Ancestry?

[MacLaren]

I can honestly say I’ve never been mistaken to be Mexican (not that it would be a bad thing) - or anything but English for that matter!
My daughter, however, has beautiful auburn /red hair (we assume as a consequence of her late grandmother being (northern) Irish, and paternal great-grandfather having had “red-ish” hair, according to his WW1 military identity card), so is often thought to be Scottish or Irish.

Thanks for sharing.

It's interesting how some physical characteristics can skip a generation or two (or maybe even more).

Jim

Yup. A good example would be Michael Jordan.
His brothers are like 5'6" - 5'8"
I think one of his sisters might be tall but, his father was about 5'8" too I think.

[James Y]

I can honestly say I’ve never been mistaken to be Mexican (not that it would be a bad thing) - or anything but English for that matter!
My daughter, however, has beautiful auburn /red hair (we assume as a consequence of her late grandmother being (northern) Irish, and paternal great-grandfather having had “red-ish” hair, according to his WW1 military identity card), so is often thought to be Scottish or Irish.

Thanks for sharing.

It's interesting how some physical characteristics can skip a generation or two (or maybe even more).

Jim

Yup. A good example would be Michael Jordan.
His brothers are like 5'6" - 5'8"
I think one of his sisters might be tall but, his father was about 5'8" too I think.

Sadly, I didn't get my paternal grandfather's height gene. I'm only 5' 9". My dad was about 5' 7". Some of my uncles were tall, and some were like my dad (he was the youngest of 8 children).

Jim

[James Y]

8

I have looked a bit at my family, but it is not a huge deal to me. On one grandmother's side, the family was well to do before the Civil War and not afterwards. The huge old house still stands and is in the family still. That side was related to George Washington. My father's father's family came from England and migrated to VA and then South. My great grandfather may or may not have married a Cherokee woman. The jury is still out. He did meet and marry her up in those hills. A lot of non-Native Americans had been taken into the tribe by marriage or other means during those early years, so people claiming they have Cherokee ancestry could be right, but they weren't Cherokee genetically.

On my mother's side, all I remember is that the family has been in America since the early 1600's. They include Irish and English. I don't remember the others.

Thanks for sharing, Doc.

I've heard that if someone has an ancestor of another race, but it goes back far enough, that the DNA from that ancestor will be nil, or almost nil.

I wondered about my paternal grandfather, because he was a big Japanese for his time, over 6' tall and solidly built, born in 1871. Bigger than most Europeans were back then. And he had an unusual look. He was from Kumamoto on Kyushu, only a short distance away from Nagasaki, which once had Portuguese traders and missionaries (1570 - 1639), and then Dutch traders (1641 - 1854). It's probable that some of these traders had "intermixed" with Japanese women. But I'm willing to bet that, even if there had been some Dutch mixed in (Portuguese were too short) to account for my grandfather's unusual size and characteristics (which I seriously doubt is the case), if I took a quality DNA test, I'm pretty certain that it would come up as 100% Asian/East Asian. Because even if there had been some Dutch DNA inserted into the ancestral line back then, it probably would have been recessed/bred out long ago, and most likely wouldn't even show up on a DNA test.

My grandfather did NOT have gigantism, so I firmly believe that his height and size were simply an anomaly. And that his unusual appearance for a Japanese was due to higher than normal Jomon (Japanese aboriginal) DNA. The physical traits are a match, except for his height and size.

Jim

Why not take the test?

Another possibility is that there was a Russian in the mix, or it could have been a sailor cast upon the shores a very long way back. Even Vikings traversed the rivers across Asia and it is conceivable that one of them ended up staying in Japan.

I do have a curiosity, but TBH, at this time I don't trust the accuracy of commercial DNA tests. Especially regarding Asian DNA; these tests are far more detailed for people with European (and possibly also African) ancestry, because that is their main focus. I've also heard of people having multiple DNA tests from different companies, and the results didn't always match. If commercial DNA companies had their stuff down to an exact science, the results should be consistent. I also don't know what the company(s) might do with the information once they have it, such as possibly sharing it with insurance companies, etc.

If some future, truly scientifically accurate DNA test indicated some European ancestry, I wouldn't be overly surprised nor disappointed, but I also wouldn't be celebrating, either. For some reason, many east Asians seem to wish they have something other than only Asian DNA, but all I would want is the truth. I do believe there is probably some central Asian in there somewhere. A European Russian? It's a very distant possibility, but far more likely a native Siberian. A Viking? Probably the least likely scenario in my case.

Most likely my paternal grandfather was an abnormally large and tall Japanese person for his time, with higher than normal Jomon (of which the Ainu are a surviving remnant/descendant group) DNA. Of course, nowadays there are many tall (over 6') and physically solid Japanese men, but there certainly weren't many back in the late 1800s/early 20th century, when the average height for men in Japan was around 5' 3" to 5' 5".

