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[Darvi]

This is my family's coat of arms.



Broken sword because my grandfather was a WW2 field medic.

Really? Mine too!

Mine was a WWII smuggler. As in, smuggling people across borders. Yeah.

[Tack]

That is pretty cool.
And one of the more socially acceptable law-breaks.

[MaximumZero]

My grandfather was part of an artillery crew in Korea. Does that count?

[Starver]

To the last two posters:
Might depend on which side they conducted those activities for, and which side the audience to which such information is conveyed considered themselves allied with.

(None of my immediate ancestors ever told me or my family that they did anything so interesting, in WW2 or otherwise.  But then the really cool stuff would never have been talked about.  I have an acquaintance whose cousin (it turns out, and of course after a long silence on the subject) worked at Bletchley Park, and apparently directly with Alan Turing.  That'd be a legacy I'd like association with...  Although, again, it rather works best for people who didn't favour the equivalent Axis efforts, in this field...)

[NobodyPro]

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

The big one isn't the right part of the family but the other crest I found gives away my actual last name . Basically the same anyway.

[MaximumZero]

Might depend on which side they conducted those activities for, and which side the audience to which such information is conveyed considered themselves allied with.

'Murrica, of course, at least for me. My lineage gets to claim being more american than most americans.

Every time the xenophobic rednecks wander into my stores and start yelling about how blacks mexicans middle-easterners need to go back to their own countries, I kindly tell them to get the fuck off my lawn.

[Hubris Incalculable]

Might depend on which side they conducted those activities for, and which side the audience to which such information is conveyed considered themselves allied with.

'Murrica, of course, at least for me. My lineage gets to claim being more american than most americans.

Every time the xenophobic rednecks wander into my stores and start yelling about how blacks mexicans middle-easterners need to go back to their own countries, I kindly tell them to get the fuck off my lawn.

So, you're native?

[MaximumZero]

Might depend on which side they conducted those activities for, and which side the audience to which such information is conveyed considered themselves allied with.

'Murrica, of course, at least for me. My lineage gets to claim being more american than most americans.

Every time the xenophobic rednecks wander into my stores and start yelling about how blacks mexicans middle-easterners need to go back to their own countries, I kindly tell them to get the fuck off my lawn.

So, you're native?

Some. At least 1/8, and probably moreso. Enough for the One Drop Rule, anyway.

(Yes, I'm mostly white, and well aware of the hypocrisy of my statement, but it's too damn funny not to.)

[Furtuka]

My grandfather was in the South Vietnamese army during the Vietnam war, and was high ranked enough to warrant the US goverment having my dads side of the family brought over to America immediatly once the war ended for their own safety. I think my mom might have said he was a colonel? I need to ask him about his life story next time I visit his house

[MetalSlimeHunt]

My family is all over the place. Mostly Swedish and German, but I've got some Ashkenazi for sure (Great-Great Paternal Grandmother survived Auschwitz, in fact, though I have no idea how) and there's rumors that our family has some Native American blood as well. It's hard to tell because my family tree breaks down about four generations back.

[Svarte Troner]

One of my aunts has a White Army officer's sword from around the time of the Russian revolution. So I suppose my great granddad hopped on the boat before the commies executed him for being Tsarist swine. I just wish I knew more about them and had a cool family crest  ... For the longest time we thought we were Polish, but it turns out my family just escaped Russia/Ukraine into Poland and then came to America (luckily before ww2)... or something.

[Haspen]

My father's family lived south of Gdańsk (my home city) for generations.

My mother's apparently migrated from the east and one of my great-great-grandmothers from my mother's side lived/was born near Brest.

Pity I can't find a way to get before 1880...

[Ancre]

My father's family has been american for a century or so, but we don't know exactly where they come from - current legend says that a czech immigrant with a lithuanian name came in the US and was sheltered by a russian person. Or something along those lines. My last name is of lithuanian origin, apparently, and that's all I know for sure. I must have some french ancestry there too, since all of my father's family is bilingual.

My mother's family is a proud lineage of military officers from the Savoie region. My great grandfather hijacked a german plane and flew to Algeria during world war II We still have the newspaper narrating the tale somewhere.

[Reudh]

If we're going war stories here, I am told my great-great-grandfather had the top of his head blown off by a mortar, lay for days in the sick tent with his scone missing before they put a metal plate in... not thinking he'd pull through they moved him to the mortuary.

He sat up and said "Does anyone have a cigar? I could kill for one."

He then raised a large family, built his own house out in Tynong, Victoria and lived to the age of 89 after having the top of his head torn off.

[Guardian G.I.]

According to my father and my grandfather, my grand-grandfather have encountered a ball lightning at some point around 1988 or 1989 (I don't remember the exact date). The ball lightning exploded behind his back, melting most of the skin and flesh on it. He was more than 90 years old during the incident. Amazingly, he survived that explosion, but because of the resulting health complications he died in 1993.