Aug 16, 2020

There have been numerous genealogical institutes over the last several weeks. As a result, we were unable to schedule a Genealogy Connection podcast recently. However, it will be back soon!

News You Can Use and Share!

• The Blackstone Group Inc. has reached an agreement to purchase a majority stake in Ancestry.com.
• Ancestry has extended to late August the deadline for saving your small DNA matches.
• Drew shares some recent large collection additions and changes for Ancestry.
• William Dollarhide has published a new 2020 multiple volume set of Census Substitutes and State Census Records at Family Roots Publishing Company - https://www.familyrootspublishing.com/store/product_view.php?id=3770&title=Census%20Substitutes%20&%20State%20Census%20Records,%20Third%20Edition,%20Volume%205%20%E2%80%93%20Western%20/%20Pacific%20States%20&%20Nationwide%20Chapter%20(Printed%20Book%20&%20eBook%20Bundle)
• Findmypast has updated their collections of Hampshire Baptisms, Marriages, and Burials.
• Drew recaps two weeks of highlights of FamilySearch record collection releases.
• Drew has been attending the virtual International Association of Jewish Genealogical Societies conference this week. In preparation, he reviews Genealogical Publishing Company’s Genealogy at a Glance publication "Finding Eastern European Jewish Ancestors" by Janette Silverman, available at https://genealogical.com/store/genealogy-at-a-glance-finding-eastern-european-jewish-ancestors/.

DNA Segment with Diahan Southard

Drew asks Diahan to explain how the various DNA testing companies determine the best minimum matching thresholds.

Cyndi Says

Cyndi Ingle is taking this episode off because of backlogs from institutes and a family medical situation. (Don't worry, Cyndi herself is fine!)

Our Listeners Talk to Us

• In response to Lori’s email in Episode #382 about becoming a transcriber, we had two responses:
  • Floreen suggests getting involved with the National Archive and Record Administration’s Citizen Archivist program at https://www.archives.gov/citizen-archivist. You can choose which records you want to transcribe.
  • Dana also suggests the Citizen Archivist program. She also suggests Zooniverse, a site that allows transcribing of many disciplines. They are at https://www.zooniverse.org/. Five projects of especial interest to genealogists are “Anti-Slavery Manuscripts”, “The American Soldier”, “Every Name Counts” (Nazi murdered persons), “American World War I Burial Cards”, and “Measuring the Anzacs”.
• Linda writes in detail about the upcoming changes in the Ancestry Message Boards and her experiences. (We welcome email and comments from our listeners on this topic.)
• Jim shares his experiences having used DNA to locate a half-brother and the bad experiences he had. He also located a new half-niece and contacted her to find her “aloof” to the knowledge. (We’d love to hear from our listeners about their experiences with this, good or bad, to represent their own experiences.

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