Category: DNA General

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Updates to My Children’s Polish Jarek Genealogy and Beyond

Recently I have in touch with a few people over a previous Blog I wrote. Actually there was more than one Blog:

  1. NOVEMBER 26, 2018 – Some Genealogy for my Children’s Maternal Side: Jarek and Cavanaugh
  2. NOVEMBER 26, 2018 – My Children’s Maternal Genealogy: Part 2 -More Poland and Jarek
  3. JANUARY 18, 2019 – Heather’s Jarek LIne At AncestryDNA
  4. NOVEMBER 18, 2019 – My Childrens’ Polish DNA and Genealogy

The first contact I had was from Laurie. She commented on my Blog #2 above. She is apparently a second cousin of my children. I see that my son JJ is a 2nd cousin by genealogy and DNA to a Roger:

Laurie is also on the Walter Jarek Line. Laurie has done a lot of research and has found that the marriage record for Francis’ wife at the top of the tree may be wrong concerning Antonina. According to Antonina’s marriage record from 1905 in Lowell:

This shows that Francis (or Frank) and Antonina were both born in Austria (today’s Poland). Antonina’s mother is listed as Agnes Letkowicz. Here are Frank and Antonina presumably on their wedding day:

I have that Antonina was 16 when she married. Frank was 26. The photo is quite interesting. It is likely that there are other Jarek and Wozniak relatives in the photo.

This is the 2001 letter that Laurie got from the Polish archives concerning Antonina:

I thank Laurie for taking the time to get this information. There is actually quite a bit of information in this documet. For example, the Godfather was Marcin Lekiewicz. Same surname given as Antonina’s mother in her marriage record. As Laurie pointed out in her email to me, this record also gives the parents of Antonina’s parents. It turns out that this information will correct a mistake I have in the Jarek tree and fill in some blanks. This is what I have now:

Here is my interpretation of Laurie’s letter from the Polish Archives:

My guess is that Polish is one of those languages that the female surname and male surname could be spelled differently. Hence the Dziuria for Weronika and Diuria for her father. I see I have the wrong birth date for Weronika. I’ll have to fix that later.

More on the Jarek Family in Poland from Laurie

Laurie also sent me this document:

This fills in some of the blanks on the Jarek family. This appears to be a church record or a type of census. I know about Cecylia as she was also in Lowell:

This is my daughter’s DNA match to the Matusik Line through Cecylia. The Jarek family in Poland had 9 children. It appears that 3 died young leaving 6. One married in Poland. However, the death date written for Jan is lighter, so I don’t know if that is right.

Back to the Wozniac Family

Laurie also sent me this:

Here Jacek is back to Jacenty. At the top, there is even a Jacentego. This probably all makes more sense if you are from Poland. This appears to be the marriage of Jacenty Wozniak and Weronia Dziura and includes their children. It looks like Jacenty had all girls. Perhaps other immigrated to the US. I wonder what the j.w. means after Antonina. The note appears to indicate that the records they were looking at ended in August 1889. However, I already have the detailed sheet on Antonina from Laurie earlier in the Blog.

Jedlicze is about three miles from Odrzykon:

The general area of these places is Southeast Poland:

I’ll add the information to my Ancestry tree from the paper above. I see that Jacenty was 24 and Weronika was 21 at the time of their marriage. As they married in January, I’ll assume that they turned 25 and 22 in 1883. That means that Jacenty was born about 1858 and Weronika 1861. This family apparently lived in the Northwestern part of Jedlicze:

Francis Jarek’s Baptismal Record

Finally, I have this from Laurie:

This is a detailed baptismal record as it gives Franciszek’s parents and grandparents.

My Childrens’ Polish Connections with Bill at Ancestry

I tested my childrens’ DNA at Ancestry and have been in touch with Bill. Bill and I have been corresponding since June 2009. In January 2020, Bill wrote:

I found our link!! After recording baptism, marriage and death I found at least on match! Blecharczyk, Valentine 1762-14 NOV 1820 married Sobon, Regina 1763-18 OCT 1821 Regina the daughter of Michael Sobon dom 142, 1729-27 JUL 1821. Their daughter Catharina married Jacob Was, Matusik line Their daughter Maria married Stanislaus Dudek, Wolfendale line

I got back to Bill and found out that the Was above was an autocorrected Ras as I had guessed. Unfortunately, Bill is a bit beyond me in his Polish genealogy. I’m not sure how this fits in with what I have. As a hint, Bill wrote:

so the Ras-Blecharczyk, their son Ras-Grzybala, their son Ras-Jarek,

Then most recently in January 2021, Bill wrote me:

You have an incorrect marriage in your tree 1843 November 21, dom51 150 Antonius Ras Jacobi et Catharina de Blecharczyki conj. cmethonum in Odrzykon filius catholic 23 single Regina Grzybala, Thoma et Anna de Galuszki conj. cmethonum in Odrzykon filia catholic 18 single

This must be where I went wrong. This message from Bill seems to indicate that Antonius Ras was the son of Jacobi and Catharina Blecharczyki.

Ras/Gryzbala

Here is what I have in my tree now:

If Antonius was 23 and the end of 1843, I’ll say he was probably born about 1820. I previously had this for Antoni:

However as I don’t know where I got that, I’ll go with what Bill has. Or, Antonius’ age at marriage could have been off also. Here is my correction:

I’ll keep the parents I had for Regina Grzybala as it seems like I was on the right track there.

Putting it Together

Normally I would put a tree together in Excel to see how these all fit together. But apparently I have already done that. Let’s see if it is still right:

That’s odd that I had created a tree about a year ago, but never made the correction on my Ancestry Family Tree. This is interesting because it shows how far back the connection is with Bill. I would not be surprised if there were other ways my children might connect with Bill. For example, the Such name sounds familiar:

The immigrant Francis Jarek’s mother was Marii Such. Perhaps there is also a connection with Bill through his 2nd great-grandmother Katarzyna Such.

It would be possible to expand the Francis Jarek Line on this tree. Here is what Ancestry shows for ThruLines:

ThruLines show DNA connections where there are also genealogical connections on paper. This is the view from my daughter Heather’s perspective. She has 6 matches on the Walter Jarek Line where Laurie is. One good thing in my improving my children’s tree is that Ancestry should be able to make better ThruLine connections similar to the ones above. Ancestry hasn’t figured out the connection that Bill has found yet.

Summary and Conclusions

  • Due to my ignorance in matters of Polish genealogy, I have depended on Laurie and Bill to correct and augment my children’s trees. As Blanche Dubois once said, “I have always depended on the kindness of strangers”.
  • I’m sure life was difficult in Poland. People don’t leave their homeland when times are good. A more thorough review would have looked at the history of Poland at the time.
  • By filling out the Jarek Line with their ancestors and relatives, I should be able to make more DNA and genealogical connections at AncestryDNA and elsewhere.

 

 

 

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A Tale of Two Mayflower Descendant Applications

For quite some time I have been of two minds as far as applying to the Mayflower Society. On the one hand, I already know I descend from several travelers on the Mayflower, so why should I pay someone to affirm what I already know is true. On the other hand, my friend Gary was thinking of joining, so that sort of tipped the scale for me. I wrote about Gary’s descent from the Mayflower last about a year ago. As you may guess, Gary is the second application referred to in the title of this Blog.

My Application

From what I read, approval of you being in the Mayflower Society is through the State Association. In my case, that is Massachusetts. The State Society is in Hingham and the National Mayflower Society is in Plymouth. I’ve been to the Plymouth Mayflower Library and bought books there, but I’ve never been to the Hingham Office. I called Hingham and the woman there wanted to know if I was sure of my Mayflower ancestry. I said I was. My White ancestor came to Rochester MA in the late 1600’s and my ancestors have lived there since. Plus, Rochester has tended to have pretty good records.

The woman emailed me an application and reminded me that I needed to send in a check with my application. Here is the relevant part of the application with some blurring of the living people:

I would have cost me $75 more for a Mayflower Lineage Match, so I skipped that step. I didn’t hire a genealogist, but I have my genealogical information at Ancestry and I have my own web site.

