Welcoming Information for DNA tested members

Welcome to the Phelps DNA Project! As your volunteer administrator for our website, I thought you would need this information to understand all that is available to you. You may want to print it as a guide to review the many facilities available to you.

Requirements for Membership to the Phelps DNA Project (Changed 11/25/2008)

When you order your kit, it will be helpful if you will describe the earliest known paternal Phelps of the tested person. We will list him with your kit number.

If you would like, provide us with your paternal Phelps ancestry which will be posted on the Ancestry page. Only the member's FTDNA kit number will be placed with it. Omit living people. After DNA tests prove a common ancestor for family lines, any differences of ancestry data can be resolved by consensus of tested family members and long-time researchers of the line using source records where possible. We take pride in being able to "prove" our ancestries.
As a Phelps Project member, your kit number (not name) and earliest ancestor will appear on the "Y-Results" page (provided by the FTDNA company) showing your Y-DNA results.
To allow tested persons or their sponsors/proxies a way to discuss the results with their "cousins", I'll provide a free, Google group (usually private) where you and approved researchers are identified and can thrash out what the DNA tells us. You can also work with them on your ancestry.

How does Y-DNA “triangulation” to a male ancestor 200 years ago work to prove his y-dna and my paternal line?

Below is a copy from DNA Heritage's web page which may help illustrate the concept.

Y-DNA testing is at its most powerful when comparing two or more people and the results overlaid onto the existing genealogical records.

Here is a simple scenario where 3 cousins of the same surname have been tested (diagram below). Two of them share a great-grandfather, and all three share a great-great-great grandfather.

In our family tree, only the males of the tree are shown. The red X shows where a paternal line has died out.

Paternal family tree (only males are shown)


	At some point way back in time, a single mutation in the Y-chromosome occurred. This mutation has left all the yellow males with this same mutation and can be detected when their DNA is analysed.

Proof" of a paternal patriarch's YDNA - using the proper selection of descendant testing - could perhaps be defined as a confirming scientific test of a documented paper trail. Proof in this case would not prove in court who fathered whom, but it would prove the Y-DNA of a long dead male.

Allow me to be simplistic to make my point. First, let’s agree that Y-DNA passes largely unchanged from father to son - and only to the son. If your ydna is tested to be the same as the YDNA of your documented (Bible, birth records, deeds, etc) brother then you know the Y-DNA of your biological father because you both inherited his Y-DNA. If your brother’s YDNA does not match you, then there was a “non-paternity event” and you have no proof of your father’s YDNA. (Non-paternity events are said to occur 1.3% to 4% per generation.) Assuming they match, if you also have records which name the father, then you have "proof" that that recorded father’s Y-DNA is the same as yours and your brother. Without the records, you can only state that the father was a male who is also in the same male line; that is, your father could have been your uncle for example. So we can establish the YDNA of one's father using paper records and YDNA tests of two or more of his sons.

If we agree on that point, we can proceed. If a male descendant of grandfather's son A matches the ydna of a male descendant of grandfather's son B AND we have records to show that A and B were sons of grandfather along with records of their descendants, then we can "prove" the Y-DNA of grandfather. (It is always better to have confirming tests of male descendants of as many sons of grandfather as possible.)

Continuing with this logic, we can "prove" the YDNA of a man living in 1800 if we have good family records and matching Y-DNA tests of male descendants of at least two sons of that 1800 man.

Additional information:

When matching y-dna, it is very beneficial to have more than 12 matching markers, since often we find different surnames matching at 12 markers indicating a common ancestor far, far back in time. 15 Phelps "cousins" were able to prove their Phelps lines of NC & Va back to 3 patriarchs in the 1700s. However if one is not able to accomplish that difficult research, one may be able to confirm at least part of the way back to a man living in the mid 1800s - and hopefully assume the "tentative" ydna of his male ancestor. If not that, then the proof should go to back to at least one's great grandfather. It is not advised to test descendants of a living person because of the unpleasant implications when there is no match.

