If that don't put the ink in coinkidink

Maybe in the future I'll do a post about Barry Obama's unconventional upbringing and (presumed) lineage, and what his parents/grandparents may have been up to.

But for now, I'll just mention this, a false lead that turned into a strange coincidence. Barry's grandmother, who helped raise him, had the maiden name of Madelyn Lee Payne. This rang a bell. This Payne was from Kansas. I wondered if she was related to Ruth Payne, landlord to the Lee Harvey Oswald family in Dallas Texas?

Well, I had that wrong. I was thinking of Ruth Paine, whose mother-in-law, Ruth Forbes Paine Young, is a fouth cousin to John Forbes Kerry. Ruth Forbes Paine Young's own life and involvements form a rabbit hole that would probably drive a full-time conspiracy researcher insane. In any case, she founded the International Peace Academy, and among her husbands was the inventor of the helicopter who founded the School of Consciousness in Berkely. Her son Michael Paine, from her first marriage, married the Ruth Hyde Paine in question, who "harbored" the Oswalds.

Anyway, Ruth Forbes' father was named Ralph Emerson Forbes, grandson of the famed 19th-century poet Ralph Waldo Emerson.

As to the coincidence. I thought I found the connection with one fellow name "Ralph(first name) Waldo Emerson (two middle names)" in the Obama family tree.

And I was right, but on the grandfather's side. Barry's maternal grand-dad was Stanley Armor Dunham. His father was Ralph Waldo Emerson Dunham Sr.

I was tracing down the wrong Payne, but uncovered descendants of Ralph Waldo Emerson. At the same time, on the other side of Barry's family, I find someone named "Ralph Waldo Emerson Dunham," though at this time I can't find evidence of a family connection and will just presume he was named for the poet out of admiration.

So I'm not saying this is anything more than a coincidence. Still, it is striking that I come across the "Ralph Waldo Emerson" in two apparently unrelated places, by mistake.