What Happens Next?

Here is what I found at the Massachusetts Society of Mayflower Descendants web page:

Application Process

This page describes the procedure for adult members. For Junior Members click here.

If you have identified a lineage from a Mayflower passenger to you, and have some evidence that it is correct, we invite you to proceed with a Preliminary Application Form. To make your application process as efficient as possible, and reduce the potential of unnecessary expense we recommend waiting until you receive your personalized worksheet and instruction guide before obtaining additional documentation.

Your application goes through a process on the journey for you to become a member. The average time for candidates is eleven months, but it can be as short as six from this office’s receipt of your application to your being mailed the acceptance of your membership.

First you obtain your preliminary application form. It can be mailed to you, emailed to you, or downloaded from this website. Fill it out completely and return it with a check for the appropriate amount for the options you have chosen for membership. Don’t forget to sign the application. Please do not submit documentation at this stage.

During the application process, the Historian will return a worksheet that details what is known about your lineage after researching in our library and membership files in the Massachusetts Society, and the General Society. If further primary documentation is needed, there will be bolded comment in the references section of the worksheet. This indicates that you will need to provide more documents to support that claim (of birth, marriage, or death).

This says that to become a member, it takes an average of 11 months. I assume that means that review of my Preliminary Application will be within a month or so. The last paragraph above is interesting. The Historian will send me what is known about my line already. I do have probably over 100 2nd cousins. Maybe one of them has already applied. I like the idea of finding out what research has been done on my line so I don’t have to duplicate the effort.

Once I hear from the Historian:

This is the time when you will personally research any gaps remaining on your application. When you are ready to return your documentation to support the items in bold, you do not need to send in a copy of the worksheet as we will have one here. Legible, unmarked copies of the requested documentation should be submitted via postal mail at this stage of the process. You also have the option of scanning your documents, and sending the digital images as attachments. Please remember to include your name in either a mailing or an email.

The Historian will review all the documents you have supplied. If further documentation is needed, the Historian will email a revised worksheet with the remaining issues highlighted. There may be an explanation of the different steps you can take to solve the problem areas. Please feel free to call or email with any questions you might have (anytime during this process). Just remember that the Historian is only in the office two days a week.

Once all the documentation has been received to the satisfaction of the Historian, you will be mailed a copy of your “final” application form on acid-free paper. At this point you are allowed to jump up and down for a few minutes of course keeping your fingers crossed. Please sign the form in black ink on the first page. Do review the document one last time to make sure there are no typographical errors. If you find one, on a separate piece of paper, (do not write on these final forms other than your signature), write out the correction you feel needs to be made and the Historian will deal with it when your final papers are returned. Include any fees outstanding as noted on the letter accompanying your final application.

When your signed final application is returned, it will be forwarded to the Historian General in Plymouth, Massachusetts, where the application will be reviewed one last time. The Historian General has the final say over what is approved. This review process takes about thirteen to fifteen weeks.

When it is approved and returned to the office, our Historian will mail you a certificate, a membership card, and a copy of your final application as approved by the Historian General. Congratulations! 

I suppose that this is what takes the six to eleven months. Fortunately, I do not live far from the Rochester Town Hall. Also, hopefully the person in charge of the records there will be understanding.

Why I Chose White for My Mayflower Application

I am descended from many of the original Mayflower travelers. My more recent line is Bradford. My great-grandmother’s mother was a Bradford. However, the records are not so good for that line. Many of these early Bradfords lived in Plymouth up to Harvey Bradford. He moved to Wareham, and then apparently to Rochester. My connection is through land records rather than vital records. It is possible that should I join the Mayflower Society, I could submit a Supplemental Application for my Bradford Line for a mere one-time fee of $200.

The records down from White on my line are pretty complete. I even know about where many of these ancestors lived within the Town of Rochester, Massachusetts where I grew up.

Mayflower Database

Here is something I didn’t realize. A lot of the Mayflower Descendant Applications are supposed to be online.

This is a FamilySearch article. I looked up Penelope White and found a tree:

I put a box around Francis Crapo, my ancestor. I don’t know what all the letters and numbers are for. I suppose they are numbers from the Mayflower Society. From there I can get out to Harvey Bradford:

Let’s take this all the way out:

This ends at Ralph Gurney and Annie Hartley. These are people I remember, so that is interesting. Their children were/are my father’s 1st cousins. So I assume that there is someone in the Gurney family who is/was in the Mayflower Society. I called my Gurney 2nd cousin who used to work at Plimouth Plantation, but she did not know of any of her relatives who were members of the Mayflower Society.

Update from the Massachusetts Society of Mayflower Descendants (MSMD)

I received this email today as I was writing this Blog:

We have received your check and application for the William White line, and have entered both in our process. Due to the back-log caused by the quarantine, it is taking a little longer, but you will receive a worksheet from our  State Historian with instructions for the submission of your documentation.

In the meantime, you could gather two COPIES of your birth certificate- long form showing parentage; 2 copies of your marriage certificate [if applicable] and two copies of your spouse’s birth. The General Society also requires these same documents for your parents, and death certificates [if applicable].

We look forward to working with you.

That is something to think about. My mother was born in Philadelphia and married in Pennsylvania. This could be more work than I thought. I suppose my marriage certiicate has to do with if I want to include my children.

Gary’s Application

Gary’s application hit a snag. Even though he is descended from William White, the research since about 1996 has brought this into question. Here are our two White lines:

The John on the left who is on Gary’s line is now thought to be illegitimate. John’s mother was likely Martha Doty. Here is a record from 1690:

Usually someone confronted with fornication had given birth. In this case, as the father was not named, it is assumed that Martha Doty/Doten did not offer that information. Further, it appears that Martha herself was born outside of marriage. According to the April, 1996 edition of The American Genealogist,

That makes me wonder if there were those who were admitted to the Mayflower Descendant Society before 1996 on the John White Line who were later found to not be from the William White Line.

That means that this appears to be Gary’s Mayflower LIne:

Mayflower Records at FamilySearch

Above, I traced a line that was close to mine. Are there Mayflower Lines that are close to Gary’s? First, I’ll check through Gary’s ancestor John White:

This does show that John White born in 1689 was the son of John White and Martha Doty. However, if this was right, John White Sr would have been 20 and Martha 17. Plus, the arguments against this being the case are pretty good. I assume that this was from an old tree before it was discredited. I’ll take this down Gary’s line:

This brings us from right to left over to Phineas born 1785.

Gary’s line goes through Augustus White to Walter White. Walter must be the brother of Edward Nelson White where the tree ends. These trees end at 1910, so it makes sense that the tree ends with Edward White born in 1881.

I could try Martha Doty, but that line would end at the same place.

Gary’s Doty Line

The Mayflower Database has some blanks when I do a search for Thomas Doty:

I’m not sure what a blank box means. It appears that there are three parts to the Edward Doty Mayflower Families. Thomas would be in Part 2:

It would be interesting to see what this book says. This book came out in 1996 – the same year The American Genealogist article came out that I mention above. The online book at American Ancestors does not show all pages. It starts with page 72 at the fifth generation. Page 73 has one of Gary’s ancestors:

It could be that these books are available at libraries that are not too far away.

Gary’s YDNA

If Gary has an unbroken line to William White from the Mayflower, then a YDNA test should show that. YDNA tests changes on the male line only. That is, father to father to father all the way back.

The Mayflower Society Project is one of Family Tree DNA’s (FTDNA’s) projects:

The White portion of the project is small:

However, the first tester has proven lineage to William White, Mayflower Passenger. It would have been better if this person had taken the BigY test, but they did take the STR test. The STR test is less definitive than the BigY test, but comparison to the combination of the tester’s STRs should be able to prove or disprove relationship to William White. It is easier to prove than to disprove with the STRs. The R-M269 is a very broad Haplogroup. It’s age is from 4,000 to 10,000 years old according to Wikipedia.

Apparently, whoever runs the project felt that the other two Whites beneath the proven White had a close enough match to the proven White to also descend from William White of the Mayflower.

Here are some of the comparisons of White markers:

The third row is the mode of the three testers. Changes from the mode are highlighted in pink or blue.

