that we haven’t found them yet.

Malcolm McKenzie (1855-1918) was born in Nova Scotia and died in New York City. He had 7 children that we know of but only 5 of these survived into adulthood. I believe only 2 of these had children – Isabel “Bella” MacKenzie and John Alexander “Alec” MacKenzie.

In trying to learn a bit more about these McKenzie and McGregor families, I have found that I am related to many people in Canada as well as others in Australia and New Zealand.

If you think you might be related to this Mac/McKenzie family, please join in the fun. Either comment or send me a private note.