Therefore, a single test of a surname line can indicate the "tentative" YDNA for the entire line, but it can be very misleading when proving a paper trail of male ancestries.

The first two y-dna tests back to a common ancestor in the 1800s may result in a MAJOR mismatch. (Occasional mutations are normal.) This means somewhere there has been a non-paternity event (name change, adoption, etc). Additional tests must be done on additional descendants to indicate in which line the NPE occurred.

Our Phelps Project Ancestry Website

FTDNA provides us a free basic website in which they automatically present the results. As a convenience, from your FTDNA logon, you may link to our Phelps project web page by clicking where you see “ View the Group page “

Their provided web site provides me a limited ability to make changes. The provided website is at http://www.familytreedna.com/public/phelps On the top of this page, you may click several provided links to see what FTDNA has provided. The most important one is "Y-Results". Scrolling downward from this main page you will see other links that I have provided and include much more detailed information.

The most important additional function provided at our project is correlating genealogies with Y-DNA results. In order to do this, I need your ancestry to allow me to make the correlations and for you researchers to interact with one another. To make this a meaningful research site, I need your male ancestry by the time you receive your dna results.

Additional linked-to pages from the main page

The Ancestry Pages: Kits and their ancestries will be placed on separate linked-to pages. These are a key pages for your research. Please review it often since it changes as ancestries and dna results come in.

The Articles page: This page includes specific articles of DNA and family line interest and you should review them also.

I suggest that you click on the other pages that are provided which should help you learn more about DNA and our surname.

Your free, private Google Group “forum”

For family lines with enough interest, tested members and other approved researchers will be able to view and post comments about their ancestry at a private Google group for that line. You should view the past comments made there. If you are not joined or invited to join, please contact me. Please note that if I do not have your ancestry posted, I will not be able to include you in the proper google group.

The Google group is usually a private "forum" benefit for DNA tested members - or other approved researchers. In most all cases,it will be private, viewable and postable only by approved members. It is not quite as good as most traditional forums, but hopefully will be easy and fill our needs.

When you are joined you are asked by Google to create a logon and password for all Google options including the access to your discussion groups. One Google log on will suffice.

Identification of google members and their kits may be provided in the google groups. Alternatively, If you want to contact a kit member ask me to send them an email for you.

Your Personal Page at FTDNA

FamilyTreeDNA at http://www.familytreedna.com/ is the testing company used by most of us. You receive an email from FTDNA when your order, when they receive your kit, have results for you, or have matched your Y-dna to someone in their database. At some point after you order , FTDNA will email you a Kit Number and password, allowing you to log on to your personal page at their website.

You log on using the kit number and password which they have provided. If you do not remember your password, Click the small words beside the logon box "Forgot your password?" and follow the instructions.

Before your results are in, there is little to see there, but once your results are in there are many facilities available to you. You will receive a notice of your results by email from FTDNA and a certificate by mail later. As the administrator, I always get copied. I also have access to your personal logon page at FTDNA.

After your results are in you may view your results at your logon page. Using the several links, you can see those with whom you match, observe your projected haplogroup, order more tests, etc. Many wonderful analytical facilities are provided. You should plan to explore all the tabs and options you will see there (after your results are in.) Don’t overlook the interesting clickable icons!

If you match with someone, be sure to click the icon to the right of the person you match: And be sure to click the FTDNATiP report option which is to the right of the match!! See more about that here.

Your official personal information is recorded at your personal page which you may change. Initially, your test results will be compared ONLY with others of the surname(s) in our project. This option is seen from your “Setup Preferences” tab as:

I want to restrict the display of matches only to my Surname Project

I want my matches to be set against the entire database.

Since I think this default is too restrictive for our surname, if I see that you have not changed this option, I will change it for you. If you do not agree with this please let me know.

Remember that tested members in OTHER surname projects who have not changed that option are never compared to you.

You also have the option to quickly join any other project that may be of relevance. Simply click the icon and follow instructions. You may join briefly to see if you match anyone there, and then “remove yourself from the group”.