Summary and Conclusions

  • I don’t foresee any issues with my line to Mayflower William White. I’ll keep plugging away with my birth, marriage and death certificates until I hear further from the Massachusetts Mayflower Historian
  • Gary had a bump in the road with his direct line to William White. He could apply to the Mayflower Society under Doty, but he would rather apply under White
  • Gary has ordered a YDNA test which could prove or disprove that his ancestor John White was the illegitimate son of Martha Doty.

 

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A 23andMe DNA Match with My Daughter’s Namesake

I recently was contacted by a DNA match at 23andMe and she had the same name as my daughter. As 23andMe gives birth dates, I knew it was not my daughter but a second cousin of mine who was born before my daughter. As my great grandparents had 13 surviving children, I have a lot of 2nd cousins.

Heather’s DNA Match

Heather and I have a large DNA match. Heather shot to the top of my 23andMe match list:

Heather shares more than twice the amount of DNA with me compared to my other 2nd cousins at 23andMe. This had me concerned at first as I originally thought that Heather was a 2nd cousin once removed. At that level, her DNA match with me would have been off the scale. This had me going back to my online genealogy to check where Heather was on the family tree:

This tree shows my Hartley second cousins who have tested for DNA at different companies. I am missing some testers. I know there are more under Grace Hartley and I didn’t include my children or nieces and nephews. There are also other lines I have missed, so I should update this tree.

Heather is on the Greenwood line:

That brings me to a match with Heather who is two generations closer to Greenwood Hartley compared to Charles.

Heather Shares About as Much as DNA with Me as Possible:

The 7.84% DNA that we share is 584 cM. Blaine Bettinger has a shared DNA project. He gets people to tell him how much DNA they share with each relationship and he puts that in a chart:

When I thought that Heather was my 2nd cousin, once removed, I thought that something was wrong as our match would be off that chart. As it is, our match of 584 cM is very near the top reported 2nd cousin match.

23andMe Thought That Heather and I Were 1st Cousins

That was a bit of surprise. I suppose that was based on average shared DNA. But your mileage may vary as the saying goes. Here are some more numbers from the Shared cM Project:

Based on that study, our DNA match would indicate that we would be closer to 1st cousins once removed. Here are my two first cousins and three first cousins once removed at Gedmatch.com:

The first two in the orange box are 1st cousins on my mother’s side. The second three are 1st cousins once removed on my father’s (Hartley) side. The last is the highest 2nd cousin match at Gedmatch. That means that Heather at 584 cM has a higher match than my three 1st Hartley cousins once removed. These are my father’s cousins. I find that interesting.

The DNA that Heather and I share is from our two great grandparents. They are James Hartley and Annie Snell. Here they are with some of their children:

In fact, roughly half  of Heather and my shared DNA is from James Hartley and half is from Annie Snell. It is possible to figure out exactly which is which, but it takes matches with descendants of older common ancestors to figure that out. I’ll give a few examples later in the Blog.

23andMe Family Tree

23andMe has a Family Tree. They try to figure out your tree by the DNA, but that isn’t always precise. So they want you to add known relatives to that tree. Here is my tree:

Normally a family tree would have the paternal ancestors on the left, but this one does not. My Hartley ancestors are in blue on the right. Here is more of a close-up of the Hartley side:

One, person, DL, I don’t have matched up to a named line. Heather is on the Greenwood line and her father is Sonny’s brother. You don’t know the players without a program. My line goes off to the left where it matches up with my mother’s ancestors. It took a bit of trial and error to get Heather into the tree correctly at 23andMe, but I have her now:

This shows that Heather is 1st cousin to my 2nd cousin Woody.

DNA Painter

I have my Chromosomes painted or mapped by my various matches. I’d like to see if Heather adds any new information to that map. I already have a lot of Hartley 2nd cousins mapped. Here is what I have mapped so far:

My paternal DNA is on the top row of every chromosome and my maternal DNA is on the bottom row of each chromosome. The predominant green is where I would match Heather as that color represents James Hartley and Annie Snell our common 2nd great grandparents.

This shows up better when I choose my paternal-only side on the Painter:

It would be easier to say which chromosomes that Heather and I share no Hartley matches on. Those are Chromosomes:

  • 6
  • 17
  • 18
  • 19
  • 21
  • 22
  • X

Part of the reason that I may not have Hartley on a chromosome is that my chromosomes may have recombined or not recombined more likely to exclude Hartley on a certain Chromosome. The only two choices on my paternal side are Hartley or my father’s mother who was a Frazer. So if I got all Frazer DNA on a particular Chromosome, I will not have any Hartley matches on that Chromosome. I would not match Heather on the X Chromosome because men only recieve one copy of that Chromosome from their mother. That means I have no Hartley X Chromosome DNA. Heather doesn’t really have any Hartley X Chromosome DNA either. She did get an X Chromosome from her father, but that X Chromosome was the same that he got from his Gifford mother. So she got Gifford DNA from her father on the X Chromosome, not Hartley.

Right now I am 45% painted overall and 53% painted on my paternal side. I’ll see if Heather adds anything or if I am already maxed out. Here is the data I need for DNA Painter:

One interesting thing I see already is that my match with Heather starts at position 1 for Chromosomes 2, 4, 13 and 15. That would be right at the start of these chromosomes. I already have a match painted at or close to the beginning of Chromosome 2, but not at the beginnings of Chromosome 4, 13, and 15. That is encouraging.

I choose, “Paint a New Match”.

I refreshed my percent painted:

This shows that I am up to 47% painted now overall or an increase of 2%. I also added 17 segments from my match with Heather. However, I’m sure a lot of those segements are overlapping other Hartley/Snell matches.

On my paternal side I am now at 56%. That is a increase of 3 percentage points or quite a bit at this point in my mapping.

Here is my new green Hartley/Snell mapped DNA:

One interesting thing is that the Hartley side is filled up now on Chromosome 13. Here are my second cousin matches on Chromosome 13:

I kept the names out for privacy, but Heather is the match at the top. I have also mapped my DNA to my 4 grandparents. My guess is that my Chromosome 13 is all Hartley. I need to find my Blog on Chromosome 13. Back in November 2018, I mapped out my Chromosome 13 and that of my 5 siblings:

This was one of the easiest chromosomes to map because there were not many crossovers. The crossovers are when you change in your chromosome from the DNA you got from one grandparent to the spouse of that grandparent. I am in the third row above and I have all the same paternal grandparent (Hartley) and the same maternal grandparent (Rathfelder). That means that it was not unexpected to have my Chromosome filled in with green Hartley DNA on the DNA Painter that I mentioned earllier.

So in the example above, if Heather uploaded her DNA to gedmatch where I have my siblings’ DNA, she would not match my brother Jim on Chromosome 13. That is because Jim got Frazer DNA in the first part of his Chromosome 13 where Heather matched me. Heather would match Jon and Heidi as much as she matches me. For Lori and Sharon, Heather would match on Chromosome 13, but not as much as she matches me as she would be matching in different/fewer regions.

Heather’s Older DNA

The DNA that Heather and I share came down from James Hartley born in 1862 and Annie Snell born in 1866. I mentioned earlier in the Blog that it should be possible to identify some older DNA. That can be seen at DNA Painter. The first example I see of this is in Chromosome 4:

On this Chromosome, Heather matches me at the beginning and end of the Chromosome. In the middle, I have some matches from my Frazer side. In yellow, I have a match with Anne whose ancestry goes all the way back to Abraham Howorth (or so we believe). This DNA goes all the way back to 1768. The Howorth family lived in Bacup, Lancahsire, England:

 

Beth, Jim and Joyce didn’t match Ann on Chromosome 4, but they did on Chromosome 8. When that happens, we call that triangulation which is a sort of check that the DNA really did come from where we think it did. In this case, Heather would extend that triangulation to Chromosome 4. If Heather  uploads her DNA to Gedmatch, she would likely match Ann through their common 4th great-grandparents.

