How "close" is an 8th cousin? (In other words, how many of those would I likely have?)

Question

I just got one of those "you're related to a famous person" notifications from Geni.com. They told me former actress Loretta Young was my 8th cousin, twice removed. It's beyond my abilities, but I was wondering, how many 8th cousins (removed and otherwise) does the average person have? (I know just the grandparents get geometrically plentiful after a while.) Is it in the hundreds, thousands, more?

I don't know if this would be helpful, but here is the "relationship trail" they gave me. If anyone can shed some light statistically on these things, I think it would be interesting to know. (Like, is there an easy way of looking at this relationship trail and seeing how I'm an 8th cousin? I know the "twice removed" part has to do with generation differences, right?)

Loretta Young is your 8th cousin twice removed.

Bob S→

Doris Pauline Scrivens (Fountain) 
your mother→

Yvonne Fountain (Robert) 
her mother→

Marie Lumena Robert (Pigeon) 
her mother→

Charles Pigeon 
her father→

Marie-Catherine Gagnon 
his mother→

Jean-Baptiste Gagnon 
her father→

Marguerite Lacombe 
his mother→

Jean Lacombe 
her father→

Marie-Charlotte Millet 
his mother→

Marie Catherine Desautels (Lorion) 
her mother→

Marie Picardy Lorion 
her sister→

Moses de Graaf 
her son→

Cornelia De Grauw 
his daughter→

Harmanus Nix 
her son→

Hermanus Nix 
his son→

Susan Young (Nix) 
his daughter→

Benjamin D Young 
her son→

John Earle Young 
his son→

Loretta Young 
his daughter

Answer 1

Nobody addressed the "how" you're an 8th cousin question yet, so just wanted to note that you can figure it out from the trail they gave you.  Loretta would be your cousin because you both share a common ancestor.  In the list it looks as if the common ancestor(s) would be the parents of the two sisters, Marie Catherine and Marie Picardy.  Their parents would be the 7g-grandparents of Loretta and your 9g-grandparents.  You're an 8th cousin of anyone with whom your closest shared ancestor is a 7g-grandparent of one of you.  In this case you're twice removed because your relationship is 2 generations farther removed than Loretta's.  As the others note, you can probably find a huge bunch of other 8th cousins from the same ancestors (along with 7th, 9th, 10th, whatever cousins at various degrees of removal).  And then you would have up to 2**9 more 9g-grandparents to analyze for similar results.  So it's boatloads of cousins, and probably a math problem you wouldn't want to attempt to work!

Comments

And oh BTW, you may need to have faith that the genealogy of that whole daisy chain for both of you was done correctly!

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Thanks; that was a very helpful and lucid explanation, Dennis.

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This is the best explanation that I have seen yet for this question. I am related to so many famous people such as Howard Hughes, Lawrence Welk, Judy Garland, Mae West, Clark Gable, Buster Keaton and several more. All of which are 8th cousins 2x removed. I could not begin to fathom what that meant. Thank you very much for explaining this.

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As am I.Just in entertainers I have Johnny Carson,Johnny Cash,Jim Henson,Red Skeleton,Roy Orbison,Gene Surry,Buddy Holley,Elvis Presley, Hoagie Carmichael,Jim morrison,Janis Joplin,Stevie Nicks,and about 100 more.Its So exciting but have found nobody really cares.In fact, someone told me "a friend"has been talking behind my back saying I think I am better than everyone else.Fact is,my car was built in 2002 and I love a good yard sale.lol

Answer 2

It depends, in part, on how many siblings Loretta Young had as well as how many siblings all your other cousins had. Loretta young had three sisters and one brother.

Answer 3

In a static population, say 30,000 to 100,000.  In America, a permanent population explosion, millions.

Comments

For you numbers, could you explain how you figured your computations? I was especially intriqued about the "millions" figure.

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I'm sure RJ's math is similar to mine, knowing that most families have more than two kids, although some have no kids.

256 x 3^7 (or 4^7, etc) is a really large number. (1/2 million+ for only 3 kids each; 4 billion+ for 4 kids -- assuming everyone lives and no pedigree collapse)

Answer 4

Well, your 1st cousins are the children of your aunts and uncles, and your 2nd cousins are the grandchildren of your great aunts and uncles (keeping them in the same generation as you), and its going to depend on how many siblings your aunts and uncles had.

But let's simplify the math, with only two children from each relationship.

1st cousins : 2 (parents) x 2 (siblings) x 2 (kids) = 8
2nd cousins : 4 (grandparents) x 2 sib x 2 kids (parents) x 2 kids = 32
3rd cousins: 8 ggparents x 2 sib x 2 kids (gp) x 2 kids (p) x 2 kids = 128

The smallest number of 8th cousins, assuming everyone lived and produced two children each, and no intermarriages of cousins, would be: 256 x 2^7 = 32,756

For twice removed, you start at 8th, and walk back up (or down) the tree two levels, so still a much larger number than 6th cousins.

If your parents come from large families (my mom was one of eight), and each of them had four or more children, then you could have as many as 64 1st cousins. (2 parents x 8 siblings x 4 children). and my grandparents are also from large families (mine had 6 to 8 siblings each), then 4 grandparents x 6 siblings x 6 children x 4 grandchildren each = 576  2nd cousins (if I did my math right).

Comments

http://www.vyrtex.com/article/everyone-on-earth-is-actually-your-cousin

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Thanks for spelling out the math, Dennis. That makes it much easier to follow.

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Excellent article! Thanks! My favorite quote: "You can see why it’s not really that impressive when someone tells you they are descended from famous royalty who lived a few hundred years ago. Look how many people you’re descended from only about 300 years back! Within that top section, there’s probably some royalty, in addition to some peasants, scholars, warriors, painters, prostitutes, murderers, lunatics, and any other kind of person who existed back then."

Answer 5

I unknowingly married a 7th cousin. What are the odds of that happening? Her paternal line and my maternal line. It boggles the mind.

Comments

I hope you don't regret the decision. :-)

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apparently (according to the relationship finder here on wikitree), I've married my 21st cousin once removed.

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No regrets at all. 31 years of marriage, 3 beautiful daughters and 6 wonderful grandchildren. I wouldn't change a thing.

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I just got my DNA results back and I'm "5-8th" cousin with my husband! I don't know if we'll be able to figure out how we're related.

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I wish I was married to my 8th cousin because apparently that's the Rockefeller family!!!

Answer 6

I can't help you with the technical aspects of cousin relationships, but I can give you an idea of the exponential nature of those connections.  My Dad's parents were born in Mexico over a hundred years ago with some Spanish ancestry.  Little is known of his father's lineage as he died when my dad was a toddler.  To try to find those connections, my dad did a DNA test on Ancestry.  Just in people who have done their DNA on Ancestry so far, my dad has 30,000 people with a DNA connection of 8th cousin or closer with only about a 1000 of those being 4th cousin or closer.  Only about 20 are 3rd cousin or closer.

Comments

on ftdna I have over 500 at what they predict as 2nd - 3rd cousin and over 2,000 matches at 2nd - 4th cousin level.  I've never tried to find how many there are in my whole list, but I did see screens up to 5,000 of them and I think they stop at predicting 6th cousin level.

Despite all that, I have only managed to connect with 1 match, who is a 2nd cousin … but she's worth everything!  We have forged a very close bond.