Using the FTDNATiP option at FTDNA

Any of you can log on to FTDNA, ask for matches, and the ask for a related report called FTDNATip which explains how well you match.

"What is so special about FTDNATiP™? FTDNATiP™ is the world's first program that incorporates specific mutation rates that have been proven to differ across markers, which greatly increases the power and precision of estimates of Time to the Most Recent Common Ancestor (TMRCA). Coupling this program with the results of a recent mutation rate study conducted by the University of Arizona, and presented by Family Tree DNA at the 1st International Conference on Genetic Genealogy on Oct. 30, 2004, has resulted in an extremely powerful new tool for genealogists."

For some of the Phelps lines, I may display several YDNA related tables on the ancestry pages. I use a software tool to combine what you individually can see by logging on at FTDNA and asking for matches (the FTDNATip report). The tool is a great time saver for me.

For those lines where I have shown a table showing the years to MRCA , the years may be too large in some cases. The reason is that the tool I have been using is not as precise as the FTDNATiP report at your logon at FTDNA. The only way I can present a more accurate table is to view pretty much what you can view and enter the data manually. The problem is that while the tool allows me to change the average years/generation, it is not as precise for the mutation rates as is FTDNA's report (FTDNATip) that you can view at your logon. On the other hand, the FTDNATip report shows only the number of generations. One has to multiply manually those years times your own selected years/generation. (FTDNA suggests 25 years). Of course you could research to compute the average years/generation. Perhaps we can eventually compute an average for the major lines??? But I suspect the avg years/generation should be computed on each line.

I strongly encourage you to log on, ask for matches, and click the appropriate FTDNATip report links.... and study the result carefully. Always use the largest number of ydna markers (25, 37, etc) for a given match. IN ADDITION: for those people that you PARTIALLY match at your FTDNA logon, you have the option to enter the number of generations that you KNOW that there was NOT a common ancestor. If for example you know you did not match in 8 generations, enter 8, and the recomputed years to the MRCA will appear. The resulting years will always be LARGER.

For some lines I hope to enter on the table, on the ancestry page, the years taken manually from the FTDNATip reports. Even so, you will learn much more by using the analysis tools at FTDNA as you look at each person you match.

Uploading your ancestry files to FTDNA

If you want other matching FTDNA surname kits to easily view your complete ancestry you have the option of uploading your personal home computer ancestry file from your computer to FTDNA. After logging on to FTDNA with your kit number and password, choose the orange “Gedcom Family tree” tab. Instructions to upload are provided there. Let me know if you have problems.

I don't recommend uploading everything that you have in your PC’s ancestry file. I asked my software to view my personal Phelps ancestry from the oldest ancestor. At that point by clicking on File, I can export choosing an option to export only what I have viewed Or of course you can begin your export by positioning on your earliest ancestor and doing a standard "Export file". In any case, you should first export a GEDCOM file rather than try to upload directly your real file. You will have a new gedcom file which you then can upload to FTDNA.

Uploading your ancestry files and your Y-DNA data to Y-SEARCH.com

Ysearch is a free public database provided by FTDNA. It allows free uploads of any lab’s Y-DNA results and optionally gedcom files, and provides additional analytical functions. The same approach is used to upload here as at FTDNA. Sometimes you will find matches here that you did not find at FTDNA.

You must first register at Y-search. While logged on to FTDNA, click on the orange tab, Y-DNA matches. Then click on where it reads Click here to upload to Ysearch.org in small print. The first time you will be required to register and assign a password which you must save. Fill in the extra information. If you are a FTDNA customer, your dna is presented and is uploaded if you so request (follow the instructions carefully.) Your haplogroup code is also uploaded (you may have to enter that?). Additionally, you may optionally upload your gedcom file at Ysearch, again so that Ysearch viewers may view your ancestry.

Once you have done this your personal page at FTDNA will have this clickable icon Important: If you later add new markers or have a haplogroup change, you need to update the information at Ysearch.