In the most comprehensive study to date on the genetic origins of Native Americans, an international research team confirmed that Native Americans who descended from ancestors who crossed from Asia to the Americas approximately 20,000 years ago are offspring of six founding, or ancestral, mothers. The study also confirms the presence of genetic subgroups of more rare, less known and geographically limited genetic groups who arrived later. This study is the first time all known Native American mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) sequences and lineages have been compiled, corrected and organized into a single tree with branches dated.
Researchers from the Sorenson Molecular Genealogy Foundation (SMGF), a non-profit foundation building the world's largest collection of integrated genetic and family history information, the department of genetics and microbiology at the University of Pavia, and others today published online at the Public Library of Science (www.plos.org) the results of their study of more than 200 full mtDNA sequences from Native Americans. mtDNA traces maternal ancestry for both men and women and is inherited exclusively from mothers.
Researchers combed GenBank, the National Institutes of Health genetic sequence database, and earlier scientific publications for scans of Native American mitochondrial lineages and added previously unpublished sequences to this work, said study co-author Ugo Perego, director of operations at SMGF. The genetic sequences are pan-American, including native North, Central and South American populations.
"This is the first comprehensive overview of the principal pan-American branches of the Native American mtDNA tree," said Antonio Torroni, study co-author heading the University of Pavia group. Torroni is considered one of the fathers of genetic research on Native Americans and was the first to discover, 15 years ago, the four major genetic groups to which 95 percent of Native Americans belong.
The study released today identifies the six surviving Native American mtDNA lineages that are dated to approximately 20,000 years ago, designated as A2, B2, C1b, C1c, C1d and D1. Today's study also confirms the presence of five more rare, less known and geographically limited genetic groups: X2a, D2, D3, C4c and D4h3.
The five more rare genetic groups will help researchers isolate branches within the pan-American groups that are younger or come from a better-defined geographic area, said lead author Dr. Alessandro Achilli, researcher at the University of Pavia and assistant professor at the University of Perugia. "For example, we learned one branch is only found among Aleuts and Eskimos," he said. "The presence of these additional subgroups suggests different migratory events from Asia or the Bering Straits. This study will be used as a reference for all future research on Native Americans. It is essential for reconstructing the history of specific Native American groups and for reliable association studies between mtDNA haplogroups and complex disorders," said Achilli.
Comprehensive data from the study is available online at www.plos.org, said Perego, and may be used to improve tests by commercial genetic genealogy firms, such as GeneTree. GeneTree (www.genetree.com) is a DNA-enabled family history-sharing Website helping people understand where their personal histories belong within the greater human genetic story. GeneTree was developed by the Sorenson family of companies and draws on the expertise of the Sorenson Molecular Genealogy Foundation.
People are increasingly using genetic testing to learn about their roots, said Perego. "I receive calls and emails regularly asking, 'With a DNA test, can you prove I have Native American ancestry?' Our new research has the potential to fine-tune genetic genealogy tests for these people." He noted genetic testing is not currently accepted as proof of ancestry for admission into a tribe.
About Sorenson Molecular Genealogy Foundation
The Sorenson Molecular Genealogy Foundation (SMGF; www.smgf.org) is a non-profit research organization that has created the world's largest repository of correlated genetic and genealogical information. The SMGF database currently contains information about more than six million ancestors through linked DNA samples and pedigree charts from more than 170 countries, or approximately 90 percent of the nations of the world. The foundation's purpose is to foster a greater sense of identity, connection and belonging among all people by showing how closely we are connected as members of a single human family. For more information about the foundation's free, publicly available database, visit
http://www.smgf.org/.
