Like Thomas MacEntee, I think a GeneaBloggers' Code of Conduct is long overdue. From now on, any blogger wishing to appear in my Genealogy Blog Finder must adhere to the following guidelines: Follow best genealogical practices at all times. Or else learn to fake it like the rest of us.Hateful language will not be tolerated unless directed at people I also hate.When attacking religions, lay off the Mormons because you'll probably need their help someday.Politics should never, ever be discussed on a genealogy blog because Obama is the Antichrist.Always give proper attributions for the stuff ...

I first wrote about scientists producing human embryos with the DNA of three people in 2008. The new issue of Nature has an article on the researchers' progress.The British team carrying out the study used fertilized eggs donated by couples undergoing fertility treatment, and which were unsuitable for in vitro fertilization (IVF). At this early stage the sperm and egg nuclei, which contain most of the parental genes, have not yet fused. The researchers removed these nuclei and transferred them into another fertilized egg cell which had had its own nuclei removed. As very little cytoplasm ...

Not only is genealogy a worthless pursuit, it can lead to family discord.Illegitimate children, hidden affairs, troubled finances and deceit all await those determined to piece together their family's past, found Dr Anne-Marie Kramer of Warwick University. When she interviewed more than 220 people across the country who had looked into their past, she discovered it had led to conflict with relatives in more than one in eight cases. [Link]So, in about 7 out of 8 cases, family history research did not lead to conflict. Those are pretty good odds. And the odds might be even better, as ...

The Times has another of those "genealogists are (and should be) only interested in famous ancestors" articles, this time by Sathnam Sanghera.Genealogists also have a habit of remarking that “every family has a story”. But it’s not necessarily a story worth telling. Given the huge number of worthless family stories in the world, how fortuitous that Sanghera found

Chris Staats finds five degrees of separation between himself and George Washington. I think I can beat him. I knew my great-aunt Gladys (died when I was 25), who knew her grandfather Lemuel Dunham (died when she was 10), who knew his grandfather Moses Dunham (died when he was 15). Moses served in the Continental Army under Washington for a couple of years, and was by his own account present at the surrender of Cornwallis. I would imagine he was in the front row and met the general himself, which would leave four degrees of separation between me and Washington. If you think you can beat ...

It's a genealogist's worst nightmare: 800,000+ burials and only one marked grave.Most New Yorkers don’t even know it’s there. Hart Island, near the popular summer spot City Island, is one of the world’s largest cemeteries, and the U.S.’s largest potter’s field, where the indigent and unidentifiable have been buried en masse since just after the Civil War.At one time the island also housed a prison, a boys’ workhouse, a Nike Ajax nuclear missile silo, and for four months in 1865, it was a prisoner of war camp used to house captured Confederate Troops, ...

The consul general of Barbados in New York is obliged to visit local Barbadians who've reached 100 years of age on their birthdays. Mae Bishop will have none of it.According to her birth certificate, she will turn 102 on May 16. But with the feistiness and independence that have characterized her long life, she has steadfastly refused to acknowledge that she has lived a century. For Mrs. Bishop’s 100th birthday in 2008, the family held a party and allowed the previous consul general, a family friend, to attend. But it decided to respect Mrs. Bishop’s sensitivities by sending ...

Via Nina Lentini's Life Without End:She was born Myrtle Hart, at 85 Morrell Street in New Brunswick. However, as she would admit to anyone, she loathed the name Myrtle, so she would introduce herself by the name of Chris(tianne), her baptismal name, to which she finally changed legally at the advanced age of 81. [Link]

Maine lawmakers eager to protect our privacy must be relieved that Elwyn W. Lancaster has passed away.Elwyn had a remarkable memory for dates and numbers and was known in the community as the "Birthday Man." He loved to greet people by their birth dates as he sat at McDonald's. Often times, he would receive birthday cards signed only with birth dates. He could recite hundreds of birthdays, anniversaries and social security numbers. He was even interviewed by the local news station for this tremendous talent. [Link]

The proofreader of the Topeka Capital-Journal may soon be replaced by a 13-year-old.A 13-year-old who began reading when he was in kindergarten won the 2010 Topeka Capital-Journal Regional Spelling Bee in the 25th round when he spelled "geneaology," the study of family history. [Link, via]

Kimberly Powell proves that, while not everything is online, enough is online to make Sarah Jessica Parker weepy.My Scots Ancestors presents the geekiest genealogy post in the world, converting Ahnentafel numbers to their binary equivalents. If you were born to a surrogate mother, use base 3.A genealogy blogger wrote about a mysterious box found near a lake and ended up on the evening news. A serious journalist would have climbed inside the box. If you're sick of watching celebrities on genealogy shows, the latest episode of The Generation Project starts with a non-famous woman conversing ...

Interesting discussion over at Genea-Musings here and here regarding the question whether an American of Colonial descent should be able to document his complete ancestry back ten generations. The problems Randy brings up are rooted in our unique American history: Ours is a federal system of government. Any requirements for BMD registration were first imposed by 13 diverse colonies and their various governments, later by the states. These requirements have converged toward universal registration, but even today some states have policies that other states would never countenance.Ours is a ...

Neil Genzlinger's New York Times column on tonight's premiere of "Who Do You Think You Are?" warns potential family historians not to get their hopes up.Some of us may take the genealogical plunge expecting cool family stories like the ones the celebrities get, only to find that we’ve been ordinary and uninteresting since we were living in caves.My own tree, for instance, shows that, on my father’s side, Great-Grandpa Fred and Great-Grandma Elisa came to the United States from Germany on the same ship, the Noordland, in June 1889, apparently meeting onboard, down in steerage. ...

On last night's Simpsons episode, one of Lisa's paternal ancestors looked remarkably like Lisa's mother, who is related only by marriage to the Simpsons. Back to the Future III had a similar problem. Writer/producer Bob Gale and writer/director Robert Zemeckis were once asked to explain how the same actress ended up in two branches of Marty's family tree:Q: Lea Thompson plays Maggie McFly, Marty's great-great-grandmother, as well as Lorraine, Marty's mom. But Lorraine's family name is "Baines". Why did Lea play Marty's paternal great-great-grandmother, when she's really not part of that ...

Who's stupider—Time columnist Joel Stein or his great-grandmother?I found out through the 1930 Census that my father's father's parents paid $45 a month for a one-room New York City apartment for six people and they were the only ones on the block without a radio. My great-grandmother, when asked what country she grew up in, wrote "Poland," crossed it out and then wrote "Austria." These are countries that don't even border each other. I come from stupid people. You know how I know that? Because I had to look up whether those countries border each other [Link]Um, is Stein aware that ...