RootsTech 2019 - Friday - 1 March

Crowds at RootsTech

Three days into RootsTech and I am still alive. There are so many things to do here that many genealogists are overwhelmed trying to learn everything we can in only 4 days. They have said there were 15,000 pre-registered attendees for the conference. Saturday is Discovery Day and the crowds are expected to increase by several thousand more.

Today was my day to focus on some German research classes. One class I attended focused on German Family Research in the Digital Age. This class was led by Dietmar Cziesla of FamilySearch and Andreas Hedwig from the Hessisches Landesarchiv. There were a couple major points presented concerning how Germans feel about the use of social media and sharing information. While 50-60% of Germans have Facebook accounts, they don't share information like Americans. They tend to use the WhatsApp app because they feel it is more private. This is evidenced by the fact that between 83% and 96% of Germans, depending on age group, have WhatsApp accounts. Also, Germans are not as likely to do DNA tests but Ancestry and MyHeritage are trying to increase the comfort level so more will provide DNA samples and more matches might become available in the next few years.

Currently there are 50 million German record images available online, 30 million of those are from Hesse. The physical records in Germany are held in 65 different archives and consist of over 1,000 miles of shelves. One collection that was mentioned was the War Maps collection. I found it interesting that this collection contained detailed maps of the east coast of the US. The oldest records in the German archives date back to the 8th century and church parish records start in the 14th century. The partnership between FamilySearch and the Hessisches Landesarchiv has resulted in 11 million digital record images being put online. They are now working on hand writing recognition applications and expect surname indexes to be available within the next couple years. Place searches are already available for these records. One great resource in the German archives is the website www.arcinsys.de. Check it out to see the number of collections already available. Additionally, FamilySearch has five digital camera crews currently working in Germany to digitize new records and they have a partnership with Ancestry to index the German Lutheran Church records.

MyHeritage DNA AutoCluster

MyHeritage talked about some of their new DNA tools - AutoClusters and the Family Theory of Relativity. Both of these will make DNA relative discoveries much more efficient. The AutoClusters organizes shared DNA matches into clusters of related individuals. Each cluster likely has a common shared ancestor. Once you find a cluster (a block of similar colored boxes), you can begin to determine how that group is related.

MyHeritage's other new DNA tool, the Family Theory of Relativity, uses data from various sources including family trees from MyHeritage, FamilySearch and Geni, along with records such as censuses, and DNA matches to build an estimated family tree which shows how you may be related to a DNA match. All that is required to develop a theory is for both individuals to have a family tree on MyHeritage with at least 1 person in the tree connected to the DNA sample. Users are expected to review these matches and provide feedback as to the accuracy of the estimates.

MyHeritage also announced an extension to their DNA Quest program which was started at RootsTech last year. That program contributed 15,000 DNA kits to adoptees and provided support to find their biological families. This year, they will provide an additional 5,000 kits. The program starts today and runs through April 30. Adoptees can register for the program at www.dnaquest.com. 

I hope you have enjoyed reading my posts about what is happening at RootsTech. I will be speaking tomorrow so I don't know how many classes I will be attending. So, I'll say goodnight for now.