Jim

[kennethsime]

I'm not sure how much I've shared here previously, but I'm an amateur genealogist. My father is one too, and I was spoiled by his relatively high-quality research.

Another place I'm spoiled, as a genealogist, is that my wife's mother was adopted and the adoption record is sealed, presenting quite the mystery to solve. I finally convinced her to do an Ancestry DNA kit, and we've identified four cousins with 3-400 cM shared. Of those, only one is definitely paternal, so we hope the other three are maternal. I share nearly 1,200 cM with one of my 1st cousins, so I presume my wife's cousins are 2nd or further.

Messages have been sent, and now we play the waiting game.

Have anyone else uncovered a biological relationship via DNA testing? What was your story?

[Doc Dan]

8

I have looked a bit at my family, but it is not a huge deal to me. On one grandmother's side, the family was well to do before the Civil War and not afterwards. The huge old house still stands and is in the family still. That side was related to George Washington. My father's father's family came from England and migrated to VA and then South. My great grandfather may or may not have married a Cherokee woman. The jury is still out. He did meet and marry her up in those hills. A lot of non-Native Americans had been taken into the tribe by marriage or other means during those early years, so people claiming they have Cherokee ancestry could be right, but they weren't Cherokee genetically.

On my mother's side, all I remember is that the family has been in America since the early 1600's. They include Irish and English. I don't remember the others.

Thanks for sharing, Doc.

I've heard that if someone has an ancestor of another race, but it goes back far enough, that the DNA from that ancestor will be nil, or almost nil.

I wondered about my paternal grandfather, because he was a big Japanese for his time, over 6' tall and solidly built, born in 1871. Bigger than most Europeans were back then. And he had an unusual look. He was from Kumamoto on Kyushu, only a short distance away from Nagasaki, which once had Portuguese traders and missionaries (1570 - 1639), and then Dutch traders (1641 - 1854). It's probable that some of these traders had "intermixed" with Japanese women. But I'm willing to bet that, even if there had been some Dutch mixed in (Portuguese were too short) to account for my grandfather's unusual size and characteristics (which I seriously doubt is the case), if I took a quality DNA test, I'm pretty certain that it would come up as 100% Asian/East Asian. Because even if there had been some Dutch DNA inserted into the ancestral line back then, it probably would have been recessed/bred out long ago, and most likely wouldn't even show up on a DNA test.

My grandfather did NOT have gigantism, so I firmly believe that his height and size were simply an anomaly. And that his unusual appearance for a Japanese was due to higher than normal Jomon (Japanese aboriginal) DNA. The physical traits are a match, except for his height and size.

Jim

Why not take the test?

Another possibility is that there was a Russian in the mix, or it could have been a sailor cast upon the shores a very long way back. Even Vikings traversed the rivers across Asia and it is conceivable that one of them ended up staying in Japan.

I do have a curiosity, but TBH, at this time I don't trust the accuracy of commercial DNA tests. Especially regarding Asian DNA; these tests are far more detailed for people with European (and possibly also African) ancestry, because that is their main focus. I've also heard of people having multiple DNA tests from different companies, and the results didn't always match. If commercial DNA companies had their stuff down to an exact science, the results should be consistent. I also don't know what the company(s) might do with the information once they have it, such as possibly sharing it with insurance companies, etc.

If some future, truly scientifically accurate DNA test indicated some European ancestry, I wouldn't be overly surprised nor disappointed, but I also wouldn't be celebrating, either. For some reason, many east Asians seem to wish they have something other than only Asian DNA, but all I would want is the truth. I do believe there is probably some central Asian in there somewhere. A European Russian? It's a very distant possibility, but far more likely a native Siberian. A Viking? Probably the least likely scenario in my case.

Most likely my paternal grandfather was an abnormally large and tall Japanese person for his time, with higher than normal Jomon (of which the Ainu are a surviving remnant/descendant group) DNA. Of course, nowadays there are many tall (over 6') and physically solid Japanese men, but there certainly weren't many back in the late 1800s/early 20th century, when the average height for men in Japan was around 5' 3" to 5' 5".

Jim

All of these testing companies test different things so the results are not going to always show the same things. It doesn't mean they are wrong, it means they are picking up different things.

I guess you could sign up under a false name and take it. Get an email address just for the tests.

[James Y]

8

Thanks for sharing, Doc.

I've heard that if someone has an ancestor of another race, but it goes back far enough, that the DNA from that ancestor will be nil, or almost nil.