See also:
http://download.ajhg.org/AJHG/pdf/PIIS0002929708001390.pdf
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
Monday, March 10, 2008
MELUNGEON FAMILY OF THE MONTH
Notes for HEZEKIAH MINOR:
''Under the column Purebred Indian group from Blackwater are the Minors. The Minors, a fighting people, show more of the Indian than any other Indian group in Scott County. They claim to be Portuguese Indian stock. They are of large stature, tall of black complexion and very strong. I believe the Minors are of three-quarters Indian and one-quarter Portuguese. The are of the type of people whose word is their bond. In Scott County some of them own large stock farms and have prospered.'' Source: Wash Osborne
James Anderson Minor: Son of Lewis Minor & Sarah Fields, Grandson of Hezekiah Minor & Elizabeth Goins
Richard C. Minor Rosa Minor: Children of Gilford Minor & Ussley Roberts, Grandchildren of Zachariah Minor & Aggie Sizemore
Ussley Roberts Born 1841, Wife of Gilford Minor, Daughter of Emanuel and Lucy Roberts
Photos Here:
http://www.geocities.com/ourmelungeons/melfam3.html
''Under the column Purebred Indian group from Blackwater are the Minors. The Minors, a fighting people, show more of the Indian than any other Indian group in Scott County. They claim to be Portuguese Indian stock. They are of large stature, tall of black complexion and very strong. I believe the Minors are of three-quarters Indian and one-quarter Portuguese. The are of the type of people whose word is their bond. In Scott County some of them own large stock farms and have prospered.'' Source: Wash Osborne
James Anderson Minor: Son of Lewis Minor & Sarah Fields, Grandson of Hezekiah Minor & Elizabeth Goins
Richard C. Minor Rosa Minor: Children of Gilford Minor & Ussley Roberts, Grandchildren of Zachariah Minor & Aggie Sizemore
Ussley Roberts Born 1841, Wife of Gilford Minor, Daughter of Emanuel and Lucy Roberts
Photos Here:
http://www.geocities.com/ourmelungeons/melfam3.html
Sunday, March 9, 2008
Standards For Sound Genealogical Research
Recommended by the National Genealogical Society
Remembering always that they are engaged in a quest for truth, family history researchers consistently—
Remembering always that they are engaged in a quest for truth, family history researchers consistently—
- record the source for each item of information they collect.
test every hypothesis or theory against credible evidence, and reject those that are not supported by the evidence. - seek original records, or reproduced images of them when there is reasonable assurance they have not been altered, as the basis for their research conclusions.
- use compilations, communications and published works, whether paper or electronic, primarily for their value as guides to locating the original records, or as contributions to the critical analysis of the evidence discussed in them.
- state something as a fact only when it is supported by convincing evidence, and identify the evidence when communicating the fact to others.
- limit with words like "probable" or "possible" any statement that is based on less than convincing evidence, and state the reasons for concluding that it is probable or possible.
avoid misleading other researchers by either intentionally or carelessly distributing or publishing inaccurate information. - state carefully and honestly the results of their own research, and acknowledge all use of other researchers’ work.
- recognize the collegial nature of genealogical research by making their work available to others through publication, or by placing copies in appropriate libraries or repositories, and by welcoming critical comment.
- consider with open minds new evidence or the comments of others on their work and the conclusions they have reached.
© 1997, 2002 by National Genealogical Society. Permission is granted to copy or publish this material provided it is reproduced in its entirety, including this notice.
See also:
Standards for Sound Genealogical Research
Guidelines for Using Records, Repositories, and Libraries
Standards for Use of Technology In Genealogical Research
Standards for Sharing Information with Others
Guidelines for Publishing Web Pages on the Internet
Guidelines for Genealogical Self-Improvement and Growth
Saturday, March 8, 2008
Surviving Indian Groups
by Janet Crain
Be sure and take advantage of the 1948 Smithsonian Booklet; a Report of the Surviving Indian Groups in the Eastern United States, which Don Collins has contributed. Scroll down the right side until you come to the image of the booklet cover. Click on that and you will be taken to an album with all the pages in order. You can enlarge the pages and save and print if you desire or you can download the entire album.
Many thanks to Don for this great information!
Be sure and take advantage of the 1948 Smithsonian Booklet; a Report of the Surviving Indian Groups in the Eastern United States, which Don Collins has contributed. Scroll down the right side until you come to the image of the booklet cover. Click on that and you will be taken to an album with all the pages in order. You can enlarge the pages and save and print if you desire or you can download the entire album.
Many thanks to Don for this great information!
Friday, March 7, 2008
Melungeon Myth: Joseph's Machado Disease
by Janet Crain
The following statement is an example of the kind of Melungeon Myths being found on the Internet. These statements are being used as an attempt to link Melungeons to non-existent Turkish ancestors and do not bear close scrutiny.
The following statement is an example of the kind of Melungeon Myths being found on the Internet. These statements are being used as an attempt to link Melungeons to non-existent Turkish ancestors and do not bear close scrutiny.
