Awesome tool just reopened on GEDCOM which added the ability to search your GEDMATCH DNA matches and then look at any GEDCOM's associated with them. I was able to confirm some speculative relationships with this.
If you have not uploaded your GEDCOM to GEDMATCH yet, now is the time to do it. Also if you manage multiple tests, there is a way to just use one GEDCOM.
After uploading GEDCOM use the "SEARCH ALL GEDCOMS" in the lower left corner and look yourself up.
You can then navigate though the page it pulls up to any other person that matches the tests you have recorded. Ie, I can navigate to my cousin Ang's page, then link her test to it since I know her GEDMATCH number. Then you just put in the GEDMATCH test number to associate with the person in the record and you have linked the person into your tree. I have not tried doing this with all of my relatives, but just the test I specifically manage.
Monday, June 22, 2015
Wednesday, June 10, 2015
It isn't all click and add....
Sometimes people get the impression that they can sign up for Ancestry, and get all of the information they want just by using the hints that are suggested to them. It is great if the hints are correct, but a lot of times they are not.
The real fun of the research comes in when you examine the records and find something new. Or you look at records in a different way to bring about more and more hints.
Case in point is a brick wall I have been working on for a few years. My GG grandparents James Guider and Mary Robinson have been hard couple to research. One, because on his first census James and his sister were living with guardians and Mary because Mary Robinson is such a common name.
I had a picture of a man named Geroge HULTZ I couldn't exactly make out my grandmother's writing, which stated that he was a cousin of Zua May Guider my Great Grandmother, a daughter of the brick walls. Well I was able to find a George Hultz on the census and built his tree and followed his descendants all with no luck. I placed him on the back burner as he was not paying off after hours of research.
A few days ago, however, I was paging again through my grandmother's old address book looking at names and I saw Leva HULTY's name again. Now I have photo's of Leva with Charles DAVIS who lived in Chicago and was son to Mary's first daughter by her first husband (before GUIDER). The DAVIS boys were only partially interesting to me because they were only related to me through one great great grandparent, Mary. Also there was a case of the second DAVIS boy, George's will. When he died his estate was contested by some orphan girls in Michigan who claimed to be descended of Charles. Leva, I thought, was Charles' girlfriend. I had never really pursued her.
Well I was feeling a little overwhelmed by the DNA evidence lately, so I decided to do some old fashioned research. First, I went hunting for the address that was in my grandmother's book. I tried to find the address on the census maps and paged though the census records for 1900, 1920 and 1930 with no luck. Then I went online to see if I could find any historical directories for Chicago. I found one from 1920 and decided to see if I could find her. Going through the alphabetical listings, I found a Lena HULTS. Not only had I misread my grandmothers writing for the first name but also the last name.
Bang. I plugged that name into my database and a census record popped up with George HULTS and Emma HULTS as the parents. This was very exciting. I had fit two pieces of my puzzle together in a way I hadn't imagined before.
This whole time I had been researching the wrong George.
Armed with the knowledge of the correct George I was able to trace his records and find his parents. Since George was the cousin I was looking for, it was going to be one of his parents that was brother or sister to my brick walls.
Quickly I narrowed it down as George's father was from New York. No one on this branch of the tree had any connection to NY as far as I knew. That left his mother Lydia. The biggest problem was that Lydia had no maiden name. If I had relied on the hints from Ancestry, I quickly would have gone off in the wrong direction. Instead I pulled up each census record I had already found, and looked closely at it. One census record for the HULTS family had the mother living with her son when she was very old. This is very common and a great way to get missing information. On this record her name had changed to HUBBARD. After plugging in the information for this, I saw where all of the mistakes on Ancestry had come from. All of the hints were for the wrong people. The Ancestry researchers had just accepted the first clues without really delving into the logistics of it. It was a few pages down where I found the correct Lydia HUBBARD. Ancestry volunteers had mistakenly had her listed as the wife of a completely incorrect person. The correct husband was listed on the record but not near his wife. He was a hotelier in Michigan and Lydia was listed a few rows down from him as wife... but the volunteers had chose the man listed directly above her as the husband. I was able to confirm all of this, because as I looked down the guest list at the hotel, I was to discover Lydia's son was staying at the hotel, using his middle name of Oscar. Now that I had Lydia's husband's name I could start researching them.
