Saturday, November 9, 2013

Advice on How to Research Family History

I'm guessing the first article is indicative of how tremendous this is going to be!! Elizabeth Shown Mills is doing an "Ask An Expert" series for the New York Times and the articles will be available free, online, beginning here http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/06/booming/advice-on-how-to-research-family-history-part-1.html?_r=0

So part 1 deals with all kinds of questions, but the one that I really appreciated was her explanation regarding a question about DNA: "The differences between various DNA tests are easier to understand visually. We often see family trees depicted as a fan chart. On this kind of chart, if we put a point in the middle of the bottom centerline and write our name there, our Y-line is the flat base line to the left. Our mitochondrial line is the flat base line to the right. In between, we have many other ancestral branches that fan out and stretch farther than any piece of paper can show."

So simple!

Cheers,
Pat

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