This is a list of notable hereditary and lineage organizations, and is informed by the database of the Hereditary Society Community of the United States of America. It includes societies that limit their membership to those who meet group inclusion criteria, such as descendants of a particular person or group of people of historical importance. It does not include general ethnic heritage societies.
The National Society Daughters of the American Revolution is a lineage-based membership service organization for women who are directly descended from a patriot of the American Revolutionary War. A non-profit group, the organization promotes education and patriotism. Its membership is limited to direct lineal descendants of soldiers or others of the American Revolution era who aided the revolution and its subsequent war. Applicants must be at least 18 years of age and have a birth certificate indicating that their gender is female. DAR has over 190,000 current members in the United States and other countries. The organization's motto is "God, Home, and Country".
The General Society of Mayflower Descendants — commonly called the Mayflower Society — is a hereditary organization of individuals who have documented their descent from at least one of the 102 passengers who arrived on the Mayflower in 1620 at what is now Plymouth, Massachusetts. The Society was founded at Plymouth in 1897.
The Citizens Flag Alliance (CFA) is an American organization advocating in favor of the Flag Burning Amendment project. CFA was founded in 1989 by the American Legion and originally called the Citizens' Flag Honor Guard.
First Families of Virginia were families in the British colony of Virginia who were socially prominent and wealthy, but not necessarily the earliest settlers. They descend from European colonists who primarily settled at Jamestown, Williamsburg, the Northern Neck and along the James River and other navigable waters in Virginia during the 17th century. These elite families generally married within their social class for many generations and, as a result, most surnames of First Families date to the colonial period.
A rosette is a small, circular device that is typically presented with a medal. The rosettes are either worn on the medal to denote a higher rank, or for situations where wearing the medal is deemed inappropriate, such as on a suit. Rosettes are issued to those awarded a knighthood or damehood in a chivalric order, as well as state orders in nations such as Belgium, France, Italy and Japan, among others. Certain hereditary societies, such as the Society of Descendants of the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem, as well as some fraternal orders issue rosettes to their members as well.
The Colonial Dames of America (CDA) is an American organization comprising women who descend from one or more ancestors who lived in British North America between 1607 and 1775, and who aided the colonies in public office, in military service, or in another acceptable capacity. The CDA is listed as an approved lineage society with the Hereditary Society Community of the United States of America.
The National Society, Daughters of the American Colonists (NSDAC), commonly known as the Daughters of the American Colonists, is an American patriotic organization headquartered in Washington, D.C. Founded in 1920, at St. Louis, it was federally chartered in 1984. Its object is to research and preserve the history and deeds of American colonists and commemorate deeds of colonial interest. The organization is headquartered at 2205 Massachusetts Avenue on Embassy Row.
Sara Agnes Rice Pryor, born Sara Agnes Rice, was an American writer and community activist in New York City. Born and reared in Virginia, she moved north after the American Civil War with her husband and family to rebuild their life. He was a former politician and Confederate general; together, they became influential in New York society, which included numerous "Confederate carpetbaggers" after the war. After settling in New York, she and her husband renounced the Confederacy.
Eugenia Scholay Washington was an American historian, civil servant, and a founder of the lineage societies, Daughters of the American Revolution and Daughters of the Founders and Patriots of America.
The Order of the Founders and Patriots of America (OFPA) is a non-profit, hereditary organization based in the United States that is dedicated to promoting patriotism and preserving historical records of the first colonists and their descendants. The Order is made up of "Associates" who trace their ancestry back to colonists who settled between May 13, 1607 to May 13, 1657, and who also have ancestors in the same male ancestral line who served in the American Revolution.
Charles Wheaton Abbot Jr. was an American military officer of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. He was commander of the 1st Rhode Island Volunteer Infantry during the Spanish–American War and served as Adjutant General of Rhode Island from 1911 until his death in 1923. He was also a veteran of the Indian Wars, Philippine Insurrection and the First World War.
Ephraim Kibbey was a United States soldier in the American Revolution, a frontiersman and early settler of Ohio, the leader of Mad Anthony Wayne's famous forty scouts in the Northwest Indian War, and a member of the 1st Ohio General Assembly. He was a contemporary of Daniel Boone, Simon Kenton, and Simon Girty, and what Daniel Boone was for Kentucky, Kibbey and his fellow pioneer, Benjamin Stites, were to early southwest Ohio.
The Military Order of the World Wars (MOWW) is an American social organization of military officers of the United States and their descendants. It was created in 1919 as the Military Order of the World War at the suggestion of General of the Armies John J. Pershing as a fraternity for American military officers coming out of World War I. Two decades later, when the United States became involved in World War II, the conflict reference was pluralized to its current title of Military Order of the World Wars. Though the society's title has not been changed since 1945, it accepts additional members from other conflicts and non-conflict service, including those in current military service, retired military service, and former military service. It also accepts members who are direct lineal descendants from a qualifying officer and family members within two degrees of consanguinity as hereditary members.
Walter S. Steele was an American editor and publisher of The National Republic monthly magazine and an anti-communist, anti-immigration activist.
Joseph Sumner Rogers was an American educator and United States Army officer. A native of Orrington, Maine, he was a veteran of the American Civil War and was most notable as the founder and longtime superintendent of Michigan Military Academy.
Lynn Forney Young is an American civil leader and clubwoman. She was the 43rd President General of the Daughters of the American Revolution, serving from 2013 to 2016. As the organization's president general, she oversaw a $4 million restoration of DAR Constitution Hall, led the organization in setting a Guinness World Record for "most letters to military personnel collected in one month" with 100,904 letters to members of the United States Armed Forces, and met with Elizabeth II during an event to launch a project to digitize the Royal Archives of George III.
Mary Hilliard Hinton was an American painter, historian, clubwoman, and political activist. She was a leader in North Carolina's anti-suffragist movement and an outspoken white supremacist, co-founding and running North Carolina's branches of the States Rights Defense League and the Southern Rejection League. A prominent clubwoman, Hinton was active in the Daughters of the American Revolution, the United Daughters of the Confederacy, the Colonial Dames of America, and the National Society of the Colonial Dames of America; serving as a booklet editor, artist, registrar, and state regent for the North Carolina Society of the Daughters of the American Revolution.
Sarah Johnson Cocke was an American writer and civic leader. She was also active in several women's clubs. Cocke's works of Southern fiction include, Bypaths in Dixie, Master of the Hills, and Old Mammy Tales from Dixie Land. A memoir, A Woman of Distinction: From Hoopskirts to Airplanes, a Remembrance, was published posthumously.
Mary Margaretta Fryer Manning (1844–1928) was an American social leader with wide experience in business, social, and philanthropic areas. President William McKinley appointed her commissioner to the Exposition Universelle, and to represent the U.S. and the Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR) at the unveiling of the statue of Gilbert du Motier, Marquis de Lafayette in Paris, on July 4, 1900. On July 3, 1900, she assisted in unveiling the statue of George Washington, a gift of the women of the U.S. to France. Among her many roles, Manning served as President-General of the DAR for two terms. During the years that her husband, Daniel Manning held the portfolio of the United States Secretary of the Treasury their home in Washington, D.C. became a center of social and political affairs in Washington. After widowhood in 1887, she spent part of each year in Washington. Her patriotism was shown in her work for the DAR Mohawk Chapter of Albany, New York, of which she was regent.
Major Almyra Maynard Watson was an American military nurse. She served in the American Red Cross Disaster Nurse's Service before joining the United States Army Nurse Corps in 1941. Watson served during World War II and the Korean War, and was stationed in the United States, Germany, Japan, and the Philippines.