Notable Kin, Volume Two treats royal descents of 30 tycoon families (including Morgans, Rockefellers, and Vanderbilts); "fun" ancestors of numerous folkloric figures and Hollywood actors, actresses, directors, writers and composers; and much of the known, and some conjectured, ancestry of the three major icons in mid-20th century popular culture (Marilyn Monroe, James Dean, and Elvis Presley). Mr. Roberts also covers notable descendants of Northern New England and Rhode Island immigrants with royal forebears, and offers a genealogical tribute to the late Diana, Princess of Wales. Folkloric figures treated include Pocahontas (her descendants and "kin-of-kin"); Salem witchcraft victims; Nantucket founders; presidential cousins "Johnny Appleseed," "Buffalo Bill" Cody and "Wild Bill" Hickok; P.T. Barnum and Tom Thumb; Lizze Borden and Jessie and Frank James. Texans and other "molders and mythologizers" of the West include the H.L. Hunts of Dallas, the King-Klebergs; the Colt and Winchester arms manufacturers; and writers Laura Ingalls Wilder, Jack London, and Louis L'Amour. Actors and actresses included are Humphrey Bogart, Bing Crosby, Montgomery Clift, Anthony Perkins and John Wayne, and Tallulah Bankhead, Bette Davis, Jane and Bridget Fonda, Dorothy and Lillian Gish, Katharine Hepburn and Joanne Woodward.

By Gary Boyd Roberts
Published: 1999