I received an email message recently that is not terribly unusual. I have received a number of similar questions before. I did reply in email, but I thought I would also write an article about it as I am sure others have faced the same "problem." In fact, the resolution is simple, although perhaps difficult to prove.

This is the email message I received although I edited out the name of the person and the name of the DNA testing company in order to protect the privacy of both. In fact, this could have happened with any of the DNA testing companies:

I have a topic that has been bugging me lately. A certain DNA testing company is advertising about their "ethnicity" reports. My previous family history results show that I am over 80% British Isles and less than 5% German. However, I know that my father (he had his test done, too) is almost 50% German/Czech. Our family history research also shows that his father must have been close to 100% German. 

I understand that I get what I get - not an exact % split of DNA but a roll of the dice. However, their commercials imply that you will know that you are not German if the DNA test shows no German in the ethnicity profile. What gives? 

I think they are misleading people with those ads. What's your opinion? (I also think their ethnicity reports are not 100% accurate.) 

Thanks for your consideration of my question, and thanks for your newsletter. It has led me to several invaluable resources over the years of family records I would have never found otherwise.

Here is my (slightly edited) reply:

There are at least three possible reasons that the DNA results show non-German ancestry of the individual in question. The most obvious reasons are:

1. A mistake at the DNA lab where your test sample was accidentally swapped with a sample from someone else.

2. Even brothers and sisters (with the same parents) normally do not receive exactly the same DNA from each parent. It has been compared sticking a ladle into a container of soup on the stove. One person might pull out “components” of 40% British DNA, 35% German DNA, and 15% Swedish DNA. Meanwhile, that person’s brother or sister might use the same ladle and dip it into the same container of soup, but perhaps will pull out 65% British DNA, 25% German DNA, and 10% Swedish DNA. Almost no one ever receives exactly 50% of their DNA from each parent, the mix is almost always more or less than 50% from each parent. To be sure, the total is always 100% but almost never exactly 50/50.

3. Did his ancestors REALLY come from Germany and nearby regions? Sure, that’s what the records show, but were those REALLY HIS ANCESTORS?

One “mystery” that turns out to be very common in DNA research is that someone was quietly adopted into a family some years ago without paperwork and other family members kept it quiet (this happened often; I have several examples in my own family tree). 

Another possibility is what is humorously referred to as a “non-marital event.” That is, someone in your family tree spent at least one night with someone other than his or her married and documented spouse.

While we all smile when we say “non-marital event,” the fact remains that such liaisons were common throughout the years, even in the 1700s or later.

There is a book called “Sex in Middlesex” by Roger Thompson. The book is available from Amazon and probably other bookstores. It may be found on Amazon by searching for ISBN 0870236563.

In the book, Roger Thompson describes various sex “crimes” that were tried in court in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, in the early to mid-1600s: "Sex in Middlesex pulls its facts from the Middlesex County, Massachusetts, court records. Eleven chapters discuss court cases by categories such as “Fornication: Detection and Evasion,” “Courtship and Patriarchal Authority,” “Pregnant Brides and Broken Promises,” “Unfaithful Wives,” “Unfaithful Husbands,” and “Community Control.” Statistical charts include “Geographical Incidence of Sexual Misdemeanors [1649–1699]” (the winner is Charlestown with 60, next was Cambridge with 31), and “Incidence of Conviction for Sexual Misdemeanors.”

I am sure such events were not limited to one county in Massachusetts. Anyone digging through old records can find many similar court cases everyplace else. While we commonly think of our ancestors as straight-laced Puritans or others who would never do such things, the fact remains that they were human beings with the same weaknesses and challenges that modern-day humans face. The court cases reveal that unmarried couples or couples who were not married to each other had extra-marital affairs probably at least as often as do today's couples.

So, were your grandfather’s REAL ancestors from someplace other than Germany? Or did one of your ancestors have an extra-marital liaison that you do not know about? It is possible that the DNA results you have received may prove something about your grandfather's ancestry that perhaps even he didn’t know.

Luckily, the solution is simple, although a bit expensive. Have another DNA test taken by another DNA lab. (I have had my DNA tested by five different DNA labs, and I know of other genealogists who have tested with even more labs than that.) See if all the test results agree. In my case, the test results are similar but never exactly the same. 

If only one test result shows non-German ancestry, then the first assumption probably is correct: the lab made an error.

However, if all the DNA tests say that he had little to no German ancestry at all, then I would suggest that you have some new family history challenges ahead of you!

I can hear a collective gasp from everyone reading this article: "What? Not MY ancestors!"

But it was true many, many times.

So here's a question for everyone else: What's in YOUR DNA?

Many genealogists owe a debt to the many unsung heroes and heroines who convert  medieval documents from print to photography and finally to the internet where we all can read them while conveniently seated in our homes.

While Thomas Hoccleve was a 15th-century scribe, his workday complaints slipped into his poems: eyestrain from long hours staring at text, backaches from a lack of ergonomics, difficulty standing up straight.

His experiences aren’t that far removed from the teams who digitize texts today, which include librarians, curators, imaging specialists, conservators and preservation experts, catalogers and metadata specialists, technologists, project managers, production coordinators and sometimes students. As Hoccleve himself knew, copying texts is exacting and complicated work — and often unappreciated by readers.

