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Still finding my way |
I did Ancestry. It's frikin awesome! I love how they break down your lineage by percent and from what I know it's extremely accurate. I hit the jackpot being adopted. Found ALL of my blood family including both parents and younger brother. | |||
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paradox in a box |
I probably should have mentioned the issues I've had with Ancestry. It has nothing to do with the DNA, but with the hints. If you accept a hint it will add people to your family tree. If you realize you made an error it is not easy to remove that one person. Overall it can be very frustrating. I have some relatives by DNA that I didn't think were real relatives based on hints. Somehow there were 3 couples in Boston named Manuel and Mary Rogers in 1905. So crazy figuring out the correct ones. These go to eleven. | |||
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| Muzzle flash aficionado  |
I have dealings with both ancestry.com and MyHeritage.com, principally for tracing family lines via documentation. They both have pretty big libraries of on-line documents. I also have family trees with both agencies--the one on ancestry is very small, mostly my immediate family, but I have more than 20,000 persons in my tree on MyHeritage (their tool is called Family Tree Builder). My DNA has been submitted to FTDNA, which is an offshoot of MyHeritage (I think). My Y-DNA (male line only) has been tested to 111 markers, and they've also done testing of my autosomal DNA (both sexes). I have not uncovered any close relatives using their services, but I already knew of all my grandparents, parents, aunts and uncles, and first cousins. I am not much concerned with possible privacy violations from my DNA, nor use by LEO (I've not done any serious crimes). (When I started building a family tree I stopped using my mother's maiden name as a security question.) I have discovered some cousins that did not live past infancy (they were not usually discussed in the family), but I did know of 3 of my father's siblings who died in the 1918 Spanish Flu epidemic. Since I am the oldest living person in either of my parents' lines, I quite some time ago lost any ability to gain personal knowledge of my ancestry. I have used the documentation on-line to fill in the gaps in my knowledge. It is an interesting pursuit. I have become connected with more far-flung relatives via the document searches and DNA matches. Genealogy may not be for everyone, but I find it entertaining. flashguy Texan by choice, not accident of birth | |||
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| Little ray of sunshine  |
HIPAA might prevent just this. Do you know it doesn't? It is health information after all. The fish is mute, expressionless. The fish doesn't think because the fish knows everything. | |||
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Nullus Anxietas |
No tin-foil-hat-ism, but I will merely caution you to read their ToS and privacy polices very carefully--and note they probably retain the right to change those as they see fit in the future. I have read of cases where, as with one or two of the members here, they tried both Ancestry and 23 and Me, and gotten essentially identical results. Then I've read where identical twins sent in DNA and gotten back wildly different results. So I dunno. My family line on my father's side hit a dead end in the New Orleans area sometime just prior to the War of Northern Aggression. Haven't been able to trace it back any further than that. It would be interesting to do so. My mother's side would probably be easier, but we haven't really pursued it. Theoretically, we should be able to trace hers, on her father's side, all the way back to a Scottish Highlands Clan--and perhaps back to Ireland, before that. "America is at that awkward stage. It's too late to work within the system,,,, but too early to shoot the bastards." -- Claire Wolfe "If we let things terrify us, life will not be worth living." -- Seneca the Younger, Roman Stoic philosopher | |||
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| Like a party in your pants  |
I was not a fan of the DNA tracking services, but changed my mind. I'm adopted, along with my twin sister. My adopted parents never held the fact that we were both adopted.I never pressed them about info on my birth parents because I never wanted them to think that I some how considered them less than my parents,I could not have had better parents growing up. My Mother died many years ago, my Father passed a few years ago. I was curious about blood relatives so I applied for my original birth certificate which I received.It listed my birth mother but not father. She lived in Milwaukee but came to Chicago to give birth. I'm sure a young girl back in 1951 had more pressure when having a baby out of wedlock back then than now.This seemed to back up the info my adopted parents told me. I looked up her last name and found blood relatives with that name living through out N. Wisconsin. This prompted me to do the Ancestry DNA test. I was curious about my genetic back ground but more curious to see if I had any blood relatives.It showed a few distant relatives but nothing close. I do get updates with new names when they surface. I found it useful for my purpose. | |||
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| Little ray of sunshine |
My first wife was Hispanic-surnamed. Her father was Hispanic, but very European Spanish - think tall, wavy hair - like a latin movie star from the 30's. Her mother was anglo. My wife was tall, pale, and had very red hair - not at all what we expect a hispanic person to look like. But she got a Hispanic student's scholarship at her college, and she said when she went to pick up the check every semester, she got a lot of funny looks. So, sure, you're Hispanic. The fish is mute, expressionless. The fish doesn't think because the fish knows everything. | |||
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| Muzzle flash aficionado |
^^^^^ ensigmatic, it is not necessary to submit DNA to find out a lot of information about your forebears. A subscription to ancestry.com is not very expensive and you can do a lot of searching of just the on-line documentation. Be advised that although Census records are on line for mnay years prior to 1850, they only listed the name of the family head and then how many others were in the household based on age ranges. Some states have birth, death, and marriage certificates on line that go back farther than that, and a lot of Wills are on-line, too. You might sign up with ancestry.com and see what can be found about your parents' lines. flashguy Texan by choice, not accident of birth | |||
