Jamboree 2015

This past weekend was the annual Jamboree of the Southern California Genealogical Society. As usual, it was both educational and lots of fun. It is held every year the first weekend in June at the Burbank Marriott. For the past three years a special DNA Day has taken place on Thursday before Jamboree starts Friday morning.

The use of DNA testing in genealogy is becoming more and more popular. There are three different types of DNA testing useful to genealogy: Y-DNA, mtDNA, and autosomal DNA.

Y-DNA is inherited by males from their fathers who got it from their own fathers. Each male receives a complete copy of his father's Y-DNA although mutations occur at predictable intervals. It is those mutations that determine how closely two or more men are related.

mtDNA is inherited by all children from their mothers but can only be passed on by females. It is the least useful form of DNA testing because mutations are rare and a match between two persons  could be from a female ancestor from thousands of years ago. It can be used to disprove relationships but is harder to use to prove descent from a particular woman.

Autosomal DNA is the DNA inherited from both parents. Each person has two sets of 23 chromosomes, one set from each parent. Mothers give each child an X chromosome and fathers give their sons a Y chromosome and their daughters a second X chromosome. Each parent recombines the two sets of 22 autosomal chromosomes they received from their own parents into a unique new set of 22 chromosomes. Each child of the parents receives 50% percent of their DNA from each parent but no child receives exactly the same DNA from each parent (except identical twins). Autosomal DNA testing will find cousin matches on all lines and is the most popular and useful DNA test.

Getting Started

I've met people who were anxious to go to Ancestry.com and start building their family tree but that is definitely not the best way to get started. Tracing your family history starts with you, your siblings, and your parents. You must start with what you know and work your way backward from there. I will admit that that was not what I wanted to do when I first started. I was anxious to see where my family came from and who my ancestors were but I can guarantee that if you don't begin by documenting what you know, you will later have to prune many "ancestors" from your tree. You get really attached to these people whose lives you have researched and it's hard to accept that they are not related to you. So save yourself the wasted time and anguish and do it right from the beginning.

How do you do that? First, you will need a pedigree chart and family group sheets. You can download blank forms from many websites, including Ancestry.com and Cyndis List. Start with the pedigree chart and fill in as much as you can. Put yourself as Number 1 on the chart. Then add your parents' information and as much as you can about your grandparents and great-grandparents. It's a good idea to use pencil so you can make changes if it turns out some of your initial information is wrong.

Blank Pedigree Chart

Next you will need some family group sheets, one for each marriage (or other relationship that produced children) on your pedigree chart. Here you will record birth, marriage, and death information for family units: parents and all children. If a person was married more than once, a separate family group sheet must be filled out for each marriage.

Family Group Sheet

The pedigree chart shows you and your direct ancestors only (parents, grandparents, great-grandparents, etc.) The family group sheets are where you record your siblings and those of your parents, etc. It's very important to collect information on all family members. I'll discuss why in a later post.

Honoring Military Service

I have ancestors who fought in all major wars in this country: the French and Indian War, the Revolutionary War, the War of 1812, the Civil War, World War I, and World War II. Because Memorial Day began as a way to honor those who died in the Civil War, I will focus on my Civil War ancestors in this post. First, a list of those who served:
   
   

James Lindsley Ferguson

James Lindsley Ferguson, 1829-1899, from Ohio
James Spellman, 1812-1887, from Ohio
John Addison Kerchner, 1844-1926, from
        Pennsylvania
Edmond Bennett Helwick, 1844-1914, from Iowa

I have two Confederate ancestors as well, both from what became West Virginia, serving in Virginia units: Burwell Charlton, 1827-1868, and William H. Ogden, 1825-1877.

There is a family story that another ancestor, Joseph F. Legron from Ohio was drafted and paid another man to go in his place. That man was killed in the War. My grandfather and his sister knew the name of the substitute. Unfortunately, they died before I was interested in recording his name. Apparently there are military records that do list the names of the draftees and substitutes; researching those records is on my to-do list.

