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Case Study: Using DNA to Solve Historical Adoption

May 21, 2019 by Daisha 36 Comments

This post contains affiliate links

Adoption and the questions it left

My Great Grandmother was placed for adoption and a question of her biological family has lingered for many years. Here is how I solved a 106-year-old mystery using DNA.

The Start Of Our Family Tree

If you have read the About Me page, then you know I was never interested in genealogy. In fact, it was my Grandmother, Marie, who started our family tree back in the 1990s. She began researching our family because her Mother, Helen, was adopted. Helen never knew anything about her biological family and so Marie began researching in hopes to find the answer.

Growing up, Marie would try and tell me stories or talk to me about new discoveries she made in her research and I would half listen to her. At some point, my Grandfather emailed me a GEDCOM file of our family tree. I never opened it and just saved it to a folder in my inbox. Shortly after 2009, Marie’s computer crashed and she lost all of the research she spent years preparing. Ultimately, she gave up and washed her hands of family history forever without any answers to who Helen’s biological family was.

DNA Discovery

During 2017 my Husband and I took a 23andme DNA test. While waiting on the results, I remembered I still had the GEDCOM file in my email and decided to upload it to ancestry.com. I had absolutely no idea what I was looking at or how my Grandmother came to find all of the names in our tree.

Our results came in and I noticed I had a match named Mike, who was listed as a 2nd cousin. Growing up, my family was very close and I knew I did not have a second cousin named Mike. I sent him a message on 23andme in August 2018, asking him if he would be able to help me figure out our connection. Immediately, he responded and explained that his Father Russ grew up not knowing his own father. Mike’s Grandma never spoke about her family and Russ had never met them. He knew small details about his Grandmother, such as approximate birth date and location and her death date and location. We were no closer to figuring out how we could be related.

DNA Testing For Each Side

Not having any idea how we were connected we decided the next step would be for myself, my Mother, and my Paternal Grandparents to all take an ancestry DNA test to see who Mike matched with. The DNA tests narrowed down that Mike and I were connected through my Grandma Marie. Luckily, Marie had done extensive research on her paternal line and we were able to quickly dismiss a connection on the Jotz side due to no shared matches in common on that line.

Shared DNA Gives Us A Clue

Mike and Marie had a fairly significant amount of shared DNA at 454 cM’s. There was an 89% chance Mike and Marie were either 1st cousins 1x removed, half 1st cousins, 2nd great-grandparent or 2nd great-child or 2nd great Aunt/Uncle or half great Aunt/Uncle. Based off of Marie and Mike’s age, the only likely combination would be 1st cousins 1x removed or half 1st cousins. Looking at the information I had for Helen and the information he had for his Grandmother Ethel, our hypothesis was that Helen and Ethel may have been sisters or Helen was a sister to Russ’s father.

The Basic Information We Had

According to the information my Grandma provided in the family tree I was able to begin my search with the following:

Helen Landtree was born 20 Sept 1911 in either Newark, New Jersey or Atlantic Highlands, New Jersey. In October 1913 Helen was surrendered to the Children’s Aid Society and placed into the home of Otto and Barbara Stumpf. In 1926, Helen was adopted by Barbara Stumpf and her name was legally changed to Helen Barbara Stumpf.

Helen and her adopted mother Barbara Stumpf

With Mike’s information on his Grandmother Ethel we were able to gather the following:

Louise Lambert may also have been known as Louise Cutting or Louise Lamfren born in 1899-1900 in NY.

Armed And Ready Or So We Thought

Somewhere in my brain, I rationalized the idea I could call an orphanage and they would just give me the answers I needed. Let me be the first to tell you I was SO wrong! Being armed with the information that Helen was placed with the Children’s Aid Society I set off to google. I came back with a result for the Children’s Aid Society in NYC and somehow thought that made sense. I fired off an email with all the information I had. A nice gentleman replied that he could find no records and asked if I was sure it was the Children’s Aid Society of NYC. I’m not sure why I never thought to check New Jersey first.

