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Post by kastoniago on Apr 20, 2016 9:26:52 GMT
I'm sure I'm not the only one who is confounded by certain branches of the Collins family tree, piecing together who is related to whom in the more obscure areas of Collins family history. So I was thinking, with this new information provided by the cast announcement for Blood & Fire, whether we can work out as coherent (as is possible) family tree for the Collins family.
I know there was a similar discussion on the old Big Finish forums about a related topic, so if you want to bring those here, I'd very much appreciate it. Also, for you closet genealogists like myself, if someone has a detailed family tree designed for the fictional Collins family, now would be the time to show it off!
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Post by barnabaslives on Apr 20, 2016 9:58:17 GMT
Here's the link that Rob Morris posted to the thread on the old board: darkshadows.wikia.com/wiki/Collins_family_treeSome of my original comments on the chart there in case they're still of any use: I don't think much has been added to the Collins Family Tree after the version at the Wiki link, I think mainly that Amy Jennings down at the bottom of the chart in the near present, later has husband (Adric!) and children who we meet in Bloodlust. (Isaac Collins at the top of the tree we meet for the first time in The Crimson Pearl).
...the tree diagram is easy to break down - most of the oldest entries in the family tree belong to the 1795 OS storyline, then going further down the tree, to the 1841 OS storyline and the 1897 OS storyline (before and after large black box respectively), and finally to storylines set c.a. 1960-1970.
I don't think any of the names of characters from the OS that were mentioned but never placed in the family tree (names in large black box) have been placed since then (although I've seen it speculated that Thaddeus Collins may be Tad Collins, who appears in the 1841 OS storyline and the excellent Big Finish DS drama Speak No Evil). The lineage of orphan Victoria Winters (small black box) is addressed in the non-Big Finish DS audio drama, Return To Collinwood.
(BTW, at the risk of further confusing the OP here, as usual I didn't make a proper written note of it so absolute certainty is out of the question, but I think Geoffrey Collins might not actually belong on that family tree but on the one for Parallel Time (aka PT)?
Also there is a Quentin Collins in both 1841 and 1897 so they are occasionally referred to as Quentin (1) and Quentin (2) when a distinction needs to be made, as you can see on the tree. If it's of any help, Quentin (2) is the one who appears in the Big Finish audios.
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Post by Zagreus on Apr 20, 2016 16:28:58 GMT
Persons to be added:
Victoria's confirmed parentage, as per Return to Collinwood.
Carolyn's later husband Ned Stuart, as per Return to Collinwood.
Isaac's wife Annabella Collins, and son Caleb Collins, as per Crimson Pearl.
Isaac's cousin Silas Collins, and wife Grace Collins, and their son Gregory Collins, as per Crimson Pearl.
Jamison Collins' wife Catherine Collins, as per Collinwood Christmas.
Amy Jennings Cunningham's husband Andrew Cunningham, step-son Harry Cunningham, and son Tom Cunningham.
Quentin (2) Collins' wife Lela Quick Collins.
Benjamin and Thaddeus Collins don't appear to be on that tree. Benjamin is purportedly Roger's "great-uncle", as per episode 54. Thaddeus may well be, as mentioned above, Tad's full name.
Jonah Collins was born between June 16, 1839 and June 15, 1840, and is likely the son of Gabriel and Edith. If Roger was shortening things and Benjamin is actually his "great-great-uncle", this would make him Jonah's brother, and Jonah the great-grandfather of Roger and Elizabeth.
Gabriel is Jamison's Great-Grandfather, as per A Collinwood Christmas, which matches up if his son Benjamin is Roger's great-great-uncle.
Augustine Collins is no on the tree. He was alive prior to, at least, 1840. Apparently bought a table in Bedford, Massachusetts that belonged to a woman who was hanged for being a witch. The hanging for witchcraft fad had mostly died out in Massachusetts by the late 1690s, but sporadic witchcraft lynchings continued in the States up through the 1750s, so likely somewhere in that time frame.
Not sure why Theodore Collins is black boxed, as he is mentioned in the 1795 storyline to be the father of Millicent and Daniel Collins. He and his wife (and their deaths) are portrayed in The Crimson Pearl.
The black boxed William, Mortimer, and possibly Geoffrey are all parallel time Collinses, and shouldn't be on the main family tree.
And.... I think that's it. For now.
