The Family Tree Problem Solver: Tried-And-True Tactics for Tracing Elusive Ancestors (39 page)

2. DOES THE RECORD EXPRESSLY GIVE A FACT, OR DO YOU HAVE TO DRAW A CONCLUSION?
Does Jacob Simon's will state, “I leave my belongings to my son Josiah…,” causing no doubt in your mind that Josiah is Jacob's son? Or does the record require you to make an assumption?

3. DID YOUR ANCESTOR CREATE A RECORD, BUT NOT HAVE IT FILED RIGHT AWAY?
Perhaps your ancestor entered into a land transaction on a certain date, but didn't have it recorded at the courthouse until years later. Be sure to note both dates. The later record could contain errors.

4. WHEN WAS THE TOMBSTONE PLACED ON YOUR ANCESTOR'S GRAVE?
A tombstone placed years after the person's death is more likely to containe a mistake than one erected within a few months of the death.

Step 5:
Correct misinformation.

The best part of Internet genealogy is that anyone can post his or her ancestral findings on the Web, helping researchers all over the globe. The worst part is that not all of that information has been well-researched or checked for accuracy.

While researching a friend's ancestor, professional genealogist Sandra Hewlett found birth and death dates on a RootsWeb
www.rootsweb.com
page. To verify the date, Hewlett requested a copy of the ancestor's obituary from the Memphis/Shelby County Public Library. When she received the record, she found that the name was the same, but the obituary described someone else.

“This prompted me to e-mail the person who posted this information on RootsWeb to ask where he got the birth and death dates,” says Hewlett. The submitter admitted that he had little information on that family. He had found only one person in the Social Security Death Index (SSDI)
ssdi.rootsweb.ancestry.com
whose name matched and who was close in age to the ancestor he was seeking. So he assumed that he'd found the right ancestor, and adopted the birth and death dates from the SSDI without checking them in any original records. After Hewlett sent him a copy of the obituary, he removed the erroneous data from Rootsweb.

Luckily, you can correct misinformation on the Internet far more easily and quickly than errors in a book. If you have documentation that disproves data you found online, send the original record to the person who posted that data, and ask her to correct it. Genealogists aim to help others, not lead them astray, so they will usually correct the information.

Step 6:
Hunt for more clues.

Online research certainly saves time. And the Internet is always open, so you can search day or night from the comfort of your own home. But remember that online databases usually contain only enough information to help you identify an ancestor. The original record likely will hold even more clues.

Rick Crume, author of
Plugging Into Your Past
, learned this lesson while researching Evan Jones, who was born in Wales in 1789. From a biography, Crume learned that Evan had married Elizabeth Lanigan in 1808 and then moved to London. So he looked for Jones in the
Ancestry.com
-hosted
www.ancestry.com
Pallot's Marriage Index, which covers more than 1.7 million marriages performed in London between 1780 and 1837. The index suggested the couple wed in London's St. Dunstan-in-the-West Church in 1810.

“To track down the original record, I went to the Family History Library catalog, did a place search for London, and selected ‘church records’ from the list of topics,” says Crume.

“That topic produced an overwhelming 628 matching titles. Searching the catalog for the keyword Dunstan produced a slightly more manageable 118 matches. Either way, you eventually come to the entry for the parish registers of St. Dunstan-in-the-West Church in London.”

Crume then paged through the marriage records on the appropriate microfilm and found that the original record revealed information the Web index lacked, including the exact marriage date, the witnesses' names and even signatures.

The Internet
has
made ancestor hunting much simpler. But as Sherlock Holmes advised, “Things must be done decently and in order.” So remember to go that extra mile and seek the original document. You'll be able to verify web data, and you might uncover clues you wouldn't have found otherwise.

J
enny Oligos suspected that her great-grandparents had emigrated from Piraeus, Greece, just like her friend Helen's (Helen and Jenny have the same maiden name), but she couldn't locate the records to prove her hunch. After years of scouring immigration records, she finally found her holy grail.

A second cousin who collected family heirlooms gave Jenny their great-grandmother's hairbrush, which still contained a few wispy strands. Jenny had heard that scientists can use the DNA in hair to trace a person's genetic origins. She carefully wrapped the brush and sent it to a DNA testing company for analysis. Because Helen had already confirmed through records that her ancestors had emigrated from Piraeus, she sent a sample of her own hair to the company for comparison.

