Gain

(mom's dad's family)

We're pretty sure that Gain is a shortened form of something much more complex in Ireland; there have been at least three proposed spellings of related longer versions that all sound like O'gain-a-henny or something similar. We know that Grandpa's grandfather came over from Ireland, and we think it's from County Claire, which was apparently one of the places people came from, but not as frequently as from, say Cork, though that's another option (and one that may lead back to Scandanavia, eventually, as that's where all the Vikings stayed and integrated into the celtic culture). It's said it was around the Famine, but not necessarily because of it; some of the timing seems to be before or after, but as we don't know what the name was before Ellis Island, it's hard to say.

Mom'e given me the names of her grandfather and his brothers, who apparently scattered for some reason and basically never spoke to eachother again; there's the idea that one went North and one went out to Hollywood, and one stayed around New Jersey or Pensylvania, and one maybe went to Australia... scattered. Sounds a bit mythical, but we'll see how it pans out.

There's a town somewhere up north called Gain, I think...

At one point, through Edward, granfather's father, we we reable to find a branch of the family that had been in the states much longer than we think our branch has, who started far north and moved slowly south, eventually converging with our branch; that one goes back to the 1700s, but sort of scattered, without alot of names.