The man recommended an agency that may hold the records, I called and sure enough no record. Another Google search lead me to some more listings and contacted a few more agencies. A wonderful woman sent me a PDF. This PDF had all of the closed orphanages in the state of New Jersey and where their records were currently being held. By law in New Jersey, adoption records must be kept for 99 years and if that agency closes another agency must take the records. This was wonderful news and a great resource if I only knew which orphanage Helen was placed with. I had to dig deeper.

Time To Dig In

The Surrogate Court holds adoption records and I thought maybe it would be best to begin my search there. I headed to Newark, New Jersey to the Essex County Surrogate Court. In their archival room, I found books containing adoption court cases prior to 1940. Reading each book, I found no mention of Helen or Helen’s adopted Mother Barbara Stumpf. Next, I checked with the Monmouth County Surrogate Court in Freehold, New Jersey. BINGO! I found Helen’s adoption paperwork, I paid my copy fee and hurried to my car as fast as I could. Reading all 7 pages I found no mention of Helen’s mother’s name. I was a bit disappointed but expected as much. However, I was able to find the name of the orphanage.

Finding The Adoption Agency

Using the PDF file I had received, I contacted a woman at YCS in Newark. Upon her first search, she was unable to locate a record for Helen using her biological last name Landtree. I asked if she would please search again, but this time use the name of her adoptive mother, Stumpf and sure enough, she found the file. She went on to explain to me that she could not release any identifying information and that the file was very small. It contained the court paperwork I already had, an application to Foster from her Foster parents, a list of references for Barbara and Otto and a surrender form that Helen’s birth mother signed. I wanted the name on the surrender form, but since it was identifying information they could only release it to Helen or the biological mother. Obviously given the fact both parties would be well over 100 years old that wasn’t going to happen. To say I was disappointed would be an understatement.

The Hunt Continues

Mike and I worked together to gather as much information as possible. He sent off for Louise’s Death Certificate and I obtained Helen’s corrected birth certificate and her death certificate. We both ran searches on ancestry and familysearch.org to see what, if any, information we could find. I would search using Helen’s biological last name Landtree and most of the time I would get zero results or very minimal results. This led me to believe Landtree was either misspelling or a fictitious last name, either way, it was discouraging. Mike’s searches for Louise turned up very little results that provided us with no new information.

In The End It All Pays Off

During the end of April 2019, Mike received Louise’s death certificate and I am so thankful for that piece of paper. Previous information we had on Louise was either incorrect or not complete information. For example, Louise’s name. Louise was her middle name and her first name was Ethel. We also had a new lead on the last name for Louise, which was, Lamphrey. Louise’s birth year was also incorrect according to the death certificate. Using the new information we had, I headed to ancestry.com and plugged it into the search. The very first record it showed me was Baptism record for a child of Ethel Louise Lamphrey. That child was my great grandmother! Charlotte Angela Lamphrey was born 20 Sept 1911. I could not believe my eyes.

Putting The Pieces Together

Since finding out who Helen’s birth Mother was, Mike and I have continued to research and create a clearer picture of Ethel’s life and her tough decision to place Helen for adoption.

During July of 1911, 15-year-old Ethel went to St. Katherine’s home in Jersey City. We believe she committed to living there for a year, where she was taught religious instruction and basic domestic duties. During her stay, she gave birth to Charlotte (Helen) and both were discharged from the home in October of 1912. After being discharged, Ethel and Charlotte went to live in Massachusetts with Ethel’s stepfather, Joseph’s, brother Henry and his wife Clara Kearny. In January 1913, a sister from St. Katherine’s went to visit with Ethel and Charlotte and reported that Ethel was not doing well. A few months after that visit, Ethel returned to New Jersey and placed Charlotte into the care of the Children’s Aid Society with the intent to have her placed for adoption.

Who is Helen’s Father?

Who was Helen’s father? Her adoption paperwork held no clues, except he was illegitimate and not in the picture. I was able to obtain a copy of Helen’s original birth certificate from the New Jersey State Archives. Low and behold it named a father, unfortunately, it was not a name I wanted to see. According to the Birth Certificate, Helen’s father was Joseph Kearny. Joseph, if you remember was Ethel’s stepfather. My heart sunk and I felt so sorry for 15-year-old Ethel. I have not yet been able to conclude Joseph is, in fact, Helen’s father with the use of DNA, but paper records indicate he is.

