If you’re like me and overwhelmed by DNA and this new wealth of information for genealogists, I am going through my experience with the Research Like a Pro with DNA e-course to help those looking for a way to get started! This is the third post in the series. The first two steps in the RLP with DNA process are discussed in Assess Your DNA Matches and Analyze Your Pedigree and Organize Your DNA Results...
Today’s episode of Research Like a Pro is about Diana’s recent project for the study group. She researched to discover more about her 4th great grandfather, John D. Isenhour, and his migration from North Carolina to Cape Girardeau, Missouri. In this episode, we discuss her objective, timeline, analysis of known information, and locality guide. Her objective was as follows: Discover why and when John D. Isenhour’s family moved to Cape Girardeau, Missouri, in the early...
Are you like me and overwhelmed by DNA and this new wealth of information for genealogists? If so, I am going through my experience with the Research Like a Pro with DNA e-course to help those looking for a way to get started! This is the second post in the series. The first step in the RLP with DNA process is discussed in Assess Your DNA Matches and Analyze Your Pedigree. In this step, I...
One of the reasons we prioritized German-American church records in Part 2 of this series was that church records may have been the one place where our German immigrant’s name would have been recorded accurately by a German speaker (i.e. their minister). Most of the time, however, our Germans needed to be understood by English speakers, and so their names were frequently recorded inaccurately. In Part 3 we will try some tricks to learn to...
Today’s episode of Research Like a Pro is about the influx of German immigrants in St. Louis, Missouri in the period prior to the Civil War, and how it influenced the outcome of the Camp Jackson Affair. Heidi Mathis returns for more discussion of St. Louis and German immigrants. Join us as we learn about the different beliefs of southerners and German immigrants in St. Louis in 1861. Transcript Nicole (1s): This is Research Like...
Allison Kotter is sharing her experience with the Research Like a Pro with DNA online course. Here’s her first post! – Nicole After doing traditional genealogy work as a hobby for years, I began learning the Research Like a Pro process to elevate my work to the professional level. As I started listening to the podcast, I noticed that research with DNA was mentioned a lot! Like a lot of you, I found the whole...
What is the best advice for those beginning to research their ancestor from German-speaking lands? Seek out their church records in America to discover their German hometown and parents. German research expert Roger Minert estimates that church records will be the best source of this information 65-76% of the time. Dr. Minert is the editor of a 35 volume (so far) series of books cataloging those German-Americans who have a hometown listed in their church...
Today’s episode of Research Like a Pro is about German immigration to St. Louis, Missouri in the 1840s-1860s. We discuss the reasons for immigration and the cultural differences between Americans and newly arrived Germans. Heidi Mathis shares the historical context she learned when researching her ancestor, Burkhard Schlag, who arrived in St. Louis in 1854 from Hesse. Transcript Nicole (1s): This is Research Like a Pro episode 148 19th century Germans in St. Louis with...
Clustering your DNA matches can help you make sense of that long list of unknown DNA matches. Although there are programs that now automate clustering, you might want to try it yourself. What are the advantages of creating genetic clusters manually? You might enjoy working with each match and discovering your shared ancestral lines. Each testing company website enables you to view people that share DNA with you and with your DNA match. Shared DNA...
Are you one of the 44.2 million Americans with a German ancestor, but sense that researching them is more out of reach than others in your family tree? Researching our German can seem daunting because of the language hurdle, but also because the whole concept of “German” is complex. People from central Europe had particularly complicated histories compared to those with more fixed national identities such as the English. Perhaps living on an island has...