Today’s episode of Research Like a Pro is an interview with Debra Hoffman, a professional genealogist specializing in Maryland and Germany and member of our Research Like a Pro with DNA online course. Debra recently took the Proving Your Pedigree institute course at the Salt Lake Institute of Genealogy and shares her takeaways from the course. The purpose of the Proving Your Pedigree intermediate level virtual course was to create a narrative genealogy with DNA evidence confirming traced second great grandparents. Join us as Debra shares what she learned!
Transcript
Nicole (1s):
This is Research Like a Pro episode 197, proving Your Pedigree with DNA SLIG Course. Welcome to Research Like a Pro a Genealogy Podcast about taking your research to the next level, hosted by Nicole Dyer and Diana Elder accredited genealogy professional. Diana and Nicole are the mother-daughter team at FamilyLocket.com and the authors of Research Like a Pro A Genealogist Guide. With Robin Wirthlin they also co-authored the companion volume, Research Like a Pro with DNA. Join Diana and Nicole as they discuss how to stay organized, make progress in their research and solve difficult cases. Let’s go.
Nicole (44s):
Hello everybody. Welcome to Research Like a Pro.
Diana (47s):
Hi, Nicole, how are you today?
Nicole (49s):
Doing great. I’ve been working in Gephi today, making some network graphs and just trying to learn more about how to use it better. How about you?
Diana (57s):
That’s great. I am working on my DNA study group assignment as well, and I just ran an autokinship report through GEDmatch. And now I need to dive in and understand what it told me. So that’s always the challenge with these fun tools, really working to analyze them and understand them.
Nicole (1m 20s):
Yes.
Diana (1m 20s):
So we also had some fun yesterday talking about an article from the National Genealogical Society Quarterly, and it was by Barbara Vines Little, and I was really interested in it because it was early Virginia. And, you know, we both work in early Virginia records and this one was all about interpreting a will correctly. It was all as interesting articles where there was some research done back in the day and they interpreted this will. And then someone came along later and did a new interpretation and changed the pedigree up a bit. And then Barbara was correcting and going back to the original using the law at the time.
Diana (2m 0s):
So it was pretty fascinating.
Nicole (2m 2s):
Yeah, I enjoyed it. And this is from the December, 2021 issue. And the title is Correct Interpretation of an 18th century Virginia Will Restores the Parents of Allerton Newton of Westmoreland county, Virginia. Isaac Allerton fellow was born in the 1630s and then he died in 1702 and left a will. So it was very interesting. The article had quotes from the will and like you said, discussed the Virginia law. And one thing that I really enjoyed learning was that entailment ended in 1776 after the Declaration of Independence. And then the Virginia lawmakers decided they didn’t want to do entailment anymore.
Nicole (2m 45s):
And that had a big impact on the evidence. So we really do need to understand the law don’t we,
Diana (2m 52s):
And there are a lot of terms in there, entailment was one and putative was another one, some interesting terms that we don’t use all the time in our research primogenitor, which means, you know, the land was just passed down to the oldest son, to the oldest son, to the oldest son, which they were getting rid of. So yeah, it was great. I had taken Barbara’s course at the Salt Lake Institute of Genealogy a couple of years ago, I believe. And it was all about colonial Virginia. And we had an entire class session on inheritance and probate and Barbara had made these great big charts for us and we went all through it. So it was really fun to revisit this article and see it used in an actual situation.
Diana (3m 34s):
So now I kind of want to go back and look at all of our Virginia ancestors and see if we can discover that except for they were in a county that had so much record class, we don’t even have any wills. Darn it.
Nicole (3m 47s):
And that was the challenge of this article as well, that a lot of the future descendants who wanted to look at the wills for some of them were missing. She even said in one of the people’s cases that he died intestate, but the will didn’t survive. So how frustrating would that be to know it was there, but you just can’t see it.
Diana (4m 4s):
That is so true. And that’s what we deal with. So many of our states and counties.
Nicole (4m 9s):
Well, the announcements for today are that we are going to be doing an exhibitor booth at the upcoming east coast genetic genealogy conference. So that’s just next week and it’s April 23rd and 24th. We are super excited to attend this virtual conference. It’s going to have a lot of well-known speakers that are experts in DNA, Blaine Bettinger, Jim Bartlett, Katie Cooper, Roberta Estes, Johnny Pearl, Robert Warthen and so forth. So it looks amazing. So you guys should all come watch if you’re learning about using genetic evidence in your research. And of course we’ll also be at NGS, the national genealogical society conference for this year in Sacramento, it’s going to be great. It’s a virtual conference and an in-person conference, so you can do it either way.