There were no real records of interest for Lydia Hubbard or George Hubbard. Until I found a record again, by looking closely at each non-hint record. In one I found a wedding for Lydia Halse and George Hubbard. Birthdates and locations were on, but Halse? Well, knowing how I had screwed up the names, of course, HULTZ and HALSE could easily be mistaken for one another. And, something else I learned by pulling up the record and not relying on Ancestry's abstraction. Lydia had a maiden name of Phillips.
BINGO.
I still have not made the connection, but this is the type of real research that click and adder's just can't appreciate.
This was edited to change ROBERTSON to ROBINSON as I have recently discovered that ROBINSON was the last name used on the marriage certificate for Mary Matilda.
The real fun of the research comes in when you examine the records and find something new. Or you look at records in a different way to bring about more and more hints.
Case in point is a brick wall I have been working on for a few years. My GG grandparents James Guider and Mary Robinson have been hard couple to research. One, because on his first census James and his sister were living with guardians and Mary because Mary Robinson is such a common name.
I had a picture of a man named Geroge HULTZ I couldn't exactly make out my grandmother's writing, which stated that he was a cousin of Zua May Guider my Great Grandmother, a daughter of the brick walls. Well I was able to find a George Hultz on the census and built his tree and followed his descendants all with no luck. I placed him on the back burner as he was not paying off after hours of research.
A few days ago, however, I was paging again through my grandmother's old address book looking at names and I saw Leva HULTY's name again. Now I have photo's of Leva with Charles DAVIS who lived in Chicago and was son to Mary's first daughter by her first husband (before GUIDER). The DAVIS boys were only partially interesting to me because they were only related to me through one great great grandparent, Mary. Also there was a case of the second DAVIS boy, George's will. When he died his estate was contested by some orphan girls in Michigan who claimed to be descended of Charles. Leva, I thought, was Charles' girlfriend. I had never really pursued her.
Well I was feeling a little overwhelmed by the DNA evidence lately, so I decided to do some old fashioned research. First, I went hunting for the address that was in my grandmother's book. I tried to find the address on the census maps and paged though the census records for 1900, 1920 and 1930 with no luck. Then I went online to see if I could find any historical directories for Chicago. I found one from 1920 and decided to see if I could find her. Going through the alphabetical listings, I found a Lena HULTS. Not only had I misread my grandmothers writing for the first name but also the last name.
Bang. I plugged that name into my database and a census record popped up with George HULTS and Emma HULTS as the parents. This was very exciting. I had fit two pieces of my puzzle together in a way I hadn't imagined before.
This whole time I had been researching the wrong George.
Armed with the knowledge of the correct George I was able to trace his records and find his parents. Since George was the cousin I was looking for, it was going to be one of his parents that was brother or sister to my brick walls.
Quickly I narrowed it down as George's father was from New York. No one on this branch of the tree had any connection to NY as far as I knew. That left his mother Lydia. The biggest problem was that Lydia had no maiden name. If I had relied on the hints from Ancestry, I quickly would have gone off in the wrong direction. Instead I pulled up each census record I had already found, and looked closely at it. One census record for the HULTS family had the mother living with her son when she was very old. This is very common and a great way to get missing information. On this record her name had changed to HUBBARD. After plugging in the information for this, I saw where all of the mistakes on Ancestry had come from. All of the hints were for the wrong people. The Ancestry researchers had just accepted the first clues without really delving into the logistics of it. It was a few pages down where I found the correct Lydia HUBBARD. Ancestry volunteers had mistakenly had her listed as the wife of a completely incorrect person. The correct husband was listed on the record but not near his wife. He was a hotelier in Michigan and Lydia was listed a few rows down from him as wife... but the volunteers had chose the man listed directly above her as the husband. I was able to confirm all of this, because as I looked down the guest list at the hotel, I was to discover Lydia's son was staying at the hotel, using his middle name of Oscar. Now that I had Lydia's husband's name I could start researching them.