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Post by Trace on Apr 21, 2016 0:07:18 GMT
I have an absolutely beautiful "complete" family tree that I won at last summer's DS '91 Friends Reunion. It is very intricate and includes almost every character on the show, including PT (I think!--it's been awhile since I had it out of the tube.). The downside is that it doesn't include the audios. I wonder if a pic of it would be large enough to read?
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Post by Trace on Apr 23, 2016 1:38:20 GMT
Here's the first three....I will attempt to get you the entire tree!
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Post by Trace on Apr 23, 2016 1:41:19 GMT
Two more!
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Post by Trace on Apr 23, 2016 1:58:57 GMT
Let me know if there are sections missing (use the first pic as a guide). I can blow up any section and send more....and some of these may be too small to read the print. I had a slight problem because each pic attachment can be no larger than 1MB. A few of mine were just over that, so I couldn't use those and had to try to get repeat pics but with less resolution. But I'm happy to keep trying if anyone wants to read the fine print. It's all very well done, and very intricate!!
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Post by Zagreus on Apr 23, 2016 2:18:03 GMT
Holy shit that's awesome. I kind of want that on my wall haha.
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Post by barnabaslives on Apr 23, 2016 4:17:47 GMT
This thread on the old forum has a post by Joe Lidster sorting out some of the Cunningham geneology. forums.bigfinish.com/threads/1021-Dark-Shadows-36-The-Lucifer-Gambit/page4I *think* it's a goof. The idea was a late addition to The Lucifer Gambit. We realised we had two women with supernatural abilities who were both roughly contemporary and both British so we thought it'd be a fun Dark Shadows thing to say they were cousins. So the idea was that Leona Covington from The Phantom Bride was the cousin of Isobel Randall from The Lucifer Gambit. However, Matthew Samuels then says that Isobel's maiden name was Cunningham.
So if we want to make it fit...
Bob Covington had two children, Mary and Mathias.
Mathias married Jennifer Haggerty and had one daughter - Leona.
Mary married Derek Cunningham (cousin of John Cunningham from The Creeping Fog) and had one daughter - Isobel.
So that makes them cousins, yeah, but with different surnames? Sadly, Mary and Derek died off-screen which meant that Isobel was brought up by the Covingtons - giving her access to their books about magic etc.
So Matthew was right! She was Leona Cunningham before she married sexy Dominic Randall BUT when she says to Amy "Hey, I was just learning a few of the old Covington family secrets" it's because she was brought up by her cousin's family - the Covingtons.
I think that all works. Can we confirm this is canon now?
cheers Joe
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Post by Zagreus on Apr 23, 2016 5:43:52 GMT
Well that just brings up questions of how she's related to Verne
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Post by kastoniago on Apr 24, 2016 12:55:43 GMT
I can't find any reference to Geoffrey Collins on the DS Wiki, so I'm not sure where his name comes from in relation to the family tree. Also, as gorgeous as the family tree is, I think I'd like to believe the canonical branches of the Collins Family Tree should sprout from the information established in valid source material, which I think originates from the TV series and the audio dramas. And the PT Collins Family Tree has already been shown to be drastically different from the N-Space Collins Family Tree, so I don't consider members from to be a part of the it, unless they have established counterparts in valid source material.
Personally, I prefer the idea that Jonah and Benjamin Collins are the children of Gabriel and Edith (which has been a missing link I've been looking into for ages), and Jonah is the father of the 1897 generation of Collins
EDIT: Actually, come to think of it, Jonah would be quite young to have four children the ages of Judith, Carl, Quentin and Edward, before dying at the age of 23. So maybe there is a third child of Gabriel and Edith.
