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This query is from a reader’s comment. Anyone out there have anything they can share on the issue?

“Looking for evidence that Tabitha Oliver, wife of Durrett Oliver, was the daughter of Benjamin Winn and the sister of Benjamin Winn, Jr. of Caroline County, VA Their daughter Martitia Oliver married Joel Stodghill and went to Elbert County, GA. I’m descended from their son Durrett Stodghill. Be cause it is a burned county, wills don’t exist. Benjamin Winn Jr.was guardian to the Oliver children when the estate of their grandfather Nickerson Oliver was settled. No record of Tabitha’s birth or their marriage. They lived in Orange County, VA. Does anyone have any ideas?”

Meanwhile, William G. Rankin aka Willie G. is waiting in the wings.

Robin

The thing I have been calling The Compleat Book of Rankins for the past year somehow transmogrified into The Compleat Rankin Book upon publication. How did I miss all those cover proofs, etc.? Library of Congress stuff?

Whatever the heck its title might be, Lulu Publishing has a sale through Friday the 8th. 10% off. I was frankly surprised to find that anyone would buy one, given my offer to send copies at my expense to local genealogical/historical societies and libraries. Several people have done so, despite the fairly steep price. If there is anyone else out there with such inclinations, do take advantage of Lulu’s sale.

Use the discount code SUMMER10.

Happy Fourth of July, y’all!

Robin

I started a message on Ancestry a few nights ago to a man I don’t know. I was making a tongue-in-cheek offer to send him a crisp, new $50 bill if he could produce any legitimate evidence whatsoever that a person named Margaret Masena Kendall Marshall Rankin ever existed. While defining “legitimate evidence,” I realized the message sounded unkind and might make him angry. I also remembered yet again that I (like every other genealogist) don’t always find all the available evidence. Moreover, I sometimes misinterpret evidence that is right under my nose.

I cancelled the message. He may have missed out on an easy $50.

I turned my frustration with the elusive Mrs. Rankin into a project. I sent an email to the five best family history researchers I know: John Alexander, Roberta Estes, William D. (“Bill”) Lindsey, Jody McKenney Thomson, and Gary Noble Willis. I asked them to share examples of humorous or common mistakes they have seen in family trees.

Our stories identified seven categories of common and/or funny errors:

• biologically impossible
• are you dead or alive?
• invent your own facts
• proving the wrong thing
• geographic hopscotch
• same name confusion
• GEDCOM in, GEDCOM out (“GIGO”)

Here they are, illustrated by my friends’ stories.

Biologically impossible

John started our conversation like so:

“It’s hardly even worth writing about the cases of a child who was born when his or her parents were eight years old (or less) and of the parents who came back as ghosts to have children.”

John provided a link to a WikiTree site that analyzes a “shared” family tree for members who participate in an error assessment program called “Data Doctor.” A recent posting said that “Data Doctor analysis has found 21,635 men on our shared tree who became fathers before age 10 … 1,223 women who had children after age 100 … 2,134 who married before they were born and 2,904 who married after death.”

Talk about common errors! If you haven’t made one, you are apparently a rare breed.

Jody has a somewhat related story, although the error in question has an Oedipal twist:

“… years ago, I found an Ancestry tree that had my father, James Wilson McKenney (1908 – 1976), married to his mother, Edna Mae Durfey (1885 – 1969).  Grandpa was completely left out of the story! I wrote to the owner of the tree telling him that I knew both Wilson and Edna intimately and that it just was not so. I asked nicely if he would please change the error and gave him the correct relationships. A year later he had not made the change so I implored him, pointing out how ludicrous this was. It took him FIVE years to make the correction.”

Jody subsequently found a great alternative. Rather than contacting the owner of a tree containing an error, she attaches a “note” to the tree  and provides accurate information. Mission accomplished: correct information is available to anyone viewing the tree. No imploring required. I will use that approach henceforth.

Are you dead or alive?

Roberta’s story is surely one of a kind. In her own words:

“My favorite one is that I’m dead. I wrote to the person assuring them I’m not, and they accused me of being a crook, to put it nicely. (They were anything but nice.) They told me they knew me and I’m dead. It was the most bizarre discussion I’ve ever had. I told them I’ve never heard of them and they said “of course not, you’re dead.”

I finally had to contact the company and ask them to remove my death information from that person’s tree because the fact that I was “dead” allowed my private information to be shown to others.

