Polish-Scottish American, Chris Ferguson, commands final Space Shuttle mission

glad to see that u read page 1

Oh, sorry. I see it was you, Wroclaw, that revealed the fact that he has Polish ancestry. I foolishly assumed reading the latter posts in the thread that his Polish ancestry was still in question as some posters seemed to be denying it, but I had forgotten that, for the deniers, people are not Polish unless British English teachers living in Poland say they are.

No, his mother has a Polish name originally. That means nothing - after all, as is commonly known, many minorities such as Ukrainians went to the USA under the guise of being Polish.

I still haven't seen one shred of evidence (or even quote by him) that talks about his origins.

Anyway, mods, could you please change the title? He, after all, is also Scottish-American ;)

Isnt he just a much braver ,smarter HUMAN BEING than the vast majority of us?
NASA and the space programme has always shown the best side of the USA in that its a team effort and a meritocracy and the launcher of millions of dreams.

What's that got to do with it?

I may have a name like Krzyzanowski or Kaplický, but you would still call me "English".


A pointless change in thread title, really. See below ;)

OK, here goes.

Using your definition of ethnicity:

He's not born or brought up in Scotland; doesn't speak a Scottish language; and I wouldn't be surprised to learn that he's never visited Scotland, either.

Which, based upon your very own and overused anti-Polish definition, actually makes him... American.

Or should I say "Plastic Scot"? LOL

Despite all this, I wouldn't dare call him "subhuman" - I'll leave that word for you, so you can use it to refer to ordinary Polish-Americans yet again :p

Exactly. All this false nonsense about OMG HES POLISH AMERICAN!!111 is just utter crap - like the rest of his kin, what they've achieved for the human race is of far more importance than an accident of birthplace.

Yet you still demanded that the title got changed to "Scottish-American"; if it was just "utter crap", then why bother? lol

It was irony,please dont play into his hands and live upto the stereotype :)

The other guy was being ironic also :)

People may have Scottish roots but they are often meaningless without more contact with the country itself. Many Americans are hybrids anyway, as befits their culture. As for values, I don't see why some Americans are so proud of their country when many core values have been abandoned or, at any rate, diluted.

The name Ferguson is still a Scottish surname that means "son of Fergus" regardless of whether or not its bearer ever goes to Scotland or wears a kilt. Americans with European roots do not have to have any contact at all with their ancestral countries for them to still be their ancestral countries.

Aha, so Kimbo Slice (Kevin Ferguson) is Scottish now, is he? Mac or Mc is son of.

jsc.nasa.gov/Bios/htmlbios/ferguson.html

this guy? Where do you find any Scottish-Polish connection here?

You know full well that he is an African-American whose ancestors were enslaved, perhaps by Scottish-Americans bearing the surname Ferguson, and that his ancestors may have adopted this surname upon emancipation because of their long association with Ferguson family. My post above explicitly mentions Americans "with European roots" and so I am rather disappointed that you would be so mistaken as to assume I was including Americans with African roots as well, that being said, knowing the proclivity of slave owners to force themselves upon their chattle, Kimbo-Slice may indeed have Scottish ancestry.

Regards from Africa :)

Agreed.

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So his mother's Polish name means nothing to you to identify his ancestry but his father's Scottish name does?? Aren't you being a hypocrite?

Also Ukrainians were only a tiny part of Poland's old population so they barely represented any significant amount of "Polish Americans". On the other hand when Poland did not exist as a nation from 1795-1917, virtually all ethnic Poles leaving Europe to America identified themselves as either Austrian, German or Russian and not Polish since these were the countries occupying Poland at the time. My grandmother for example was identified as "a German" and had a German name but her ancestry was 100% Polish.

A person's last name is an indicator of a person's ancestry but it doesn't guarantee it. We do know astronaut Chris Ferguson's mother has a Polish name and that Chris Ferguson has been active in Polish American activities like volunteering to be the Military Marshal for the Pulaski Day Parade. I read the Post Eagle newspaper (its not published on the internet) and they talk about Chris Ferguson's activities in Polish American affairs.

Other then Ferguson's father's Scottish name, we know nothing about anything identifying him as being Scottish such as Ferguson participating in Scottish American parades or festivals. And its not like they don't exist in America since Scottish Americans are proud people.

Mods, in my opinion I don't think we should label the title of this topic to identify Chris Ferguson as a Polish-Scottish American (at least not yet) just because Delphiadomine wants it. We all know Delphiadomine has a virulent anti-Polish bias and couldn't care a less if Chris Ferguson actually has Scottish ancestry. All he ever wants to do is find every angle possible to diminish anything good anybody of Polish ancestry has ever done. Either to find fault with them or to diminsh any kind of factor that identifies them as being Polish.

If there was evidence of Chris Ferguson participating in Scottish American activities, then fine that shows he's part Scottish. But as of now, there is (as Delphiadomine would say) NOT A SHRED OF EVIDENCE of this.

If Chris Ferguson is identified as being a Polish-Scottish American and only participates in activities that shows his pride in being Polish and not Scottish, what would that say? People who are Scottish or part Scottish are proud of their Scottish roots and are not not shy about showing their Scottish pride but for some reason we don't see that with Chris Ferguson. Hmmmm

Oh who the **** cares he is going to die in a ball of fire!

John Ferguson was born in the town of Denny in Scotland. In 1889 he married Elizabeth Kelly who was born in Antrim, Ireland in 1868.
One of their sons named Andrew left Scotland to live in America.
Chris Ferguson is the grandson of Andrew.

Further, The *son* suffix in a British surname demonstrates a Scandanavian ancestry, so;
Scottish/Polish/Viking/Irish/American Astronaut.
Wouldnt it be shorter just to say he sure as sh!t aint Vietnamese?