Genealogical Excitement Afoot

The last few days have genealogically very significant. Aside from the release of the 1950 U.S. Federal Census and New York City Municipal Archives making their vital records freely accessible online, several of my recent DNA clients had milestones.

Yeah, in my free time (Haha - like I have any free time), I have been picking up DNA projects hear and there for the last few years. I've been really quite successful with my work on unpuzzling DNA matches to find biological parents. There is something very gratifying about helping others to learn the truth.

• On Wednesday, March 30, a man I was helping to figure out who was his maternal grandfather was, received confirmation in the form of a DNA match to a half-aunt.

 

• Yesterday, April 2, the client I had to tell he was adopted, spoke with his bio mother for the first time in a video call.

 

• Today, April 3, I attended a local event with the woman for whom I found her bio father for last year. There I met her husband, daughter, maternal grandparents, as well as her bio father, his wife, their son, and her bio paternal grandmother.

Another incredible thing that I learned about yesterday came in the form of an email from a former graduate student. In my course my students are required to create a well-researched tree on Ancestry.com. They don't have to make it public but we use it to communicate about their research. 

This student had her tree public and last week her family received a knock on the door from the FBI. Yup, apparently they had a 2017 cold case. The unidentified remains lead back to a family my student had in her tree. Her mother hadn't tested, so it wasn't that they found them through a DNA match. No. The DNA matches they did have must not have been close enough or did not supply substantial family trees. Thus the found my student's tree and are now testing to confirm if this deceased individual is connected to her family line.

Kind of fabulous right?

DNA testing opens a whole can of worms, maybe not for you. maybe you're biological parents are legitimately the people you were raised by but I bet you anything someone in your list of DNA matches is searching for their biological family either because of adoption or misattributed paternity. 

And if your DNA or family tree can bring peace to a distant family member in the form of notification that their loved one is no longer a John Doe, why wouldn't you want to be part of that?

Exciting stuff, my friends, exciting stuff.

If feels good to give people the truth.