Multiple times. They kept killing me off again. Seriously.”

John asked if the person was just trying to be funny. Roberta’s response:

“Nope, they were dead serious, pardon the pun. They were angry with ME for wanting them to remove my death date in their tree. I suggested that perhaps it was another Roberta Estes and they very condescendingly said, ‘No, that’s not possible, I know you and you’re dead.’”

I was compelled to ask Roberta if she was already dead when she and I met about twenty years ago in Halifax, Virginia for research in the county courthouse. I would love to be able to say that I met an actual ghost in the flesh, so to speak.

Invent your own facts

Bill’s story would be funny if it didn’t involve unalloyed meanness. To wit: he had a long exchange with the administrator of a certain DNA project about an ancestor issue. He provided reams of documentation to the administrator. (For the record, it was NOT the Lindsey/Lindsay DNA project administrator.) The administrator had written an article about one of Bill’s collateral relatives named Thomas “Doe” of South Carolina.

Bill describes the administrator’s article as “entirely divorced from reality.” Attempting to connect Thomas Doe of South Carolina to a John Smith in Mississippi (where Thomas Doe never set foot), the administrator claimed Thomas changed his name in Mississippi from Thomas Doe to John Smith. I probably don’t need to add that there was no evidence of any name change. The administrator also claimed Bill had provided no support for his argument, thoroughly insulted him, and threw him out of the DNA project with a false claim that he was sharing DNA results.

Bill’s story probably wins some kind of prize for the administrator’s mendacity and petty cruelty. The apparent lesson: if the facts don’t support your argument, invent some facts. Get out your Sharpie and alter the weather map.

Proving the wrong thing

Gary’s story wins the trifecta category for awards because it qualifies as “proving the wrong thing” as well as two other categories described below, “geographic hopscotch” and “same name confusion.”

Here it is. Having exhausted available records in the library and the Family Search website, Gary looked on Ancestry for any evidence of the children of a Hugh Rimer/Rymer and Mary Willis of Dorchester County, Maryland. Voilà! Gary found a tree including Hugh Rymer and wife Mary of Maryland. The only problem was the supporting record proved Hugh and Mary Rymer had eight children who were all born in England. The English couple could not possibly have been the same Rymers as the Maryland couple. Oops!

Geographic hopscotch

Gary’s story would have a Maryland couple repeatedly crossing the Atlantic to have children. One example I found concerns a man whose Revolutionary War pension application (and his widow’s) say that he was born and died in Pennsylvania. Census and other records establish that most of their eight children were born in Tennessee. You’ve either got to smile – or be amazed. That was one busy woman, going back and forth from Pennsylvania to Tennessee eight times. I wonder if she took all the kids with her on those trips.

When you see a lot of intra-generational geographic moves, be alert … you’re often on the trail of some bad genealogy. Those eight children were probably just attached to the wrong parents.

Same name confusion

This is a common error which we have all undoubtedly made. I’ve written articles about it a number of times on this blog, including articles about Lyddal Bacon Estes,  Edward Buxton Lindsey, Robert Rankin  — two different Robert Rankins, including Robert Rankin of Gibson Co., TN  and Robert Rankin (died 1795),  Jeremiah Rankin, and David Rankin of Franklin Co., PA. One of those “same name” stories taught me that people do not like hearing they are wrong, even in the context of family history – where we all make errors!

Here’s what happened. I “met” a close match through FTDNA autosomal tests. Both of us have Rankin ancestors. We compared notes and learned we share Rankin great-great-grandparents. We had a pleasant exchange of emails sharing personal info and family histories. I looked closely at his tree, and found that it showed one of our shared ancestors – Lyddal Bacon Estes – married to two different women at the same time. This is a common error for Lyddal. It is really  understandable in light of his unusual name(s).

I sent my distant cousin information about our ancestor’s one-and-only wife. I included citations to county records. The email was not rude or unkind, and didn’t suggest he change his tree … it was just an “FYI, here is another view” message. Not only did I never hear from him again, he barred me from viewing his tree. That’s pretty angry.

GEDCOM in, GEDCOM out (“GIGO”)

Bill recalls a woman he met decades ago at an LDS family history center. Her research consisted of printing GEDCOM after GEDCOM on a dot matrix printer. She then painstakingly inserted the information from the printout into her own family tree. That takes almost as much effort as doing the original research, although it wouldn’t be nearly as much fun. Bill calls her approach “GEDCOM in, GEDCOM out,” or GIGO for short – meaning “garbage in, garbage out.” If you ever worked with computers, you are familiar with that acronym.

