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Tag: Jaquard WASHINGTON (AP) — They were a sailor, a bookkeeper and a factory worker, men

of humble roots and distant times whose kin would run for president in 2008.Although they

are long gone, these three are heard about on occasion through the voices of their

descendants — John McCain, Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton.Now there's another way

to get to know them. Under an agreement being announced Tuesday, a vast range of records

held by the National Archives will become more easily available online, offering information

on some 100 million ancestors.McCain talks in the campaign about granddad "Slew," the

brilliant, foul-mouthed seaman. Obama speaks of the "straight-backed" Methodist ways of his

great-grandfather, Rolla Payne of Kansas.Clinton talks about the times of Hugh Simpson

Rodham, the grandfather who labored in a Scranton, Pa., lace factory, back when that was

enough for a stable life.The ancestors are anecdotes these days. Once they were making their

own way.The documents provide a snapshot of who these men were.Among the papers: a 1910

census statement showing John Sidney McCain serving as an ensign aboard the USS Washington;

a 1917 draft registration card of Payne; and a 1942 draft registration card of Rodham.Payne

was white. In a sign of those segregated times, his card is marked at the bottom, along the

left: "If person is of African descent, tear off this corner."Generations later, his great-

grandson, of African descent on his father's side, is close to becoming the first black

Democratic nominee for president.Rodham was 62 when he filled out his card. He fell under

the 1942 "old man's draft" of World War II requiring registration by men up to their mid-

60s.Such documents are already available to the public at the archives in Washington and

some can be found on genealogy sites.Now they are being made available as a massive

collection by Ancestry.com, which has been transferring the National Archives records into

digital form. People can search the online military records, some of which have been

available for several years, for free through May 31. After that, a paid subscription will

be required.A look at the three men:___INHERIT THE WINDBAGIn 1910, John Sidney McCain, the

roughhewn son of a Mississippi sheriff, was stationed aboard the USS Washington in Puget

Sound, Wash., when the census man came calling. The first of three John McCains was on his

way to a legendary career.Slew had a herky-jerky gait and a high-strung and fidgety nature;

his words were plagued by whistles from his false teeth, describes Robert Timberg in "John

McCain: An American Odyssey."He was ranked a lowly 79 out of 116 at the Naval Academy, the

first of three John McCains who distinguished themselves in the Navy despite mediocre

academy marks.Current Biography called Slew "one of the Navy's best plain and fancy

cussers."During World War I, he served as an engineering officer on the armored cruiser San

Diego, escorting convoys across the Atlantic through schools of German U-boats.In World War

II, he commanded an aircraft carrier task force in the Pacific and fought the Japanese from

Guadalcanal in the Solomon Islands to Tokyo Bay.A hard drinker who could roll his own

cigarettes with one hand — a talent that amazed his young grandson — Slew McCain was a

pioneer in the development of naval aviation and in carrier attack strategy.He stood on the

deck of the battleship Missouri to witness Japan's surrender on Sept. 2, 1945, one of the

chattier figures of that historic occasion. Later that day he was photographed with his son,

submarine commander John Sidney McCain Jr., on a ship in Tokyo Bay.Just days later, the

senior McCain dropped dead of a heart attack. He was promoted to admiral posthumously.John

Sidney McCain III was 9 when his granddad died. "To spend time in his company was as much

fun as a young boy could imagine," the Republican presidential candidate said in a campaign

speech in Meridian, Miss., where a naval airfield is named for his grandfather.___TOOT'S

TIMESFor a man whose ancestry is half African, Obama has a deep American lineage with

distinguished names. That's because some of his ancestors on his white mother's side were

named after great historical figures.There was Ralph Waldo Emerson Dunham of Kansas, 1894-

1970; Christopher Columbus Clark of Missouri, 1846-1937; and George Washington Overall of

Kentucky, 1820-1871.As he reminds people frequently, he's also distantly related to Vice

President Dick Cheney.Rolla Charles Payne was not famous in any sense.On his 1917 draft

registration, Payne is listed as having a slender build, medium height, gray eyes and brown

hair.At age 24, he described himself as a bookkeeper for an oil company in Tulsa, Okla. His

home address was in Kansas."Caucasian" is scribbled on the form, spilling over the too-short

line. The corner for blacks to tear off — an easy way to sort black from white in the

segregated armed forces — is left intact.Obama speaks of Payne and his daughter, nicknamed

Toot, in his memoirs. Toot was Obama's grandmother."Toot's family was respectable," he

wrote. "Her father held a steady job all through the Depression, managing an oil lease for

Standard Oil."The family kept their house spotless and ordered Great Books through the mail;

they read the Bible but generally shunned the tent revival circuit, preferring a straight-

backed form of Methodism that valued reason over passion and temperance over both."Obama's

denomination is the United Church of Christ.___BLUE-COLLAR BASTIONBorn in Durham, England,

to a Welsh miner, Hugh S. Rodham emigrated with his family to the U.S. and worked for the

Scranton Lace Co. for a third of the company's 105-year existence.His son, Hugh E. Rodham,

joined his dad at the mill before leaving for Chicago to start his own drapery business.He

brought his children, including Hillary, back to Scranton for their christening.Scranton

Lace was once the world's largest producer of Nottingham lace. It used huge European looms

to weave swaths of flowers, ferns and geometric shapes, according to Southern Textile

News."The Scranton of my father's youth was a rough industrial city of brick factories,

textile mills, coal mines, rail yards and wooden duplex houses," Clinton wrote in her

memoirs.Scranton Lace hung on longer than other relics from the boom years, closing in 2002

and putting a shrunken work force of 50 out of jobs.Hugh S. Rodham's 1942 draft registration

lists categories of complexion for applicants to check. Their choices were sallow, light,

ruddy, dark, freckled, light brown, dark brown and black.