Nicole (4m 52s):
We’ll have a Family Locket booth there, and Diana’s teaching a couple of classes. I’m teaching about airtable and that’s May 24th through the 28th. So we’re looking forward to that. And of course we always say this, but make sure you join our newsletter so that when we have updates and speaking engagements, you might want to come to and special deals, you can get notified.
Diana (5m 16s):
All right. Thanks for that, Nicole. Well, today we are excited because we have a guest. We have Debra Hoffman here with us. Hi, Debra.
Debra Hoffman (5m 24s):
Hello.
Diana (5m 25s):
We’re so excited to talk to you.
Debra Hoffman (5m 27s):
Thank you.
Diana (5m 27s):
Let me do a little intro. Debra a Hoffman is a professional genealogist specializing in Maryland and Germany research, owner of Hoffman Genealogical Services and coordinator of the Maryland course at the Salt Lake Institute of Genealogy. Debra also is of course, member in our Research Like a Pro with DNA course. So we’re excited to have her here and learn all about her adventures in genealogy and in DNA. And I think that I first met you at that course at Salt Lake Institute of Genealogy when you coordinated Maryland. When was that? Like three years ago. I’m trying to remember what year that was.
Debra Hoffman (6m 8s):
It was in January of 2020.
Diana (6m 10s):
Okay. Okay. So just two years ago just seems forever doesn’t it before COVID
Debra Hoffman (6m 15s):
Right.
Diana (6m 16s):
So tell us a little bit about how you got started in genealogy research.
Debra Hoffman (6m 20s):
So I became passionate about genealogy at a young age. I was about 10 years old because my paternal grandmother, Ruth Lindenmeyer, which would share family stories every week during our Sunday dinners. And she lived about 10 minutes from me and we would go over there every Sunday and I would ask her questions and we’re always interested in family history. And so she would tell me all about, you know, with the members of her family that she remembered and things like that. And she also had a family Bible that intrigued me was actually my grandfather’s family Bible, but he was very reticent to talk about family at all. And so she was the one who would tell me what she knew about them. And it was just fascinating because there was a lot of children that had died young.
Debra Hoffman (7m 3s):
And so it was just really intriguing to me to learn more. They were lived on the eastern shore of Maryland. And so that, that was interesting. And then in seventh grade I had a history class that took us on a research trip to the National Archives in Washington, DC, back in the day when you had to do censuses with microfilm and just, you know, reel through them. And I was really excited because I was one of the students that found my family in the census. And then I married up being able to get the family stories from my grandmother with actually being able to go find documents and other sources. And so that just sealed me in for being, you know, obsessed with genealogies for the next 40 plus years.
Diana (7m 46s):
That’s so fun. You know what, there is something about finding the family in the census is such a hook. It really is. And that’s what Nicole did. Some of her original research when she was 16 and found our family, like somebody who’d been alluding us. And that was so fun. So that’s awesome that you got to go to the National Archives for a field trip. I’m very jealous and I’m sure you’ve been back several times. Yes. So how did you decide to become professional?
Debra Hoffman (8m 15s):
So I would never had the intent to become professional. I always thought about back in the nineties, I thought about becoming certified. And so that’s something that I’m still working on. It’s become a really long journey, more like a marathon, but I’d never really decided to do professionally until about 2013. When I decided that I really enjoyed working with people and sharing the knowledge, I had gained an expertise with others to help them find their families too. And what I have really found is, is probably been, I think I’ve helped people, but I think for me, it’s been more beneficial for me to allow me to investigate and learn about things that I never would’ve learned about if I had just concentrated on my own family. And so I really enjoy, you know, the ability to help people find their family stories and their family histories.
Debra Hoffman (9m 0s):
And also, I think it just makes me a better genealogist to overall,
Diana (9m 5s):
Oh, I can wholeheartedly agree with that. You get into these other families and you find different kinds of records and localities that you wouldn’t otherwise so fun. Do you do mostly projects there in Maryland in DC that area, or, or does your research take you lots of places?
Debra Hoffman (9m 23s):
Mostly for the clients I do Maryland and I have delved into some Pennsylvania research as well because the family, you know, started in Maryland, but ended up going back into Pennsylvania. So I have done, you know, I’ve branched out a little bit, but typically my client work is the Maryland or Germans. I haven’t gone over to Germany, but I do research in German records. And so I’ve done that as well.
