Mariä Himmelfahrt Church, Schönholthausen, Kreis Olpe, North Rhine-Westphalia.

Are we related to them somehow?

If we have a common ancestor, then we are related.

• If we have the same parents, we are siblings.
• If we have the same grandparents, we are cousins.
• If we have the same great grandparents, we are second cousins.
• If we have the same great great grandparents, we are third cousins.
• If we have the same great great great grandparents, we are fourth cousins.

Or, count the G's to determine the cousin.

If my parent has the same ancestor as you, or vice versa, then we are nth cousins once removed. If my grandparent has the same ancestor as you, or vice versa, then we are nth cousins twice removed. And so on.

The Druekes in Grand Rapids, Michigan, are a good example to illustrate distant and removed cousins. We are not the only Drueke family in Grand Rapids. There is another one that is related to us in two ways. Back in the 1880s, two Drueke cousins once removed married two Berles sisters. We knew about the Berles relationship, but we did not know how we were related on the Drueke side until Marilyn and I met Pastor Franz Rinschen in 2007 in the rectory of Mariä Himmelfahrt Church in Schönholthausen, Germany. Pastor Rinschen told us about my great great great grandparents, Johann and Elisabeth Bitter Drüecke and took us to their house in Ostentrop, a nearby town that was part of his parish. He also gave us details on their descendants, enough to see the connection between the two Drueke families in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

In the above table, which looks at the Drueke relationship, Mary Kay is fourth cousin of Karl A. Drueke.

In the table below, which looks at the Berles relationship, Mary Kay is third cousin of Karl A. Drueke's son Roger.