Know Your Ancestors

I’m Megan Hillyer, professional genealogist and host of Know Your Ancestors. This podcast is about more than building a family tree, it’s about discovering the strength, belonging, and healing that come from knowing your lineage. Each episode is an invitation to explore the power of your ancestors’ lives and how their stories can shape and guide your own. At its heart, this podcast is about one truth: when you know your ancestors, you know yourself.

Know Your Ancestors is a society podcast hosted by Megan Hillyer, with 71 episodes on record and a Required Pod Score of 80. PitchCentric scores this show on Booking Probability, Listen Score, and live audience signals refreshed every 24 hours.

Megan Hillyer hosts Know Your Ancestors, a society show with 71 episodes published.

Our AI reads these to draft pitches. Use them as grounding for a pitch that cites a real guest and a specific topic.

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  Episode #83

  [ENCORE] Storytelling Roots with Christopher Ward

  Aug 12, 202642 min

  Ep 83: This one's back by popular demand. Christopher Ward, the photographer behind Model Strangers, joins me for a conversation that turns up one of my favorite discoveries yet — his family's direct line back to the Brontë family, yes, those Brontës. We trace Christopher's roots from a two-story cottage in County Down, where storytelling nights around the fire were a nightly ritual, all the way down through generations of laborers, a servant at a grand manor house, and a great-grandmother whose death just ten days after childbirth changed the whole shape of the family. And there's a twist in the family name itself that ties back to storytelling in a way neither of us expected. Christopher shares how it feels to trace a creative thread through people who mostly just had to survive — and what that means for the work he's doing now, one stranger at a time. Find Christopher and Model Strangers on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/modelstrangers TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@modelstrangers Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/modelstrangers YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@modelstrangers Grab my free guided meditation here: The Pattern That Isn't Yours: ⁠ https://knowyourancestors.co/pattern⁠ If this one landed for you, I'd love a rating and review — it's still one of the best ways to help people find the show. Follow me on: Instagram: ⁠ https://www.instagram.com/meganhillyer ⁠ TikTok: ⁠ https://tiktok.com/@meganhillyer⁠ Facebook: ⁠ https://www.facebook.com/knowyourancestorsco

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  Episode #82

  [ENCORE] Giving Her a Voice with Monica Packer

  Aug 5, 202647 min

  Ep 82: This one's from the archives, back for encore because it still hits. Monica Packer of the About Progress podcast joins me to talk about the pull toward perfection so many women inherit — and then we go looking for where that pattern actually started in her family. We dig into her second great-grandmother, Lucy Rose Ehmann, and a story that's been sitting with Monica's family for generations — one involving a birth out of wedlock, a name that doesn't match the record, and a marriage that may have been anything but a choice. It's a hard one, and Monica meets it with a lot of honesty. Monica also talks about her own path through perfectionism, why "progress over perfection" became her life's work, and what it means to honor the women who came before you by doing the things they never got to. Find Monica and About Progress at https://www.aboutprogress.com/ and on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/aboutprogress Grab my free guided meditation here: The Pattern That Isn't Yours: ⁠https://knowyourancestors.co/pattern⁠ If this one landed for you, I'd love a rating and review — it's still one of the best ways to help people find the show. Follow me on: Instagram: ⁠ https://www.instagram.com/meganhillyer ⁠ TikTok: ⁠ https://tiktok.com/@meganhillyer⁠ Facebook: ⁠ https://www.facebook.com/knowyourancestorsco YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@knowyourancestors

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  Episode #81

  [ENCORE] The Grandfather She Never Got to Meet, with Ashlynn Allen Mitchell

  Jul 29, 202627 min

  Ep 81: We're revisiting this one from the archive this summer — it's stuck with me. Ashlynn Allen Mitchell came on to learn about her grandfather, a man her own father rarely spoke of before he passed. What we found on FamilySearch took us through a WWII POW camp, a one-month gap between a divorce and a surprise remarriage, and a few quiet parallels between his life and the family that came after him. Find Ashlynn on IG: https://www.instagram.com/this.isashlynn Grab my free guided meditation here: The Pattern That Isn't Yours: ⁠ https://knowyourancestors.co/pattern⁠ If this one landed for you, I'd love a rating and review — it's still one of the best ways to help people find the show. Follow me on: Instagram: ⁠https://www.instagram.com/meganhillyer ⁠ TikTok: ⁠ https://tiktok.com/@meganhillyer⁠ Facebook: ⁠ https://www.facebook.com/knowyourancestorsco

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  Episode #80

  [ENCORE] Untold Family Stories with Crystal Haitsma

  Jul 22, 202649 min

  Ep 80: This one's from about two and a half years ago, back when Crystal was homeschooling her four kids while circumnavigating the globe with her family, working online from wherever they landed. We talk about what that life actually looks like day to day — and then I share what I found digging into her paternal family history. Why did her great grandfather change his name? What happened to his mother? Those are the mysteries we get into. Grab my free guide, The Pattern That Isn't Yours: ⁠https://knowyourancestors.co/pattern⁠ Find Crystal on Instagram: ⁠https://www.instagram.com/its.crystal.noelle/ ⁠If this one landed for you, I'd love a rating and review — it's still one of the best ways to help people find the show. Follow me on: Instagram: ⁠https://www.instagram.com/meganhillyer ⁠ TikTok: ⁠ https://tiktok.com/@meganhillyer⁠ Facebook: ⁠ https://www.facebook.com/knowyourancestorsco

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  Episode #79

  [ENCORE] Results of Generational Trauma with Cristy Duce

  Jul 15, 202628 min

  Ep 79: This was maybe my absolute favorite one of these interviews I've done and am so excited to share it again, almost 3 years later. I've known Cristy since elementary school, and going into her family tree, I thought I'd be sharing something lighter. Instead we ended up with a marriage that unraveled more than once, and a little boy who left home alone at twelve and crossed a border to start over. There's a lot more underneath it — where it all traces back to, and what it means for how Cristy sees her own story now. You'll have to listen to get there. Grab my free guide, The Pattern That Isn't Yours: https://knowyourancestors.co/pattern Find Cristy on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cristyleeduce If this one landed for you, I'd love a rating and review — it's still one of the best ways to help people find the show. Follow me on: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/meganhillyer TikTok: https://tiktok.com/@meganhillyer Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/knowyourancestorsco

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