Diana (9m 46s):
Nice. And then you probably do a lot of onsite research at the Maryland archives and the national archives. You have so many repositories nearby,
Debra Hoffman (9m 54s):
Very blessed with the number of repositories that I can dig into
Nicole (9m 58s):
How wonderful, you know, I was thinking back Debra too, when I first met you and we were working on this like committee together, Salt Lake Institute of Genealogy or SLIG. And I was just impressed that you were coordinating the Maryland course and also helping on the committee. It seemed like a lot of time and effort. So I know that you spend a lot of your time where you could be working on certification with volunteering and teaching and helping increasing the knowledge and the genealogical community. So thank you for that.
Debra Hoffman (10m 27s):
Thank you.
Nicole (10m 28s):
So one of the reasons I thought it would be fun to invite Debra on the podcast today was because we were both in a course at the Salt Lake Institute of Genealogy regarding DNA, the course is called Proving Your Pedigree with DNA. And this was an offering in the SLIG virtual series in the fall of 2021. And it was coordinated by Karen Stanbary. And I asked Karen, is there somebody in the course that you would recommend to come on our podcast? Because I just thought it was such a neat idea and I didn’t get to do the whole course because I had just had the baby. And, and it was just teaching that one class about air table at the course. And she recommended Debra and I thought, yay. I love Debra.
Nicole (11m 10s):
So this’ll be really fun. So I’m excited. We’re going to ask Debra all about her takeaways from this course and kind of get an idea of what we can do to apply some of these assignments and takeaways to our own research too. So Debra, what was the format of the course and how did it work?
Debra Hoffman (11m 29s):
So I actually loved the format of the course. I’ve been taking Institute courses since 2009. This is the first one that I’ve taken. And it came about, I think because of the virtual environment that was necessary because of COVID. But we had a meeting every Friday for about six weeks. And then you had time in between to actually work on, you know, what you learned. You could work on the homework, you could conduct additional research to fill in gaps. If you notice things that you need to do. And I really appreciated having the ability as part of each weekly session to meet with experienced well-known genealogists like Karen Stanbary, Angela Magee, Rebecca Koford and Tom Jones.
Debra Hoffman (12m 10s):
They all had some consultation hours during that Friday session in the afternoon that you could take advantage of. So I just felt like it’s the ideal. It really allows in the Institute setting for students to be able to not only have time to learn about a new topic, but then to have the time to practice it, to see where they might have issues or might not, you know, understand everything that they were taught. And then having the ability to talk to somebody and sit down with somebody and ask them the questions and get back on the right track. So this is probably my favorite format now for taking Institute classes.
Nicole (12m 46s):
Absolutely. It’s so nice to have the extra time for homework.
Debra Hoffman (12m 50s):
It is because you never fit it in during the weeks that you’re there. And the only downside, I think, is the missing out on some of the social aspects,
Nicole (12m 58s):
For sure. Yeah. I really miss the social aspects too. So what was the purpose of the course? What were you hoping to learn?
Debra Hoffman (13m 5s):
It was really intriguing to me was to be able to take a line and just kind of focus on that. And I was wanting to learn more about the effective use of DNA in genealogical research. And then the purpose of this intermediate course was to apply DNA analysis skills to the documentation of one ancestral line to a second grade grandparent couple. And so you were just focusing on the one line and kind of walking through how to do that effectively. And so I really was intrigued with that because I had not done that myself. I had been, I’m interested in learning more about DNA. I have your book Research Like a Pro with DNA, and I just felt like this was a great like methodological class where you could actually take some of what you’re learning and apply it.
Nicole (13m 52s):
Absolutely. One thing that intrigued me about this course also was that you would have like a running assignment throughout it. And at the end you would have like a final work product. So tell us what that assignment was. And had you had any experience doing that before?
Debra Hoffman (14m 6s):
So the main assignment for this was to complete a source cited, descending, genealogy, including parentage proofs, but incorporating genetic evidence. So I had created a project like this before, but not using the DNA evidence as part of it, including that in the writeup. I wasn’t nervous about doing that part of it, but I was wanting to learn more about like, how do you write up, you know, the DNA evidence? How do you include that? I know there’s some terminology now that I think we, as genealogists are using more where in the past, I think we noticed that the father of this or the mother of this, and now we’re quantifying those relationships to include the word biological. So when we can prove that somebody, you know, is related biologically their parentage, then you can add that the biological father of this.
Debra Hoffman (14m 54s):
And I think that we’re finding that DNA is changing some of the ancestry that we have found in the past because of it was attributed parentage that, you know, we may not have known about just looking through documents.
Nicole (15m 9s):
Absolutely. And it can be surprising, but then it’s really important to use those correct terms so that we can let our clients know, or our family members know that we have found that genetic evidence that makes it so we can say this is a biological relationship. So that’s a good point.
