can i find living relatives with an ancestry dna test?
I come from a cultural and ethnically mixed family. As far as we know we're spanish, french and irish, but it all seems like vague information seeing as how most of my oldest relatives have passed. I'd like to find living relatives and know the true origins of my ethnic background. Can anyone recommend a good ancestry dna website to order a kit, or any other recommendations. I come from a small family, and i thought it would be neat to find more living relatives out there. Thanks!
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You never know what you will find until you start researching; it’s always different for every family. As far a DNA is concerned, that is not the quickest way to find living relatives you need to know something about which study to join in most cases to be effective.
If you would like to start your research, I have included a plan for beginners with links that will be easy on your budget until you get a feel for things. You can always come back for questions.
First, start by asking all your living relatives about family history and get any documents or pictures they are willing to share with you for your files. You can photocopy or scan these and return them to their owner. Your public libraries will most likely have both Ancestry.com and Heritage Quest.com free for anyone to use while at the library and with a library card you can use Heritage Quest at home.
Another free online resource is U.S. GenWeb at: http://www.usgenweb.org/ they have a page for every state and everything is free. Then there is Rootsweb at http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/, a free site hosted by Ancestry.com where you can search for surnames and leave queries on the message boards. Additionally, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention FamilySearch.org they have many free online records and are digitizing more every day, all free. Their website is: http://www.familysearch.org/. Be sure to check each state that you need information from as many have their own projects, for example, the state of Missouri has a great website that has many free source documents online at: http://www.sos.mo.gov/mdh/ and South Carolina has many free wills at http://www.archivesindex.sc.gov/onlinear…
Also, do not forget to check Cyndi’s List at http://www.cyndislist.com, which has many links for both free and paid sites.
I’m sure I could come up with many more websites but these should keep you busy for a while and there should be lots of family history to be found for free with all these websites.
The best way to find living, long-lost relatives, is to get a subscription to ancestry.com and start building your tree.
I have been contacted by several cousins I never know I had. I also found a third family of my children’s great grandfather that we never knew existed. Great grandfather was rogue and left a family in Boston, had a second family in Chicago and a third in Arkansas. all without benefit of divorce.
Good luck and have fun.
Well the only way you would know through a DNA test is if they got one too and then you compared the DNA.
I have to agree with the others that have posted here. First, get all of the information that you can about your family from those who are still living. Then work on your personal family tree. If you are not sure where to begin then you should give the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (Mormons) a call. Ask them where their nearest Family History Center is to your home. It is free and they should have Ancestry and other data bases free there, along with free help. Don’t worry if you are not a member of the church, the centers are for everyone.
Good Hunting!
The History Man
http://wwwhistoryman.blogspot.com/