"Modern-day Melungeons have found an intriguing link between their peculiar diseases and those of eastern Mediterranean. Diseases identified in the Melungeon population include thallasemia, Behcet's Syndrome, Machado-Joseph(Azorean) Disease, sarcoidosis, and Familial Mediterranean Fever."
_http://www.turkgenealogy.com/turkhistory/TurkPapers/The%20Melungeons.htm_
_http://www.turkgenealogy.com/turkhistory/TurkPapers/The%20Melungeons.htm_
This blog will address the validity of each of these claims. Today we are taking a look at the Machado-Joseph (Azorean) Disease claim. In 2004, in spite of the statement by author Brent Kennedy that a half dozen Melungeon descendants in Tennessee had this rare and debilitating disease, Dr. Marie Boutte of the University of Nevada-Reno, who studies genetic diseases, particularly Machado-Joseph Disease, was not able to find a single case in a person of Melungeon descent anywhere. Her search was to continue and to date nothing more has been heard.
Machado−Joseph disease (MJD) is an autosomal dominant, multisystem neurodegenerative disorder involving predominantly cerebellar, pyramidal, extrapyramidal, motor neuron and oculomotor systems. Although it was first reported in families of Portuguese−Azorean descent, MJD has also been described in non−Azorean families from various countries, being one of the most common hereditary spinocerebellar degenerations. With the use of highly polymorphic microsatellite DNA polymorphisms, we have assigned the gene for MJD to the long arm of chromosome 14 (14q24.3−q32) by genetic linkage to microsatellite loci D14S55 and D14S48 (multipoint lod score Zmax=9.719).
What is Machado-Joseph Disease?
Machado-Joseph disease (MJD)-also called spinocerebellar ataxia type 3-is a rare hereditary ataxia. (Ataxia is a general term meaning lack of muscle control.) The disease is characterized by clumsiness and weakness in the arms and legs, spasticity, a staggering lurching gait easily mistaken for drunkenness, difficulty with speech and swallowing, involuntary eye movements, double vision, and frequent urination. Some patients have dystonia (sustained muscle contractions that cause twisting of the body and limbs, repetitive movements, abnormal postures, and/or rigidity) or symptoms similar to those of Parkinson's disease. Others have twitching of the face or tongue, or peculiar bulging eyes.
The severity of the disease is related to the age of onset, with earlier onset associated with a more severe form of the disease. Symptoms can begin any time between early adolescence and about 70 years of age. MJD is also a progressive disease, meaning that symptoms get worse with time. Life expectancy ranges from the mid-thirties for those with severe forms of MJD to a normal life expectancy for those with mild forms. For those who die early from the disease, the cause of death is often aspiration pneumonia.
The name, Machado-Joseph, comes from two families of Portuguese/Azorean descent who were among the first families described with the unique symptoms of the disease in the 1970s. The prevalence of the disease is still highest among people of Portuguese/Azorean descent. For immigrants of Portuguese ancestry in New England, the prevalence is around one in 4,000. The highest prevalence in the world, about one in 140, occurs on the small Azorean island of Flores. Recently, researchers have identified MJD in several family groups not of obvious Portuguese descent, including an African-American family from North Carolina, an Italian-American family, and several Japanese families. On a worldwide basis, MJD is the most prevalent autosomal dominant inherited form of ataxia, based on DNA studies.
http://www.ninds.nih.gov/disorders/machado_joseph/detail_machado_joseph.htm
Disclaimer:This article is not intended to provide medical advice or diagnosis. Consult a medical health professional if you think you might be suffering from a medical condition.
Sarcoidosis is Not a Melungeon Disease
Another Internet Myth about Melungeons that needs to be addressed is that Melungeons are afflicted by Sarcoidosis. This is simply not true.
Janet Crain
SARCOIDOSIS
What is sarcoidosis?
Sarcoidosis is an inflammatory disease that can appear in almost any body organ, but most often starts in the lungs or lymph nodes. The disease also can affect the liver, skin, heart, nervous system and kidneys. No one yet knows what causes sarcoidosis. It can appear suddenly and then disappear. Or it can develop gradually and produce symptoms that come and go, sometimes for a lifetime.
As sarcoidosis progresses, small lumps--granulomas--appear in affected tissues. While these granulomas frequently clear up, with or without treatment, sometimes they do not heal. In these cases, the tissues tend to remain inflamed and become scarred (fibrotic).
What are the symptoms of sarcoidosis?
Generally, shortness of breath and a cough that will not go away are among the first symptoms of sarcoidosis. The disease also can show up suddenly with the appearance of skin rashes. Red bumps on the face, arms or shins and inflammation of the eyes also are common symptoms. It is not unusual, however, for sarcoidosis symptoms to be more general: weight loss, fatigue, night sweats, fever or an overall feeling of ill health.
Patients can have symptoms related to the specific organ affected, they can have only general symptoms or they can be without any symptoms whatsoever. Symptoms can vary according to how long the illness has been under way, where the granulomas are forming, how much tissue has become affected and whether the granulomatous process is still active.
Who gets sarcoidosis?
Once considered a rare disease, sarcoidosis is now known to be a common chronic illness that appears all over the world. Indeed, it is the most common of the fibrotic lung disorders.
Anyone can get sarcoidosis. It occurs in all races and in both sexes, but mainly in people between 20 and 40 years of age. The risk is greater if you are a young African-American adult (especially a woman) or of Scandinavian, German, Irish or Puerto Rican origin. White women are just as likely as white men to get sarcoidosis but, among African Americans, females get sarcoidosis two times as often as males.
Cont. Here:
http://www.idph.state.il.us/public/hb/hbsarcoi.htm
Disclaimer:
This article is not intended to provide medical advice or diagnosis. Consult a medical health professional if you think you might be suffering from a medical condition.
Janet Crain
SARCOIDOSIS
What is sarcoidosis?
Sarcoidosis is an inflammatory disease that can appear in almost any body organ, but most often starts in the lungs or lymph nodes. The disease also can affect the liver, skin, heart, nervous system and kidneys. No one yet knows what causes sarcoidosis. It can appear suddenly and then disappear. Or it can develop gradually and produce symptoms that come and go, sometimes for a lifetime.
As sarcoidosis progresses, small lumps--granulomas--appear in affected tissues. While these granulomas frequently clear up, with or without treatment, sometimes they do not heal. In these cases, the tissues tend to remain inflamed and become scarred (fibrotic).
What are the symptoms of sarcoidosis?
Generally, shortness of breath and a cough that will not go away are among the first symptoms of sarcoidosis. The disease also can show up suddenly with the appearance of skin rashes. Red bumps on the face, arms or shins and inflammation of the eyes also are common symptoms. It is not unusual, however, for sarcoidosis symptoms to be more general: weight loss, fatigue, night sweats, fever or an overall feeling of ill health.
Patients can have symptoms related to the specific organ affected, they can have only general symptoms or they can be without any symptoms whatsoever. Symptoms can vary according to how long the illness has been under way, where the granulomas are forming, how much tissue has become affected and whether the granulomatous process is still active.
Who gets sarcoidosis?
Once considered a rare disease, sarcoidosis is now known to be a common chronic illness that appears all over the world. Indeed, it is the most common of the fibrotic lung disorders.
Anyone can get sarcoidosis. It occurs in all races and in both sexes, but mainly in people between 20 and 40 years of age. The risk is greater if you are a young African-American adult (especially a woman) or of Scandinavian, German, Irish or Puerto Rican origin. White women are just as likely as white men to get sarcoidosis but, among African Americans, females get sarcoidosis two times as often as males.
Cont. Here:
http://www.idph.state.il.us/public/hb/hbsarcoi.htm
Disclaimer:
This article is not intended to provide medical advice or diagnosis. Consult a medical health professional if you think you might be suffering from a medical condition.
Wednesday, March 5, 2008
There really is no 'Melungeon or Anatolian bump"
From Joanne Pezzullo's Research
There really is no 'Melungeon bump." The "anatolian bump" is actually a
PRONOUNCED EXTERNAL OCCIPITAL PROTUBERANCE or EOP and it does not mean you
"have ancestry from the Anatolian regions that are now Turkey" as has been
reported over the years. There is a higher incidence in that region but it
is found in Germans, Asians, and Africans. I know of no report that suggests
Melungeon descendants have a higher average of this Pronounced EOP than
compared to other groups. Actually it is reported;
"As this trait relates to activities and muscle development, physical labor
will affect EOP development. Increased physical activity (e.g., to plow
arable fields, to reap and carry crops) may explain some of the observed
differences.'' [See article below]
Nadir Gülekon,1 M.D., Ph.D. and H. Basri Turgut,1 Ph.D.
