Have you ever used one of those family tree/genealogy sites?

I did ancestry a little but not much. It has a lot of historical stuff and stuff that other people in your family might have added.

I sure did and guess what I found out who Daddy was this is Billy sweet Billy boy are you enjoying reality mr. Delusion

Its a great tool for the FBI to do DNA match ups for unsolved crimes.

If you cannot afford Ancestry and those other genaelogy sites use this, it is free, I have found a few relatives, going way back, right to about the 1570's, they even have scans of certain church records also.

[link to www.familysearch.org (secure)]

They get info from grave sites, census bureau etc. I second family search, it's free and I use it a lot.

I used it many years ago and traced my family history back to Vikings that raided and assimilated into Scotland.

My ex father in law was given the DNA swab/find your ancestors as a gift. It totally destroyed his life. He was once the Patreon but now is the Pariah.

Law of Unintended Consequences. Don't do it.

people do it for horses

I think it would be fun for people too

and pre-crimes as well

I traced my family history back to the Vikings that concurred Normandy and later England in 1066. The picture below is of Sir Henry and his home.





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My 2 percent Neanderthal genes totally explains my fondness for "The Flintstone" (I saw both movies twice) and daily craving for bananas

I don't care to know my ancestry. It won't help my standing in life.

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You don’t have to give DNA. It costs and is a separate feature. If you’re in a tree with others who have done DNA it doesn’t much matter if you have or not, they already have you. It’s inevitable we will all be neatly tagged because they get it from other sources as well. So, on that note find out about your family because it is fascinating. I have early Texas people when we were a Republic and numerous Civil War and Revolutionary War ancestors as well as very early Kentucky settlers that lived in and near Ft Boone with the founder. There are so many records saved and restored you will definitely find something.

I did not but my father did. Traced our family back to early 1100 in England. Found out we were shipbuilders and traders. Made money transporting and trading slaves. We've had a few knight's and lords. Came to America in early 1600. Gave up all nobility to fight for freedom in revolutionary war. Realized the mistakes we made and fought for the North in civil war. Lost all money and lands in doing that. Now I and my son get to hear how racist and privileged we are. Even we gave up everything. Where are our reperations?

the family tree/genealogy sites, i highly recommend. it's fun and fascinating too.

avoid the dna stuff like the plague though.

my cousin does and shes got our family going back to the 1600's but i never will

I've worked on mine for several years.

First of all, hope that your family isn't named Smith or Jones or Johnson. More uncommon names are easier researched.

Even so, I find so much wrong information on the ancestry sites. It is mostly only so reliable as the people who contributed "their research". Many pay no attention to dates which is paramount to getting better information.
Because many haven't they end up with the name of the son in the grandfather's place or name of the great grandmother for her daughter or grand daughter. Often girls as well as boys were "juniors" in that girls were often named for their mothers or grandmothers just as sons were named for fathers and grandfathers so you need to make sure of each generation's entry to be able to go further back correctly.

But, just start out putting in known grandparents name and date of death or birth followed by the word genealogy search and often it will lead you to find-a-grave info or which search company has your person of interest listed. Knowing sibling names is helpful when possible because even if no one has ready info on your line doesn't mean that a sibling descendants hasn't traced it back further than you knew.

Good luck.

If you know your grandparents it would be easy to trace back several generations just finding them in the census records. The records are free as FamilySearch.

If you don't know your natural parents or grandparents or suspect you are adopted you would definitely want to take a DNA test.

The DNA test is a spit or swab sample. The extraction process looks at about 700,000 specific markers called SNPs (pronounced snips) sprinkled across your 23 chromosome pairs.

Then the computers compare that list of SNPs against everyone else in their database and they are able to find people who have similar patches of SNPs.

The tests can accurately find people who are parents, siblings, aunts, uncles, siblings, first cousins and second cousins because you share a lot of DNA with them. You will DNA 100% to any of those relationships.

When you get to third cousins though the percentage drops to 90% and less each generation more away from the common ancestor.

The matches will have a "centimorgan" (cM) value and that's a round-about way of measuring how much DNA you actually share. The cM number is actually a value of the probability of recombination but that's needlessly technical. I only mention cM because it's important in determining if someone is a HALF relation rather than a FULL relation. I recently discovered by looking at the cM number my niece was actually a half niece meaning my sister's father was not my and my other sibling's father. My mother took that secret to her grave.

There's a website called "Shared Centimorgan Project" that has the most accurate relationship estimator based on the cM number. I mention this BECAUSE Ancestry and 23/Me relationship calculators don't really consider HALF relationships. In my case 23/Me said me and my half-niece are first cousins because both relationships have almost the same cM number. The websites don't KNOW your actual relationship to your matches they only look at amount of shared DNA. This is also why a HALF first cousin (one grandparent cheated) can get pegged as a second or third cousin.

Last Edited by TexasPaleo on 06/01/2022 09:46 AM

I didn't but my daughter did and found my missing half sister.. and the daughter of my missing half sister was also searching and they got their answers around the same time.. running into each other.

and me and half sister discovered out birth dates are only 6 months apart.. which said something interesting..

Last Edited by Mother Maggie on 06/01/2022 09:33 AM

Yeah, there were a lot of gaps on my mothers side that got filled when I did the Family Tree DNA test. I knew we were Native American, but being 20% Asian was the real shocker ! My Aunt said that it was probably the Mongols, as they sure went all over Asia and some of Europe. Finding a Jooish ancestor on my mothers side was interesting, as well as tracing back some Middle Eastern thrown in the mix for good measure.

On one side I looked up and found they were in records in Saint Mary, something forgetful, it was in the early fifteenth century. I was quite surprised that most of the line of men live a very long time back then, also all down the line, a lot of them were over a hundred years old.

