Jared Wheeler’s ancestors may not have come over on the Mayflower, but he says his family tree does include a corrupt New Bedford mayor and the infamous Lizzie Borden.

Wheeler is one of a few dozen Old Rochester Regional students researching his family history in a new genealogy class offered by English teacher Kathleen Brunelle.

Meghan Johnson's great grandmother Marjorie R Johnson in 1950 when she became the Deputy Grand Marshall of the P.M. Hatherly Chapter #185.

The one semester elective teaches students how to uncover their personal histories using the Internet, relatives and local resources. Members of the group also got a look at how the pros do it when they attended a recent taping of PBS’s Genealogy Roadshow that featured Brunelle.

Brunelle first became interested in her own genealogy in college. Visiting the New Bedford library she was able to discover how her great grandmother had died and where her grandparents lived before they moved to Cape Cod.

That day she said, “I took a little drive, found the house and I was hooked.”

Brunelle brings 20 years of genealogy research to the class and is helping students uncover mysteries along the eway.

Keegan Lant recently learned that her father never knew his grandparents.

“It sparked my interest. I’ve got to do something about that,” she said.

Her father didn’t know his grandmother’s name, so she started researching her great grandfather first.

“He kind of just disappeared, and no one ever talked about him,” Lant said. “There’s this huge mystery, and now I really want to solve it.”

So far, she has uncovered her great grandfather’s military records that told her he had brown eyes and brown hair.

“It makes him more real, not just a name on the paper.”

Kylie Machado discovered that her great grandfather Romeo Normandin died after falling from a train. Those responsible for the accident put him into a train car. When he got to his office, however, he died, and his family tried to get justice. Machado said her research has stalled somewhat but this interesting tidbit is a layer of her history she never knew.

Many students have uncovered distant relations they didn’t know they had.

Arthur and Lillie Eklund, great grandparents of Lillie Farrell.

Alyson Maguire discovered she is probably related to folk hero Daniel Boone.

Using Family Search, an online ancestry database, Bailey Sweet found a possible link to Joseph of Arimathea, the man who the Bible says offered his tomb for Jesus’ burial. To figure out if it’s true, Sweet has some work to do through about 2,000 years of history.

Through his research, Jared Wheeler discovered that he’s related to a 1950s New Bedford mayor who took a bribe from a mobster. He also found out he’s related to Lizzie Borden. One family rumor, however, proved to be untrue. While speaking with a historian at the Genealogy Roadshow, he was told he did not descend from the Mayflower, something that is part of family lore.

“That was a little disappointing,” said Wheeler. Fortunately, he’s always got Lizzie.

Many students have had a difficult time tracing their family heritage. Those with Irish roots often find that family records were destroyed in rebellions and/or lost due to the Great Famine in the mid 1800s. Those with Portuguese relatives, most of whom only came to the U.S. one or two generations ago, also hit a wall since there are none or next to none online records.

Kayley Sylvia’s father came from Portugal, but died when she was 3, leaving very little family history behind.

“I originally wanted to find out more about his side of the family. I really can’t,” she said.

On her mother’s side, she discovered that her great grandfather was an orphan in France and nuns gave him a last name.

“The nuns made up the last name so it doesn’t exist before then,” Sylvia said. “Any random person could be in my family and I wouldn’t know.”

She is hoping to get more information when the class visits the New Bedford Library, which has many resources and records.

Brunelle says she encourages students who get stumped that the process of filling out their family tree is one they can work on their whole life.

“It’s not a weakness. It’s just history,” she said.

Michael Lavoie discovered that his 12th generation great grandfather was the Duke of Brissac Charles de Cousse II of France.

Brunelle has hit plenty of roadblocks in her own research, and she asked the Genealogy Roadshow experts to help her get past one of them.

One of her New Bedford ancestors, a Portuguese emigrant, disappears from all records in 1865.

“The rest of the family is here and he’s not. He’s not buried here, he’s not on any record,” Brunelle said.

She applied to be on the Roadshow to get to the bottom of the mystery and was chosen for a spot. The team dug into her history, including a visit to the New Bedford Whaling Museum, to uncover clues. They revealed their research with Brunelle during a taping of the show in Providence. Brunelle is not allowed to divulge their findings, but they will be disclosed on an episode in February.

In the meantime, the genealogy students have plenty of work to do as they uncover relations in unexpected places and with unknown histories. Some, like Brunelle, have found that their origins are much more diverse than they ever knew. That’s part of the fun of this lifelong search to fill out the family tree, says Brunelle.

“What it shows you is that we’re all interconnected.”

(As part of their class, students displayed photos of their great grandparents. Several of them shared their photos with Sippican Week.)

Alexis Sweeney's great grandparents Erna and Edward Deyter on their wedding day. Photo courtesy: Alexis Sweeney