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How to connnect with non-members of family tree

How to connnect with non-members of family tree

Posted: 30 Jul 2015 1:31AM GMT
Classification: Query
I am new to this site and could use some helpful suggestions for searching the site.

1) What is the best way to 'find' a connection with someone? If I have a name in mind (and stats), is there a way to display that connection?

2) If so, is that through other members' family trees? And depending on this, will I have to link with a tree to 'show' a connection?

Re: How to connnect with non-members of family tree

Posted: 30 Jul 2015 7:36PM GMT
Classification: Query
I'm not understanding what you're trying to do. If you could explain, maybe someone can help.

Re: How to connnect with non-members of family tree

Posted: 30 Jul 2015 8:09PM GMT
Classification: Query
I am asking how one might find out if an individual is a relative.

For example, if I have reason to believe I am related to Abraham Lincoln, is there a way to search for a link to that person? Specifically if that person is not in my own personally created family tree?

Re: How to connnect with non-members of family tree

Posted: 30 Jul 2015 8:27PM GMT
Classification: Query
Without a minimal tree of your own, you'd be playing pin the tail on the donkey. Spend your original outlay of time trying to set up as a full a tree as you can back through the 19th century.

Only then can you get an idea of where your connections are and which way your "gaps" point.

After you done that, a DNA test will help target in on some of your blank relatives.

If you're looking for some magic button, I sure haven't found it.

Re: How to connnect with non-members of family tree

Posted: 30 Jul 2015 8:30PM GMT
Classification: Query
Edited: 30 Jul 2015 8:32PM GMT
The only way to reliably link to anyone, ever, is to work backward one generation at a time, generally starting with your parents and grandparents and using only documents (not other trees, no matter what they say or how tempting it is) and see where it leads you. If it leads to someone famous, that's great - chances are that it won't but at least you will know that, wherever it took you, your tree is accurate.

If you haven't done this yet, you might want to try some of the Ancestry tutorials.

Re: How to connnect with non-members of family tree

Posted: 30 Jul 2015 8:40PM GMT
Classification: Query
Thanks for the replies.

I know of two Colonial-era Americans with whom I share some relatives.
I do know I can (and I suppose I will) do the leg work in searching for those links...
I had hoped there was an option to 'see if we are related,' or something along those lines.
I am new to the site, and always learning!

Another way to ask, that I suppose would also help me: is there a way to show a connection between two individuals (not in my tree)? For example, Jane and John Doe. I am somewhat familiar with the searching options, but is there an option to show a link between two people? Would that also have to live in another Ancestry members' family tree? And even then, I only know of the option in the individual member view to show relation (1st cousin, 6x removed).

Thanks again for the feedback.

Re: How to connnect with non-members of family tree

Posted: 30 Jul 2015 8:57PM GMT
Classification: Query
"Show relationship" is only within a tree. I needed to find out if a DNA match was related to me on paper. He was a 4th to 6th cousin via DNA. In order to find our relationship I could have added him to my tree but I didn't know where to start. He thought he was pretty sure which line it might be on, so I took that line and started a new [private] tree working back from that person; and then from a book actually started from the top of a tree of that surname, and built the tree down to his ancestor and to my ancestor. It was interesting but the closest we could come to being related was 11th cousins. But that is what you have to do to find a relationship, is build up your tree until you get to the colonial names; and then a lot of them have books [in Family Search, in Google Books, or in ancestry] that will give descendants. You still have to be careful, they are not always 100% accurate, but a lot were written in the 19th century when some of the people were still alive. Some families of colonial times have associations you can join.

Re: How to connnect with non-members of family tree

Posted: 30 Jul 2015 9:38PM GMT
Classification: Query
Edited: 30 Jul 2015 9:46PM GMT
To see if you are related to a "famous" person, you need to compare your ancestry to their ancestry. (usually by comparing your ahnentafel to their ahnentafel).

The best source for ahnentafels of American presidents is "Ancestors of American Presidents", by Gary Boyd Roberts, which you can find in just about any library of any size. The most recent edition, I believe, has Obama's ahnentafel in it. These ahnentafels only go back 6 generations, as I recall; so will not always take you back to American immigrants of the 1600s for recent presidents. I compiled my links, shown below, by looking for my ancestors in the Index - note you kind of have to memorize your ancestors - which is a challenge when you have close to 150 separate immigrant ancestors identified back to the 1630s.

For the ahnentafels of other famous folks, you can refer to "Notable Kin", also compiled by Gary Boyd Roberts. There are a couple of editions of this work - again, can usually be found in most sizable libaries (or purchased). Again, look for your ancestors in the index of each edition.

He also has published numerous other articles in periodicals of famous folks related to Princess Di and to Winston Churchill. Again, look for your immigrant ancestors in the ahnentafels of these two, or the famous folks he has tied them to.

The most frequent success with this kind of "searching" is usually resereved for folks with New England immigrants of the 1620s - 1640s. They go back the furthest.

As an example, see these pages:

http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~riss/baldw...

http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~riss/baldw...
per page

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