It is now absurdly easy to import GEDCOMs having thousands of names and to merge them with your own tree. One cannot possibly confirm all that information. This is a great way to construct a tree that shows you as a descendant of, say, a Mayflower pilgrim, Sitting Bull, Charlemagne, and the Buddha. More power to you if that’s what you want from this hobby. As we like to say in the south, bless your heart.

Instead of starting a rant, here is my view and Roberta’s of  evidence and proof with respect to online family trees. Both articles (mine contains a link to Roberta’s) assert that they are not genealogical evidence. If you want to argue with that assertion, please send me a crisp $50 bill. Then we can talk.

It is unquestionably true that many online trees are conscientious attempts to construct an ancestry through research into actual evidence. It is also true that many online trees are simply GIGO, like the tree constructed by the woman who printed GEDCOMs.

GIGO trees contain a plethora of errors. We will all run into them. As for me, I have sworn off contacting anyone about bad information on a tree. If you are thinking about doing that, please send me a message first. I will do my best to dissuade you.

See you on down the road.

Robin

This is a repost of an article from 2018. It has received more views on this website than any article I’ve written except the one about the the Scots-Irish. The title indicates the topic is genealogical proof , which is a slight misdirection. The article is initially about what is, and is not, genealogical evidence. Then it attacks a tougher question: how much evidence is needed to say we have proof. Now, back to the original article.

*   *   *   *   *   *   *   *

I have a distant cousin (seventh cousins, maybe?) named Roberta Estes. We “met” online via Estes research some twenty years ago.  We finally met in person, spending a week together in Halifax County, VA doing nitty-gritty research among records in the basement of the Halifax courthouse. I knew I had found a kindred spirit when I learned she likes tax and deed records as much as I do.

Roberta writes an excellent blog called “DNA Explained.” A great many of her posts are about DNA “science.” When I have a question about DNA, the first place I go is to her blog and search her Archives.

Roberta’s post today is on a topic that will interest all family history researchers: what is, and what is NOT, genealogical “proof,” as she uses that term. Here is a link to  her post. 

What resonated most with me was her list of things that do NOT constitute “proof.” I have copied part of it below, with my comments and modifications in italics (the numbering has changed from her original list since I deleted a few items):

1. Proof is not an oral history, no matter how much you want to believe it or who said it. Oral history is a good starting point, not an end point.
2. Proof is not, not, 1000 times NOT someone else’s tree. A tree should be considered a hint, nothing more.
3. Proof is not a book without corresponding evidence that can be independently corroborated. Being in print does not make it so. People make mistakes and new information surfaces. Unfortunately, there are also genealogical frauds – see, e.g., Gustave Anjou.
4. Proof is not a man by the name of Jr. [taken to mean] that he is the son of a man by the same name with the suffix of Sr. “Sr.” often means older and “Jr.” means younger, but not necessarily related. In fact, the suffix can change over time for the SAME MAN: a Robert Rankin who initially showed up in Guilford, NC records as “Robert JUNIOR.” became “Robert SENIOR” after Robert the elder (his father) died.
5. Proof of a father/son relationship is not just two men with the same name in the same location.  I have a copy of a 1762 Lunenburg Co., VA deed, Thomas Winn grantor, witnessed by John Winn, Daniel Winn, John Winn, and John Winn. Nothing to distinguish between the John Winns. Some of those colonists clearly had a sense of humor. Lunenburg Deed Book 7: 227. 
6. Proof is not just a will or other document … without evidence that a person by the same name as the child named in the will is the RIGHT person.

The lawyer in me, retired though she might be, feels compelled to expand on Roberta’s discussion of “proof.” Namely, I want to draw a distinction between “proof” and “evidence,” and the amount of evidence that is needed to produce a certain standard of proof. 

The definition of “evidence” takes up a full page in Black’s Law Dictionary. Fortunately, the essence of the meaning of “evidence” as it relates to genealogical research is pretty easy to distill. Try this on for size: EVIDENCE is anything that is offered to prove the existence or nonexistence of a fact. In genealogy, evidence includes deeds, will and other probate records, tax lists, church birth and death records, census records, tombstone inscriptions, and so on. It does not include a family tree posted at the FHL or Ancestry websites, nor does it include a compiled family history, which is how trees were published in the pre-internet era.

