133 DNA Testing

        DNA Testing

More than a year ago, I ordered a DNA test from Ancestry.com. They sent a kit; you spit into a tube and return the spit to them.

Then around a month later, the results are returned by email.

I remember when we were kids, my sister complained to me that our family was so normal that we could never be great artists or writers. (She is, by the way, a pretty good artist now.)

I felt that way when I saw my DNA results. I guess I was hoping for some American Indian, African or Asian gene history for our family, but we are white bread:

My maternal grandfather came from Germany to the U.S. when he was in his teens so I expected to see more Eastern and Western Europe in my DNA regions. Was he smothered out by white bread or more Scandinavian than German? And there is also the possibility that my particular genetic blend does not include his.

I once thought having Viking blood would be interesting. I assume some of my English ancestors had Viking blood. After seeing the Viking program on the History Channel (only partially once--too violent), I wan't so sure. But probably all of us are descended from some sort of berserk invaders! 

A book I am trying to penetrate is The Origins of the British by Stephen Oppenheimer, who examines historic, linguistic, archaeological, and genetic evidence to determine the origins of the people of England, Scotland, Wales, and to some extent, Ireland. He believes that the Celts came very early to Britain from Iberian and Italy to a much greater extent that from Western and Central Europe. That may explain the 4% from both Italy and the Iberian Peninsula in my genetic makeup.

With the report come links to cousins who have also participated in Ancestry's DNA profile and are willing to communicate with other cousins.  Ancestry provided me with links to 389 cousins: one first/second cousin; 2 third/fourth cousins, and the 386 others at the fourth to sixth level cousin. I have shown the top three with the links to them hidden. The links are through Ancestry and are not direct.

I did contact the 2nd/3rd cousin and she knew less about our family background than I did! I will get around to contacting the third/fourth cousins but first I want to get more of the family tree on Ancestry. One more thing to do!

Ancestry has the biggest database for matching, but some articles that compare DNA testing services caution that there are privacy concerns. The government could use your DNA profile to try to match with a relative. Read the privacy policies of whichever service you use, and if you don't like it, don't get tested.

Ancestry cost $99, but I contacted them and began to receive emails. When I received an email announcing the $65 sale price, I purchased it then.

As you can tell, I have much more work to do, and perhaps I will have more to report!

Still searching  -  Trish

Left, my father holding me and, below, my sister on the bull: