Today we heard from Vi Hughes talking about Ancestry and Ancestry DNA and their use in family history research. Vi said that she has used both of these online subscription databases for many years. She talked about cost and then mentioned privacy and how to maintain it for both you and your family. She said that when she compared the cost of a subscription today with what she paid thirty years ago for time consuming, laborious access to only a few records, there is simply no comparison. This is a deal beyond imagining.
Ancestry allows you to build multiple family trees which are easy to navigate through and performs automatic record searches based on the information you have entered. It searches family trees, photos and stories entered by others as well as scanned and digitized government records, church records, immigration records, books, archive materials, local histories, maps and many other types of records. It has viewing software that then allows you to see and scan through the original record page by page and make your own decision on whether the document is relevant to you. You can then attach the document to the relevant person in your tree or save it to a ‘shoebox’ for later evaluation. It also allows you to easily add the information from the document that applies to someone in your tree directly to their profile.
Ancestry allows you to view the information in your tree and the information in each person’s profile in your tree in many different ways. You may view individual profiles, with facts only, or as a written story. You may also see several types of trees which make it easy to see how others are related. It will also generate many different types of both electronic or paper reports. It will also show your family members home locations on a map and add local history information to their story.
You can search their records either independently or using information from your tree. It will also link you automatically to free archive databases or other subscription based websites and then allows that information to be uploaded to your tree. When searching records it uses a system that will find names in records with many different spelling variations based on sound.
It allows you to message other members to ask questions or just to make contact with relatives. Their messaging system requires the user to log in before using and does not reveal contact information. In addition you can download information from your tree to your computer as either a gedcom file or a pdf and you can download any records you find as jpg files. There is also a free Ancestry Academy which has short educational videos and message boards with answers to common questions that will help you to learn more about family research in general and the best practices to follow.
A separate Ancestry DNA membership which gives you access to your DNA test results, ethnicity, basic info about your DNA matches or cousins and a limited family tree known as ThruLines. The testing identifies several thousand segments or ‘chunks’ of unique DNA from you and then matches them with previous results obtained from other people. These chunks are identifiable as to where on each chromosome they are located and can be matched with chunks from other people whose ethnicity is known. In this way, they can tell you what percent of your DNA matches people of certain ethnic backgrounds to show you an ethnic pie chart. It will also display your ethnic background on a world map showing communities where your ancestors came from and giving you a short historical trip through time of how these people came to North America. They can even show you a color coded map, using Chromosome painter software, of where on each of your chromosomes these ethnic chunks are located.
They can also match you with people who share exactly the same ’chunks’ and tell you how many chunks and how much total DNA you share with them. This allows them to say how closely related you are to each of these people. Since Ancestry DNA is North American based, if you have family that goes back a long ways in North America, you will have thousands of matches (relatives who have also had their DNA tested). You can also identify related matches by matching one against the remaining people. This allows you to see how many are related to each of your family lines. Her own match list shows many cousins that she can identify by family tree branch and common ancestor.
It will also build you a tree (called ThruLines) based on the trees that your matches and others have entered and show you how you are related to many of them as well as tell you who the common ancestor is that you share with each of your matches.
She said that once you have an Ancestry subscription, there are some things to keep in mind. If you have never done any family history in the past, you will find there is a whole new language to learn before you will easily understand things. As with any interest, you need to learn the lingo. Take your time and look things up if you are not sure what something means. Even the words we use to talk about relationships, like first cousin, grand aunt, and great grandfather have different meanings in different cultures. Ancestry uses the North American standard, which is quite specific and can take a while for you to understand if your family uses these terms in a more generic way.
The Ancestry website view that you have and the ease of use will depend on what technology you are using. A computer or tablet signed on to the actual website gives the most complete access to everything. Using an app for tablet or phone will give you a more limited view of things and may be more cumbersome to use.
In Ancestry, start with yourself and work backwards, entering the information you have, taking care to connect people correctly. Ancestry will then start searching its databases for matching information. Check each suggested piece of information or ‘hint’ out carefully before adding it to your tree. Take it slow and be methodical. It is much easier to do it right the first time, than to have to go back and delete or fix relationships later. Use Ancestry Academy to help you out along the way.
In Ancestry DNA you should enter a very simple direct ancestor family tree going back several generations if possible and link it to your DNA results. This way it will be able to connect you with many of your matches and show you who your common ancestors are.
She closed by telling us a few stories from her own experiences and encouraged us to gather up our information and get started on a never ending journey of discovery.