DNA revisited

Using DNA and the paper records Mike and I have found, we can confidently say Ethel Lamphrey is the mother of Helen Stumpf aka Charlotte Lamphrey. Mike’s father Russ was also Ethel’s child, making Helen and Russ half-siblings. Based on the shared DNA, 454 cM’s of Mike and Marie, that places them within the half first cousin range. This relationship, based on the records found, is correct. Building upon the family tree with the new information found on Ethel, including, a birth certificate that lists Ethel’s parents as Elizabeth Cutting and William H Lamphrey we have been able to confirm more DNA matches. Some of the matches shared between Mike and Marie we have been able to successfully confirm to the Cutting family, further confirming Helen and Russ both descend from Ethel.

If you or someone you know would like some help trying to sort DNA matches or trying to find answers to family mysteries, please contact us. We would love to help in any way we can.

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Filed Under: DNA Tagged With: ADOPTION, Case Study, Cutting, DNA, Jotz, Lamphrey, New Jersey, Newark NJ, Stumpf

Mother’s Day Gift Ideas

May 2, 2019 by Daisha 3 Comments

This post contains affiliate links. We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites.

Mother’s Day is quickly approaching and don’t worry we have you covered. If your Mom or Grandmother is a family history fan or genealogist, here are some great ideas that will make you her favorite!

DNA kits

DNA kits are a genealogists must have. They help validate a traditional family tree and also help breakdown family mysteries and brick walls. Here are some great sales for Mother’s Day.

Ancestry DNA

Sale ends May 13, 2019

MyHeritage

Sale ends May 13, 2019

FamilyTreeDNA

23andMe

Sale ends May 13, 2019

Family History Gifts

Here is a round up of some unique gift ideas.

Family Tree Picture Frame

This family tree picture frame display’s 10 hanging photo frames to show how your family tree has blossomed.

Personalized Canvas Wall Art


MuralMax canvas prints are personalized with your names and special date, making it a gift that will warm your heart every time you see it. Makes a beautiful wall decor for any family home while sharing your family milestone. Sizes range from 8×10 to 24×30 with other color options also available.

Tree Of Life Necklace

This necklace is handmade, nickel free and lead-free. This is a large circle wire wrapped pendant attached with non-tarnish chain. Different colors are available.

The Non Biological Mother Necklace

A beautiful pendant to show love and gratitude for an amazing nonbiological mother. It’s a great gift for Step Mothers, Foster Mother and Mothers-in-law.

Family Tree Personalized Cutting Board

The Personalized Cutting Boards are finely crafted and custom engraved with our state of the art laser machine. Each wood board is made for special cut wood, sanded, and finished with food safe cutting board oil for excellent protection. The boards are engraved on one side which is meant for display while the other side can be used for cutting.

Books She Will Love

Genealogists are constantly looking to perfect their research and learn. These books are a great idea for anyone who loves family history and Genealogy.

The Family Tree Toolkit

The Family Tree Toolkit guides you on how and where to begin, what records are available both online and in repositories, what to do once you find the information, how to share your story and of course DNA discoveries.

Research Like A Pro

Learn how to form an objective, review your research by creating a timeline analysis, construct a locality guide to direct your research, create a plan, style source citations, set up a research log to organize and track your searches, and write a report detailing your findings and ideas for future research. Work samples and templates are included.

Professional Genealogy: Preparation, Practice & Standards

Twenty-three genealogists collaborated to produce the first-ever textbook outlining professional standards and practices in the discipline of genealogy.

The Family Tree Guide To DNA Testing & Genetic Genealogy

For those who’ve already taken DNA tests, this guide will demystify and explain how to interpret DNA test results, including how to understand ethnicity estimates and haplogroup designations, navigate suggested cousin matches, and use third-party tools like GEDmatch to further analyze data.

Inheritance: A Memoir Of Genealogy, Paternity and Love

Inheritance is a book about secrets–secrets within families kept out of shame or self-protectiveness; secrets we keep from one another in the name of love.

The Stranger In My Genes: A Memoir

Bill undertakes a quest to solve the mystery of his origins, which shakes his sense of identity. As he takes us on his journey, we learn about choices made by his ancestors, parents, and others, and we see Bill measure and weigh his own difficult choices as he confronts the past.

