Lineage

The Knipp · Hofmann · Thompson · Bichmiller · Gruell Family
A long-term family lineage record

Four ancestral trunks, one family.

This is the database-backed home for our family lineage record — sourced from the 70-page 19th-century Knipp/Hofmann binder, an Ancestry.com GEDCOM export of our active family tree, and ongoing research. It supersedes the static v1 and v2 snapshots, which are still available in the footer for reference.

Each person, event, and relationship is stored as a structured record with a confidence level (verified, inferred, or speculative) and traceable back to the source document that supports it. The directory below is searchable; the person pages are deep-linkable.

880
people
1037
life events
1131
parent-child links
256
marriages
1
cited source
16
generations

01The Four Quadrants

Each of us has four grandparents — four ancestral trunks. Here are Benjamin's. Click through to see the full descent line.

You are here

Benjamin Andrew Thompson

b. November 19, 1978
Paternal grandfather

Jack Ralph Thompson

19222009
Thompson · Helms · Lindsey · Smith · Norris
Paternal grandmother

Virginia Bichmiller

19252023
Bichmiller · Lipps · Ahlenstorf · Kiefer · Steiner · Blaimschein
Maternal grandfather

Jackie Darrel Hofmann

19262007
Hofmann · Knipp · Wilmer · Hettrich · Nance
Maternal grandmother

Betty Jo Gruell

19282018
Gruell · Helms · Conner · Kunkle · Holmes · Frye

02How to use this site

Three ways in.

Browse

The Directory

Every person in the tree, searchable by name or surname.
Start from a person

Benjamin's page

Walk up through parents, down through children.
About confidence levels: Every fact in this record carries a confidence flag. Verified means it's confirmed against a primary source like a birth certificate or census record. Inferred is the default for facts pulled from the Ancestry GEDCOM — believable but not independently checked. Speculative flags contested or unverified claims (for example, the deep European royal lineage in the GEDCOM is shown but explicitly speculative).