52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks 2025: Week 4 (OVERLOOKED)
I was scrolling through one of the Facebook genealogy pages I belong to when I had an 'ah ha' moment.
The comment was that they had been looking at their Ancestry Thrulines to see how many DNA matches supported their paper trail only to discover a possible error in their research or parentage.
I have always been very cautious with Thrulines due to the errors made in trees used to create them.
I had completely overlooked that Thrulines might be a good spot to see if the lines I had in my tree were likely correct.
I looked at all of my 5th great grandparents to see how many DNA matches I had to corroborate.
I discovered Ancestry Thrulines had 75 5th great grandparents listed, but 23 were not currently in my tree and only suggestions.
In that list the majority had 3-10 DNA matches to corroborate followed by 20-23 matches.
There were some larger clusters of matches for a few 5th great grandparents: 38, 48, 52, and 65. Those were already solidly in my tree with the paper trail and DNA to support.
I was surprised to find two with ZERO (0) DNA matches to support.
I went back to check the paper trail for these two X5 great grandfathers only to discover all I had was a name on a marriage registry for their child.
With this in mind I tried digging further, and found no easy records so added them both to my 'to be searched' list.
At the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th great grandparents level all the Thrulines DNA matching fit for the paper trail.
This is very good news because we have two unexpected parentages that DNA matching had been able to unravel, and Thrulines supports my findings with 48 DNA matches to one and 27 to the other.
This overlooked aspect of Thrulines has given me a new spot to dig for a couple of 5th great grandfathers (both named William) to be sure the right folks are in our Bramble Bush.
Completely unrelated to this week's blog I am sharing this photo from May of 1998 of Chris and I.
We recently received this photo we had never seen before from a relative.
This is why I search -
Cause ...
You can pick your friends, but you can't pick your family you know!
***Any errors are my own. Please send me any updates or corrections via the comments at the bottom of this blog post***
Photos:
Personal
Links:
Amy Johnson Crow, 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks Challenge
https://www.amyjohnsoncrow.com/52-ancestors-in-52-weeks/
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