Chromosome 9

An example of identified Snell DNA is on Chromosome 9:

I left out the names, but my match in blue is Celeste. Her ancestors were Otis Snell and Mary Parker. My match with Heather is right above the blue match. That means that Heather likely matches Celelste also.

Here are Mary and Otis:

Those are the only two examples I have right now of older DNA. I would like to find more examples. This would require getting some of my AncestryDNA matches to upload to Gedmatch. AncestryDNA has a lot of matches but they do not use a Chromosome Browser. That means I can tell how much DNA I share with a match there, but I cannot tell on what chromosomes I match them nor can I tell on what portion of the chromosome I match them.

Summary and Conclusions

  • I was glad to hear from Heather
  • I was surprised at how much DNA we shared with each other. The amount is right near the top of the scale of likely DNA matching
  • Because Heather and I share so much common DNA that came down from James Hartley and Annie Snell born in the 1860’s, I was able to add a lot of DNA to my DNA Map using DNA Painter.
  • I showed a few cases where I could identify older DNA matches that Heather and I shared going back to Howorth, Snell and Parker.
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Frazer YDNA Loose Ends and Private Variants

In my previous Blog, I was caught a little off guard as I didn’t know that Rodney had tested for the BigY 700. However, that was good news as now we have a BigY 700 in both the James and Archibald Lines of the Frazer YDNA Tree. One confusing thing about FTDNA is that it is difficult to know when your BigY test has been completed. Here is Rodney’s order history:

This seems to indicate that his BigY was completed on January 14. However there are still more tests ordered by FTDNA. Another way to check is if Rodney’s Private Variants match up with the average Private Variants shown on the Block Tree. [Note: Later in the Blog I show that is not a good way to see if your BigY has completed.]

Here are Rodney’s Private Variants:

Rodney now has 7 Private Variants. These are described by their position numbers to distinguish them from SNP which need to have a match with someone. To get the average number of Private Variants for the James Frazer Line, we need to know the number of Jonathan’s Private Variants:

Jonathan has two. This averages out to 4.5. The Block tree shows an average of 4:

4 is close to 4.5, so I would say that the BigY analysis is complete – except for the Backbone Tests. The number of Average Private Variants went up from 2 to four probably on January 11th when the backbone test was ordered or on on January 14th when FTDNA shows the BigY was completed.

Rick’s Results

Rick shows that his BigY completed in December:

However, Rick has nine Private Variants:

Paul who is on Rick’s Branch has one Private Variant.

That is a total of 10 for Rick and Paul’s Frazer Branch for an average of five Private Variants. The Rick and Paul Branch of the Block Tree shows an average of three Private Variants. That means that FTDNA’s manual review must not be completed yet.

The James Line Private Variants

These should be the variants that have formed since Rodney’s and Jonathan’s common ancestor.

That common ancestor was Thomas Henry Frazer. Thomas Henry Frazer had, for sure, these two SNPs – Y151390 and FT421607:

I say, for sure, but the backbone tests seem to be confirming these. The point is that Rodney and Jonathan’s Private SNPs formed after Thomas Henry Frazer in 1836. By the way, I made a mistake in dating the Block Tree in a previous Blog, so I’l correct that here:

The slightly confusing part is that the 1836 is higher on the tree than the 1804. I think that could change as the average number of Private Variants right now appears to be 5 between Paul and Rick under the R-Y85652 part of the Tree. Say that some of the testers were born around 1950. That would mean that this Tree represents 750 years of Frazer YDNA history.

Jonathan’s Private Variants

Here is Martin’s take on Rick’s initial results. Martin is the FTNDA administrator for the portion of the R1a YDNA Tree that our Frazers are on. These have since changed since Rodney’s BigY 700 upgrade came in.

This shows Rick with a BigY-700, but doesn’t show Rodney in that category yet. I mention above, that Rodney has 7 Private Variants. The BigY 700 is more comprehensive and finds more variants. Before Rodney’s BigY 700 results came in, he only had one Private Variant. Jonathan has two Private Variants. They are the last two in the yellow box aove.

Jonathan’s first formerly Private SNP became part of the new James Line Haplogroup:

I don’t see BY84935 on the Block Tree, so if it isn’t there and isn’t on Jonathan’s Private Variant list, where did it go?

Here are Jonathan’t test results:

The mutation should be G to A, but Jonathan shows at least two reads that are G to T.

Let’s see how Rodney tested for this. This is now a named SNP, so no longer a Private Variant for Jonathan. I don’t see Rodney having BY84935:

Based on these two test results, this should still be a Private SNP for Jonathan.

Rick and Paul Have a ? for BY84935

Rick is sometimes positive for this SNP and sometimes not. Also, he seems to have a lot of similar results in this region of the Y Chromosome. Now I see why they took away this Private Variant from Jonathan.

Let’s check out Paul’s results:

Very similar to Rick’s results:

Based on these results, I’m a bit surprised that Jonathan ever had a Private Variant at this position. For Jonathan’s other two Private Variants, I will assume that they are correct. The bottom line is that Jonathan has two Private Variants. These are:

  • 11718822 and
  • 11720223

These had to have formed in Jonathan’s line in either Edward, Walter, or Jonathan:

In a sense, these Private Variants are not important from a genealogical point of view. Jonathan already knew he was a second cousin to Rodney. However, if anyone else ever tests positive for these Variants in the future, it will show that they are from this same Edward Fitzgerald Frazer Line.

Rodney’s Seven Private Variants

There is another use of Private Variants. These can be used to date the common ancestor between two people. A number between 83 and 144 years is generally used. However, that time-frame does not work well in the case of Rodney and Jonathan. Their ancestor is believed to be Thomas Henry Frazer born 1836. Even if we take that date from 2021, that is 185 years ago. That means that, at most, there should have been an average of three private variants between Jonathan and Rodney where there are 4 (and actually 4.5). That means that these Variants were forming about every 40 years or about twice as fast as would be expected, on average.

Here are Jonathan and Rodney’s average of 4 Private Variants:

Rodney’s Private Variant at Position # 11830989

I don’t want to go through each of Rodney’s Private Variants, but I will at least look at one:

I don’t think that FTDNA shows test results in the browser for Private Variants if you are not positive for them. Here is Jonathan’s downloaded results for this position:

It looks like Jonathan’s results were less than conclusive.

Next, I’ll look at Paul’s results:

Paul was not tested at that position.

Let’s see what Rick has. I need to download his ‘csv’ file. I would expect that Rick would have good results as he has tested for the BigY700:

Here is a surprise. This shows that Rick has this Private Variant. That means that it can no longer be Private. That is good because it means that Rodney has one less Private Variant. I don’t know why FTDNA didn’t pick this up:

That means that this should be a new SNP included in the umbrella SNP group of Frazer. At YBrowse Position # 11830989 is FT420438:

The good news is that this will take away one of Rick’s Private Variants as he has too many already.

Rodney’s Private Variant at Position # 5987829

I did a comparison of Rodney’s and Rick’s Private Variants and found one more match:

This brings up another reason that Private Variants are important. If they match with someone else’s Private Variant, they form a new SNP. Usually FTDNA will catch that. In this case, they are still in the middle of some of their reviews and have ordered backbone tests for Rodney and Jonathan. It is possible that FTDNA is not sure where to put these new SNPs. This seems to indicate that they are Frazer SNPs, but perhaps they go back even further?

Here is what YBrowse shows:

These two SNPs are interesting as YBrowse shows that they are from an unknown Haplogroup. That seems to support my theory that FTDNA doesn’t know where these SNPs belong. Here are Rodney’s test results for the position:

Here are Rick’s results:

If Rodney and Rick are positive at this Position, then Paul and Jonathan should also be positive.

Paul’s results above were inconclusive.

How about Jonathan’s?

Jonathan’s test results were also inconclusive.

FT420438 and FT420010 Frazer SNPs?

If it was up to me, I would add these two SNPs to this area:

That means that there would be 8 SNPs in this area instead of the current six. So far, everyone how has tested for these SNPs have been Frazers. However, the six or eight SNPs represent four or five hundred years of history. It would be great to fill in some of the blanks for this time period. It may be that FTDNA hasn’t finished their review or are awaiting the results of the two backbone tests they are doing.