Six weeks later, Jenny received a full report that provided the answers she'd sought for years. Not only did she find out that her ancestors had in fact hailed from Piraeus, but she also learned that she and Helen are fourth cousins. The company even identified who Jenny and Helen's common ancestors are. Cousins currently living in Greece had obtained samples of their ancestors' DNA by exhuming their bodies. They'd submitted the DNA samples to the same testing company, which maintains a database genealogists can use to find genetic matches. Now that Jenny has identified her family's origins, she can focus her research efforts.

Does this tale of genealogical discovery sound far-fetched? That's because it is. Jenny Oligos is a figment of imagination. The story illustrates common misconceptions about DNA testing, the latest trend in family history research and the source of much confusion — and even fear. Let's tackle those misconceptions one by one so you can learn the truth about your genetic genealogy testing options.

Myth 1:
Geneticists use hair and blood samples to trace ancestry.

Although scientists do utilize hair and blood samples for paternity tests and forensic analysis, there's no need to draw blood or pluck hairs for a genetic genealogy test.

When you order a DNA test for yourself or someone else, you'll receive a cheek-swab kit or a mouthwash kit in the mail — complete with instructions, a consent form and a return envelope. For the cheek-swab kit, you'll use a sterile swab or toothbrush-like device to painlessly scrape the inside of your cheek for a few seconds. (The company may provide multiple swabs in order to obtain backup cheek-cell samples, just in case the first one doesn't yield clear results.) For the mouthwash kit, you'll swish the supplied rinse for a specified amount of time and spit it back into the container.

Then you'll just sign the consent form and mail it and your DNA sample back to the company. You should receive results in the mail or on a password-protected website within a few weeks.

REALITY CHECK:
So could “Jenny” have sent her great-grandmother's hair to a DNA lab for testing? Although there are forensic labs that test hair, this type of analysis comes with a much higher price tag.

Myth 2:
A DNA test can pinpoint precisely where your ancestors lived or which tribe they belonged to.

If your ancestors and their off spring had stayed in one geographic region and never allowed outsiders to enter, it would be relatively easy to distinguish their DNA (and yours) from the DNA of people living in other regions. Over time, all the inhabitants of your region would come to share specific genetic mutations (usually harmless changes in DNA), which would identify them as a distinct population, the same way a surname identifies members of a family.

But our ancestors didn't stay in one place. For thousands of years, humans have moved about, leaving their genetic imprints wherever they procreate and making it increasingly difficult for geneticists to distinguish one region's population from another's.

Scientists can make inferences about your ancestry based on trends among populations, but they can't say for sure that your ancestors lived in a specific country, much less a specific town. Testing companies analyze a person's genetic makeup by comparing his or her DNA to a reference database of DNA samples from modern individuals living in various regions — such as residents of present-day African countries.

But it's important to keep in mind that today's inhabitants of a given region are genetically different from the people who lived there before migration occurred. Just because your DNA matches the DNA of someone who currently lives there, that doesn't necessarily mean your ancestors came from that place. Likewise, your DNA might match that of a modern-day African tribe, but your ancestors may not have identified with that particular group.

Biogeographical tests such as DNA Testing Systems'
dnaconsultants.com
DNA Fingerprint tests will estimate where in the world your ancestors originated. Yet scientists haven't agreed upon definitions for even broad genetic ethnicities, so if you test with more than one company, you may get different results.

By combining genetic genealogy and traditional genealogical research methods, however, you can make headway in pinpointing your family's origins. As more people get tested and contribute both their DNA test results and their family trees to online databases (see myth 5 for more on these), scientists will be able to identify additional patterns and draw better conclusions.

REALITY CHECK:
While browsing a database, Jenny might have noticed that her close relatives' DNA matches the DNA of people with confirmed roots in a certain part of Greece. She could then focus her research efforts on that locale. But at this point, it's unrealistic to expect a DNA testing company to provide that level of assurance in your test results.

Myth 3:
You must exhume an ancestor for a DNA sample to find out if you and another researcher share that same ancestor.

