Archive | 2015

Ancestry.com News

Aug1

So much to report, teach me to take a vacation! Ancestry.com has a new database: Social security applications and claims index, and DNAgedcom has a new tool to report your ancestry DNA total cMs, and I missed mentioning the Ancestry DNA sale at $79 instead of the usual $99 because it ends tonight. Hopefully there will be another one soon.

SocSecAppIndxI tried looking for my uncle in the index and it found him quickly. It listed his birthplace and parents names, useful information.

To learn more about the U.S. Social Security Applications and Claims Index read this post from Randy Seaver: http://www.geneamusings.com/2015/07/new-ancestrycom-database-us-social.html – I recommend following his blog for news about databases added to familysearch and ancestry plus many good genealogy articles.

I hope to review the DNAgedcom ancestry client soon. It requires a subscription which seems fair as increased usage is bound to be costing them money and it is hard for these free sites to exist on donations alone. I like this trend whereby you can subscribe to a site like DNAgedcom or GEDmatch and get extra functionality but there is still plenty of good stuff available for free.

Disclaimer: I am an affiliate of Ancestry.com and profit slightly when you click my links, see my footer here for all my affiliations.

Congratulations to DNAadoption on its anniversary

Jul14

You do not have to be an adoptee to benefit from a class on DNAadoption.com – they have several one day classes which are introductions, explaining how to use your results, tailored to each specific vendor. They also have a longer basics course and many more advanced courses.

Diane, Tim Janzen, and Kitty at the 2013 Rootstech

Diane, Tim Janzen, and Kitty at the 2013 Rootstech

The inimitable Diane Harman-Hoog wrote a blog post today announcing the two year anniversary of their classes. Along with Karin Corbeil and Rob Warthen, Diane has taken DNA adoption searches into the electronic age with online courses and much more information available on that site. The many success stories bring tears to my eyes.  A few are here – http://www.dnaadoption.com/index.php?page=reunions and more can be found in the archives of the DNAadoption yahoo group.

I got to meet Diane at the 2013 Rootstech conference along with expert genetic genealogist Tim Janzen and many other wonderful people I had corresponded with via email. Needless to say I keep going back to that conference; of course, the location next to the great genealogy library in Salt Lake City has something to do with that also!

Rob Warthen has written some wonderful tools that benefit all of us genetic genealogists that are hosted over at DNAgedcom.com and are linked to from the DNA adoption site.

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Talking about Triangulation

Jul9

Next Thursday, July 16, I will give my presentation on using triangulation with autosomal DNA test results over in Carlsbad for DIG, the DNA Interest Group of the North San Diego County Genealogical Society (click here for the where and when). This was last given at the Jamboree and might be given at the next Rootstech.

TriangulationSlidesMy slides are online, but without my speech, they are not much use. However I have written up the words that are meant to accompany them in my downloads area

I like to use examples from my own research in my talks to illustrate the “how tos.” My blog post on triangulation from earlier this year does just that, specifically discussing the case of a possible third cousin once removed, postulated from the paper trail, and then proven with DNA triangulation. Other cases discussed include unknown DNA relatives matching at the same spots.

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Goodbye Norway, hello again California

Jul6

So my trip to the land of my ancestors has ended and I am home, busy catching up on correspondence and work. It may be a few more days before I start blogging about genealogy and genetics again. The exciting news is that we got three DNA samples from 2nd, 3rd, and 5th cousins while over there. One came from knocking on the door of a farm house with cousin Corinne and saying, “Our ancestors lived here, are we related?”

Tromsø from a boat

Tromsø From Boat

The last week of my trip was spent at a Bridge Tournament above the Arctic Circle in Tromsø. I was amazed at how difficult it was to get my sleep rhythms in synch when the sun never set. I think I did not play my best. I was also surprised by how much colder it was there than down South.

Tromso was the start point for many artic explorations and had several museums with displays celebrating this plus a lovely Sami exhibit at the University Museum.

My plane home had a 5 hour stopover in Oslo so I took the train in and visited their art museum, the National Gallery and the Dance of Life exhibit.

Oslo National Museum

Oslo National Gallery

No photos were allowed of Munch’s Scream but I took many pictures of Norwegian landscapes that really appealed to me as well as some of the impressionist paintings.

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Kristiansand, where the Monsens came from

Jun26

KarensLunchOn Thursday my 2nd cousin Karen, who moved back to Norway some time ago, had us to her house for a lovely late lunch.

She lives in a fairly unique house with seven gables that her grandfather Oscar Bie bought and enlarged, staying with the original style, creating a lovely sun porch among other enhancements. The ceiling is low in the old part as you can see; Karen is touching it.

KarenCeiling

She looked through her photo albums and I found two that included my grandmother and many other wonderful ones. I took photos of a number of her photos so we will see how well they turn out

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