Diana (15m 24s):
That sounds like a really great course. And I think as a, so wise with, I guess it was Karen that dreamed up this idea, and I loved that it was part of the DNA dreamer series because a lot of people don’t necessarily have an unknown parentage case to work on with DNA or like a mystery in their family tree. They maybe have their family tree all filled out. And so being able, just to prove that line, everybody can do that. And it’s such a great way to apply the DNA and to learn what to do with that matchless and how it all works. So I guess my question is which ancestral couple did you choose to focus on and how did you choose
Debra Hoffman (16m 9s):
The welcome letter suggested that you pick a line free of pedigree collapse, which meant that I really couldn’t use my mother’s line because we do have some pedigree collapsed there. And she’s from Virginia. I have a lot of Virginia ancestors too, when they did kind of inter-marry, they married first cousins and sometimes, and then you were supposed to have two base test takers who descend from the target ancestral couples and then many matches on that line documentation for most of the parent-child relationships, no unknown parentage in the line. And then, you know, taking all of that from that welcome letter, I use my dad’s test results because once you have your parents’ test results, that’s closer to usually the ancestors that you’re looking to connect to.
Debra Hoffman (16m 49s):
So I used my dad’s and I chose his second great maternal grandparents, Charles and Maggie Weaver. I was excited because I had actually done a source cited narrative genealogy on this family before. And so I felt like it would be really interesting to be able to add the DNA aspect to it. And just to confirm all of the information that I had found, what I found with this line is that I didn’t have as many matches as I had hoped that I would uncover. And so I’m still working on this because it’s not as solid as it needs to be.
Diana (17m 23s):
Oh, interesting. What was the location?
Debra Hoffman (17m 25s):
It was Baltimore, Maryland. Charles was the first generation born in the United States. He was one of many siblings. So I was really surprised that I didn’t have more hits. I thought that I would have more his, and unfortunately my mom’s side has lots of hits, but my dad’s side, not so much, my dad is mostly German. So there are a lot more, I think, issues around that with, you know, immigration and maybe just not as many people taking tests.
Diana (17m 53s):
Yes. We see that in our client work with clients that have got more recent ancestry, as opposed to the colonial ancestry, that goes way back. It makes a big difference with the matches. And I think it’s interesting that you thought you’d have plenty because there were so many children, but we also see this, that sometimes in families is just becomes this thing, that everybody in the family tests and then other families, nobody tests. So it’s so random,
Debra Hoffman (18m 20s):
Right?
Nicole (18m 20s):
So they were German.
Debra Hoffman (18m 24s):
Right.
Nicole (18m 25s):
Very interesting. So one of our researchers, Heidi Mathis, she wrote a series about 19th century German immigration. And she also found the same thing with her dad’s results that they had immigrated in that time period from Germany. And she didn’t have hardly any DNA matches from that side of the family. And she kind of hypothesized that. It was because they had just not been in the United States, as long as some of our more distant ancestors and especially with like ancestry and some of those bigger databases, most of the test takers are Americans. And so a lot of the people in Europe are not taking DNA tests for privacy issues.
Nicole (19m 5s):
And anyway, it’s interesting to hear, you know, her hypothesis was kind of true for you as well, as far as finding matches from those more recent German immigrants.
Debra Hoffman (19m 14s):
All right. My dad’s, I did do a Y-DNA test with FamilyTree DNA, and I have found no matches for him even at the 25 marker.
Nicole (19m 26s):
Wow.
Debra Hoffman (19m 27s):
Yes, I know. It’s, it’s really interesting. He has, he doesn’t have any, so, so his line may be a little bit more challenging. I’m finding to add the DNA component to my research.
Nicole (19m 38s):
That’s so fascinating. You have one of those unique Y lines that not a lot of people have tested. One of the first writing assignments for the Proving Your Pedigree course was to write that source cited, descending genealogy, but not the whole thing all at once. But to just get started with taking the line back from your base test taker, which was your dad and then going back each generation to those second great grandparents. So how did that work? It sounds like you already had the documentation ready.
Debra Hoffman (20m 7s):
I did. So I had completed a significant amount of research on this line. I had used Family Tree Maker, like version 16 or whatever, and I had done a source cited, a narrative genealogy on it, but now I found that to do this course. I really wanted to like redo it. So I ended up taking it and starting over again. I had done more research since I had originally published that back in like the 1990s. And so I thought, well, this will be a really good time to be able to take that additional research and incorporate it. And so I basically started overwriting that source cited genealogy and it, and so it was good because I had a lot of information already. So I really didn’t feel I had to go back and do a lot of research, but it did take some time to put it all together again,
Nicole (20m 55s):
That’s neat. So you had a lot of things done, but then you kind of got the chance to really focus on writing and, and how to write things instead of focusing on finding all of the pieces to put into it.