Changes to Frazer Testers’ Private Variants

The other change that should be happening is that Rick and Paul’s Average Private variants under R-Y85652 should be going up. They show 3 currently. Rick has 9 but two of these are shared with Rodney. Rick should have 7 Private Variants and Paul has one Private Variant. That should result in an average of four Private Variants under the Archibald Frazer LIne of R-Y85652.

Rodney currently has 7 Private Variants, but two of those are shared with Rick. That should results in 5 Private Variants for Rodney. Jonathan has two Private Variants. If FTDNA rounds down, that will result in an average of 3 Private Variants for the James Line Branch under R-Y151390.

Further, I note this under FTDNA:

This says it could be that the two matches I found between Rodney and Rick could be there because they haven’t properly been properly validated yet. Hence the backbone test which is in process.

Summary and Conclusions

  • I started out trying to figure out if Rodney and Rick’s BigY reviews were done or not.
  • I thought that perhaps Rodney’s review was done because the Block tree average number of Private Variants matched with his and Jonathan’s Private Variants.
  • Then, when I started comparing Rodney and Rick’s Private Variants, I saw that they had two in common. That means that if Rodney’s review was over, there was still two SNPs to be assigned to the Frazer Block Tree.
  • I guessed that perhaps FTDNA had trouble placing these new SNPs and that is why they ordered the Backbone tests for Rodney and Jonathan
  • I had thought that if your Private Variants matched with what the average Private Variants were on the Block Tree, then that meant that your BigY manual review was over. But then I found something at FTDNA that said that may not be true.
  • I had thought that the Backbone tests ordered for Rodney and Jonathan were to confirm their new Haplogroup of R-Y151390. Now it appears more likely that the Backbone test is for the two matching Private Variants that Rodney and Rick have with each other.
  • It could be a month or more before the dust settles for Rick’s new BigY 700 test and Rodney’s upgrade from BigY 500 to BigY 700. By then, we will probably have the results from the new Frazier/Frasher BigY 700 test which has been delayed.
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Two New Frazer YDNA Haplogroups: R-Y151390 and R-Y85652

Family Tree DNA has issued the Frazer family two new Haplogroups as seen in Rick’s block tree below:

R-Y151390 and R-Y85652

I was only expecting one new Haplogroup for the Archibald Frazer Branch (shown as “Your branch” above. Previously, I was disapointed that Rodney’s previous test did not form a new branch for the James Frazer Line. Apparently Rick’s BigY test also gave FTDNA the confidence to create a James Frazer Branch shown in the bottom left portion of the Block Tree above.

The James Line and the Archibald Lines were previoiusly under R-YP6489 which is now an umbrella group over the two new Frazer subgroups.

R-Y85652

This Archibald Frazer Branch came out as predicted by the R1a – L664 FTDNA Project Administrator Martin. The Archibald Frazer Branch is the one below near the date 1804:

I added the dates in black above from my previous Blog. Apparently the manual review has not completed (or started?) yet. My understanding is that there is a mechanical/automated review first before the manual review. Note that the Private Variants do not line up. Martin has Rick with 10 Private SNPs. The Block tree shows an average number of three private variants between Paul and Rick. Rick’s Private Variant List at FTDNA has gone down to nine pressently:

It’s a puzzle trying to find the difference between Martin’s list and FTDNA’s. Martin has the additional Private Variant numer of 11683336. If Rick had 13 private variants and three went to the new Archibald Frazer Line, then he should have 10 left.

11683336

Here is 11683336 at YBrowse:

This must be a new Private Variant as it has no name yeat at YBrowse. This Private Variant may have gone up to the umbrella group of YP6489. Here is Rick’s previous Block Tree:

The old YP6489 had five SNPs. The new group has six:

FT421618 is the new SNP in that group. That means that Rick’s BigY results ended up changing the umbrella Frazer group of YP6489 as well as creating two new groups (for Archibald and James Frazer) under that group.

More on FT421618

The FT series is FTDNA’s newer SNPs. As seen by the fact that YBrowse is not yet aware of this SNP, this must be a brand new SNP. In order for this position to be a true Private Variant for Rick, it has to show as negative in Rodney, Jonathan and Paul. FTDNA probably looked at their results and saw that Rodney, Jonathan  and Paul tested for this posisiton and it wasn’t clear that they didn’t test positive for this position.

Here is Rick’s results:

What this shows is that Rick is very positive for this SNP. 10 good reads is usually OK. He has many more than 10 good reads.

Here are Paul’s results:

There is a little arrow where the results should be, but there is nothing there. That is probably what is called a no-call.

Here are Jonathan’s results:

Jonathan has four good reads. Remember that for Rick to have this position as a Private Variant, the others have to be negative for this position. Jonathan didn’t have enough reads to give him this SNP on his own, but because Rick tested really well for it, then Rick and Jonathan must both have this SNP. That is how it got added to the Frazer Umbrella Haplogroup.

Finally, we look at Rodney:

Rodney has only one good read for this SNP, so Rick confirms this single read.

Where Does R-Y151390 Come From?

This is the new James Frazer Line Haplogroup that FTDNA is showing on their Block Tree, I am having trouble finding this SNP perhaps because it has not been on a tree before. When I search on YBrowse:

When I search for Y151390 at FTDN, BY151390 shows up which is a different SNP. Without knowing what position Y151390 is, I cannot do further analysis on it. I have one more place to look. Here is Jonathan’s non-Block Tree at FTDNA:

When I hover over the SNPs under R-Y151390:

The first is Positive and the second is presumed negative. However, I still don’t know what position that Y151390 is at. That means that I can’t figure out how FTDNA arrived at their decision.

A Google search for this SNP revealed that I had mentioned Y151390 in at least one of my old Blogs:

The answer appears to be at YFull. After clicking around a while at YFull, this appears to be the position of Y151390:

For some reason, this named SNP was perhaps never uploaded to YBrowse:

So it appears that FTDNA got the name of its SNP for the James Frazer Branch from YFull. I believe that the Y prefix is from YFull. Further it is unclear how my cousin Paul was listed under Y151390 at YFull and is now not in that group at FTDNA.

FT421607

This is the other SNP in the new YDNA Tree for the James Frazer Line. I can’t find it right now listed as being tested for either Jonathan or Rick. That means that it must be still listed under the position number. As I don’t know what the position number was, I can’t find the test results for the position. An FT prefix refers to a new SNP by FTDNA. Here are the search results for Jonathan:

 

Summary and Conclusions

  • Recently FTDNA came out with three important developments for our Frazer group. One was expected and two were not.
  • What was expected was that there would be a new Haplogroup for the Archibald Frazer Line based on three different SNPs
  • The first unexpected thing was that there would be a new SNP added to the now umbrella of R-YP6489. This group is now over the two Frazer Lines of Archibald and James. This new SNP could theoretically make the age of YP6489 older by about 100 years.
  • The second unexpected thing was that a new Haplogroup formed for the James Line. I had expected this to happen when Rodney did a BigY test but it didn’t happen. This new Haplogroup is R-Y151390. I was unable to see how FTDNA arrived at this conclusion. I think that it will be clear as the manual review progresses.
  • Hopefully, subsequent review will confirm this new James Line Haplogroup
  • Rick’s new test results in conjunction with the previous three Frazer BigY tests has resulted in a quantum leap in the Frazer YDNA Tree. These results are helpful in a quite recent timeframe. They cover the time from ancient history up to the 1800’s when the genealogical records became more reliable.