There were no real records of interest for Lydia Hubbard or George Hubbard. Until I found a record again, by looking closely at each non-hint record. In one I found a wedding for Lydia Halse and George Hubbard. Birthdates and locations were on, but Halse? Well, knowing how I had screwed up the names, of course, HULTZ and HALSE could easily be mistaken for one another. And, something else I learned by pulling up the record and not relying on Ancestry's abstraction. Lydia had a maiden name of Phillips.
BINGO.
I still have not made the connection, but this is the type of real research that click and adder's just can't appreciate.
This was edited to change ROBERTSON to ROBINSON as I have recently discovered that ROBINSON was the last name used on the marriage certificate for Mary Matilda.
Saturday, June 6, 2015
New DNA Matches with Ancestor Hints at ANCESTRY
OK. Pushed into a new family by Ancestry DNA. Now I am supposedly part of the Pleasant Howard and Abigail Wright group. They are connected to the Swafford/Lee families through the Howards, but I am not sure closely enough for the amount of DNA we share.
I was able to cross reference and found Raphael Francis Andrews and did some work with our mutual matches.
Looking at our Generational Matix got me wondering, why are there no 3rd generation people? I have 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 7 but no 3's.
I am gonna have to run some tests and see if that is significant. If there were out of wedlock children, that might make sense or very small families. I also expect that the immigrants are going to limit the number of generational matches I should get, but the families that have been in the country for hundreds of years should be pretty flush.
I was able to cross reference and found Raphael Francis Andrews and did some work with our mutual matches.
Looking at our Generational Matix got me wondering, why are there no 3rd generation people? I have 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 7 but no 3's.
I am gonna have to run some tests and see if that is significant. If there were out of wedlock children, that might make sense or very small families. I also expect that the immigrants are going to limit the number of generational matches I should get, but the families that have been in the country for hundreds of years should be pretty flush.
Wednesday, June 3, 2015
Identifying your AncestryDNA Matches
So the past couple of days I have been about to communicate with Sandra Fisher Woolsey. I was not getting any response on the Ancestry site, so using the power of google, I was finally able to find an email address I sent a simple inquiry to. Luckily she received it and responded. What a great opportunity. I was able to convince her to share her ANCESTRY DNA results with me through the Ancestry Site. Ancestry allows you to share your DNA results in a way similar to sharing your tree, in that now, I can look at all of Sandra's matches. Using AncestryDNA helper, I was able to go through and cross tabulate her results with mine and pull out the line to concentrate on.
It seems the next few weeks will be looking at her COZART and PRIEST lines. I matched someone that shows on her list as a 1st/2nd Cousin, someone who shows as 2nd/3rd Cousin and a smattering of people further out. This is awesome in that I can really start narrowing down the search for how we are matched up. No longer do I have to search her entire tree. I can concentrate SURNAMES that all of us match together. Since COZART and PRIEST are new in my line, I would never have found the matches without her sharing her results with me.
Lets start today and see how long it takes me to find our MCRA.
It seems the next few weeks will be looking at her COZART and PRIEST lines. I matched someone that shows on her list as a 1st/2nd Cousin, someone who shows as 2nd/3rd Cousin and a smattering of people further out. This is awesome in that I can really start narrowing down the search for how we are matched up. No longer do I have to search her entire tree. I can concentrate SURNAMES that all of us match together. Since COZART and PRIEST are new in my line, I would never have found the matches without her sharing her results with me.
Lets start today and see how long it takes me to find our MCRA.
Tuesday, June 2, 2015
Which Test would I recommend June 2015
So people have asked me which test I would recommend.
