Sunday, August 23, 2009

Family History Monthly




I must say that the new issue of Family History Monthly magazine (for the UK) caught my eye.
Issue 174 of the magazine has two articles on the use of DNA for genealogy:


"Was Crippen Innocent?" by Chris Pomery investigates an old family history crime scene, this time using DNA evidence.

"A Practical Guide to DNA Testing" by Debbie Kennett, which explains how DNA testing is used for genealogy.




In her article, Debbie explains that DNA has been in use for genealogy for nearly 10 years now, with estimates of nearly a million people now using DNA for genealogy. She explains how Y-DNA and mtDNA tests are used for genealogy projects, and goes into some detail about how each works. Debbie includes an evaluation of testing companies available in the UK, providing a guide on available choices.

She includes a table of number of vendors, including features that you should expect to find with each vendor. Included is a section on understanding your results, Geographical Projects, and Deep Ancestry. Also included is an introduction to ISOGG (the International Society of Genetic Genealogy).

A nice touch to the article is a side column featuring Spencer Wells with the National Genographic Project, explaining the the Genographic Project now has 100,000 samples from indigenous people, and nearly 300,000 paid participants from 130 countries.

The Deep Ancestry section includes a section on SNP testing (Single Nucleotide Polymorphisms) and gives an overview of migration patterns from the National Genographic Project.

She includes a summary about further information on DNA testing, testing companies, DNA databases, and books.

You probably won't find the article on newsstands here in the U.S., but you can subscribe or purchase this issue individually from the Family History Monthly web site:

http://www.familyhistorymonthly.com/

A very good article on how DNA testing can contribute to the legacy or knowledge about the origins and evolution of your surname.




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Thursday, August 20, 2009

National Genographic News


A lot of activity during the month of August at the National Genographic blog page "Genographica."



Briefly, they are hi-liting three items:


1) The new High Definition version of their Human Family Tree video airs Su
nday, Aug 30th at 9 PM. This has been advertised all month on the National Geographic channel, more information is available on their web site.




with the TV schedule here:


http://channel.nationalgeographic.com/


The new HD video is also available for purchase at the National Genographic online store.


Saturday, August 8, 2009

Free 1930 Census Images



I have a note from Jeff Weaver of the New River email list that Footnote is granting free access to their 1930 Census images during the month of August:





http://go.footnote.com/1930census/





They appear to be experiencing some performance problems due to the high traffic, tho.




So, if you're looking for something from the 1930 Census, here's the opportunity.





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