The External Occipital Protuberance: Can It Be Used as a Criterion in the
Determination of Sex?
JOURNAL OF FORENSIC SCIENCES
''It is known that the EOP can show shape differences in various
populations. The incidence of a prominent EOP has been reported to be 10.9%
in Germans, 8.3% in Asians, 8.3% in Americans, 4.4% in Africans, 1.2% in
Egyptians, and 0.0% in Australians (1). The incidence of the EOP is found
higher in the Anatolian population (in general, 33.8% in the modern and
32.8% in the historic samples) compared with other populations. As this
trait relates to activities and muscle development, physical labor will
affect EOP development. Increased physical activity (e.g., to plow arable
fields, to reap and carry crops) may explain some of the observed
differences.''
http://books.google.com/books?id=EWc7d22_UMYC&pg=PA147&lpg=PA147&dq=pronounc
ed+external+occipital+protuberance&source=web&ots=Pe5coLXOb8&sig=OyeeHk33lpc
kqWz3hueaGxWnkqY
There really is no 'Melungeon bump." The "anatolian bump" is actually a
PRONOUNCED EXTERNAL OCCIPITAL PROTUBERANCE or EOP and it does not mean you
"have ancestry from the Anatolian regions that are now Turkey" as has been
reported over the years. There is a higher incidence in that region but it
is found in Germans, Asians, and Africans. I know of no report that suggests
Melungeon descendants have a higher average of this Pronounced EOP than
compared to other groups. Actually it is reported;
"As this trait relates to activities and muscle development, physical labor
will affect EOP development. Increased physical activity (e.g., to plow
arable fields, to reap and carry crops) may explain some of the observed
differences.'' [See article below]
Nadir Gülekon,1 M.D., Ph.D. and H. Basri Turgut,1 Ph.D.
The External Occipital Protuberance: Can It Be Used as a Criterion in the
Determination of Sex?
JOURNAL OF FORENSIC SCIENCES
''It is known that the EOP can show shape differences in various
populations. The incidence of a prominent EOP has been reported to be 10.9%
in Germans, 8.3% in Asians, 8.3% in Americans, 4.4% in Africans, 1.2% in
Egyptians, and 0.0% in Australians (1). The incidence of the EOP is found
higher in the Anatolian population (in general, 33.8% in the modern and
32.8% in the historic samples) compared with other populations. As this
trait relates to activities and muscle development, physical labor will
affect EOP development. Increased physical activity (e.g., to plow arable
fields, to reap and carry crops) may explain some of the observed
differences.''
http://books.google.com/books?id=EWc7d22_UMYC&pg=PA147&lpg=PA147&dq=pronounc
ed+external+occipital+protuberance&source=web&ots=Pe5coLXOb8&sig=OyeeHk33lpc
kqWz3hueaGxWnkqY
Tuesday, March 4, 2008
There is No Unique TURKISH DNA
by Janet Crain
It is now quoted widely on the Internet that certain groups (American Indians and Melungeons) in the USA have Turkish DNA. The article below from PubMed does not bear out that possibility. The suggestion is disengeneous at best.
The most important sentence in the article below is this:*The major components (haplogroups E3b, G, J, I, L, N, K2, and R1; 94.1%) are shared with European and neighboring Near Eastern populations* and contrast with only a minor share of haplogroups related to Central Asian (C, Q and O; 3.4%), Indian (H, R2; 1.5%) and African (A, E3*, E3a; 1%) affinity.
In other words, 94.1% of the DNA found in 523 Turkish Y chromosome samples is shared with European and neighboring Near Eastern populations. So there is no special motif or Turkish DNA. And this finding is explained by the closing sentence; "the variety of Turkish haplotypes is witness to Turkey being both an important source and recipient of gene flow".
Genes have flowed out and genes have flowed in for a very long time and cannot now be separated as belonging exclusively to one group or the other. So it is very deceptive to speak of "Turkish DNA" in the context of it being unique.