Notice that the word “prove” appears in the definition of evidence. Here is what Black’s has to say about that: PROOF is the effect of evidence.

Boiling both definitions down, evidence is what supports a belief that a fact is proved (or disproved).

If you have ever served on a jury, you already know there are different “standards of proof.” In a Texas criminal trial, the standard of proof requires a defendant’s guilt to be established “beyond a reasonable doubt.” In a Texas civil case, the standard of proof is usually “preponderance of the evidence.”

Another standard of proof lying somewhere between those two is “great weight and preponderance of the evidence.” Law students, who like to boil things down to something understandable, may view it like this:

• Beyond a reasonable doubt: at least 95% of the facts compel a certain conclusion.
• Great weight and preponderance: 65-85% of the evidence supports a conclusion.
• Preponderance of the evidence: a conclusion is more likely than not – it has the weight of at least 51% of the evidence.

Naturally, there are parallels in family history research, or I wouldn’t be carrying on about this.

You frequently see the phrase “conclusively proved” in family history articles. This is roughly equivalent to “beyond a reasonable doubt.” For example, my paternal grandmother’s identity – Emma Brodnax Rankin – is conclusively proved by my birth certificate, my father’s birth certificate, his mother’s will naming him as a son, census records naming him as a son, ad infinitum. There is also my recollection of all those awful holiday dinners in her grotesquely overheated house in Gibsland, Bienville Parish, Louisiana. A court would call my testimony about those dinners at Ma Rankin’s “direct evidence” based on personal knowledge. If I’m a credible witness, THAT case is closed.

When you see the phrase “conclusively proved,” it means there is really no reasonable argument to the contrary. That is how I use the phrase on this blog. There is no reasonable argument that anyone other than Emma Brodnax Rankin was my paternal grandmother.

Use of the word “probably” in family history articles seems to equate with “preponderance of the evidence.” Namely, a conclusion is more likely than not.

Similarly, the phrases “most likely” or “almost certainly” are somewhere in between the other two. There may be a reasonable doubt, but the weight of credible evidence strongly points one way.

The “eye of the beholder” obviously plays a role in this determination. I may deem a conclusion “most likely;” you might find it only “probable.” This is a good reason why one would want to know the evidence for another genealogist’s conclusion … you might not find the evidence sufficiently compelling to justify accepting the conclusion.

We also need to talk about “circumstantial” evidence, because sometimes there is no other proof of a family relationship. That is particularly true in counties where records have been lost and documentary evidence is limited. “Circumstantial evidence” just means facts that lead to a reasonable inference.

For example, the fact that a 65-year old man named Jedediah Rankin is listed in the 1860 census in a household immediately adjacent to 40-year old Jacob Rankin constitutes circumstantial evidence of a relationship. You can reasonably infer some family connection between the two men because such an inference accords with common sense and experience. If Jacob and Jedediah witness each other’s deeds, that would provide additional circumstantial evidence of a family relationship. If Jacob named his eldest son Jedediah, and Jedediah Sr. was security on Jacob’s marriage bond, those facts would also be circumstantial evidence.

Circumstantial evidence such as this can establish a compelling web of family connections suggesting only one reasonable conclusion: Jacob was Jedediah’s son. It is a powerful tool in serious research.

One last red flag about “proof:” beware the passive voice, a grammatical form that frequently signals lack of evidence. Keep an eye out for these phrases, which appear in many compiled family histories: “it is thought that …” or “it is believed that …”  or “it is reported that ...”  Hmmmmm…. who believed or reported? And what is his or her evidence? Those phrases rightfully justify a jaundiced eye unless the writer provides evidence supporting the “belief.”

In all fairness, I do need to point out one thing about those old compiled family histories. Academic writers routinely cite evidence supporting factual assertions in their books, papers, and articles. Historically, family history researchers have not done so. No telling why — perhaps because genealogists, unlike academics, aren’t writing to burnish a reputation or (usually) to make money. We do this because it’s fun, or we want to share, or we’re just curious about our history. Or all of the above. 

