This was my biggest brick wall.

I had clues pointing this direction.  I even had her whole name and his first name.  But it took a great deal of help from a number of people before I was able to put it all together.

Once I got all the clues and bits of names pushed together in a semblance of order, this is what I came up with:

My great great great grandparents are Marguerite PÉPIN and Michel MAY.  So how did I wind up as a Peppan?

Well, as I understand it, their first child, my great great grandfather, was born sometime between 1797 and 1799, before Marguerite, and Michel married.  Marriage was in the works, but they were a pair of impetuous --and impatient-- young people, lending credibility to the old adage that says the first child can come anytime but all the rest take 9 months.

And if you think my attitude about my great great grandfather's illegitimacy is a bit too nonchalant . . . ?  It happened far more frequently than records show, and if Marguerite and Michel had waited, none of the people responsible for making me possible would have been born.

Anyway. . .

On 3 May 1802, Marguerite PÉPIN married a fellow named Michel MAY or Michel MAIE, at St-Michel d'Yamaska in Quebec.

Michel is the son of Antoine MAY and Madeleine LAJEUNESSE.

According to the old parish records from St-Michel, Marguerite and Michel had 10 children.

1.	Michel-Etienne MAY baptised 19 April 1803, St-Michel d'Yamaska. country-marriage sometime in the 1820s to an unknown Aboriginal woman at Fort Vancouver, no  known issue country marriage circa 1830 to unknown Mascoyennés [Maskagonne] woman producing two children, Marie and François a possible third country marriage, later sanctified by Roman Catholic clergy, to Isabelle Kwantlen, 21 July 1856, at Fort Langley, produced one son, baptised Simon Magice. Michel-Etienne, as Etienne PEPPIN, was buried in what is now the Pioneer Cemetery in Fort Langley in 1874
2.	Bejamin MAIE baptised 14 October 1804, St-Michel d'Yamaska
3.	Archange Marie MAIE baptised 17 March 1806, St-Michel d'Yamaska married 29 April 1829, to Louis BADAYAC-LAPLANTE, at St-Michel, Yamaska
4.	François Edouard MAIE baptised 16 Jul 1807, St-Michel d'Yamaska buried 24 Feb 1808, St-Michel d'Yamaska
5.	Julie MAIE baptised 2 Jan 1809, St-Michel d'Yamaska married 11 April 1826 to Michel COTENOIR, at St-Michel, Yamaska
6.	Marie MAIE baptised 20 Sep 1810, St-Michel d'Yamaska buried 7 Aug 1811, St-Michel d'Yamaska
7.	François Edouard MAIE baptised 19 Apr 1812, St-Michel d'Yamaska
8.	Louis MAIE baptised 29 Mar 1814, St-Michel d'Yamaska married 13 Oct 1835 to Angele COTTENOIR, at St. Michel Yamaska
9.	Angele MAIE baptised 14 Jun 1816, St-Michel d'Yamaska
10.	Jean Baptiste MAIE baptised 14 Jun 1818, St-Michel d'Yamaska buried 28 Jun 1818, St-Michel d'Yamaska.

Marguerite was buried 21 June 1818.  Michel married his second wife, Angélique GENEREAU on 22 Feb 1819 at St. Michel Yamaska.

1.	Catherine MAIE baptised 20 Apr 1821
2.	Edouard MAI baptised 4 Oct 1826
3.	Hermine MAY baptised 5 Apr 1829
4.	Moïse MAY baptised Apr 1831
5.	Angele MAY baptised 4 Jan 1834
6.	Mathilde MAY baptised 4 Jun 1836

My Pepin family from Marguerite and Michel on back looks like this:

Louis Etienne PEPIN & Jeanne McCLURE Married 1761

Louis PEPIN & Marie Madeleine MARTIN dit LaCHANCE dit JOLICOEUR Married 1724

Jean PEPIN & Marguerite MOREAU Married 1695

Robert PEPIN & Marie CRETE Married 1670

Jean PEPIN & Jeanne DUMONT

Links on each on each couple -- except for Jean and Jeanne there at the bottom -- will take you to individual pages for each (what I know about Jean and Jeanne is on their son Robert's page).  For now, these individual pages will deal only with my direct line, but as time goes on I will be adding pages for my great aunts and uncles.  I have the info in most cases, but there's just so much of it, it will take time to get it all worked up in html.

However, if you're curious about any of these folks, drop me some email and I'll be happy to share whatever I have.

IN FACT . . .

I would love to create a PEPIN Orchard, of sorts, filling in as many branches, twigs, and leaves, from my great grandfather Simon MAGICE aka PEPIN's generation on back, as far as we can go, sharing the info freely, and sharing any more recent lineage as each of us is comfortable.  Simon -- born in 1855 -- is the younger son of Michel-Etienne MAY aka PEPIN.

I'm thinking that if you have a web site that deals with any of the above lines, I would be delighted to add a link to your site here.

If you would like to put up a page that deals with your PEPIN lineage but aren't sure how to go about it, drop me some email.  I am more than willing to work up a page for you and add it to my site here.

OR I can walk you through how to do it yourself.  I figured out how to do it and if you have a fairly recent version of Netscape or have a program called Front Page Express that you're not exactly sure how to use, I can offer pointers.

I'm not looking to charge anybody anything . . . though if anyone wants a hard copy of some document I might have, I will ask for a self-addressed envelope with return postage (but we can talk about that in email when/if it comes to that).  I'll file attached most anything I have upon request.

If you can help --or have suggestions-- drop me some email at lisa@fortlangley.ca.

IN THE WORKS

I decided to download the entire Tanguay and am taking on the task of filling out the PEPIN family tree, including the collateral lines.  It's going to take some time, mostly because there are errors in the Tanguay.

One example is a three young ladies, all with the same parents, same year of birth, and the same marriage date to the same guy.  After some cross referencing entirely within the Tanguay, my educated guess is that Marie Alard, Marie Charles Alard, and Marie Charlotte Ursule Alard, are all one in the same: Marie-Charlotte-Ursule Alard who married Louis Lamotte dit Laramée on 29 Oct 1727, in Beauport.

How does this relate to the Pepins . . .?

Her 1st cousin, Jean-Baptiste Alard married Marie-Elisabeth Pepin, granddaughter of Robert Pepin and Marie Crete.

So, once I'm done, I'll be putting my findings up, probably using the html formatting provided with PAF (Personal Ancestry File) version 4.0, until I can get a "fancy" version done.