I wondered about my paternal grandfather, because he was a big Japanese for his time, over 6' tall and solidly built, born in 1871. Bigger than most Europeans were back then. And he had an unusual look. He was from Kumamoto on Kyushu, only a short distance away from Nagasaki, which once had Portuguese traders and missionaries (1570 - 1639), and then Dutch traders (1641 - 1854). It's probable that some of these traders had "intermixed" with Japanese women. But I'm willing to bet that, even if there had been some Dutch mixed in (Portuguese were too short) to account for my grandfather's unusual size and characteristics (which I seriously doubt is the case), if I took a quality DNA test, I'm pretty certain that it would come up as 100% Asian/East Asian. Because even if there had been some Dutch DNA inserted into the ancestral line back then, it probably would have been recessed/bred out long ago, and most likely wouldn't even show up on a DNA test.

My grandfather did NOT have gigantism, so I firmly believe that his height and size were simply an anomaly. And that his unusual appearance for a Japanese was due to higher than normal Jomon (Japanese aboriginal) DNA. The physical traits are a match, except for his height and size.

Jim

Why not take the test?

Another possibility is that there was a Russian in the mix, or it could have been a sailor cast upon the shores a very long way back. Even Vikings traversed the rivers across Asia and it is conceivable that one of them ended up staying in Japan.

I do have a curiosity, but TBH, at this time I don't trust the accuracy of commercial DNA tests. Especially regarding Asian DNA; these tests are far more detailed for people with European (and possibly also African) ancestry, because that is their main focus. I've also heard of people having multiple DNA tests from different companies, and the results didn't always match. If commercial DNA companies had their stuff down to an exact science, the results should be consistent. I also don't know what the company(s) might do with the information once they have it, such as possibly sharing it with insurance companies, etc.

If some future, truly scientifically accurate DNA test indicated some European ancestry, I wouldn't be overly surprised nor disappointed, but I also wouldn't be celebrating, either. For some reason, many east Asians seem to wish they have something other than only Asian DNA, but all I would want is the truth. I do believe there is probably some central Asian in there somewhere. A European Russian? It's a very distant possibility, but far more likely a native Siberian. A Viking? Probably the least likely scenario in my case.

Most likely my paternal grandfather was an abnormally large and tall Japanese person for his time, with higher than normal Jomon (of which the Ainu are a surviving remnant/descendant group) DNA. Of course, nowadays there are many tall (over 6') and physically solid Japanese men, but there certainly weren't many back in the late 1800s/early 20th century, when the average height for men in Japan was around 5' 3" to 5' 5".

Jim

All of these testing companies test different things so the results are not going to always show the same things. It doesn't mean they are wrong, it means they are picking up different things.

I guess you could sign up under a false name and take it. Get an email address just for the tests.

Thanks. But I think I'll give it a pass for now. Maybe someday, when the technology advances for civilian commercial DNA tests. Even then, maybe not.

I'd just want to know that, whatever the results (since such tests cost a good amount of money), that they're LEGITIMATE, and that the company isn't going to share my information with insurance companies. Which would be virtually impossible to verify.

Even if some DNA test result found that I had some European DNA, I would never claim to be European, or even part European. I would never embarrass myself like that. Because it would be the same as Elizabeth Warren claiming to be Cherokee Indian, until her DNA test indicated she had about 1/1024 Native American. Which is essentially none at all. Heck, I have ZERO connections to any Native American tribe, and I would probably get a closer DNA match for Native American than she did.

Jim

[James Y]

https://youtube.com/shorts/cVqy5M4XGwM?si=11EX8iXtIh3YqHaB

https://youtube.com/shorts/N6kN-17SWzs?si=OUAMpkFllergEEH5

I thought those two video shorts were funny, but they demonstrated a legitimate reason why I'm not planning on ever getting a DNA test, especially from 23andMe, or Ancestry. Just a big waste of money to tell me what I already know, but not giving enough real information. The fact is, nobody is 100% any one modern group. EVERYONE is a mixture of many different groups, but these DNA companies lack diversity when testing those of East and Northeast Asian ancestry, which they tend to lump all together.

Perhaps if there is a legitimate test done in Japan or somewhere, that really concentrates specifically on DNA types found in the Japanese archipelago. But even then, I don't know how much I could trust any commercially-available DNA test.

I suppose if I didn't mind throwing money away, I could always give them a fake name, as Doc had suggested, like Juan Epstein, or Vinnie Barbarino, and see what DNA results they come up with. At least they couldn't use my last name as a cheat sheet as to what my genetics are, in order to give me some lazy, generic "test results."



Jim

[James Y]

Why Everyone Has a Cherokee Grandma

Or their great-great-grandma...

https://youtu.be/fR5tuVQybVw?si=YFi-eWzm9O8C3rFP

This is why, even if I did take a DNA test and it found some trace amounts of European ancestry (which is highly doubtful, but let's just suppose it did), I still would never claim to be European. Because even if there was any European DNA, the amount would be so negligible as to be virtually nonexistent. And although many people have thought or assumed I must be "mixed," nobody has ever thought of me as "that European guy," or "that white person." That would never happen in a million years. So why would I claim to be something I'm not?