Fortunately, more family history researchers now seem willing to share evidence and provide citations to county and other records. As a cautionary note, though, here’s a piece of advice I received from a woman researcher I had been peppering with questions via email back in the ’90s. She had obviously reached the end of her rope. “Honey,” she said, “if you really want to find answers to all those questions, I suggest you go dig around in the records of Middlesex County, Virginia. Your library has a bunch of good abstracts.” <grin> I took her advice.

Finally, back to Roberta’s list of “not proof,” item #2, someone else’s tree. It may be a fact that “many online trees” show Jedediah Rankin as Jacob Rankin’s father. Those online trees are not even evidence of a relationship between those two men. All they might prove is that many online trees are copies of other online family trees. Or that many people believe Jedediah was Jacob’s father. But … evidence? Nope.

See you on down the road.

Robin

We learned about a new genealogy scam today. It seems unlikely that many people would fall for it, but … just in case, here’s a heads up. Here’s how the scam works:

• The scammer hacks someone’s account at Ancestry.com (or at least finds their Ancestry password and accesses the account). From there, he can view any tree on Ancestry and send messages to any tree owner via the Ancestry messaging system.
• He sends the message quoted below to anyone on Ancestry who seems a likely target. In the email below, the scammer is targeting a man named Willis, attempting to peddle Willis family records.
• The name of the message sender is genuine: it is the name of the person whose account has been hacked. The account owner is unaware of the scam.
• The scammer tells the potential victim to contact him directly, rather than the actual account owner (see boldface sentences in the message).

Bottom line: the scammer tries to sell alleged family history documents to the message recipient. 

Here’s an actual scam message, verbatim except for names at the beginning and end. Some of the information about William Willis in the second sentence may be genuine. I didn’t check. It would certainly make the scam more credible if it included accurate info, although that sounds like too much work for a grifter.

“A message from John Doe [name of person whose Ancestry account was hacked]

Good Afternoon [name of potential victim], I am writing you because I recently acquired a box full of genealogical information on your family from an auction in Sykesville, MD. Documents are mostly from the 1920-30s by William Nicolas Willis (1879-1939), a noted author, poet, genealogist and historian. This is a true treasure trove of family history that goes back at least 7 generations from his perspectives. There are some interesting photographs of family members, family properties, tomb stones, several trees illustrating the connections, many dozens of letters to & from his desk, journals, contemporaneous newspaper articles, etc. it appears from how William Willis drew his family tree there is a solid connection to George Washington during the 1600’s timeframe. There is even two photos of a family Elm tree from the John Willis plantation that is most suiting for this project of his. It appears that William had only one son, William, Jr. … so perhaps with his death the papers co no longer be passed to a next generations, so I ended up with them at an auction that would have thrown it all away otherwise. Please contact me so that I can go into detail and see if you would be interested in acquiring this tribe which I am definately certain will beef up your family tree on this site. I am using my nephew John Doe’s page on Ancestry so please write to me at {email address} If you respond on this site my nephew (in Ohio) will receive it but not know why as this is not his project. I look forward to hearing from you. [name of person who will receive the responsive email]”

End of message.

We don’t know whether the person who originally received this message reported it to Ancestry (we don’t know who he/she is – just that he is a Willis researcher). If you get something similar, please do report it.

Anyone who reads carefully would probably not fall for this. It was plainly written by someone for whom English is a second language, not unlike those emails from a “Nigerian Prince” that we have all received. However, it’s hard to overestimate the appeal of all those alleged family history records, supposedly establishing a connection to the line of George Washington.

Also, based on the amount of obvious errors one finds in online trees, perhaps there are naïve possible victims for this scam on Ancestry. 

Here’s my latest experience with bad trees, also passed on as a caution.

I recently took Ancestry’s autosomal test, and then learned that I really needed to post a tree to make it useful. That is no fun at all. Here’s why.

If you have worked on building a family tree at their website, you know that Ancestry provides “clues” every time you enter a name. For example, I added to my tree the name of an ancestor born in the early 1800s. Up popped a “clue” to the name of his parents. The suggested parents were so far out in left field that I couldn’t even imagine how someone invented them. I’d never heard of them.

Fortunately (or not), Ancestry lets one connect to the source of the information in its clues. When I went to one of the trees sourcing that bad clue, I found a host of Ancestry trees having a picture of my mother. Several of them gave her an inaccurate name or a nonexistent middle initial. 

A number of friends have told me how upset they get by the bad information posted online about their families. I am not usually among them. Still. This was my mother. Golly gee, if someone can post my mother’s picture, he or she could at least get her name right! I realize that is a minor error that won’t lead anyone down the wrong ancestor trail, so it is really of no consequence.