See Also:
http://hpgl.stanford.edu/publications/HG_2004_v114_p127-148.pdf
Hum Genet. 2004 Jan;114(2):127-48. Epub 2003 Oct 29. Links
Excavating Y-chromosome haplotype strata in Anatolia.
Cinnioglu C, King R, Kivisild T, Kalfoglu E, Atasoy S, Cavalleri GL, Lillie AS, Roseman CC, Lin AA, Prince K, Oefner PJ, Shen P, Semino O, Cavalli-Sforza LL, Underhill
PA.Department of Genetics, Stanford University School of Medicine, 300 Pasteur Drive, Stanford, CA 94305-5120, USA
Analysis of 89 biallelic polymorphisms in 523 Turkish Y chromosomes revealed 52 distinct haplotypes with considerable haplogroup substructure, as exemplified by their respective levels of accumulated diversity at ten short tandem repeat (STR) loci. *The major components (haplogroups E3b, G, J, I, L, N, K2, and R1; 94.1%) are shared with European and neighboring Near Eastern populations* and contrast with only a minor share of haplogroups related to Central Asian (C, Q and O; 3.4%), Indian (H, R2; 1.5%) and African (A, E3*, E3a; 1%) affinity. The expansion times for 20 haplogroup assemblages was estimated from associated STR diversity. This comprehensive characterization of Y-chromosome heritage addresses many multifaceted aspects of Anatolian prehistory, including: (1) the most frequent haplogroup, J, splits into two sub-clades, one of which (J2) shows decreasing variances with increasing latitude, compatible with a northward expansion; (2) haplogroups G1 and L show affinitie s with south Caucasus populations in their geographic distribution as well as STR motifs; (3) frequency of haplogroup I, which originated in Europe, declines with increasing longitude, indicating gene flow arriving from Europe; (4) conversely, haplogroup G2 radiates towards Europe; (5) haplogroup E3b3 displays a latitudinal correlation with decreasing frequency northward; (6) haplogroup R1b3 emanates from Turkey towards Southeast Europe and Caucasia and; (7) high resolution SNP analysis provides evidence of a detectable yet weak signal (<9%) href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/14586639">http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/14586639
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turkish_people
It is now quoted widely on the Internet that certain groups (American Indians and Melungeons) in the USA have Turkish DNA. The article below from PubMed does not bear out that possibility. The suggestion is disengeneous at best.
The most important sentence in the article below is this:*The major components (haplogroups E3b, G, J, I, L, N, K2, and R1; 94.1%) are shared with European and neighboring Near Eastern populations* and contrast with only a minor share of haplogroups related to Central Asian (C, Q and O; 3.4%), Indian (H, R2; 1.5%) and African (A, E3*, E3a; 1%) affinity.
In other words, 94.1% of the DNA found in 523 Turkish Y chromosome samples is shared with European and neighboring Near Eastern populations. So there is no special motif or Turkish DNA. And this finding is explained by the closing sentence; "the variety of Turkish haplotypes is witness to Turkey being both an important source and recipient of gene flow".
Genes have flowed out and genes have flowed in for a very long time and cannot now be separated as belonging exclusively to one group or the other. So it is very deceptive to speak of "Turkish DNA" in the context of it being unique.
See Also:
http://hpgl.stanford.edu/publications/HG_2004_v114_p127-148.pdf
Hum Genet. 2004 Jan;114(2):127-48. Epub 2003 Oct 29. Links
Excavating Y-chromosome haplotype strata in Anatolia.
