BUFFALO, N.Y. — Music megastar Taylor Swift and her song about her grandmother Marjorie prompted historian Angela Keppel, a self-proclaimed Swifite since 2006, to want to learn more about her through websites as well as census records, and found she too had a music career. 

What You Need To Know

  • March is Women's History Month

  • Music megastar Taylor Swift has family roots in Dunkirk and Chautauqua County

  • One Buffalo historian is helping to uncover Swift's family tree

She also found out Marjorie's husband Robert's mom, Taylor's great-grandmother Eleanor Mayer was born in the Chautauqua County city of Dunkirk.

"And I was like, 'Oh my goodness. How is her great-grandmother born in Dunkirk?' " said Keppel.

Eleanor's mom and dad, Julius and Delia Mayer, Taylor's great-great-grandparents, also came from Dunkirk and lived upstairs from the store they owned and operated Mayer Music.

Their other daughter, Eleanor's sister Emma, was a music teacher in Dunkirk.

"And so maybe some of that musical talent and musical knowledge kinda trickled down through the generations," said Keppel.

It landed at the Dunkirk Historical Museum, where leaders have been able to track, uncover and preserve much of that Mayer family history.

"To be able to go the places that her family lived and worked. Look at the legacy her family started in Dunkirk and in Western New York. It's just a fascinating connection," said Kristin White, executive director of the Dunkirk Historical Society.

As is the connection between White and Keppel, whose curiosity is credited for discovering Taylor's Dunkirk era.

"Her research opened up doors for us to have a clue where to start with our own to go back even further," said White.

Keppel recently went back to the site of the music store, which collapsed in 2015. Only the imprint of the outdoor staircase and some bricks still exist, minus one, as she took one to keep.

"So, it's really cool to think about all the history that was at this site and the different generations that have come out of the family that lived here," Keppel said.

Members of the Mayer family are buried in nearby Fredonia.

To complete the family tree, Swift's grandmother Marjorie gave birth to Andrea, who married Scott Swift, and the rest is history.