My mom's great grandfather was over a hundred and fifteen, and she always thought he was her grandpa, nope he was her granddad's father. I found there were more older people back then than most people believed. I even checked graveyards and tombstones and started seeing a lot of people live to a ripe old age. Unless people get a disease or one from an outbreak of something that went around, they seem to find themselves getting old.

Not really easy on the other side of the family, they say Scotland but there were some from our family tree who did a DNA test and those came back Viking, only part of the course but I don't trust DNA tests really, every person has DNA all their own, so a brother and sisters or sister and sister are going to have different DNA, say if your grandmother was part Native American, then you didn't inherit those genes, they would say you not part yet you are, or very tiny bit, I know this is true, there are recessed genes, DNA that is more dominant in different siblings. They mess up more than people know, they sure messed up the Native Americans and had to go back.

I rather just look at what I know, it is easier than trying to get information from a long time ago.

On one side I looked up and found they were in records in Saint Mary, something forgetful, it was in the early fifteenth century. I was quite surprised that most of the line of men live a very long time back then, also all down the line, a lot of them were over a hundred years old.

My mom's great grandfather was over a hundred and fifteen, and she always thought he was her grandpa, nope he was her granddad's father. I found there were more older people back then than most people believed. I even checked graveyards and tombstones and started seeing a lot of people live to a ripe old age. Unless people get a disease or one from an outbreak of something that went around, they seem to find themselves getting old.

Not really easy on the other side of the family, they say Scotland but there were some from our family tree who did a DNA test and those came back Viking, only part of the course but I don't trust DNA tests really, every person has DNA all their own, so a brother and sisters or sister and sister are going to have different DNA, say if your grandmother was part Native American, then you didn't inherit those genes, they would say you not part yet you are, or very tiny bit, I know this is true, there are recessed genes, DNA that is more dominant in different siblings. They mess up more than people know, they sure messed up the Native Americans and had to go back.

I rather just look at what I know, it is easier than trying to get information from a long time ago.

i sent in Lizard spit

im am either Viking or

a Black King of Africa

If anyone wants to do a DNA test they should do the Ancestry test because it has the largest database by far.

Because it has the largest database I was able to triangulate through the DNA matches of multiple cousins the parents of our great-great-great grandfather John Williams (1811-1888) which had been a brick-wall line for decades. There was no paper trail for him.

This would not have been possible with FamilyTreeDNA, MyHeritage or especially 23/Me because the databases are TOO small and they have no easy way for cousins to see each other's DNA matches. Ancestry lets you add select people to a "viewers" list so cousins can investigate each other's DNA matches and do this more serious DNA research.

I also use Gedmatch which let's me get down to the chromosome and SNP level of my matches.

Last Edited by TexasPaleo on 06/01/2022 10:03 AM

Yeah, they're pretty interesting.

I had never realized that I was a heir of Scottish clan chief Sir John Henderson (14th great grandfather). I'll have to make a visit to Fordell castle if I'm able. It would be nice to go back and see where it all began.

Rest in peace, great grandfather.

Sir John Henderson 14th great grandfather

https://imgur.com/UFmTUbI

Last Edited by The_Gardener on 06/01/2022 10:10 AM

I have a family member who did it. Pretty impressive. It told her the county in Ireland she had ancestry from and the area of London she had ancestry from.

Plus...they sell the info to the Chinese, who are trying to create a completed global DNA database

My daughter did n i was pissed. Its a DNA collection site they all are

It's not there to improve your standing in life. It's there to help you learn where you come from; It's the story of you. Familysearch.org is free (after you sign up) as far as their records go, and they aren't doing anything with DNA yet - only has records/sources. If you're just starting your family tree, then forget about DNA testing (for now, anyway). DNA testing becomes useful after you have your family tree. (Say you've done your tree - After DNA testing you search for DNA matches to your own DNA, then figure out where that person belongs in your own tree and add them to your tree. DNA testing is another source you use to help prove the claims you make in regards to your tree (the people you have in your tree). and will help weed out the one's you have in tree that don't belong there. Say you've done your family tree (and I use the term 'done' loosely, as you will learn that your family tree is never really 'done'). Your tree claims you/your ancestors come from, say Brazil. You DNA test, but discover all of your matches are from the Netherlands with no matches from anyone in Brazil. This tells you that you've probably made a wrong turn within your own research. With DNA testing you'll also find lost lines/relatives. In my own I've found adopted relatives, whose stories would have otherwise been lost to me, as usually their stories are known to only a few, and it's hard to find paper sources about such things unless you're immediate family member.

Anyway, familysearch.org is the way to go to start out because it's free, and their holdings are 2nd only to the big one - Ancestry.com. They do have some records for free, but to get into the bulk of their records you will have to become a paying member. They're not cheap, and they don't have everything you might need, but they will have alot of what you're looking for. They claim to carry international records, as well as US records. Their US collection is huge - not so much with their international records. I've found most of my international records elseware, attached them to person in my tree, and only then I get hints for same record I just added. For me, this happened with sources for people from Slovakia, England, and Scotland. Even if your a non-paying member of ancestry.com, you can still keep your tree on their website, and it is your own tree that only you, or those you allow, can change, as opposed to familySearch.org, which uses a world tree, which anyone, and everyone can make changes to, and does not belong to you alone, but rather to everyone. So, you could attach a source to someone, only to come back tomorrow to find that source you attached to someone the day before has now been removed, or he is now married to someone else, or with wrong family now. FamilySearch.org tree belongs to everyone and can be changed by anyone. Ancestry.com tree belongs to you alone.

Sorry for the length of this response - just wanted to share what I've learned :)