You can let Great-grandpa rest in peace. There are easier ways to prove a genetic link that don't involve literally turning relatives over in their graves.

To find out if you and someone else descend from the same male ancestor, you should turn to Y-DNA testing. The Y chromosome (also called Y-DNA) is passed virtually unchanged from father to son, just like (in most cases) a surname. So Great-grandpa should have the same Y-DNA as his son, his son's son and so on. You can use Y-DNA to trace your paternal lineage, which is represented by the top line of a pedigree chart.

If you and your fellow researcher are both male and have the same surname as the man you think is your third-great-grandfather, then you both should have your Y-DNA tested. (Even if one of you has a different surname, you still could be related; a surname might've changed after an adoption or during an immigrant ancestor's assimilation process.) If you're indeed related, your Y-DNA test results should be identical, or nearly identical because mutations do occur occasionally.

But even with a perfect match, there's no telling whether you're related through your third-great-grandfather or a different ancestor, unless you can find the records to prove your hypothesis. That's because mutations don't occur at regular intervals, so it's hard to predict exactly when the most recent common ancestor (MRCA) might have lived. Most DNA testing companies provide an estimate, though.

DNA GLOSSARY

Because women don't have Y chromosomes, a female researcher would need to turn to someone with the same Y-DNA as her biological father. She could ask her father, brother, uncle (her father's brother), a male cousin (her father's brother's son) or a nephew (her brother's son) to take a Y-DNA test.

Geneticists use another type of DNA, called mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA), to trace maternal lineage, what's shown on the bottom line of a pedigree chart. Mothers pass their mtDNA to their daughters and their sons, but only daughters pass mtDNA on to the next generation. Genealogists can use mtDNA in much the same way as Y-DNA, although it's not as useful because it doesn't correspond to surnames. Plus, mtDNA mutates more slowly than Y-DNA does, making it even harder to predict when an MRCA might have lived.

Typically, genealogists use mtDNA to explore their ancient ancestry or to weed out people who aren't related through their maternal lines. If your mtDNA results don't match exactly with someone else's, you're probably not closely related. Rarely do two people with one or more differences in their mtDNA have a common ancestor who lived recently enough that she might appear in written records.

Testing your own or a close relative's Y-DNA or mtDNA can reveal information about your paternal line (your father's father's father) and your maternal line (your mother's mother's mother) but not about anyone in between. But you can enlist the assistance of your male and female cousins to learn about the ancestors named in the middle of your pedigree chart.

REALITY CHECK:
To find out if they're related, Jenny and Helen could have had their mtDNA tested (using cheek-cell or saliva samples, not hair). If their results had revealed an exact match, though, Jenny and Helen couldn't have known when the MRCA on their maternal line lived without turning to traditional roots resources — that ancestor could have walked the earth hundreds of years ago.

The two women also could have asked male relatives to get their Y-DNA tested. The DNA company would have been able to use those test results to estimate with more precision when the MRCA on their paternal line might have lived — for instance, a twelve-marker match might mean there's an 80 percent chance they share an ancestor within the past fifteen generations — but again, this would be just an estimate. Geneticists wouldn't be able to tell them that they're fourth cousins. Which leads us to the next myth.

Myth 4:
The results of ancestral DNA tests are 99.9 percent accurate, just like the DNA tests on crime dramas.

Genetic genealogy isn't an exact science — it involves quite a bit of interpretation. Although your DNA doesn't lie, scientists use it to calculate the probability that you and another researcher are related or that you have African roots, based on genetic patterns they've observed in populations. This means that genetic genealogy can suggest, but not prove, a relationship.

TYPES OF GENETIC TESTS

Biogeographical test results, in particular, must be taken with a grain of salt because scientists haven't agreed upon definitions of genetic ethnicity. What makes interpreting results from biogeographical tests even trickier is that these tests rely on autosomal DNA, a mixed bag of genetic information inherited from both mothers and fathers. A test may suggest that you have some American Indian ancestry, but you won't know whether it comes from your mother's side or your father's side unless both of your parents get tested as well. Nor will you know how long ago your American Indian ancestor (or ancestors) lived.