Archive | January 2014

Congratulations to contest winner Linda Hall-Little

LindaLittleCongratulations to Linda Hall-Little who has won a free pass to RootsTech 2014 for her question for Spencer Wells, “What is the future of DNA in genealogy? – say 25 years from now….”

Linda is excited to be coming to the conference. She is also a family history blogger at http://passagetothepast.wordpress.com/ and “she enjoys helping friends and family get started with their genealogy.”

She lives in New Hampshire and has deep New England roots. I look forward to meeting her!

 

News for Rootstech 2014: one day left in my contest, and my Saturday schedule

VideoCamMany of the Rootstech sessions will be streamed to the internet and then available for about a year online. The schedule of those sessions is at the familysearch web site: https://familysearch.org/node/2519 so I will add this video symbol to the sessions I am going to that will be online.

Today is the last day  for my readers to win a free pass to Rootstech 2014

In my last post I had looked through the schedule for Rootstech up until Friday at 1:00. Below I have laid out the rest of what I plan to attend.

I am excited to finally meet Daniel Horowitz with whom I work remotely on the IAJGS cemetery site. He is the Chief Genealogist at MyHeritage.com, of which I am a big fan. One of the problems for those of us with recent ancestors from Europe is finding online sources and our distant relatives abroad. MyHeritage and GENI.com, who are partnered now, are two of the best sites to assist with that.

So this is a must-go-to session for me!

Finding Family and Ancestors Outside the USA with MyHeritage New Technologies RT1278

DANIEL HOROWITZ

VideoCamLearn how MyHeritage tools can help break down brick walls in your research of ancestors outside of the United States by harnessing the power of an international family history network.

Friday, 2:30 PMRoom: Ballroom Hall

Skill Level

Intermediate

Hopefully I will find some time for the Exhibit Hall

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My preliminary schedule for Rootstech 2014

One of the best parts of a conference like RootsTech is meeting people in person with whom you have been corresponding about your beloved hobby. There are a number of folk whom I really look forward to meeting in person.

Reminder there are 2 days left to win a free pass so send me your questions for Spencer Wells.

Since there are so many presentations I want to go to I thought I would try using the Ipad app. So I downloaded it and as soon as I tried to use it though it wanted a username and password. I tried several of my usual combos to no avail and then used the handy “forgotten password help” which kindly sent me my username and a new password.

Meanwhile here are my picks for presentations to attend:

Searching the Digital Archive of Norway RT1486

FINN KARLSEN

How can you find your ancestors in the Norwegian sources? Many of the sources are available free on the Internet, but how do you find what you need?

Thursday, 10:30 AMRoom: 251A

I have used the digital archive but have great trouble with the search engine. I really look forward to improving my skills!

Next I am torn between Tim Jantzen’s presentation, much of which I know already and …

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A deep DNA triangulation success story

So many of these one segment DNA matches that I find with other testers are too far back to find the common ancestors. However those of us with Norwegian ancestry often have very deep trees thanks to the good records and the many farm books for each locality. So when you find a fellow genealogist with Norwegian roots who matches your DNA you get quite hopeful, and sure enough …

I had four matches, the colored lines in the picture below, for my Norwegian descended Dad on chromosome 16. However they span the centromere which is from 35335801 to 38335801, so initially these segments did not seem that promising.

 Chromosome 16 from my one segment mapper tool

Four people overlapping on Chromosome 16
from my one segment mapper tool

Luckily the most recent match had an extensive tree of which only a small piece was Norwegian. So perhaps it would be easier to find our common ancestor with less tree to look through. Note that using a tool to compare Norwegian GEDcoms does not usually work so well because of differences in naming conventions (patronymic, farm name, Norwegian characters, etc)

Here are the details of these segment overlaps from my master spreadsheet for Dad:

Edith 16 31000000 52000000 9.20 1301
Nancy 16 31000000 54000000 9.70 1359
Loretta 16 31000000 52000000 9.90 1423
Aaron 16 33000000 53000000 8.2 1241

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Organizing your Autosomal DNA Information with a Spreadsheet

By Jim Bartlett

Impressed by Jim Bartlett’s prose on various message boards and mailing lists, I asked him to do a guest blog post on using spreadsheets with autosomal DNA results, here it is – Kitty

jvb-in-coat-and-tie-cropUsing autosomal DNA testing can be a challenge – but it doesn’t have to be. It can be intimidating – but by taking it a step at a time, you can break it down into bite-sized pieces that are much easier. When you decide to use autosomal DNA (atDNA), and to get the most out of it, I recommend three broad areas of focus right from the start:

  1. Learn all you can about DNA testing for genealogy and particularly about autosomal DNA (atDNA). The ISOGG wiki is a good place to find good articles, tools, blogs (to keep you up to date), etc. Join email lists and read and ask questions. This is definitely a “continuing education” hobby. We are on a frontier with genetic genealogy – and we are pushing the boundaries every day!
  2. Create as robust a Tree as you can – stretch as much as you can to 12 generations, or more. This is the net you need to catch cousins and find your Common Ancestors. This is very important – if you don’t have the ancestors in your Tree, you cannot expect to find a Common Ancestor with a Match.
  3. Set up a process for your autosomal DNA project. To determine Common Ancestors you have to share ancestry info with your DNA Matches – you’ll be sending (and receiving) a lot of emails and messages. You’ll want to keep track of what you do; to find info on your Matches; to remember the Common Ancestors you determine; new names, new emails, new links to Trees, etc., etc. You may want to use a spiral notebook as a Diary or Journal of your notes. Some people keep a notecard for each Match, or a folder. I now have over 3,000 matches at FTDNA and 23andMe, so I need something that can handle that many (and more) Matches. Many of us use a spreadsheet – read more to see how to set up one.

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