Danish Roots

Between 1850 and 1920 more than 350,000 Danes left their homeland to start a new life overseas, most of them in the United States. The 2000 United States census lists 1,430,897 people claiming Danish ancestry. Since you have found your way to this website, your parent, grandparent or great-grandparent likely was one of those immigrants and you are one of those Danish-Americans.

Tracing your Danish ancestry can be a daunting and sometimes frustrating task. The system of patronymic naming that was used well into the 1800’s is only one of the things that can make it difficult to trace your family lineage.

There are, however, resources available that can help, many of them online. Hopefully there will be information on this site that can make your search for you ancestors a little easier as well as providing links to online databases and sharing some Danish history and culture.