Staying Curious

Kim & Sue’s Genealogy Pages

Gibbs DNA Project

             If you take a look below, you’ll find the results we’ve received for our DNA test since February 26 –27, 2006.  The final results will hopefully show that we are related to a Gibbs clan that is already part of the DNA project!  If not, we are encouraging more Gibbs families to get their DNA done, so we can match up our families and share the history we have found.  There is SO much information coming out, it’s making our head spin!  Here’s the easiest way we can explain “what now?”. 

             In the results we received, we matched a group of men almost exactly.  What does this mean?  We will be able to limit our search to certain family lines now.  Here’s the best equivalent we can give you:

            

 

 

            

             We are looking for family of Thomas D. Gibbs, Sidney and Vernon's father's (William) father's (Thomas L), father (Thomas D) and hopefully his father(?), and so on.  This takes us back to around the Revolutionary War, about 1780 or so.

             The results to the DNA don't provide a magical, "Oh, here he is" moment.  It's more of a magical, "Oh, we don't need to look over here anymore" moment.  We now resort back to old fashioned genealogy hunting through paperwork and records, but we have the help of 5 other matching DNA participants who are thrilled to make the connection, and willing to put all their efforts into helping us find our common ancestor, with results they have found for their family and vise versa!  We will keep you posted as more "Ah-ha" moments occur. Stay tuned!

 

Please e-mail Sue Collier if you have any questions.

Gibbs DNA Project Website

DNA matches and explanations posted 10-10-07

             Say you need to find a needle in a haystack. (yes, we know this isn’t a good start!).  The haystack is in the middle of a field with hundreds of other haystacks.  Where do you start, when all you know is there's a needle in one of them?  We have spent MANY years looking through many of the haystacks.  Now, with this DNA test, we know which haystack to look in.  It's getting closer, and the anticipation is intense! (this is good!)

                 O.K.  We’ve made you the table above to explain what we have found.  Each column is numbered at the top, 1-67.  These are “markers” or DNA strands that we are looking for a match on.  The more of these markers that match, the closer we are to a particular family line.  If you take a look at the table above, you will notice all the columns match, except columns 14 and 18.  This is a reasonable set of numbers to be different, because these particular strands mutate (or change) often through the generations.  We are only one number off from all sets, so we are a very close in the family relationships.

             Take a look at the last row, that’s another person that is part of the Gibbs DNA project.  Although there are some markers that match, many don’t.  That means that although we have come from the same family at some point, we are not of close relations to help each other out.  Many people research on their direct ancestors, i.e. father/mother’s parents, they’re parents and so on.  Many don’t go extensively into the siblings, or their kids, or their kids, kids families.  That’s why we don’t match with the last row, because they’re too far removed from our direct line.

             You may notice that the 3rd and 4th rows only have 25 markers, while the first one has 67 and the other has 37.  The first one (us) has done the more extensive 67 marker test, that has just become available recently.  The second one is 37 markers, while the others are 25.  The more markers we can match with someone, the more we can narrow down the generations of relations.  WHAT???

             It means the more numbers you match, the more you can figure out if our common ancestors where father/son, cousins, brothers, or grandsons/grandfathers.  Genetically close, but how close depends on how many numbers match.  Since we match so closely with these participants, we hope to find the connection with them, within 4 generations of the tester.  That would take us back to about the time we loose our g-g-g-g grandfather Thomas D. Gibbs birth.  Maybe, if we’re lucky, we’ll find out that one of the participants g-g-g-g grandfather was Thomas’ father or brother, hence allowing us to trace our family even further back.  Perhaps over the pond to England or Scotland. 

I’m SO confused, what does it all mean?

We’d like to take this moment to recognize the efforts of William Gibbs, for stepping forward to do this project.  We lost Bill to cancer in May 2007.  He was very excited about the possibilities of this project, and we hope that soon his efforts will allow us to match up and find the long lost relatives he hoped we’d find.

William Robert Gibbs

June 1, 1935 to May 14, 2007