Debra Hoffman (21m 9s):
Right?
Nicole (21m 9s):
So part of the course was this word template for writing a genealogy style narrative. So Brent Chadwick was one of the instructors and he has these Microsoft word, macro enabled templates, and he made a special one just for this course kind of fit in the style that Karen had imagined would be really helpful. So how did that go? Did you use that and did you like it?
Debra Hoffman (21m 31s):
I did use it and I really do like it. I think it helps save time as far as being able to add information later. And you don’t, I think it’s easy to make mistakes if you’re manually changing numbers and manually tabbing and things like that. So his macro enabled document, once you get used to using it, I will say there is a learning curve to it, but I really enjoyed doing it. And he gave really great instructions for how to go through the different steps. And so once I got into the groove, I really did like it. Cause I think, you know, a lot of times when we’re doing research, you know, we have nine kids and then we find that 10th kid and we have to add that child in.
Debra Hoffman (22m 11s):
And so this makes it so much easier to do that without really having to, you know, renumber everything. No one wants to go back and read number all of those numbers, especially when you’re using the NGSQ, where everybody gets a number. And so I really did, I was really thrilled with, and that was part of the other part that in air table were both technology that I wanted to learn more about and be able to get better at using
Nicole (22m 34s):
I’m so glad that air table was helpful. And that’s great that the Brent Chadwick template was good as well. And if anyone isn’t sure what we’re talking about as far as numbering and NGSQ numbering, I’ll put a link in the show notes about it. There’s the registers dial is another common style for numbering, but basically when you’re writing a document with a lot of people in it, and it’s not that visual of a tree, you have to have some way of keeping track of who’s who and where do they belong in the descending genealogy. And so that’s what the numbers are for. So that’s great that the, the macro enabled template was helpful for keeping that numbering system all straight without you having to re redo the numbers.
Diana (23m 14s):
Yeah. I would love to learn how to use that template because I have never done one of the, you know, the NGSQ or the register style type narratives. And it was certainly would be nice to have something to make that a little bit easier. So I love it when there’s technology that we can learn to help us. So thanks for sharing about that.
Debra Hoffman (23m 36s):
Thank you.
Diana (23m 36s):
So, one of the other things that you had to do was a personal pedigree evaluation, which was figuring out how many generations of your tree are complete. And did you learn something surprising or was it what you thought it would be when you did that?
Debra Hoffman (23m 51s):
Well, it was nice to know no surprises there, cause I have been working on life family as I mentioned for a long time. So I have done pretty good, especially on my mom’s side and I’ve been working on filling in my dad. So I actually learned that my pedigree was in pretty good shape and there was only one of my paternal second great grandparents that is unknown. So it is nice to be able to quantify it. I had never really done it that way, where I actually looked at, well, how many people am I supposed to know? And Karen had us do a FAN chart prior to the course as well. That was part of the welcome letter. Like one of the things that we needed to kind of do beforehand to get an idea of what our pedigree looked like.
Debra Hoffman (24m 31s):
So it would give you an idea how much work you might have to do. And that’s nice to be able to actually look at that, to see, are you as good as you think you are? Because I think sometimes, you know, we, at least me as a genealogist, I know I keep a lot of stuff in my head that I shouldn’t. And so being able and actually go back and do some analysis was good for me. I appreciate having to do that.
Diana (24m 58s):
Yes. And it’s important for DNA because if you have some holes there in your pedigree, that might be where some of your matches go to. And if you don’t know that it’s going to be hard to make discoveries and you could incorrectly attribute someone to the wrong ancestor, it makes a difference.
Nicole (25m 16s):
Yeah, for sure. And I was just thinking about how, you know, the goal of the course was to prove a set of second great grandparents. And, and part of that is being able to say that these DNA matches that you’re using are not related to any of your other sides of the family and that they provide evidence only for this one line. So that’s really good that you are able to check your pedigree and see how complete it was. And that really helps with, you know, meeting the DNA standards in genealogy standards.
Debra Hoffman (25m 47s):
Right.
Nicole (25m 47s):
So when you looked at your DNA matches and you kind of were building the foundation of your DNA, did you find close cousins or how did you sort and filter your match list?