The Girls Who Went Away

Written by an adoptee, this book describes how countless single women were compelled to give up their children and how their situations were devastatingly compromised by the growing sexual revolution, limited birth control options, unrealistic social standards, and the unavailability of safe abortions.

Subscriptions

There are many websites genealogists use to conduct their research. Consider buying your Mom a subscription to one of these valuable sites.

Ancestry.com

Ancestry.com has sophisticated engineering and technology that harnesses family history and consumer genomics, combining billions of historical records, millions of family trees, and samples from over 15 million people in the AncestryDNA database to provide people with deeply meaningful insights about who they are and where they come from. Ancestry also allows the option to give an Ancestry Gift Subscription.

MyHeritage

MyHeritage is the leading global destination for discovering, preserving and sharing family history. Our platform and DNA kits make it easy for anyone, anywhere to embark on a meaningful journey into their past and treasure their family stories for generations to come. Our powerful technology does the searching for you, revealing fascinating new details about your family history — effortlessly.

Find My Past

Findmypast is a British-owned world leader in online genealogy. It has 18 million registered users across its family of online brands, which includes Findmypast, Genes Reunited, The British Newspaper Archive among others.

Fold3

The records at Fold3 help you discover and share stories about these everyday heroes, forgotten soldiers, and the families that supported them.

Search Military Records - Fold3

Newspapers.com

Newspapers.com is the largest online newspaper archive consisting of 491 million+ pages of historical newspapers from 11,800+ newspapers from around the United States and beyond. Newspapers provide a unique view of the past and can help us understand and connect with the people and events.

Discover you family history through historical newspapers at Newspapers.com

GenealogyBank

GenealogyBank’s 9,000+ historical newspapers include letters, speeches, opinion pieces, advertisements, hometown news, photographs, illustrations and more.

Happy Mother’s Day to all the Mom’s out there.

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Filed Under: DNA, Genealogy, Products Tagged With: amazon finds, DNA, genealogy, gifts

DNA Day Sales

April 23, 2019 by Daisha Leave a Comment

This post contains affiliate links. We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites.

Did you know that April 25, 2019, is DNA Day! DNA Day celebrates the day when James Watson, Frances Crick, Rosalind Franklin, Maurice Wilkins, and their colleagues published papers on the structure of DNA in 1953.

If you have ever wanted to take a DNA test or need one for a gift, now is the time to stock up! Many of the DNA companies are holding some great sales to celebrate. Here is a short round-up of what they are offering.

MyHeritage

MyHeritage has a sale on their kits for $59 until April 28th.

FamilyTreeDNA

FamilyTreeDNA is running a sale on all of their products! You can save up to 30% on not only an Autosomal kit but also their Y-DNA test and their mtDNA. This sale is running until April 25th. SALE EXTENDED UNTIL APRIL 28th!

23andMe

23andMe is offering a Mother’s Day Sale until May 13th on their Health & Ancestry tests for 30% off.

Ancestry

Ancestry is offering a sale of $69 on their kits until April 25th.

Don’t forget to check out our post on DNA Matches to better understand your results.

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Filed Under: DNA Tagged With: DNA

DNA Matches: The Basics

April 11, 2019 by Daisha 13 Comments

This post contains Affiliate Links.

www.rootsuncovered.com DNA Basics

DNA matches can be very overwhelming and confusing to sort out. I remember the first time I looked at my DNA match list, it was like a sea of unknown names. I did not even know where to begin in order to make sense of it all. My Aunts were showing up as cousins and nothing made sense. However, with the help of many useful websites and Facebook groups, I began to understand how it all worked. My hope is by the end of this post you will feel much less overwhelmed.

First thing is first and most important, attach a family tree to your DNA results. This helps not only see where people fit within your tree, but also helps others who are trying to work on their own trees. If you need help with this step please send me an email using the contact page and I will gladly help walk you through it.

Let’s start with some DNA Language you should know.

centiMorgan (cM) is a unit of measure for DNA. cM tells you how much DNA you and another person share. The more you share the closer they are related to you.

centiMorgan’s are going to be key in figuring out your matches. Blaine Bettinger at the genetic genealogist created a wonderful resource called the Shared cM Project. This tool gives you an estimate, based on your shared cM, of how you and a match are related.