 

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My Look at an R1a Administor’s Review on Frazer BigY Results

Sorry for the awkward title on the Blog. Things are moving quite quickly after a 4 month wait for Frazer BigY results. I wrote my first review the day the initial results came out on December 29th. Martin’s initial review came out on January 2, 2021. Happy New Year.R1

Martin’s New S2880 Tree

Martin, who live in the Netherlands, is the L664 Project Administrator for FTDNA’s R1a YDNA Project. Here is L664 on the left of the image below:

 

This is from a 2015 R1a Tree.  At that time, L664 was dated around 3,000 BC.  L664 is in blue on the bottom left of the image above. Martin has updated what he calls Section 2b or S2880 as of January 2, 2021. Here is where that is on the bottom left side of the 2015 tree:

 

Here is where S2880 is on Martin’s new tree:

The date for S2880 is about 1800 BC:

Here are the four Frazer BigY testers on the tree:

Here is a more close-up version:

Above YP6489 is the date 1200 AD. Below that box is 1600 AD. That is an important jump as it brings us into more of a genealogical time-frame. It is also important to understand the what these two dates mean. It says that the SNP YP6489 (which is actually a group of SNPs) formed about 1200 AD. The shared group of Frazers go back to 1600 AD (by DNA). This is probably 1690 or so by our genealogy, so a pretty good agreement. However, others outside our group who descend from our 1690 Roscommon Frazer and who share YP6489 could have have an earlier shared date. We are currently awaiting BigY results for a Frazier/Frasher who may fit into this category. His results should show where he fits in.

The last four vertical lines are the Frazers in our group. They are Rodney and Jonathan in the James Frazer Branch. The last two are Paul and Rick in the Archibald Frazer Line. They are the two with all the projected private SNPs.

Martin’s Review

Rick and Paul’s Shared Private SNPs

This is the most important part, because these shared private SNPs willl become a new Frazer YDNA branch. Martin writes:

You have 13 private SNP’s and I found that you share 3 of your private SNP’s with the private SNP’s of Frazer #[number deleted for privacy]. This means you both create a new subclade downstream Subclade YP6489, which I have called Y85652.  

In my first review, I only found two private SNPs that Paul and Rick shared. Martin was able to find three:

These three are shown in the block where the bolded Y85652 is. Here were the two variants that I found:

Positions 8162400 and 21457649

These were the two that I found. Martin has these as SNPs Y85652 and Y112046. In my previous Blog, I had identified that Rick and Paul had matching SNPs Y85652 and Y112046. So that looks like we agree.

Position 16784516 aka Y102972

This is the posiition that Martin found and that I didn’t see in my initial review. Here is my spreadsheet:

I Show that Rick and Rodney have position 16784516 as a non-matching variant but that Rick and Jonathan do not. I may have deleted this entry by mistake. Actually I see this variant above on Jonathan’s list, so I just did not match these correctly:

You have to think backwards with these lists. So if Rick has non-matching variants with both Rodney and Jonathan who are in the James Line. That means that he must have matching variants at those locations with Paul in the Archibald Frazer Line.

Here is Richard Frazer born 1830:

Here is George Frazer born about 1838:

Assuming that this is right (and it appears to be) that means that there was on average one SNP mutation every generation for Archibald Frazer born 1720, Philip Frazer born 1758 and James Frazer born 1804. Also this assumes that we have the genealogy right. We don’t know which ancestor had which mutation. However, it would be possible to find that out if we had descendants from each of these lines test. That is also assuming that there is an unbroken male descendant in each of these lines.

Here is one of Martin’s comments:

Normally we find in the BigY-700 on average a number of 100 years per SNP (or one SNP mutation in every 4-5 generations). So when we assume the Frazer family splits around 1600 AD in 4 branches, then you expect on average for each about 4 private SNP’s. You and #444958 have now about 12-13 SNP’s downstream subclade YP6489 and the other two Frazer’s only 1-3 SNP’s. But sometimes we see large differences in the SNP mutation rate in individual cases.

My opinion is that a male generation was longer between 31 and 38 years so on average 34.5 years. Of course this varies at different times and in different places. Still, with my version, there would be a new SNP every three generations as opposed to the one generation we are seeing here.

The bottom line is that I see my mistake and Martin and I are in agreement on the number of matching private variants that Rick and Paul have in the Archibald Frazer Line.

A Side Thought on Male Frazers

A little ways above, I mentioned the need for an unbroken male line for Frazer YDNA testing. Here is the line of Archibald Frazer born about 1778 and Ann Stinson. This Archibald was the son of Archibald born about 1720 and Mary Lilley:

Out of about 27 or so who tested for autosomal DNA under the Archibald Line born about 1720, I see only about two who would be eligible for YDNA testing. If these two tested, it would confirm this line by YDNA. Their common ancestor would be Archibald born about 1778.

On the James Frazer Line the first two circled on the bottom have taken the BigY test.

There are two others on the left hand side who haven’t taken the YDNA test.

Rick and Paul and Private Variants

To me the private variants are not as important as the shared SNPs. These are variants that should describe a line after the shared ancestor of the two testers.

So Rick’s Private Variants would describe his line starting with Richard Patterson Frazer. Paul’s private variants describe his lineage starting with George Frazer born about 1838. George is my second great-grandfather.

Here is what Martin has to say about Rick’s Private Variants:

You and #444958 have now about 12-13 SNP’s downstream subclade YP6489 and the other two Frazer’s only 1-3 SNP’s. But sometimes we see large differences in the SNP mutation rate in individual cases. I have also checked your 10 private SNP’s in the Yfull results of #444958, but for these 10 private SNP’s of yours, 8 gave a negative result and 2 gave a “no-call” because these two were not tested in his BigY-500 test.  

I am a bit confused by Martin’s use of what he calls downstream SNPs or private SNPs.

These are the numbers in the last yellow boxes for Rodney, Jonathan, Paul and Rick. Paul currently has 4 private SNPs. Because of his three matches with Rick, that will go down to one. However, Martin adds in private eight private SNPs identified by YFull.

Here are some of Paul’s ‘Novel’ Variants at YFull:

I highlighted the first Private SNP that Martin has identified on Paul’s yellow box above. Paul has two more Novel SNPs under his Best quality tab. I see that some on the YFull list say private and some say up to R-YP6489. According to YFull:

The words up to [name of subclade]  after a Novel SNP means that the eventual location of the SNP may be as far in the past as the named subclade or closer to the present than the current Terminal Hg.

That means that they aren’t sure if those SNPs belong in with YP6489 or after it. Just another way to slice and dice things. For the SNPs that say ‘private’, they must be after YP6489 for sure.

Rick then shows 10 private variants. These also don’t make sense in a way. If these are valid, then these would all be in five generations of his Richard Patterson Frazer line. That would mean that there were two mutations per generation. I’ll just depend on Martin’s analysis for now and wait to see if FTDNA’s manual review reduces these SNPs at all.

Dating the YDNA Tree

We can use what we know about Frazer genealogy to get better dates on this tree. The date of ca 1600 is probably a bit early. We think that the father (probably Archibald) of the Archibald and James Lines was born around 1690. Our best bet at dating is from the Elphin Census:

For sake of argument, we’ll say that Archibald Sr was born in 1690 and died at age 50 or so around 1740.  Perhaps Mary was younger and born in 1695. Let’s say she had Archibald in 1718 and James in 1720. We’ll say they both married at age 25. We know that James married in 1745. He had two children by 1749. We’ll say they were only age 1 and 3 at the time. Archibald could have married in 1743 and had children aged 1 3 and 5 in 1749. Just a guess.

All this to say that Archibald Frazer Senior could not have been born 1600. I would stick to 1690 and put that date in where the 1600 is. Then we know that the common ancestor for Rick and Paul is James Frazer who was born about 1804:

Summary and Conclusions

  • I appreciate Martin’s quick and thorough review of Rick’s test results and his incorporation of those results into Setion 2b of his L664 Tree
  • The new name Frazer Branch in the Archibald Frazer line will include three SNPs
  • I was able to identify four people who would qualify for YDNA testing from my charts of Frazers who have already taken autosomal tests. These people are rare because they have to have unbroken male line Frazer ancestry
  • I looked at Rick and Paul’s private variants briefly and will wait for the FTDNA manual review on these.
  • I looked at fine-tuning the dating of the Frazer YDNA BigY Tree based on what we know about our Frazer genealogy.
  • Next on the horizon is the Frazier/Frasher test we are waiting for and Rick’s FTDNA manual review.

Addendum on 16784516 and New Information from David Vance

This is the extra SNP that I missed. Here it is at YBrowse:

This would have been discovered at the time of my cousin Paul’s initial BigY test. David Vance recently posted a chart with the regions of the Y Chromosome:

DaveidVance has this as a good region even though it shows in a darker region on the YBrowse browser.