Debra Hoffman (25m 58s):
So I used Ancestry to do that and I was using Ancestry’s color dots to go through my match list and look for close cousins. I did not find close cousins, but I did find some DNA matches that I was not aware of that matched into the Weaver line. And I, I think the most frustrating part was that I didn’t have, like I was looking for more matches than, you know, what was coming up. And it looks like, you know, based on what I had talked with Karen about that I’m going to have to do that more targeted testing. I’m going to have to really hunt down people who would test for me. And I wasn’t successful in reaching out to some of the people that I did match with.
Debra Hoffman (26m 42s):
Some of them would talk to me as far as they would respond, but they wouldn’t do anything further. They like, they wouldn’t share their test results with me. They wouldn’t share additional information with me. Some people that I reached out to never responded to me. And so I think that was, you know, did that just added a little bit to the frustration of not being able to have more matches? I would’ve liked to had more serendipitous matches than I did, which would have made this line easier to document with DNA.
Nicole (27m 11s):
Yes. That can be challenging, especially, you know, when you’re looking for those close cousins to help you kind of sort your lines and see, okay, here’s my first or second cousin. So this belongs to a second great-grandparent or whatever. And then it makes it sometimes harder to figure out those more distant cousins. If you don’t have any of the close cousins to help you figure out which side they’re on. So that can be a challenge for sure. But I’m glad that you have a plan for targeted testing. We give that advice a lot of times in our Research Like a Pro with DNA study group two, that maybe you just need to add more test takers. And, and like you said, that can be really challenging
Debra Hoffman (27m 49s):
And it is especially cause I’d like to research backwards, not so much forward. So having to hunt down the living people is not necessarily my favorite thing to do,
Nicole (28m 2s):
Contacting those living people who are like, why do you want to talk to me, like you?
Diana (28m 8s):
Or they don’t even know you and you’re calling them out of the blue, you know, you’re a Y-DNA match and can you take a test? They’re like, what, what are you talking about? So that’s, that’s always a challenge trying to figure that out, but I’m assuming that you found a few DNA matches that could be your focal members to add in.
Debra Hoffman (28m 27s):
Yes. And I actually, I had tested my aunt on FamilyTreeDNA, and she’s also on 23andMe, she had not tested on Ancestry. And so taking this course made me realize that, you know what, I need to get her to test in Ancestry too. So I did close that loophole and got her tested. My dad only has his one sister. So I needed to do some additional like shoring up just the family members that I had already tested because sometimes I think we think we have enough tests or we don’t want to, you know, at least for me, sometimes I feel like, you know, when I have people tested in two different places, I’m asking them to take another test. They don’t always understand why it’s important to have so many tests out there and it is, and, you know, but I try to explain it to them.
Debra Hoffman (29m 12s):
So this gave me the opportunity to do that. I also got my dad’s and aunt’s first cousin to test as well. And so she provided some additional matches through her DNA test that were also helpful, but I did have her sister who refused the test. And so you do have that sometimes too, where you would like somebody to test, but they don’t want to. So
Diana (29m 33s):
Yes, we have run up against that. Well, I think this was a, a main takeaway that we have learned through the years just to expand that testing pool, how important that is, because I agree with you, you know, at first you get somebody to test new things. Okay, great. We’re done, we’ve got them at ancestry, but then you realize we need to get their results everywhere. Especially if they’re that generation that’s closest to the ancestor, you’ve got to get their DNA everywhere. So, so important volume, glad you were able to get your aunt and the additional cousins. So good job that would probably was worth it. Just getting that figured out.
Debra Hoffman (30m 13s):
I agree.
Nicole (30m 14s):
I love it. When you have a close cousin who has tested and, and your point about getting your aunt in Ancestry is really relevant. And I found a lot of people, especially some of our clients don’t know that Ancestry DNA has the largest database. And that’s really the place to start when looking for your cousin matches not only because they have the biggest database, but because they have so many trees attached to DNA results, that it just is so much faster to find the common ancestor there.
Debra Hoffman (30m 41s):
Right. And I think to one point that Karen made during the course as well, that I hadn’t really understood was each of the different testing companies have different tools. And so Ancestry doesn’t provide some of the chromosome mapping information that we need to do that MyHeritage does or 23andMe and a FamilyTreeDNA does. So it really is important to try to get the information in as many places as possible because some of the tools are different and we have to learn, you know, how to maximize, you know, the information that we’re getting from DNA so that we can make the best use of it.
Nicole (31m 16s):
All right. It just reminds me of digging through all of our documentary evidence and looking for these minute details and probate and receipts and things like that to piece together families. And we do the same thing with DNA, and we’re just trying to get every little piece of evidence we can from each different place where we can get it
Debra Hoffman (31m 36s):
Right.