NONETHELESS: I promptly fired off a cranky message to one of the portrait/wrong name posters (who also had the error about an ancestors’ parents, a meaningful one), implying that she was giving serious genealogists a bad name by copying other peoples’ info without verifying it. Upon further examination of the tree, I figured out the identity of the tree owner and her relationship to me. Unfortunately, it’s a close kinship, despite the fact that I didn’t recognize her married name.

Gee, I wish I hadn’t fired off that cranky message!

Takeaways from that experience …

• Don’t accept information posted on other family trees without confirmation in ACTUAL records. I’ve said this before, and will undoubtedly say it again: online trees don’t prove anything except how easy it is to construct and copy other people’s family trees that may be full of errors. Look closely at posted trees, and you will find, say, a 9-year-old women having children. Or a woman marrying a man who was already married. My favorite: a 120-year-old woman who was still reportedly having children, nontwithstanding that she had been dead for 60 of those 120 years. I’ll bet you have one that can top it. If so, please share.
• Likewise, don’t accept Ancestry’s “clues” at face value. Check them out. Just because Ancestry provided the will of some William Rankin, that doesn’t mean it is your  William Rankin — an error called “same name confusion.” At least take the time to read the damn will, where you might learn that the testator wrote the will in Franklin Co., PA in the 1790s, while your ancestor William Rankin died in 1850 in Lackawanna Co. You wouldn’t believe how many wills, S.A.R. applications, church and other records are attached to the Ancestry profile of a person who has no family connection whatsoever to the attached “source.” They might not even share a given name, which really boggles the mind.
• Don’t be an old grouch who attempts to correct someone else’s tree, as I did. You will be wasting your time. They probably won’t give a fig if their info is wrong, especially if they just copied it from someone else’s tree – or blindly accepted an Ancestry clue. Furthermore, errors on Ancestry multiply faster than Tribbles: exponentially. Trying to correct them is a losing battle. Finally, don’t send a cranky message to the owner of the erroneous tree because you might wind up regretting it.

That’s it for now. More Rankins are calling. Also Burkes, Trices, Estes, Winns, and Lindseys. Oakes, Odoms, Stubbs, and Hubbards. Powells, Vaughans and Perrymans. As a distant Alexander cousin likes to say: NOBODY HAS MORE FUN THAN WE DO. <grin>

See you on down the road.

Robin

OK, I’m a city girl … if you count Shreveport, LA, located in northwest Louisiana (aka East Texas) as “city.” I learned some good rural stuff, though, at Camp Fern, Marshall, Harrison Co., TX. I was a camper or a counselor there for a decade.

FYI, Harrison County, Texas is home to all four poisonous snakes resident to the US of A: water moccasins, rattlesnakes, copperheads, and coral snakes.

In my ten summers at Camp Fern, I saw them all. Nobody was ever bitten in all that time. I came to accept snakes as fellow occupants of God’s good green earth. Sometime in the late 1950s, a copperhead was hanging around on a rock near my cabin. I reported it to my counsellor. “Honey,” she said, “it won’t hurt you if you just don’t poke it with a stick.”

Live and let live: a good piece of advice.

But a snake is still a snake.

I actually remembered my counsellor’s advice with respect to the administrators of a certain FTDNA family DNA project. I failed to follow my gut hunch. Instead, I poked the snake, and wound up being defamed in an email (sent to gosh knows how many people), and two good friends of mine were tossed out of that DNA project for totally meretricious reasons. My friends are understandably upset.

That is a sad story that is probably about power and control. The project administrators in this case are (in my personal opinion) snakes, and they are out of control. That’s a damn shame.

THE PURPOSE OF THIS POST: if you are a member of a family DNA project, make sure that your administrators remain kosher. There are a zillion DNA projects, and FTDNA cannot possibly monitor everything the administrators do (although I think FTDNA does its best). The administrators are all volunteers, and most (in my experience) are committed to furthering family research in their particular family line. Most don’t punish people they don’t like by making up phony reasons to kick them out of a project. However, it is primarily up to us, as project members, to make sure that administrators do their jobs. There is no excuse for administrators to violate FTDNA ethical standards and/or to abuse their power over their members. So please keep an eye on ’em. Poke the snake, if need be. Report them to FTDNA.