Tim Allen
Allen in 2013, photo by Prphotos
Birth Name: Timothy Alan Dick
Place of Birth: Denver, Colorado, U.S.
Date of Birth: June 13, 1953
Ethnicity: German, English, Irish, Scots-Irish/Northern Irish, Scottish, distant Welsh
Tim Allen is an American actor and comedian. His roles include The Santa Clause franchise, the films For Richer or Poorer, Galaxy Quest, Christmas with the Kranks, The Shaggy Dog, and Zoom (2006), and the series Home Improvement and Last Man Standing.
Tim is the son of Martha and Gerald Dick. He is married to actress Jane Hajduk. He has a daughter with his former wife Laura Deibel, and a daughter with Jane.
Tim is a first cousin, once removed, of comedian, actor, and television host Jordan Klepper. Tim’s maternal grandparents, George H. Fox and Katherine McComb, were also Jordan’s maternal great-grandparents. Jordan has said that Tim introduced his parents.
Tim’s paternal grandfather was Lewis Albert Dick (the son of John Finley Dick and Clara Belle Ertel). Albert was born in Iowa. John was the son of James L. Dick and Mary Ann Allender. Clara was the daughter of Philip Ertel, who was German, and of Mary Ann Lawrence.
Tim’s paternal grandmother was Rebekah Cunningham Miller (the daughter of David Speer Miller and Carrie Samantha Myton). Rebekah was born in Kansas. David was the son of William Miller and Jane. Carrie was the daughter of Samuel D. Myton and Rebecca A. Cunningham.
Tim’s maternal grandfather was George H. Fox (the son of Arthur Linke Fox and Adeline Marguerite Knabe). George was born in New York. Arthur was of German descent, the son of Theodore Benjamin Fox and Georgiana/Georgianna V. Linke, who was form Darmstadt, Hessen. Adeline’s parents, Hugo Knabe and Maria Buschhorn, were German.
Tim’s maternal grandmother was Katherine McCombe (the daughter of Samuel Lewis McCombe and Olive Harriet Blunden). Katherine was born in Michigan. Samuel was Irish, the son of Robert G./T. McCombe and Mary Lewis. Olive was born in Sarnia, Lambton, Ontario, the daughter of Albert Edward/Edwin Blunden and Emma Jane McMullen.
Sources: Genealogy of Tim Allen – https://www.geni.com
Genealogy of Tim Allen (focusing on his father’s side) – http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com
Tim’s father on the 1930 U.S. Census – https://familysearch.org
Marriage record of Tim’s paternal great-grandparents, David Speer Miller and Carrie Samantha Myton – https://www.familysearch.org
Tim’s mother on the 1930 U.S. Census – https://familysearch.org
Marriage record of Tim’s maternal grandparents, George H. Fox and Katherine McCombe – https://www.familysearch.org
Tim’s maternal grandfather, George H. Fox, on the 1920 U.S. Census – https://familysearch.org
Marriage record of Tim’s maternal great-great-grandparents, Theodore Benjamin Fox and Georgiana/Georgianna V. Linke – https://www.familysearch.org
Tim’s maternal grandmother, Katherine McCombe, on the 1920 U.S. Census – https://www.familysearch.org
Marriage records of Tim’s maternal great-grandparents, Samuel Lewis McCombe and Olive Harriet Blunden – https://www.familysearch.org
https://www.familysearch.org
Birth record of Tim’s maternal great-grandmother, Olive Harriet Blunden – https://www.familysearch.org
First cousin once removed:
https://ethnicelebs.com/jordan-klepper
A few Scottish surnames in there – Dick is from Edinburgh, McComb is from Perthshire, Miller is from Dumfriesshire etc.
I researched a bit meanwhile, and it seems that both Germans and Jews bear this name even today. So what I told about the of German house names is definitely not true. Though German Wikipedia often doesn’t tell about the ethnic origin of people (probably as a consequence of the nazi terror), I found long lists of Wolf(f)s, Baers and even Hirs(c)hs who can’t all be Jewish.
So I was a victim of my misled perception … Thanks for correcting that! :-)
Seems as if in the region I grew up those names are not common. I know no one there with an animal name as surname. And all people with such a name that I know now or remember that I read about are/were Jews. But perhaps my brain just sorted out the non-Jewish …
“Fox” as a German name (“Fuchs”) is mainly Jewish. In early times this was a house name (before streets got names and houses got numbers) and of course many people in German countries had those names, but for some reason I don’t know, those names nearly disappeared in the German population and only (?) Jews still bore them.
Any information whether Arthur Linke Fox was Jewish or had Jewish ancestry?
“Fuchs” can easily be a non-Jewish surname.
http://worldconnect.rootsweb.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?op=Search&includedb=&lang=en&ti=&surname=Fuchs&stype=Exact&given=&bplace=germany&byear=&brange=0&dplace=&dyear=&drange=0&mplace=&myear=&mrange=0&father=&mother=&spouse=&skipdb=&period=All&submit.x=Search
Arthue Linke Fox’s line goes back to John Christopher Fox, born c. 1716, in Germany.
Oh, I thought I wrote what it can be … Your answer didn’t clarify my question, or did it? The location in Germany at least doesn’t explain anything. Or do you mean the mere number of people explains that also non-Jewish Germans bear that name?
I was saying that there were a lot of non-Jewish Germans with the surname. In Allen’s case, the line is non-Jewish going back to at least the early 1700s.