Going a bit OT for this post, but...

Interestingly, Bruce Lee's mother was half-German. Which would have made him around a quarter German (I say "around," because DNA doesn't always reflect exact measurements; the amounts of specific admixtures can vary, even among siblings). Yet I've never once heard of Bruce Lee claiming to be German or European, or making a big deal out of it. And he legitimately could have. I heard it was the main reason that jealous fellow Kung Fu students in Hong Kong forced Bruce Lee's teacher, Ip Man, to stop teaching him. Because Ip Man didn't teach foreigners, and only taught students who were "pure" Chinese. When these jealous fellow classmates found out Bruce Lee's family history, they used it against him, so Ip Man was forced to stop teaching him. Like the majority of Chinese martial arts teachers of his generation, the real-life Ip Man was far more conservative, and nowhere near as internationally-minded, as the Ip Man character in Donnie Yen's movies.

Jim

[James Y]

Myth: Cherokee Princess / Ancestry Academy

I'm posting this, not to single out people who claim Cherokee ancestry in particular, but to point out how relatively quickly DNA percentages of someone with 100% of a different racial group contributing into a family line, even if true, can reduce to almost nothing within only a couple, or a few generations. This can occur with any 'special ancestor' that someone refers to in their bloodline (or supposedly in their bloodline), not only one from a Native American tribe.

https://youtu.be/cfoeYtCIWAQ?si=zq1TAJjvG7Eo_MKH

Jim

[Naperville]

Congratulations to those of you doing your genealogy and 23 and Me. Some of my cousins have done theirs, but since I am not that close to them, I have never looked at the results on Ancestry.com. No harm in them doing the work if they did it correct, but I'd hate to log in and find errors....and as with everything that devolve into an argument.

I'm interested in 23 and Me, but as James says, that is the end of your family's privacy. For sure your DNA will be stolen or used by a law enforcement agencies looking for some neor do well.

Hope that if you do the DNA test they do not arrest you for the murder of somebody who died 250 years ago. "99.9% of human DNA sequences are the same in every person...." so if you do anything you want a whole genome sequencing to avoid problems, not partial DNA sequencing. I do not think any of these services do a complete DNA sequencing, they do a partial DNA sequencing and so there are bound to be what they call collisions, where you match someone elses DNA profile.

"Typically 100 to 1000 nanograms of DNA are required for whole genome or whole exome sequencing. Targeted panels or amplicon based sequencing [i.e. PARTIAL DNA SEQUENCING] can use as little as 1 to 10 ng of input material."

Whole Genome Sequencing
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whole_genome_sequencing


Funny thing! I worked for a biotech 2000 to 2002. There were DNA sequencing machines all over the place. They are very easy to use, a dummy could do it...even me!

[Naperville]

I'd like to add to my comment above, it should be obvious, even if there is a collision in DNA sequences, the police agency can ask for a more thorough test if there is enough DNA there and then you're cooked.

Identical twins are the only siblings that share 100% of their DNA. Non-identical brothers and sisters share about 50% of inherited gene variants, which is why siblings and fraternal twins can be so different. But note, the 50% that is similar....we are talking about very small fragments. 99.99% of all DNA is the same for humans.

There are 8+ billion people in the world, so there may be zero to 5+ other partial matches. They use a number of techniques to rule people out/in.

[Naperville]

More info on the 23 and Me data theft

https://sharylattkisson.com/2023/12/per ... y-hackers/

[James Y]

I'd like to add to my comment above, it should be obvious, even if there is a collision in DNA sequences, the police agency can ask for a more thorough test if there is enough DNA there and then you're cooked.

Identical twins are the only siblings that share 100% of their DNA. Non-identical brothers and sisters share about 50% of inherited gene variants, which is why siblings and fraternal twins can be so different. But note, the 50% that is similar....we are talking about very small fragments. 99.99% of all DNA is the same for humans.

There are 8+ billion people in the world, so there may be zero to 5+ other partial matches. They use a number of techniques to rule people out/in.

IMO, taking a DNA test to look into my ancestry is high risk, low (or no) reward. The chances of anything coming back as something I don't already know are very small.

In addition to law enforcement agencies possibly using your DNA results, if someone's results show any predisposition to certain diseases, if the information is shared with insurance companies, it could affect how or if they are willing to cover someone.

AFAIK, nobody in my family line has used a DNA testing service. Even if, say, any of my cousins did, their DNA results (if done by a meticulous company) would be noticeably different from mine. Only a sibling would be the closest, but would still be different.

Jim