Edmond Bennett Helwick

Edmond Bennett Helwick enlisted at age 18 with his brother, John Jacob Helwick, in August of 1862. Their unit, Company C of the 19th Iowa Infantry, took part in the siege of Vicksburg. A few months later, both brothers were taken prisoner on September 29, 1863, at the Battle of Stirling's Plantation near Morganza, Louisiana. They spent 10 months at Camp Ford at Tyler, Texas. James Irvine Dungan, a fellow soldier in Company C of the 19th Iowa Infantry who was also taken prisoner at Sterling Farm, kept a diary and wrote the History of the 19th Iowa Infantry soon after the war ended in 1865. He paints a vivid picture of the miserable conditions of the prison camp.

National Genealogical Society Conference

Last week the National Genealogical Society (NGS) annual conference took place in St. Charles, Missouri, outside of St. Louis. This is the biggie as far as genealogy conferences go. The presenters are some of the best in the field and the 2000+ attendees have incredible learning opportunities from beginner (How do I get started?, How do I organize all the information I've found?, Isn't everything online?) to advanced methodology for analyzing data, proving relationships when no record states the relationship, using DNA as a research tool, reading Old German script, and just about everything in between.

So far I have only been to one NGS Conference, two years ago in Las Vegas. It was an amazing experience to be with a couple thousand other family history enthusiasts and wonderful to hear the top genealogists lecture: Elizabeth Shown Mills, Tom Jones, Barbara Vines Little, and so many more. It was even better than I had anticipated. Unfortunately, the conference is held in early May during the school year so I can’t take off work to go again until I retire. Las Vegas was close enough that I could make it for the last two days of the conference.

A new feature that began with last year's conference in Richmond, Virginia, for those of us unable to attend was two days of streaming classes. This year two tracks were again offered, five classes on each of two days. The topics were immigration and naturalization and methodology techniques. I was only able to watch one class live last week, Warren Bittner’s excellent presentation on German research, but I have access to all ten lectures until August. As soon as the quarter is over I will switch into genealogy mode--or even before, since the Southern California Genealogical Society Jamboree will take place June 4-8 in Burbank. I'll be there for the whole conference, including DNA Day on Thursday, June 4th. Attending conferences is a great way to build genealogy skills and meet others who share this passion. Many lifelong friendships begin at conferences.

Doing Genealogy

My great-grandfather, Forest Miller Ferguson

Genealogy is an addiction. Once you start, you're pretty much hooked. You lay awake at night trying to figure out the puzzle of relationships and wondering where the proof for the hunch you have that John is Mary's father might be found. It's maddening and exhilarating and so much fun. The downside is, you're never finished. My mother used to ask, "Haven't you finished that yet?" No, I haven't. If I can prove that John is Mary's father, now I have two new questions: who are John's parents?

Many people believe the Ancestry.com commercials: that it's all online and all you have to do is click on the shaky leaves and voila! your family history is instantly done for you. Unfortunately, it's not that easy. Although Ancestry and other organizations like FamilySearch.org are digitizing vast amounts of information, most genealogical records are still hidden away in dusty closets in courthouses or buried in archival collections. The joy is in the search, using your detective skills to figure out where to look and then analyzing the records you find to mine all the bits and pieces of information that might be able to solve the problem you're currently working on.

When I was a newbie, long before the Internet arrived, I spent days in the Genealogy Room at the Los Angeles Public Library hunting for information and finding nothing because I didn't have the knowledge and skills to do research. I finally signed up for a class that taught me the basics of searching, sources, and organization. I still managed to add people to my tree who were not my ancestors. All beginning genealogists do this. The name's the same, so it has to be my guy. Today it's easy to find information and easier still to add unrelated people to your tree. Newbies happily build online family trees with 20,000 or even 50,000 names in them. Mothers born 20 years after their children; fathers dead 40 years before their children were born, but it's okay because it's the right name and I found it on the Internet so it must be true. Right?

This blog will discuss some genealogy best practices and educational opportunities for genealogists to learn the skills that will help them accurately recreate the past.