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| Muzzle flash aficionado |
Frayedends, my tree on ancestry is very simple and I don't get much use of their hints ("leafs"). My main Tree is on MyHeritage, and the hints I get from them are in the form of "Smart Matches" and "Smart Record Matches". It is possible to allow those hints to be automatically added to my Tree, but I prefer to review them and make manual changes. Every so often I'll get what they call a "Discovery" that would add about a dozen more people to my tree. I look those over very carefully before I decide to allow the additions, and if I do I immediately go to my Tree and make notations in the individual's entries that the information came from a Discovery. Smart Matches and Discoveries are based on other family trees hosted by MyHeritage. Serious genealogiest are very cautious about copying information from another family tree, because usually there is no way to confirm that it is correct. There is a lot of wrong information that has been copied from one tree to another many times--it pays to use such information as a guide to further searches for real documentation before accepting it. (I was guilty of blindly copying data when I first started, and I'm still finding and clearing up messes from that time.) flashguy Texan by choice, not accident of birth | |||
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Member |
I had a subscription to ancestry.com for about 10 years and it is very good in linking to many records you are rooting out. Finally stopped and now use www.familysearch.org https://www.familysearch.org/en/ It's free with only an email signup. It's a good place to start. | |||
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| Muzzle flash aficionado |
Family Search and its Family Tree are great places to get initial information, but don't blindly accept what it finds unless it links to actual documents. There is a lot of wrong data on FamilySearch Family Tree. Another good source to guide searches is WikiTree (www.wikitree.com). The data there is more reliable, as it is monitored and critiqued by many others. However, some bad data is also encountered there. I participate in several web boards that concentrate on my surname ("Casteel" and variants thereof). We have some very detailed discussions sometimes. flashguy Texan by choice, not accident of birth | |||
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| Master of one hand pistol shooting  |
I did the Ancestry dna thing, and found a lot more Brit in me than I ever imagined. Still there is a lot of German/Scandanavian too. Got into the Ancestry tree building thing and found Brit and French royals 1000 years ago. IF you can believe such things. King Edward(s), John (Magna Carta guy), etc. One ancestor was the Lord Lt of Ireland. Another the Empress of the Holy Roman Empire. Again, IF you can believe such things. Also tracked down some questions more recently like- where was my Dad born? I found out where that log cabin actually was. Family lore and Ancestry have agreement across the board. But for every answered question and new revelation, there are more questions come up. It is to me fascinating. SIGnature NRA Benefactor CMP Pistol Distinguished | |||
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Go Vols! |
Ancestry and Findagrave are great to start researching. Later, the DNA thing is an option but not the best tool. Gives some direction but it’s more a way to confirm with someone who has a good big of their tree complete. | |||
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| Member |
This is a serious inquiry. Does either service provide any details regarding any Neanderthal Ancestry? I'm curious about what a blood test would reveal about my ethnic background, of course. But it might be interesting to see if any of my ancestors were not homo sapien humans. | |||
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| Ammoholic |
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Shall Not Be Infringed |
Well, people are being 'pre-judged' according to their COVID Vaccine status... ____________________________________________________________ If Some is Good, and More is Better.....then Too Much, is Just Enough !! Trump 2024....Make America Great Again! "May Almighty God bless the United States of America" - parabellum 7/26/20 Live Free or Die! | |||
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Member |
23 and Me does, according to my BiL | |||
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Member |
I have traced my family back an average of 6 generations. It’s free and offers an enormous amount of information linking your relatives to actual events. I’m not a fan of the DNA thing but this is a great place to start. It is from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. I'm sorry if I hurt you feelings when I called you stupid - I thought you already knew - Unknown ................................... When you have no future, you live in the past. " Sycamore Row" by John Grisham | |||
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| Page late and a dollar short |
I’ve been using Ancestry.com and Family Search only, been hesitant to use the DNA based systems. My fathers side has been pretty much researched by my cousin, pretty simple there, Serb, Austrian, and Czech. My mother’s side gets convoluted. Through the above sources I’ve added Belgian and Ottawa in there. Biggest shock was that I am in contact with a distant cousin, my great grandfather and his great grandmother were siblings. Found him while searching for information on my great grandfather who passed in 1913. -------------------------------------—————— ————————--Ignorance is a powerful tool if applied at the right time, even, usually, surpassing knowledge(E.J.Potter, A.K.A. The Michigan Madman) | |||
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Member |
I've left genetic material in enough assholes to date that one more wouldn't hurt. I just don't do it cause you can look at my white pasty easily sunburnt skin, red/blonde hair and blue eyes and trust where the family name Otto originated from. 10 years to retirement! Just waiting! | |||
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