So SNP Y102972 is a SNP that Rick and Paul share. We’ll have to wait and see which SNP FTDNA calls this portion of the Archibald Frazer Branch.

8162400

David Vance lists this in not the best region:

Here is more from David:

21457649

David doesn’t list this as the greatest either. Based on David’s chart Y102972 would be the best SNP name for this section of the Archibald Frazer Line. Whatever the name, I think that it is interesting that the BigY test has defined a specific area of the Archibald Frazer Branch of the Frazers from Roscommon, Ireland.

 

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My Children’s Lowell Ancestors in Newspapers

Seeing as I have subscribed to newspapers.com, I am looking to see what is there. They do cover Lowell. I’ll start there and see what I find.

Here is my children’s mother’s genealogy:

The Polish top half came to Lowell later than the bottom half of the genealogy.

Jarek

17 December 1929

The Hartford Courant:

It looks like the coverage for Jarek in the Lowell Sun starts in 1936:

28 October 1938

Jules is Julius – my children’s grandfather. Walter was his brother. Julius was about 27 in 1936.

11 January 1930

15 January 1930

Here’s an interesting Boston Globe story. The newpaper dates before 1936 seem to be mostly from the Boston Globe.

I see that Julius aka Gerald was the top scorer for Lowell.

3 March 1930

28 April 1933

In case you missed seeing this game live:

6 May 1933

11 May 1934

I’m assuming that Julius also played baseball, but perhaps this was his brother Walter. Walter was listed as basketball captain in the Lowell Tech Yearbook in 1934, so this is more likely Walter.

3 January 1931

So this game was brother against brother.

26 October 1940

Draft numbers from the Burlington Daily News:

12 August 1943

The Burlington Free Press:

Cavanaugh

2 January 1974

From the Lowell Sun:

10 March 1945

The Miami News:

11 March 1945

 

Note that Agnes’ sister Helen is listed as Helen Rowbotham. I don’t think that is right.

Helen Cavanaugh Born 1917

11 November 1944

15 November

14 July 1991

Leona M Morrow Born 1891

Here is Leona’s birth record from Lowell. She was actually born in 1890:

It looks like someone may have added her in after the fact.

Her father was a jeweller:

Her mother was said to be born in Canada. I didn’t see any newspaper entries for Laona. Here is Marshall St in Lowell. I don’t know if it is the same as Marshall Place:

Summary and Conclusions

  • I found it interesting reading about Julius Jarek’s basketball games. I recall him being inducted into the hall of fame at Lowell Tech.
  • I got interested in Agnes Cavanaugh’s sister Helen when the Miami newspaper wrongly referred to her has a Rowbotham. I suppose the reporter did not realize that Agnes had been married previously.
  • I was not able to find out anything on the Morrow side. However, I did find Laona Morrow’s birth record in Lowell.
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The John Williams Family as Seen in Fall River Newspapers

Previously, I have looked at many of the Fall River newpaper entries for Officer Abe Pilling, the jeweler Abel Burrows and his wife Mary Ann Hartley Burrows. Abel and Mary Ann had one daughter out of three who survived and married. She was Elizabeth A Burrows born in 1874 in Fall River. She married John Williams who worked at Abel’s jewelry store. I suppose that a follow-up on the Pilling family will also be in order at some point.

What I found with Mary Ann Hartley Burrows was that most of her newspapers entries were listed under Mrs. Abel Burrows.

4 Sep 1900

I had shown this before, but missed the second part:

I had previously guessed that Joseph Hartley was really 9 year old James Hartley, my grandfather. The other guess is that the two women accompanied the two children back and stayed for a while in Rochester.

5 March 1903

23 February 1907

The Fall River Globe didn’t miss many events:

13 January 1912

I wonder who was there from Rochester. By the way, Orlando or Orleando Draper was the brother of Walter Draper mentioned in my previous Blog. Mary Ann Burrows was listed as Walter’s guardian. I believe that it was also Orelando Draper who traveled to New York with Abel Burrows when Abel got a telegram that his daughter was ill.

25 February 1913

13th and 18th birthdays were big deals for the Williams girls. I wonder who wrote up these stories. Did Fall River Evening Herald have a birthday party reporter?

3 September 1913

Of course, I know this was actually Mary Ann Burrows.

16 October 1913

Listed under Tiverton news:

10 July 1914

Under the heading of Tiverton:

20 January 1915

Elizabeth Burrows Williams’ father-in-law:

29 October 1915

Mary Ann Hartley Burrows is mentioned but as Burroughs. Some entries were mentioned in my previous Blog, so I will omit them here.

23 February 1918

I may have this elsewhere:

According to Google, $18 from 1918 would be worth about $310 today.

17 April 1918

My guess that Mrs. Mary Bellow above was actually Mary Burrows. Quite a few parties were held at this house. This is what Google shows at 585 Cherry Street  currently:

 

6 November 1919

18 October 1920

8 March 1921

14 January 1922

This tells me that John kept on as a jeweller. Mrs. Marion Wilmot sounds familiar.

Marion was the daughter of Marion Ann Pilling.

2 May 1922

I guess that my cousin was a member of the Central Baptist Always Busy Club.

19 Jun 1922

29 June 1922

Looks like the Fall River Evening News got the scoop on this one:

6 July 1922

5 April 1923

I wouldn’t want to miss any 18th birthdays:

12 July 1923

DNA Matches

Here are my matches at Ancestry to this side of the family:

 

Summary and Conclusions

I think that the availability of the Fall River Newspapers at newspapers.com stops about 1923. I have a few reasons for following Elizabeth Burrows Williams. One is that she is the daughter of Mary Ann Hartley Burrows. Mary Ann was the sister of my great-grandfather. Also I have DNA matches to two people through Mildred Williams.

Reading these newspaper articles give some details into the Williams family. Also it is interesting to see the differences between today and then. I can’t imagine a birthday party today including military marches and ending with the Star Spangled Banner. The Williams appeared to have had a less tragi life than the Burrows. The Burrows lost two of their three daughters to illiness. It appeared that all the Williams children survived.

 

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Mary Ann Hartley Burrows in Fall River Newspapers After 1903

In my previous Blog, I looked at Abel Burrows, the husband of Mary Ann Hartley. He died in 1903, so that was a natural ending for that Blog. I’ll look to see what else the Fall River newspapers have to say about my relatives after 1903 in this Blog. In my previous Blog, by looking at Abel, I found out some more about other relatives, such as the Hartley family who visited him and he visited in Rochester. Also, of course, I learned about his wife, Mary Ann. I’ll look some more at Mary Ann in this Blog.

6 Jun 1904

This article raises some questions. What relatives did she visit? I assume that they were Bacup relatives on the Emmet side.  Mary Ann Hartley was born in Bacup where her mother Ann Emmet was from. She could have also visited Abel Burrows’ relatives. Mary Ann returned on the SS Saxonia on September 8. This was the same ship that Abe Pilling and his family took to England a few years previous. Here the ship is called the RMS Saxonia:

12 Sep 1904

I wonder if Bank St is a typo. I have her at Oak Street in the 1906 Fall River Directory:

22 September 1905

Listed under real estate transactions:

See below for more information. Stetson St goes by the Western side of Oak Grove Cemetery:

3 Apr 1906

This was some kind of infection.

4 August 1909

There is an Island Park Beach and Island Park Cove in Portsmouth, RI not too far from Fall River.

4 July 1912

According to the 1900 Census, Mary Cowgill was a widow living with her son William Marshall at 210 Franklin Street, Fall River.

7 August 1912

From the Fall River Globe under the heading of Tiverton:

There is a Riverside Drive on the current Google Map of Tiverton:

Annie Hartley was born November 1902, so she would be 9. Margaret was born May 1906, so she would be just 6 years old. Florence and Mildred were Mary Ann’s granddaughters. Florence was 12 and 8. That leaves Sadie Edmundson of Providence. Who is she?