Cinnioglu C, King R, Kivisild T, Kalfoglu E, Atasoy S, Cavalleri GL, Lillie AS, Roseman CC, Lin AA, Prince K, Oefner PJ, Shen P, Semino O, Cavalli-Sforza LL, Underhill
PA.Department of Genetics, Stanford University School of Medicine, 300 Pasteur Drive, Stanford, CA 94305-5120, USA
Analysis of 89 biallelic polymorphisms in 523 Turkish Y chromosomes revealed 52 distinct haplotypes with considerable haplogroup substructure, as exemplified by their respective levels of accumulated diversity at ten short tandem repeat (STR) loci. *The major components (haplogroups E3b, G, J, I, L, N, K2, and R1; 94.1%) are shared with European and neighboring Near Eastern populations* and contrast with only a minor share of haplogroups related to Central Asian (C, Q and O; 3.4%), Indian (H, R2; 1.5%) and African (A, E3*, E3a; 1%) affinity. The expansion times for 20 haplogroup assemblages was estimated from associated STR diversity. This comprehensive characterization of Y-chromosome heritage addresses many multifaceted aspects of Anatolian prehistory, including: (1) the most frequent haplogroup, J, splits into two sub-clades, one of which (J2) shows decreasing variances with increasing latitude, compatible with a northward expansion; (2) haplogroups G1 and L show affinitie s with south Caucasus populations in their geographic distribution as well as STR motifs; (3) frequency of haplogroup I, which originated in Europe, declines with increasing longitude, indicating gene flow arriving from Europe; (4) conversely, haplogroup G2 radiates towards Europe; (5) haplogroup E3b3 displays a latitudinal correlation with decreasing frequency northward; (6) haplogroup R1b3 emanates from Turkey towards Southeast Europe and Caucasia and; (7) high resolution SNP analysis provides evidence of a detectable yet weak signal (<9%) href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/14586639">http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/14586639
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turkish_people
Monday, March 3, 2008
Who's Your People?
by Don Collins
A few years back the late Brenda Collins Dillon and Penny Ferguson had both told me of a good research document by Richard Carlson Jr. After ordering it and reading it, I was amazed at the amount of documented information there was about my direct Collins line.
This Dissertation is not about "theories" or "opinions", but a work of painstaking research.
If your family migrated from Hawkins County TN. to SE Kentucky in the 1800’s , this is a must read for family research, especially for researching the Collins, Cole, and Gibson families. There is also information on the early migration from Virginia. This is a paper written for and by kin folk.
"Who's your people?": Cumulative identity among the Salyersville Indian population of Kentucky's Appalachia and the midwest muckfields, 1677--2000
by Carlson, Richard Allen, Jr., Ph.D., Michigan State University, 2003, 711 pages; AAT 3115947
Abstract (Summary)
"The Salyersville Indian Population is a composite of Cherokee, Saponi and "Old Virginia" Indian families that consolidated in the late colonial period to form a distinct Appalachian Indian population. The families have preserved their identity as an Indian people ever since. An analysis of this identity through time shows that Salyersville Indian identity is the product of cumulative historical actions guided by specific sociocultural processes that subvert notions regarding race, class, ethnicity, religiosity, or political affiliation. In this case, the effective operational definition of Indian identity is based on family relations that provide kinship links, social integration, cooperative efforts, sources of knowledge and emotional support. Highlighting the functional aspects of kin arrangements--articulated through and supported by interrelated family groups--over time reveals that the economic and social cooperation of kin works to maintain the size and strength of the families. The operationalization of kinship acts to focus Salyersville Indian identity on a definition of "kin" which subsumes various attitudes about race and ethnicity that are encountered at specific times and under specific circumstances. By assigning kinship a higher priority than relations based upon religious, class or political affiliation, the Salyersville Indians have managed to keep their kin affiliations and thus their Indian identity, from being obscured over time. Family is the vehicle by which this cumulative identity as "Indian" has been maintained. That is because kinship is the only constant serving to define and maintain Salyersville Indian identity through time and space."
You can order a copy here from ProQuest UMI Dissertation Publishing:
http://tinyurl.com/ytl4sk
Here is a link to more info for "INDIAN/MELUNGEON ABSTRACTS" on this work:
http://tinyurl.com/ysqb4y
http://www.angelfire.com/tn3/youngeagle/INDIANMelungeon.htm
A few years back the late Brenda Collins Dillon and Penny Ferguson had both told me of a good research document by Richard Carlson Jr. After ordering it and reading it, I was amazed at the amount of documented information there was about my direct Collins line.
This Dissertation is not about "theories" or "opinions", but a work of painstaking research.
If your family migrated from Hawkins County TN. to SE Kentucky in the 1800’s , this is a must read for family research, especially for researching the Collins, Cole, and Gibson families. There is also information on the early migration from Virginia. This is a paper written for and by kin folk.