That’s a dynamic that Binghamton University Associate Professor of English Bridget Whearty hopes to change. In her new book, Digital Codicology: Medieval Books and Modern Labor, she introduces readers to the digitization process and the highly trained professionals who perform this work.

“In medieval studies, we use digital copies constantly. If you’re a literary scholar, it’s really easy to pull up a copy of a poem you’re working on and see it in a 15th-century scribe’s handwriting,” she said. “But even though we use them, we don’t necessarily think about who makes them and how and why they’re made. And that’s funny, because we spend a lot of time thinking about those exact questions when it comes to the original copies.”

Whearty traces the preservation of manuscripts through media history, from print to photography and finally the internet, demystifying digitization along the way. To that end, she examines late-1990’s projects such as Digital Scriptorium 1.0 alongside late-2010’s initiatives like Bibliotheca Philadelphiensis, and world-renowned projects created by the British Library, Corpus Christi College Cambridge, Stanford University and the Walters Art Museum against in-house digitization performed in lesser-studied libraries.

She also traces the story of one manuscript: a book of Hoccleve’s poetry, created in the 1420s by his own practiced hand, which now resides at the Huntington Library in California. First printed in 1796, it was put on microfiche in the late 20th century and photographed for digitization in the early 21st century. During each rendering, editors, printers and copiers made choices about what needed to be represented and preserved.

You can read a lot more in an article by Jennifer Micale published in the Binghamton University web site at: https://www.binghamton.edu/news/story/4095/modern-scribes-how-medieval-books-go-from-parchment-to-the-cloud.

Here is a list of all of this week's articles, all of them available here at https://eogn.com:

(+) The Care and Maintenance of Tombstones

Presidential Ancestry

What We Found Out About 4 U.S. Presidents in the 1950 Census

Contributions of Black, Indigenous Soldiers Detailed in New Collection at Museum of the American Revolution

Historic Iwo Jima Footage Shows Individual Marines Amid the Larger Battle

Book Worth More Than $600 Stolen From Dayton, Ohio Metro Library

eBay for Genealogists

Association for Gravestone Studies 2023 Conference

Free BCG-sponsored Webinar, February 21, 2023

Findmypast Adds Two Brand New and Exclusive Record Collections

Recently Added and Updated Collections on Ancestry.com 

Black Death 700 Years Ago Affects Your Health Now

How to Cancel a Subscription Online Even When the Company Doesn’t Want You To

MyHeritage has an interesting article published in the company's blog. Amongst the highlights:

The current U.S. president, Joe Biden, was 7 years old in 1950.

The article describes family members that Biden lived with.

Donald Trump was 4 years old in 1950

He lived with 7 other people, all close relatives except for one Irish domestic worker.

Barack Obama is the only one of the past 5 U.S. presidents who hadn’t been born yet in 1950.

We will have to wait for the 2042 release of census records to learn about his living arrangements in 1970.

President Clinton appears in the 1950 U.S. census as 3-year-old William Jefferson Blythe III

He lived in Hope City, Arkansas at the time with his maternal grandparents.

You can read the full article at: https://blog.myheritage.com/2023/02/what-we-found-out-about-4-u-s-presidents-in-the-1950-census/.

Police are investigating after a book worth hundreds of dollars was stolen from a local library. On Jan. 28, a staff member at Dayton Metro Library’s E. Third Street location reported an unknown male had stolen a book from the genealogy department, according to a police report filed this week.

The book that was stolen was Catawba Confederacy by Richard L. Haithcock. The book is valued at $660, according to the police report.

Police looked over security video and saw the suspect take the book. He was caught on camera using a knife “to remove the stickers labeling it as Dayton Metro Library property.”

With Presidents' Day in the U.S. this week, this is a good time to look at the ancestry of the U.S. presidents. After all, if your ancestors have been in the U.S. for 100 years or more, there is a strong possibility that your ancestry intersects with at least one of the U.S. presidents. The same can be said for many others of Canadian, British, Scottish, or Irish ancestry, as well as a few from the European continent. 

You can find many sources of information about U.S. presidential genealogy. Probably the most scholarly resource is Gary Boyd Roberts' book, Royal Descents of 600 Immigrants to the American Colonies or the United States. 

The Web is full of information about U.S. presidential ancestry, but with varying degrees of accuracy. Here is a list of some of those pages:

Presidential Genealogy and Family History:

http://www.presidentsusa.net/genealogy.html 

Ancestry of George W. Bush:

http://homepages.rootsweb.com/~addams/presidential/bush.html

Ancestry of George Washington:

https://www.archives.com/genealogy/president-washington.html

Ancestry of Abraham Lincoln:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lincoln_family