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Post by Zagreus on Jul 2, 2016 17:25:13 GMT
Anything new to add from Blood & Fire? Theodore's wife, I guess. Joshua's parents... That's it, I think. EDIT: I just realized that Ryan's Caleb Collins is probably the same as Isaac's son hahah. The play also tells us how Theodore factors in to the tree. We're getting much more fleshed out here as we go
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Post by barnabaslives on Jul 2, 2016 19:02:07 GMT
I can't find any reference to Geoffrey Collins on the DS Wiki, so I'm not sure where his name comes from in relation to the family tree. Also, as gorgeous as the family tree is, I think I'd like to believe the canonical branches of the Collins Family Tree should sprout from the information established in valid source material, which I think originates from the TV series and the audio dramas. And the PT Collins Family Tree has already been shown to be drastically different from the N-Space Collins Family Tree, so I don't consider members from to be a part of the it, unless they have established counterparts in valid source material. I seem to recall rather vividly that Geoffrey Collins is named on the original series, although I'm not certain whether it was in "real time" or "parallel time". I do recall it being Joan Bennett's character saying this, I think she is just walking out of the drawing room into the foyer at about this point and might have referred to one of the paintings? It's just very curious that I have never been able to find where someone else has noticed this though I've Googled quite a bit for it on several occasions. I've also tried to watch the 1970 PT arc again looking for it but haven't found it - nor have I found the episode again where Julia mentions having a brother. I could swear Roxanne was unconscious on a table thereabouts, but that's another dodgy memory I'd rather not place too much faith in without an episode number. The way the tree reads that barnabasbytes posted, it sounds like the name Geoffrey Collins might also have been used in an unofficial story as well as the original TV series?
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Post by barnabaslives on Jul 2, 2016 19:05:23 GMT
Anything new to add from Blood & Fire? Theodore's wife, I guess. Joshua's parents... That's it, I think. I think there are new entries for several families besides the Collinses, only probably a lot of question marks between most generations for them? Or at least I'm presuming that persons with familiar last names in Blood & Fire are ancestors of characters we've met.
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Post by Zagreus on Jul 2, 2016 19:46:50 GMT
I think there are new entries for several families besides the Collinses, only probably a lot of question marks between most generations for them? Or at least I'm presuming that persons with familiar last names in Blood & Fire are ancestors of characters we've met. Haskells, Loomises, the Cunninghams(!), probably a few others I'm not recalling off the top of my head. The Murdocks & Stockbridges, surely. Man, the Cunninghams. I'm kind of liking that we've now got them back in the 1760s, during the 1930s, 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s. We've established them them all over. Need one in the 1840s somewhere, and a parallel time version, and we'll have a full set! Oh, I guess 1890s and late 1700s as well. Still though, they've managed to worm their way into the periphery of the Dark Shadows universe quite nicely! I wonder if Tom will be affected unduly by that side of the family... I imagine some big storyline with the larger Cunningham family will be the cause of Amy and sons not being around in 2003.
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roygill
Big Finish Creative Team
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Post by roygill on Jul 5, 2016 9:12:55 GMT
I think there are new entries for several families besides the Collinses, only probably a lot of question marks between most generations for them? Or at least I'm presuming that persons with familiar last names in Blood & Fire are ancestors of characters we've met. Haskells, Loomises, the Cunninghams(!), probably a few others I'm not recalling off the top of my head. The Murdocks & Stockbridges, surely. {Spoiler} If you happen to take a look at episode 154, you'll see U[riah] Spencer Stockbridge (Chris Pennock's character) mentioned when they visit the Stockbridge mausoleum. Apparently his throat is slit when he's asleep in 1780. My guess is Euphemia did it.
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Post by Trace on Jul 5, 2016 23:16:41 GMT
Yeah...she definitely WANTED to!!! And who could blame her? LOL.