The Shared cM Project chart can be found here

Finding your matches

Let’s take a look at some testing companies and where you can find the cM for you and your matches and some ideas on how to sort them.

AncestryDNA

From the main page of ancestry.com click on DNA and then on DNA Matches. This will display a list of all of your matches. Below is a screenshot of my first two matches.

Let’s look at my second match. Ancestry labels my match as a close family-1st cousin. As you can see we share 1,766 cM. Using that number I can look at the shared cM project chart and narrow down my match. According to the chart, this match could be a Grandparent, Aunt/Uncle or first cousin. I know this match is my Grandfather, but if you have a match you are unsure about there is a way to narrow it down using a few steps I will discuss below.

MyHeritage DNA

From the main page of MyHeritage click on DNA and then DNA Matches and this will bring you to your list of matches.

MyHeritage is set up a bit differently then ancestry, but all in all, it provides basically the same key information you need. The DNA match example I used above is a much lower cM. This indicates that our common ancestor is going to be quite a few generations back.

FamilyTreeDNA

After you log into FTDNA click on matches and your list of matches will appear.

One thing I like about FTDNA is that they provide you with the relationship range that is a bit more in depth. The example I used above is my Mother and you can see we share over 3,000 cM, which indicates a very close relationship.

23andMe

From the home page click on ancestry at the top and then click DNA relatives and this will bring you to your match list.

As you can see 23andMe looks very different in their set up as they do not display their cM’s on the main list. To find your shared cM’s you have to click on the match and it will take you to a comparison page for you and that person.

Steps to figure out your matches

One of the easiest ways to figure out how you connect with a match is to check and see if they have family tree connected to their DNA results. This is one of the main reasons it is so important to connect a tree to your DNA. If you don’t know how to connect a tree to your ancestry DNA results check out this post. Taking a look at a matches family tree can serve two purposes. The first is that they have a very detailed tree and this will lead you straight to the answer you are looking for, which common ancestor do you share. The second, if they do not have a detailed tree and only show a few people, then you can try and build your own tree using that information to look for a common ancestor. I will write a post on this in the coming weeks.

Let’s take a look at how to find out if your match has a family tree.

AncestryDNA

Navigate your way back to the list of your DNA Matches. Once you are looking at your list you will see next to each match either, unlinked tree, no tree, a tree with x amount of people or a private tree.

For those that have a tree click on the match and you will see an option to view their tree. Let’s look at someone who has an unlinked tree. Click on your match and then navigate down the page until you see the drop-down menu to select a tree to preview. Once you select a tree a preview of their will load.

Now, let’s delve into those that have no tree or a private tree. For each of those you can message the match and see what information they are willing to share. Another option is to click on the match and then scroll down to shared matches. Check your shared matches to see if any of those have a family tree attached to their DNA results. If you find a shared match with a tree, review that tree and make a note of your relationship to that match and look for a common ancestor. Now go back to the original match and make a note of the common ancestor you shared with your shared match. This will be a clue as to how you and this unknown match connect.

MyHeritage

MyHeritage is a bit different. Navigate to your matches, looking at your list you can easily see who has a tree attached and who does not. For those that do not have a family tree, you can follow the same steps as above. First message the match and then second, review your shared matches for someone who has a tree attached to their results.

FamilyTreeDNA

Bring up your matches list on FamilyTreeDNA. You will see a small tree icon next to each match. The gray trees mean that match does not have a tree attached. If the tree is a blue color then that match has a tree attached to their DNA results.

23andMe

23andMe is a bit more difficult. They do not have family trees connected to DNA. However, you can either message your match or check each match for a link to a family tree they have on another site.

Please remember if you are still overwhelmed or need any help sorting out your match list, contact me and I will be more then happy to help you.

This post contains affiliate links. I may earn money from advertisements, at no cost to you. The opinions expressed in this article are based on my personal experience and research. They do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the companies mentioned or advertised.

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Filed Under: Beginner, DNA, Genealogy Tagged With: Basic, Beginner, DNA, family research, Matches

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