Here she is in 1910:

Sarah or Sadie was born in Massachusetts which makes sense. Sadie was actually born in 1897 in Fall River. Her father was a barber. The mother was Elizabeth Barlow. I think that William was from Blackburn, Lancashire so perhaps a friend of the Burrows family?

Actually, this newpaper article from the Fall River Evening News from 8 September 1905 sheds some light:

I assume that means that Mary Ann’s relationship was with Elizabeth Barlow who was a Draper before she was an Edmundson. Here is Orange Street:

More on Walter Draper

Although Walter is said to be born in Rhode Island in the Census above, I find a record of his birth in Fall River on June 22, 1885. His father was Oswald, a weaver. As might be expected, Oswald died in 1894. At that time, he was a restaurant keeper. Elizabeth Barlow Draper then married William Edmundson in 1897. It was William’s second marriage also. One question is why was Mary Ann Walter’s guardian if Elizabeth remarried? As may be guessed, Walter Draper poses more questions than answers.

This could be Walter’s grave stone:

This is interesting unless it is coincidental. My third great-grandmother Mary Pilling’s mother was a Shackleton. I take this to be the same Walter:

Here is a photo that gives some dates of these burial mates:

Edmundson can be explained. He was Walter’s step father. Albert Shackleton married Sarah. The Shakleton name looks like a coincidence. These Shackletons were from Yorkshire, so perhaps distantly related to my Lancashire Shackletons. However, none of this suggests why Mary Ann Hartley Burrows would be the guardian of Walter Draper.

3 Sep 1913

Under the heading of Tiverton:

Here is Quaker Ave., Tiverton:

12 November 1913

23 February 1918

16 April 1918

Here is the Fall River Globe version:

World War I ended November 11, 1918.

30 October 1920

2 December 1920

I have that Mary Ann was born 30 April 1855, so she would be 65 in 1920. Findagrave.com has her birth on 1 December 1854, so that makes more sense.

3 March 1921

I like these pleasant little articles:

Again, I think by Marion is actually meant Rochester. Here is a photo with Mary – possibly from that trip:

 

I believe Mary Ann is to the left of my grandmother. My grandmother is near the middle of the photo and has dark hair and is holding a child – probably my Aunt Sybil. My Aunt Sybil was born 8 September 1920, so the photo may be from 1922. Here is a close-up of Mary Ann:

Eighth Street was not far from Oak Street:

7 July 1921

This was under the heading of Ocean Grove:

15 April 1923

Here is Cherry Street:

That about covers what I could find on Mary Ann Hartley Burrows. Here is her grave stone taken from Ancestry:

I’ll look into the Williams family more in my next Blog.

Summary and Conclusions

  • Between this Blog and the one on Abel Burrows, I have a better picture of who Mary Ann Hartley was and the type of things that she did.
  • At some point, she must have gone from Episcopal to Baptist, perhaps due to Abe?
  • I was disappointed to not find her obituary at newspapers.com. The note said that the obituary had been removed or relocated.
  • The social customs of the day were interesting. Apparently social gatherings were very important and newsworthy
  • Mary Ann had a high regard for her daughter and granddaughter based on parties given for them and the gifts given to them
  • Mary Ann was also brave as she apparently traveled alone to England, Scotland and France.

 

 

Posted on

Another Hartley Relative in Fall River Newspapers: Abel Burrows

In my previous Blog, I wrote about Abe Pilling who was a policeman in Fall River from about 1890 until 1925. I had good luck with finding out a lot about this very public man. Next I thought that I’d check around for other relatives. This Blog will focus in on Abel Burrows who was the husband of Mary Ann Hartley. However, some other Hartley relatives will be mentioned.

1 Nov 1870 – Death of Twelve Year Old Esther Hartley

 

One of the first entries was a sad one. The Hartley family arrived in the US not much more than a year before this time.

Other Wilkinsons were listed on the previous page. Mary Wilkinson was Greenwood’s mother. The ship arrived in Boston on  25 Ocober 1869. The Hartley family lived in Fall River for only a year or less before moving to New Bedford.

Mary Ann Hartley and Abel Burrows

I had to find this 16 February 1874 article by searching for Burrows. Hartley was hypeneated in the paper. Mary Ann looked to be 18 but is listed as 19 on the State Marriage record. Abel was a weaver at the time. I wonder how the two met as Mary Ann lived in New Bedford and Abel in Fall River.

Mary Ann’s grandmother Mary Pilling Hartley Wilkinson died not too soon after the wedding:

The above is from 25 Mar 1874.

18 May 1878

14 April 1880

7 June 1880

5 August 1880

19 June 1882

21 June 1882

Was Abel a cricket player? Cricket is a very English game, but there were many English in Fall River.

13 Feb 1884

30 April 1884

27 June 1884

Friends of the family?

Here is Linden Street:

6 Sep 1884

Here are Abel’s wife and children:

8 Sep 1884

Now we know Nancy’s nickname.

29 Jana 1885

Here is a map:

There is a balloon located at 47 South Main located at the intersection of at least two streets. I circled where the old business was and Linden Street. I wonder if the family home moved also at this time. If he did move, it was not right away. Here is the 1885 Fall River Directory:

20 Mar 1885

That would explain how Abel came by the jewelry business. Emanuel decided to stay. According to the 1900 census he arrived in the US in 1885 with his wife and daughter.

24 March 1885

24 April 1885

Here was a way to get people to Abel’s store:

25 June 1885

23 Dec 1886

 

8 Mar 1887

I guess I didn’t expect to find out so much about Abel.

15 July 1887

10 August 1887

This is of interest to me as I grew up in Rochester. Perhaps Mary Ann visited her brother James Hartley while in Rochester. According to the 1885 Fall River Directory, John Slinn was in the insurance business.

It turns out that John Slinn wrote an article of his trip to Rochester in the Fall River Daily Herald published 12 August 1887.

That is quite the fish story and I had to chuckle picturing where most of this took place. My guess is that the fishing took place at Snow’s Pond not too far from the Hartley farm. What the article doesn’t mention is that Annie Hartley was due to give birth to her 2nd child later in September of that year and already had a one year old Daniel Emmet Hartley.

8 Nov 1887

15 Dec 1887

19 June 1888

30 July 1888

24 Sep 1888

1 Jan 1889

Apparently Abel owed some money.

25 Jan 1889

15 Feb 1889

28 Feb 1889

17 Sep 1889

14 May 1891

12 June 1891

20 August 1891

Mrs. David Wilkinson is Marion Ann nee PIllng the sister of Abe Pillng who lived in New Bedford. She was born in 1861. I wonder if the vacation was actually in Rochester at the Hartley farm.

30 Jan 1992

More problems for Abel:

The same day:

15 Feb 1894

15 May 1894

9 Feb 1895

25 Feb 1895

Tessie must have been a nickname for Esther.

13 Jan 1897

I assume that the Burrows attended the Baptist Church.

1 Oct 1897

29 Dec 1897

27 Jan 1899

4 Feb 1899

15 FEb 1899

21 August 1900

Who knew my great-grandfather was in the Fall River Daily Herald or that he had visited Niagara Falls? I can’t tell if James was travellng alone or not.

5 Sep 1900

This is a bit of a mystery as there is no Joseph Hartley. My guess is that this was my 9 year old grandfather James Hartley and his 7 year old sister Nellie. Henry Bradford was born January 1900 and would have been the 7th chlld in the house, so perhaps James’ and Nellie’s trip to Fall River gave their mom a break.

14 Feb 1901

8 Jun 1901

The follow-up article two days later:

My guess was that they went to visit the Hartley family. This is the type of article I was not expecting – a story about Rochester in a Fall River paper.  Mrs. Williams must be Elizabeth Burrows Williams:

The child must be Florence Williams.

6 Sep 1901

16 Jan 1902

5 Mar 1903

So that was the end of Abel. His son-in-law became exectutor and sold off the contents of his jewelry business. I felt I got to know Abel a bit through the eyes of the Fall River newspapers. He was very active in sports and a supporter of cricket, polo and biking. He was in good shape and an avid biker until near his premature death. He had his share of problems with the death of two of his daughters and more than his share of robberies.