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Post by barnabaslives on Oct 28, 2016 3:58:53 GMT
I really wish I could find my notes from a few years ago. I've been making some new ones, though, and I have some recent ruminations upon Collins ancestry. I recently made a list of every episode featuring Joan Bennett from the 1879 storyline and made rough scene sketches for them, looking for anything that was reminiscent of the scene I think I remember, where one of Joan's characters gave an unexpected name (possibly Geoffrey, or something similar like Gerald?) as the name of her father. Judith does make a statement about her father being a "strict, god-fearing man" but I couldn't find a name being given anywhere in the scenes I picked. What I seem to remember is Joan's character commenting on the paintings and giving a name in the course of moving from the drawing room to the foyer, so any declarations actually associated with paintings might be most likely to concern either the painting over the telephone, or the foyer portrait. In episode 4 of the TV series, Elizabeth makes a sweep of the room, passing portraits and rattling off their names: Isaac, Jeremiah, Theodore, and Benjamin, with the last one being the portrait over the telephone. The first two are corroborated in other episodes and Elizabeth seems to name all four convincingly enough that if there is a conflict between her apparent identification of the portrait over the telephone as Benjamin Collins and Roger's identification of the foyer portrait as Benjamin Collins to Sheriff Patterson in episode 59 (I think the DS Wiki has it as 54?) I think I would take Elizabeth's word over Roger's. If Carolyn and Roger are even fully up to speed on their family history, they're still happy enough to muddy the waters by whittling Isaac down to an "uncle" (3) and possibly also Benjamin down to a "great-uncle" (59). The foyer portrait however appears in the 1795 storyline little later than Collinwood is freshly built, and supposing the subject achieved a minimum of maturity, he could be no younger than about 20, probably making the foyer portrait at least as old as c.a. 1775. If Judith Collins were born in 1853, for the foyer painting to represent her father, he would have had to be at least 78 years old at the time he sired her, and about another 14 years older by the time he sired Carl in about 1867, making him at bare minumum about 92 at the time of the later procreative accomplishment, and perhaps making it a somewhat nonsensical thing for Judith to declare the subject of the foyer portrait to be her father and still keep any expectation of having the props match? For what it's worth, the foyer portrait can be ID'd in countless foyer shots where its face is out of frame because one hand is distinctively situated well above the other. Possibly the subject could be holding a book (or scratching an itch) which could well be a black-covered one such as a Bible if Judith's father were that much a "god-fearing" man but I have never been able to get a true good look at it, it's so often out of focus or behind someone's head in the shot or taken from an angle. (Abner Collins, whose portrait hangs outside the playroom/linen closet at some point, does actually seem to be holding a book with more reasonable certainty. The presence of his portrait there in 1840 is confirmed by an old letter read by David and Hallie). I'm not sure the source of the family tree on the DS Wiki page, it looks professionally done and might have come from one of the Dark Shadows companion books - possibly the pre-Millenial Editional DS Almanac that I don't own? - so I don't know if I should dispute the authenticity of the name Geoffrey appearing in the TV show, but it may be that the names in the black box there are grouped so that the first three represent characters from normal time and the next three represent characters from parallel time - I believe the 4th and 6th names listed are from PT so the fifth name, Geoffrey's, might also be too by association? Concerning the portrait of Benjamin Collins as originally identified by Elizabeth in episode 4, the portrait ordinarily hanging over the telephone, there is a lot one can miss while fast-forwarding obviously but I was recently unable to locate this portrait anywhere in the 1795 story line although I did locate the portrait of Theodore (394) and the sixth portrait from the present-day drawing room. Normally appearing over the liquor cabinet in the present, the sixth portrait appears in the entrance way to the foyer, just inside the front door, in 1795 (444, 445, 455 and probably others. I'm not sure if this painting was ever named although I have an image in my older materials that may have an ID on it. The subject's rugged features do seem to remind me readily of Mitch Ryan somehow so perhaps it could be Caleb if it's really up for grabs?) Left to right: Theodore's portrait, 1795 (394); comparison of enhancements of sixth portrait from episodes 22 & 455; portrait of Benjamin (?) hanging at Lamar Trask's house in 1840 (1145).In 1840, the portrait of Benjamin as identified by Elizabeth (4) appears in a small house on the edge of town where Lamar Trask lives and its usual place in the drawing room is occupied by a mirror. Given his reputation for relieving his mortuary clients of the burden of their valuables, perhaps Lamar has also relieved the Collinses of the burden of owning Benjamin's portrait by smuggling it out the servant's entrance in one of their spare red & yellow afghans which appears in the chair in front of the painting at Lamar's place (1145 & probably others). Curiously, the painting seen there may have something of the aged look of Laura's 120 year old portrait, so I hesitate to comment on its age other than noting that it existed in the 1840 storyline, although it does perhaps raise the possibility of some of the portraits as they appear in the present being restorations or copies of other portraits. One