As I have used three different companies FTDNA, Ancestry and 23andME, I can say I certainly have a favorite - AncestryDNA.
Why do I like it.
First, unlike FTDNA and 23andME, Ancestry automatically and easily integrates your family tree. As I am a genealogist, not a geneticist or someone trying to get insight into what role my genes may play in future health issues, this is precisely the type of integration I am looking for.
It is not perfect, as you would by reading my blog, but it certainly beats what the other companies have to offer in this respect.
FTDNA is useful, but I have found it to be very cumbersome to use and I have not found people all that responsive on the site. The good thing about Ancestry is, I have matches and trees I can get to work on immediately without having to wait for a response from someone else.
Second 23andMe is a really disorganized. It was geared to providing health feedback to its users. However, since that has all been taken away, it really doesn't know where it stand right now. I did testing for an Aunt on 23andMe and the sample turned out to be inadequate. They needed a new sample, so 23andMe told me they would send me a replacement kit or refund my money. Also, if I retested the same individual a second time, and it was still not a usable sample, I could not receive a refund or another test. Since I do a lot of testing, I decided to simply have a replacement test sent and to order a test from Ancestry for my Aunt to try. When I was ready to send the replacement test out to a new individual, an Uncle, I asked 23andMe how to change the information on the test. They informed me that I could not, I would have to have my money refunded to me, and then purchase a third test and have it sent to me, even though I had a valid identical test in my hand. At that point, it was confirmed for me, 23andMe just is not up to the challenge of making any of this easy and streamlined. Using 23andMe to do genealogy research simply is not a winning option.
Ancestry, even though there is a lot of misinformation done by shoddy research on the site, it still is able to provide a great tools to work with and a good jumping off point.
Tests from any of these vendors are also able to be transferred to GEDMATCH.COM to compare with users from any one else uploading their results to GEDMATCH. The tools GEDMATCH offers and the number of tests in their database make it a very worthwhile addition to any of the vendors alone, and it is free as well.
As I have used three different companies FTDNA, Ancestry and 23andME, I can say I certainly have a favorite - AncestryDNA.
Why do I like it.
First, unlike FTDNA and 23andME, Ancestry automatically and easily integrates your family tree. As I am a genealogist, not a geneticist or someone trying to get insight into what role my genes may play in future health issues, this is precisely the type of integration I am looking for.
It is not perfect, as you would by reading my blog, but it certainly beats what the other companies have to offer in this respect.
FTDNA is useful, but I have found it to be very cumbersome to use and I have not found people all that responsive on the site. The good thing about Ancestry is, I have matches and trees I can get to work on immediately without having to wait for a response from someone else.
Second 23andMe is a really disorganized. It was geared to providing health feedback to its users. However, since that has all been taken away, it really doesn't know where it stand right now. I did testing for an Aunt on 23andMe and the sample turned out to be inadequate. They needed a new sample, so 23andMe told me they would send me a replacement kit or refund my money. Also, if I retested the same individual a second time, and it was still not a usable sample, I could not receive a refund or another test. Since I do a lot of testing, I decided to simply have a replacement test sent and to order a test from Ancestry for my Aunt to try. When I was ready to send the replacement test out to a new individual, an Uncle, I asked 23andMe how to change the information on the test. They informed me that I could not, I would have to have my money refunded to me, and then purchase a third test and have it sent to me, even though I had a valid identical test in my hand. At that point, it was confirmed for me, 23andMe just is not up to the challenge of making any of this easy and streamlined. Using 23andMe to do genealogy research simply is not a winning option.
Ancestry, even though there is a lot of misinformation done by shoddy research on the site, it still is able to provide a great tools to work with and a good jumping off point.
Tests from any of these vendors are also able to be transferred to GEDMATCH.COM to compare with users from any one else uploading their results to GEDMATCH. The tools GEDMATCH offers and the number of tests in their database make it a very worthwhile addition to any of the vendors alone, and it is free as well.
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