Jun 27, 2026 By Katherine Mansfield 5 min read

EDITOR’S NOTE: This is one in a monthlong series of profiles of the people who live and work in Washington, Greene and Fayette counties, in celebration of the nation’s 250th anniversary.

The story of America is the collective narrative of every American.

It is, perhaps, a smaller-scale notion of this ideal that drives Michael Collins to chart his family’s history – all the way back to the nation’s founding.

“I’m a descendant of Thomas Kent, who fought in the Revolutionary War,” said Collins, a 1979 Peters Township grad who now lives in Oakdale. “Thomas Kent built a three-story log cabin off of Smithfield, Smith Creek Road. He kind of settled that area on Smith Creek with a couple other gentlemen who were there early on.”

That log cabin has been gone for about 30 years, Collins said, but his family’s legacy lives on, spreading north and east and well beyond Greene County. That history is told in documents and is etched onto gravestones in cemeteries throughout Southwestern Pennsylvania. That history is why the tall, lanky frame of Michael Collins haunts cemeteries near and far.

“I’ve always been the one person out of my family who’s enjoyed researching my past. When I’m in a certain area, I’ll go visit cemeteries that I have a feeling I have a relative. I go wherever,” he said.

Collins is the youngest of three children. He inherited his passion for genealogy from his mother, who was part of Waynesburg’s genealogical society and a member of the local Daughters of the American Revolution chapter. Both of Collins’ parents were born and raised in Waynesburg, so he and his siblings made the drive from Washington to Greene County often to visit family. His parents are now buried in the Greene County Memorial Cemetery, where Mr. Kent is also buried.

In early June, Collins spent a day cleaning his parents’ graves before traveling further south to Greensboro. He was on the hunt for a grave.

“I found, online, some information about that great-great-grandmother of mine, Susanna Ghrist,” said Collins, standing in Monongahela Hill Cemetery near the intersections of Route 88 South and Mapletown Road.

He didn’t find his great-great-grandmother’s gravestone, but the hunt is part of the thrill of genealogy. Genealogy itself is an art that takes years to get good at.

“Genealogy gets very confusing,” Collins said, “because there’s lots of information that’s not always accurate. People say this is my relative, but it’s not really because they don’t do enough research. Before you know it, the information gets corrupted.”

When he isn’t researching and documenting family history, Collins is a husband and father. He met his wife, Mary Lynn, through a work friend. The couple wed in 2003. Their older daughter graduated high school this year, and their younger daughter will graduate next year. The girls are, Collins said, his proudest accomplishment.

“I spend all my life around them. I got an Eagle Scout award when I was younger, and did some great stuff like that. But just getting my kids to this point without them doing anything too stupid,” he laughed, “just trying to take care of them.”

Last year, Collins, who earned an engineering degree from Penn State University, retired after 35 years with FedEx. Now that there’s no time clock to punch and his girls are heading into the world, Collins is pursuing new passions.

“I have been trying to learn to play the guitar,” he said. “I didn’t start learning until I was like 60. I’m not very good, but I really enjoy learning how to play.”

He’s also hoping to hit the trails again.

“In the ’90s, some of my friends moved out to California and Nevada. For five consecutive years, I hiked Half Dome. Half Dome’s this huge hill that you can climb. There’s, like, a rope ladder you have to go up to get to the top of it,” he said, underplaying the hike’s famous 400-foot vertical cable climb, the cherry on top of a 14- to 16-mile round-trip trail hike through Yosemite National Park.

“I’m going to try to hike again,” Collins said, “but I don’t know what’s going to happen when I get to.”

What seems more certain is that Collins will continue adding branches to his family’s tree and visiting the gravesites of relatives because, for him, genealogy is a noble pursuit.

“I think it’s just important to know, for our country, how we got to where we are and all the sacrifices that have been made. When people think of Memorial Day, they talk about all the sacrifices in World War II and Vietnam – the more recent wars – but it started before then. It started with our founding fathers and the Revolutionary War, and the War of 1812, and the Civil War. There’s so many people who have died at young ages making sacrifices. I think about that, and I think about any family members I might have who are part of that,” Collins said. “To me, it’s interesting. I enjoy doing this.”