Nicole (31m 36s):
So when the course was all over, how did you feel about your work product, your descending genealogy, and you mentioned you’re still working on it. So maybe give us an update.
Debra Hoffman (31m 45s):
Yeah, I am still working on it. I was really excited. I didn’t get as much done as I was hoping to, but I felt really good about what I learned in the class, the methodologies that I learned, I learned a lot about how to effectively research living people, which is not my core competency. I like researching dead people, but having to learn how to do that effectively and to be able to incorporate DNA research going forward successfully. I really appreciated that. I also, while it was a little bit frustrating and I still have a lot of work to do on that, I I’m excited to be able to start, I think more effectively incorporating DNA research. And it was really a great feeling to S to be able to feel like you could support all of that hard work on documentary evidence and then have it corroborated by looking at the DNA matches.
Debra Hoffman (32m 35s):
And while I don’t have enough yet to, you know, put a check mark and say, I’m done with this. I think that I’ve got a good indication that I do have it documented correctly. And now it’s just a matter of getting some additional research test takers to, you know, do some test taking or, you know, DNA changes the databases change all the time. So there’s always new people coming in. And so it’s exciting to be able to look for, you know, more targeted, you know, to target my research for new test takers or, you know, coming across, you know, serendipitous matches that will help me continue to put the check marks on this DNA line so that I can get it completed. And, and that’ll think it will be something really great to be able to leave.
Debra Hoffman (33m 18s):
Cause that was always one of my goals too, was to leave well-documented family information, the kind when I’m not hearing anymore, so that someone doesn’t have to redo all the years of work that I’ve done. And so I’m really excited about being able to add the DNA and to show that I really have met standards. And, you know, someone can rely on all of the research that I’ve done and have the family stories.
Nicole (33m 43s):
Yes. That hits on all of the reasons why we do what we do. Doesn’t it like we want to leave behind something for our family and to show that we have done accurate research.
Diana (33m 52s):
Yeah. I love that. You’re excited about it. I have a feeling that when you started, it was with some trepidation to get into DNA. So after you were all done with the course, what were some of your main takeaways?
Debra Hoffman (34m 6s):
I kind of thought that DNA would be the answer questions more readily. And I realized that DNA is just as much hard work as documentary research. I was concerned too, that it would be science heavy, that, that I had to learn a lot about genetics and things. And I think it, I think that you can really delve into that and do the crappy in your chromosomes and things like that, which are more, I feel like more scientific or more data-driven, but you can get enough knowledge of DNA and working through matches and things to really be able to effectively use it, but it does have a learning curve and it did require like you really have to use it and analyze it. It takes a lot of logic and analysis that you wouldn’t necessarily I think expect.
Debra Hoffman (34m 51s):
And so that was interesting. My other takeaway too, was the narrative genealogy that we created and having that macro document. I really appreciate it because I found that with several genealogists, like Tom Jones, now that’s how he performs his genealogical research. Like he starts, once he gets enough information, he creates one of those macro enabled documents or a word document, and pretty much writes as he goes doing the research and he plugs in information that he finds. And then if he has like a lead or something, he’ll note that in there. And has he does the research he fills in those gaps. And so at the end, it’s not about so much having all of the documentation and then trying to write, he’s actually writing his genealogical generations as he goes.
Debra Hoffman (35m 39s):
And I think, wow, that’s really probably even more efficient to be able to create the stories and the, the generations rather than, you know, my grandmother would always tease me saying she couldn’t wait until, you know, I had written it up and I was always like, oh my gosh, I have so much research to do. It’s going to be a long time before I write it up. And now I thought, you know, that’s probably just not very efficient because you only have so much time. And so to be able to at least write up what you have found and what you are you’re looking for is probably a much better way to leave your genealogy so other people could build on it and see what you’ve done without having to go through all of your research and binders and everything else and try to recreate it.
Diana (36m 21s):
Yeah. I love that idea, especially for those of us, who’ve been doing this for a while and we’ve got all this research in family tree maker or roots, magic, or ancestry tree, you know, you could take one ancestor couple and then work forward and just plug in all the information you have in this template. And then you really would see where your holes are. I love that idea. And you just kind of work around your fan chart. I always look at my fan chart when I’m talking about that and think, okay, I could do it for that couple and that couple in that couple. So that really neat idea.
Debra Hoffman (36m 55s):
Yeah. I really liked that. That was, that was eyeopening to me too. I thought of it totally differently than I had in the past. And I appreciated that takeaway from the course I made great strides and recommend the course for anybody who wants to support their documentary research with DNA evidence. I think it was a really great learning experience for me.