Ancestry of John F. Kennedy:

https://famouskin.com/ahnentafel.php?name=8108+john+f+kennedy

Ancestry of Richard Nixon:

https://famouskin.com/ahnentafel.php?name=3502+richard+nixon

Ancestry of Lyndon B. Johnson:

https://famouskin.com/ahnentafel.php?name=15671+lyndon+b+johnson

Ancestry of Gerald Ford:

https://famouskin.com/ahnentafel.php?name=8007+gerald+ford

Ancestry of Jimmy Carter:

https://famouskin.com/ahnentafel.php?name=12937+jimmy+carter

Ancestry of Ronald Reagan:

https://famouskin.com/ahnentafel.php?name=15704+ronald+reagan

Ancestry of George H. W. Bush:

https://famouskin.com/ahnentafel.php?name=3103+george+w+bush

Ancestry of Bill Clinton:

https://famouskin.com/ahnentafel.php?name=15616+bill+clinton

Ancestry of George W. Bush:

https://famouskin.com/ahnentafel.php?name=3103+george+w+bush

Ancestry of Barack Obama;

https://www.thoughtco.com/ancestry-of-barack-obama-1421628

Patriots of color are getting their time to shine as once forgotten documents re-emerge in the public eye, in a special way. Nearly 200 rare documents bearing names of Black and Indigenous soldiers who served in the Continental Army during the American Revolution will soon be on display for all to see, for free.

“I think the fact that now through Ancestry we’ll be able to have these so widely available is fantastic,” said Aimee Newell, the museum’s director of collections and exhibitions.

She says these documents — which will allow so many people of color to connect with a piece of their heritage they never knew about — will also give insight into army life at the time.

“There are handwritten receipts about men receiving a blanket from the selectmen of their town, a lot of pay vouchers, all kinds of really interesting tidbits,” she said.

You can read more in an article by Justin Udo published in the Audacy.com web site at: https://tinyurl.com/yb6mrpzn.

The following announcement was written by Findmypast:

Civil Service Commission Appointments, Promotions and Transfers 1871-1942 

Spanning 71 years, these 872,439 records cover the British Civil Service, from postal workers, prison workers, the admiralty and more. You might find an ancestor’s name, age, occupation, plus details on their appointment, transfer, promotion or certification.  

Second World War Civilian Casualties In Britain 1940-1945 

This collection comes from multiple sources and includes 64,339 records. It is made up of mostly civilian casualties during the Second World War, in addition to 4,000 servicemen who died on the home front during enemy action. You may find an exact address, standard biographical detail, and even the type of enemy action.   

Newspapers 

After months of incredible work, Findmypast’s newspaper scanners are taking a well-deserved break this week.

NOTE:   This article is not about any of the "normal" topics of this newsletter: genealogy, history, current affairs, DNA, and related topics. However, it is information that I believe every computer user should know.

Don't let unethical companies force you to call to cancel.

Most services are easy to sign up for. You enter some info, punch in those credit card numbers, and shazam! A subscription is born. The reverse isn’t always the case. Many companies make canceling their services way harder than subscribing, which should be illegal. And in some places, it is—a fact you can use to your advantage.

Being forced to call in is unacceptable when subscribing takes 30 seconds online. But if the FTC isn’t going to do anything more than issue a warning or rely on regular people to report these shady companies, there is something you can do to fight back: Lie. 

You can read the full article by Jake Peterson published in the LifeHacker web site at: https://lifehacker.com/how-to-cancel-a-subscription-online-even-when-the-compa-1850117577.

Comment by Dick Eastman: I have a similar method that I found works well. I go to privacy.com at https://privacy.com/ and sign up for a pseudo credit card for a maximum charge of $1.00 or some similar amount. Then I go to the questionable web site and change my credit card number on file to the new (low maximum price) card number. When it comes time to automatically renew, the charge bounces (as long as the charge is for more than $1.00). 

After sending me 2 or 3 notices that I "need" to change my credit card number (which I will never do), the vendor then cancels my account for non-payment.

Simple. Effective.

When most Americans think of the World War II battle for Iwo Jima – if they think of it at all, more than 75 years later – they think of one image: Marines raising the U.S. flag atop Mount Suribachi, the island’s highest point.

That moment, captured in black and white by Associated Press photographer Joe Rosenthal and as a color film by Marine Sergeant William Genaust, is powerful, embodying the spirit of the Marine Corps.

But these pictures are far from the only images of the bloodiest fight in the Marines’ history. A larger library of film, and the men captured on them, is similarly emotionally affecting. It can even bring Americans alive today closer to a war that ended in the middle of the last century.

Take for instance, just one scene: Two Marines kneel with a dog before a grave marker. It is in the final frames of a film documenting the dedication of one of the three cemeteries on the island. Those two Marines are among hundreds present to remember the more than 6,000 Americans killed on the island in over a month of fighting.

Most of the cameramen on Iwo Jima used 100-foot film reels that could capture about two and a half minutes of film. Sgt. Genaust, who shot the color sequence atop Suribachi, shot at least 25 reels – just over an hour of film – before he was killed, roughly halfway through the campaign.

More than 50 Marine combat cameramen operated across the eight square miles of Iwo Jima during the battle, which stretched from Feb. 19 to March 26, 1945. Many shot still images, but at least 26 shot motion pictures. Three of these Marine cinematographers were killed in action.

You can read a lot more and view videos in an article published in The Conversation web site at: https://tinyurl.com/ycktp2jd.