I started writing our family´s history 50 years ago in Costa Rica, with the family name written in Western alphabet. I eventually visited our home town in Canton, where I discovered that the few remaining members. fearing for their lives, had destroyed their precious Family Record Book during the disastrous years of "The Gang of Four".  It is included in our Wellesley Record Book because no other endeavor in my life has been as difficult as putting together this giant puzzle in a language I do not speak and most others cannot read. The realization that the First Generation of the Lü Clan shows up in 960 b. c., and there are unbroken, continuous written records to prove it, is an amazing discovery. In Western terms, it is like tracing a Western family´s ancestry  back to the mythical " Trojan Wars"  in one unbroken written record, kept by each surviving family, and without the Rosetta Stone. This provides a key to all Chinese and Westerners who seek to understand a little of Chinese history. It gives back to all Overseas Chinese the possibility to find where they come from and who they are: a sense of belonging somewhere.

For information about finding your Chinese family roots, read HOW TO FIND YOUR 5,000 YEAR OLD CHINESE FAMILY ROOTS© (in 6 not-so-easy steps ).

In the photo, 150 (out of 300) members celebrate 180 years of the Luis Wachong Lee and Teresa Ho Sosa Clan in Costa Rica, taken at the Costa Rica Supreme Court in San José, 2003.