Genetic Genealogy - Anyone Tried It?

[Uncle Slayton]

Having come from a rather late-in-life parenting event (my father was 59, mom was 36 when I was born), I have had to drag every bit of my family history kicking and screaming from old courthouses, libraries, etc, because the people who all knew it were long gone by the time I got interested in it.

As it turns out, I also am descended on both sides from a long line of serial courthouse arsonists, as most places where my forebears stopped suffered staggering losses of vital records following (in some cases, multiple) disastrous courthouse fires.

Technology to the rescue. Last year I did an 'entry level' test at a family history site that basically tells you your 'geographic genealogy' and learned I come, DNA-wise, from Western Europe and Scandinavia (ie, the intersection of White & Bread streets).

My surname is a common Scottish one, and have had no luck getting earlier than 1850, so at Christmas, I submitted a cheek-swab sample to another vendor for a 111 marker y-DNA test.

Anyone else tried this? Successes? Failures? Other thoughts? It is a bit pricey, but the cost is coming down as more vendors enter the marketplace.

[kelroy55]

I used to use Ancestry.com and got a ways back but got busy doing other things and need to get back to it.

[RadicalModerate]

Is there a different sort of Genealogy other than the Genetic kind?
(if so, that UFO radio dude out there in the hinterlands of Arizona, his replacement, plus Glen Beck and Alex Jones need to be informed, posthaste. =)

Edited to Add: My granddad, on my mother's side, used t' say: "Don't look too close at the family tree . . . there might be some of us a-hangin' from it."
(His side of the fambly wuz immigrants t' Oklahoma Territory from Kentucky.)

Me, personally, be a EuroMongrel, adrift in The Wilderness o' Modern America, jest a-strugglin' t' git by. And looking forward t' the celebrations o' SAAW/SAAD (Scandinavian America Appreciation Week/Swedish American Appreciation Day), Robert Burns Nacht (without the Haggis) and St. Patrick's Day (although I am not personally a believer in Roman Catholic Saints--except for my wife (who is a charismatic, reformed, Irish Catholic, angel).

It's all in the genes. well . . . Ain't it? =)

in order 't celebrate all o' the above,
i, just today, attacked the tree leaves
littering my property, on a day off,
on account of the weather was nice.
while listeningcarefully to the chirping
o' the birds sharing my Joy
as well as the dog barking
from a distance,
in the background
while missing, carefully,
the misplaced extension cord
to the Christmas lights
whose time is
overdue

=)

[Uncle Slayton]

That's actually a good question, RM...yes, all genealogy is genetic, but DNA testing is pushing things back so much further than the standard list of 'begats' that most people view as their family history.

I despised biology in college, but am having to learn (and re-learn from my sophomore daughter) DNA and how it's put together...some of the population models are fun to plug your DNA results into and see what percentages you are of every known group on earth.

Your grandpa was right, might not want to look too closely at some of those branches. My patrilineal line terminates rather abruptly in 1865-ish in Federally-occupied northern Alabama. A plantation owner named Edwin Tanner was dragged from his home and shot by a group of his former slaves turned Union soldiers...my direct ancestor disappeared about that same time, he being the overseer on Tanner's plantation. One might guess that his punishment may have been equal to that dispensed to the unfortunate Mr. Tanner. At any rate, no one in my family ever talked about it.

Agree with you on haggis. Who was it that once postulated that all Scottish cooking can be traced to a dare?

[RadicalModerate]

That's actually a good question, RM...yes, all genealogy is genetic, but DNA testing is pushing things back so much further than the standard list of 'begats' that most people view as their family history.

I despised biology in college, but am having to learn (and re-learn from my sophomore daughter) DNA and how it's put together...some of the population models are fun to plug your DNA results into and see what percentages you are of every known group on earth.

Your grandpa was right, might not want to look too closely at some of those branches. My patrilineal line terminates rather abruptly in 1865-ish in Federally-occupied northern Alabama. A plantation owner named Edwin Tanner was dragged from his home and shot by a group of his former slaves turned Union soldiers...my direct ancestor disappeared about that same time, he being the overseer on Tanner's plantation. One might guess that his punishment may have been equal to that dispensed to the unfortunate Mr. Tanner. At any rate, no one in my family ever talked about it.

Agree with you on haggis. Who was it that once postulated that all Scottish cooking can be traced to a dare?

Probably some dude on The Monty Python Crew . . .
perhaps a Key Grip? probably of Scottish descent, yet not a "protestant:
At least not in the "conventional" sense of the term =)

Sorry . . . Saw a reminder, just last night, of how Barry Goldwater (AuH2O) wasn't really such a bad guy, back in the day . . .
although LBJ did a better job of IT than BGAuH20 might have done. =)