I am reviewing many past issues of the Glasgow & West Scotland Family History Society newsletter ( nice pub - quarterly) for helpful URL's, et al, so that I may better solve the questions that must lie in the "...mists of the past...". I am struggling with the learning curve of a new technique that I believe offers a ton of help in addition to traditional genealogical tools - Y DNA testing. I am the current Administrator of the Mackinlay Surname Project run by Family Tree DNA of Houston, TX, and have upgraded my own DNA test to the 67-marker level, This level should exhibit the greatest sensitivity and, hence, return the earliest common ancestor and the fewest, real matches to others with similar DNA.
I have put a serious amount of time and effort into the study of Scottish genealogy, in general, and the family of Mackinlay, in particular. I have caused a website to exist that represents the knowledge gained, called, Clann Mackinlay Seannachaidh, which may be visited at http://homepages.rootsweb.com/~mckinlay/
I happen to have been offered a Google Mail Acccount a couple of years ago, but I really have Heather McFarlane to thank for steering me on to Google Blogspot. Heather's blog is at http://knapdalepeople.blogspot.com/ and her website (fantastic !) may be visited at http://www.knapdalepeople.com/
I'll sign off for now, as I'm already scratching for material for next time.
Regards aye,
Bob McKinlay
3 comments:
I too am working on a McKinley DNA project and am using the familytreedna site that Bob MacKinley is the monitor for. I have gotten several people to provide DNA samples. In my own line I have gotten samples from descendants of several brothers who were in Kentucky about 1800 and have gotten matches for them all. My desire is to go back thru Pennsylvania to Ireland to Scotland using DNA to accomplish this. Feel free to call me toll-free at 888-825-7744 (fax and answering machine also)any time any day if you want more detail. I am currently trying to locate relatives of president McKinley to participate in this project.John M. (Mike) Daley Carlisle, PA My e-mail is jmdgen@aol.com.
Mike - We have talked on your way to Columbus this summer.
The facts are correct, except my surname is spelled McKinlay. You are correct that I am the Group Administrator for the FTDNA DNA-Surname Project of Mackinlay, the original Scottish spelling of the surname.
I think you are to be commended for recruiting so many McKinleys for the DNA Project. There is no dount that they each are vital contributors to the basic search issue.
There is a common misconception that the 25th U. S. President has Scottish roots - he is likely an Ulster-Scot (came from County Antrim in Northern Ireland) and may have roots in Scotland, except no primary documentation is available to support that.
Keep up the recruitment !
Bob McKinlay
I should have clarified a little over a year go, that I have enjoyed the tele calls & e-exchanges w/ your sister LBM. She even has given me permission to view the McKinley family tree on Ancestry.com She, like yourself, has been busy over the years, having accumulated in excess of 850 individuals in the documentation of her genealogy.
I owe a great deal, also, to MDM, Esq., a member of the Mackinlay Surname Project, who, singlehandedly, designed an EXCEL Spreadsheet that makes available to all Project Members, an easy-to-understand display of their genetic results, their relationship to each other & their MRCA (Most Recent Common Ancestor).
Finally, what kept me from being more communicative than I should have been during the last year was a cyber-disaster of the worst kind:
a total faiure of a relatively new hard drive, requiring a too pricey Level III Recovery of "lost" data, just as I was getting ready for an otherwise memorable 9-day trip to Australia & an equally memorable WW II Memorial Cruise for 3 weeks from Auckland, NZ to Kobe, JN. I had nearly 4000 digital pictures of the whole month that can still be viewed at http://picasaweb.google.com/home It's taken that long to edit the pics, recover, etc.
A brief plug for 2009: I'm taking an online Genealogical Studies course from the U of Strathclyde, Glasgow. I plan to fly to Glasgow, take the Clan Macduff 2-week Tour, attend the Genealogy Festival in Glasgow & The Gathering in Edinburgh, July 2009.
If I survive all that, I wish you good hunting & keep returning to the Clann blog. Comments are solicited.
See you in Scotland !
Regards aye,
Bob
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