Diana (37m 15s):
So let me just ask you a couple more questions about that. So we’re talking about narrative. Did you actually write paragraphs about it or is it basically just putting in all the sources for each person in the generations? How did you approach that?
Debra Hoffman (37m 30s):
So they started with doing just the sources and the outline. So starting with a light for each generation, you start with the couple of birth, marriage and death, and then putting in the children’s list. And then as you, whatever sources that you have, you could start putting in that information. And then as you started with the DNA, you would start filling it in. So it’s basically starting with the skeleton and the outline, and then just, you know, adding to it as you add in different documentation. So it’s just a continual work in progress that you’re constantly being able to build on, which I think is really an exciting thing to think, because if anybody wanted to see your research, it’s so much easier to share that than it is to, you know, print out a Jed comm or do you do something like that?
Debra Hoffman (38m 12s):
Because then if you had family stories, you could include them and then you could do more research if you needed to. Or you could make a note that you wanted to look for something based on a document. You know, if you had another clue as to something else to research and it’s all right there, it’s a much more readily digestible research product.
Diana (38m 33s):
That’s great. So interesting.
Nicole (38m 34s):
Wonderful. Well, thank you so much, Debra for sharing us. You’ve told us a lot of your successes and challenges that you had. Are there any final words you want to share with us about the course or you have already recommended it and it is going to be available this fall 2022 again, so that is an option for the listeners to go ahead and sign up.
Debra Hoffman (38m 54s):
Thank you again. And I want to thank you both for having me on the podcast today. I’m really, I’m always excited to talk about genealogies and I really appreciate not only the knowledge that you share with all of us, with your books and with your eCourses and with the study groups, I’m looking forward to being a part of the DNA, one in the future. And I’m also like the institutes with SLIG and with the coordinators that work so hard to share their knowledge and expertise with us so that we can all become better genealogists and all learn from each other and be successful. And so I just really appreciate all your efforts and your time. And I appreciate the opportunity to talk about this great course, and I hope that others will have an opportunity to take it as well.
Debra Hoffman (39m 37s):
I think it was a really beneficial and I’m looking forward to continue building on my DNA expertise and finishing some more of those other lines in my genealogy.
Nicole (39m 48s):
Wonderful. Thank you so much, Debra. And we hope everyone listening enjoyed this discussion today, and you can go to the Salt Lake Institute of Genealogy website to learn more, have a great day, everybody.
Diana (40m 1s):
Thank you, Debra. Bye everyone.
Debra Hoffman (40m 3s):
Thank you.
Nicole (40m 40s):
Thank you for listening. We hope that something you heard today will help you make progress in your research. If you want to learn more, purchase our books, Research Like a Pro and Research Like a Pro with DNA on Amazon.com and other booksellers. You can also register for our online courses or study groups of the same names. Learn more at FamilyLocket.com/services. To share your progress and ask questions, join our private Facebook group by sending us your book receipt or joining our courses to get updates in your email inbox each Monday, subscribe to our newsletter at FamilyLocket.com/newsletter. Please subscribe, rate and review our podcast. We read each review and are so thankful for them. We hope you’ll start now to Research Like a Pro.
Links
Debra Hoffman profile in the APG Directory: https://www.apgen.org/users/debra-a-hoffman
Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/debra-a-hoffman-plcgs-358b9965/
NGS Research in Maryland book: https://www.ngsgenealogy.org/ris/maryland/
Karen Stanbary: https://karenstanbarygenealogy.com/why
Salt Lake Institute of Genealogy: https://slig.ugagenealogy.org/cpage.php?pt=524
Research Like a Pro Resources
Research Like a Pro: A Genealogist’s Guide book by Diana Elder with Nicole Dyer on Amazon.com – https://amzn.to/2x0ku3d
Research Like a Pro eCourse – independent study course – https://familylocket.com/product/research-like-a-pro-e-course/
RLP Study Group – upcoming group and email notification list – https://familylocket.com/services/research-like-a-pro-study-group/
Research Like a Pro with DNA Resources
Research Like a Pro with DNA: A Genealogist’s Guide to Finding and Confirming Ancestors with DNA Evidence book by Diana Elder, Nicole Dyer, and Robin Wirthlin – https://amzn.to/3gn0hKx
Research Like a Pro with DNA eCourse – independent study course – https://familylocket.com/product/research-like-a-pro-with-dna-ecourse/
RLP with DNA Study Group – upcoming group and email notification list – https://familylocket.com/services/research-like-a-pro-with-dna-study-group/
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