Sunday, January 1, 2017

Blake Newsletter, Volume 6, Issue 1, 2017

 Blake Newsletter

Table of Contents

1.   Blake Surname Study - What to expect in 2017

2.   Decision on publishing Family Trees

3.   yDNA study

4.   Family Finder study



1.   Blake Surname Study – What to expect in 2017

The newsletters of 2016 mostly talked about what I was not accomplishing having put in a lot of time in the five years since I took on the Blake family study at the Guild of One Name Studies. Hopefully, 2017 will see me return to my Wills transcription. I have already worked on a couple of wills and they are ready to publish on the 1st and the 2nd. Working on the wills again has been interesting as I am really entering into a blank script once again. My mind had been full of all sorts of details – for sure tainted by prior notions – and this space of time has eliminated all of those apparently logical thoughts with regard to various Blake families. But I do believe as the time has passed that Blake has arisen spontaneously in a number of areas and that is clearly seen in the yDNA study.

2.   Decision on publishing Family Trees

I had chatted a good deal about reconstructing family trees in distinct Blake areas in the British Isles and in the case of some Blake lines I will continue doing that. But I will refrain from publishing in areas for which there isn’t a yDNA sample submitted. I will also refrain if I do not have an individual who has been researching their particular line in an area – Cornwall was very much an example to me. The flow of the data was pointing out a rather interesting possible family story for that area but an email from a Blake member descendant of the family there questioning my thoughts reminded me that I am a collector of data not a provider. All of my thoughts will be archived with the Blake Study once I step down.

3.   yDNA Study (https://www.familytreedna.com/public/blake?iframe=yresults)

I must thank all of the members of the study for submitting their samples to the Blake yDNA Study. The growth of the study has been slow. It probably needs a more aggressive active person than myself to grow. The variety of the results is amazing covering haplogroups that have been in the British Isles from 8000 to 10,000 years ago to a much more modern era. The value of a yDNA study is huge to anyone trying to link back to a particular area but it does need, especially for a surname study on Blake, a lot of testers. We have not yet reached a point where the study is large enough to assist other than individuals who match the present group of researchers. The yDNA study of Ireland Project will be helpful if they are able to pinpoint the Galway Blake family and the other Blake families present there.

4.   Family Finder Study

Women are unable to participate in the yDNA study unless they have a brother/father/paternal uncle (or male descendants of this group) to test for their paternal line. Hence the suggestion that submitting results of Family Finder studies to this Blake DNA study. Unfortunately publishing results is somewhat difficult but I do plan to begin some reporting on Family Finder shortly. A couple of groups do have information linking them and known relationships.

Elizabeth Kipp, kippeeb@rogers.com

Member #4600: Guild of one name studies -
Blog: http://kippeeb.blogspot.ca/

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