last rumination concerns prestige of placement, as it were - three of the named drawing room paintings are very important to the Collins family. There's Isaac, who founded the town, family business and Maine branch of the family; Jeremiah, who was mistakenly though to be the builder of Collinwood, and Theodore from the successful New York branch of the family. Millicent had barely arrived at Collinwood for Barnabas and Josette's wedding before Joshua began hinting that perhaps Jeremiah should consider courtship of the wealthy young heiress, with Theodore's line via Daniel eventually providing us with present-day Collinses after the line of Caleb Collins and his son Joshua seemingly evaporates with the loss of Jeremiah, Barnabas and Sarah. One wonders if perhaps Benjamin and whoever is actually in the foyer portrait in normal time should have to be relatively equal in importance or success to the others to have earned their portraits those prominent places in the downstairs. Finally, as to the possibility of Gabriel and Edith Collins having three children, the reference source I looked at suggested that there are multiple children of the couple away at boarding school, citing episode 1119. I might have missed something which is very easy to do, but checking the episode, it seemed to me that Samantha says that Edith sent one child, singular, away to boarding school. So I don't suppose any of that clears anything up, but it seemed like there might be some pointers there and it might be a good idea if I don't lose these references like I did the last batch, so I'm posting them for posterity. Happy ancestor hunting! :-)
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Post by barnabaslives on Oct 28, 2016 4:25:39 GMT
BTW, I really have to hand it to the present day producers of Dark Shadows again for the casting of Blood & Fire. Every time I get an out-of-focus glimpse of Theodore and his formidable sideburns, I can't possibly think of anyone to play him but David Selby with a piece of latex across his forehead to give him a receding hairline. How wonderful that David Selby actually got the part of Theodore! :-)
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Post by barnabaslives on Oct 30, 2016 3:51:48 GMT
I'm still trying to think of what might be the most elegant and canonical way both of working all of this out. I think I've come up with a theory just maybe, but I don't know if it actually works - especially if anything canonical contraindicates it. For whatever it's worth, it is: Caleb and Theodore have another brother, Benjamin Collins. He has earned his portrait the prime position in the foyer being the very first ancestor to greet guests, by making a particularly substantial contribution to the building of Collinwood although unable to attend the wedding of Joshua and Laura, and his portrait appears there as early as 1795 when the masonry is still fresh at the newly built mansion. He is the father of a successful namesake, Benjamin Collins II, whose portrait is normally seen over the telephone in the drawing room, which appears in storylines as early as 1840. Thus both Elizabeth and Roger are right when identifying the two different portraits as Benjamin respectively (I did have second thoughts about the idea that Roger could live at Collinwood all those years and still have no idea whose portrait is in the foyer, and I also took some inspiration from the way Joe Lidster handled the interpretation of the Cunningham family as quoted earlier in the thread. A number of the Collins still unplaced in the family tree - Abner, Augustine, Flora & Desmond, and even "the original David Collins" might originate from Benjamin's bloodline? If Edith and Gabriel only had one child canonically, and particularly if that child proves to be Sayer Caleb Collins who died unwed and presumably childless, the Collins family might have ended had Edith not remarried after the loss of Gabriel. If Edith had married a cousin from Benjamin's bloodline, it might contribute to the explanation of the prominence of the portraits of Benjamin I and II, since it would have been Benjamin's bloodline that the present day Collinses are descended from, after both Caleb and Theodore's bloodlines ended. Theodore, whose bloodline gave a good try at keeping the Collinses in existence has a modest sized portrait in the drawing room; Benjamin II, whose bloodline actually succeeded, gets to have a larger one on display. Jonah Collins might either alternately be the first son of Edith and Gabriel, or a second one, who left no heirs due to his untimely end - or the first child of Edith and her husband after Gabriel, followed by Edward, Quentin, Judith and Carl? Perhaps a likely candidate for Edith's husband after Gabriel would be Abner, who may be pictured with a Bible in his portrait, providing Judith and her siblings with the strict god-fearing father she described. Abner might be Gabriel's senior by not more than, say, 10 years were his portrait painted relatively recently in 1840 when it hangs outside the playroom? I am assuming that Edith somehow survived the attempt on her life in 1840 (possibly just by playing dead if canon will actually allow that, which might be the least damage to the timeline?) but yes - the 1897 generation of Collinses presumably does have to come from somewhere. :-) BTW, does anyone know who this is supposed to be? I've been calling it the fifth portrait since it's the fifth one in the drawing room not counting the one over the liquor cabinet, but if the latter appears as early as episode 22 and this one doesn't appear earlier than episode 65, it's technically the sixth of the drawing room portraits in order of appearance. Somehow it looks older than Isaac (it's the poncey hair, I think), so I have a tentative theory that it's Isaac's father, Ponce de Collins, who amassed a vast fortune smuggling afghans, but that's probably not a very good theory. :-)
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