"Who's your people?": Cumulative identity among the Salyersville Indian population of Kentucky's Appalachia and the midwest muckfields, 1677--2000
by Carlson, Richard Allen, Jr., Ph.D., Michigan State University, 2003, 711 pages; AAT 3115947
Abstract (Summary)
"The Salyersville Indian Population is a composite of Cherokee, Saponi and "Old Virginia" Indian families that consolidated in the late colonial period to form a distinct Appalachian Indian population. The families have preserved their identity as an Indian people ever since. An analysis of this identity through time shows that Salyersville Indian identity is the product of cumulative historical actions guided by specific sociocultural processes that subvert notions regarding race, class, ethnicity, religiosity, or political affiliation. In this case, the effective operational definition of Indian identity is based on family relations that provide kinship links, social integration, cooperative efforts, sources of knowledge and emotional support. Highlighting the functional aspects of kin arrangements--articulated through and supported by interrelated family groups--over time reveals that the economic and social cooperation of kin works to maintain the size and strength of the families. The operationalization of kinship acts to focus Salyersville Indian identity on a definition of "kin" which subsumes various attitudes about race and ethnicity that are encountered at specific times and under specific circumstances. By assigning kinship a higher priority than relations based upon religious, class or political affiliation, the Salyersville Indians have managed to keep their kin affiliations and thus their Indian identity, from being obscured over time. Family is the vehicle by which this cumulative identity as "Indian" has been maintained. That is because kinship is the only constant serving to define and maintain Salyersville Indian identity through time and space."
You can order a copy here from ProQuest UMI Dissertation Publishing:
http://tinyurl.com/ytl4sk
Here is a link to more info for "INDIAN/MELUNGEON ABSTRACTS" on this work:
http://tinyurl.com/ysqb4y
http://www.angelfire.com/tn3/youngeagle/INDIANMelungeon.htm
Saturday, March 1, 2008
A Scientific Researcher's View of the Lack of Evidence for a Turkish Connection
A Scientific Researcher's View
By James S. Elder
Young Turks…
Recently we have seen an over-abundance of newspaper and magazine articles suggesting that Melungeons may have Turkish roots. Such articles are inevitably of the interview type in which the reporter doesn't actually do any research himself but instead lets subjects ramble on about their latest supposed discovery.
Journalists, with white space to fill, love every new conjecture. They neither know of the accuracy of these discoveries nor care if they are accurate. The comedian Carrot Top talking about physics would be as good as Einstein talking about physics for such "reporters". They are, after all, just reporting; and mindless babbling fills column space just as well as real research.
As far as I can determine, the Turkish Melungeon speculation seems to have started with Brent Kennedy and some apparently incorrect information. Kennedy is an entertaining man. I first heard him speak in Gate City, Virginia in October of 1995. According to his introduction at the talk, he holds a Ph. D. in Mass Communications from The University of Tennessee. He is certainly a good communicator. I still have an audiotape of that speech. He told the enthralled crowd about his brush with death from his Melungeon disease, let everyone hear the sound his Mediterranean teeth make when you pluck them with a fingernail, rubbed the bump on the back of his head, and spun a web of Turks stranded in 1586 by Sir Francis Drake at Roanoke Island who migrated to Hancock County and started the Melungeon race. It was an interesting, if not accurate, talk.
He says in the preface to his book that he is neither an historian nor an anthropologist. Nevertheless, he has managed to become a much-publicized name in Melungeon "research" over the past several years.. He certainly has charisma. Unfortunately, for his mass of partisans, his ideas don't appear to stand up to close, or even cursory, scientific examination.
Here's his basic story. According to his book, Kennedy became ill in 1988 with what eventually was diagnosed as erythema nodosum sarcoidosis. Kennedy and his wife went to the library and discovered sarcoidosis is "primarily of Middle Eastern and Mediterranean disease [sic], although it's not unknown among Irish and some Scandinavians as well…". Kennedy gets better, returns to his hometown in Virginia, talks to his family, and finds out his people were oppressed. He gets a research grant in 1995 from the Turkish government and goes to that country for a visit. He thinks that Turks and Melungeons look alike, eat alike, dance alike, dress alike, and have some similar sounding words. From all of this, he deduces that Melungeons are a mish-mash of people including Portuguese from Santa Elena, Dominicans, Jesuits, French Huguenots, Acadians, Drake's Turks and others who mysteriously decided to leave the Atlantic coast and go to the boonies, intermarry with Native Americans and become the Melungeons. He somehow divines "that the Turkish/Moorish element was at least in the beginning the predominant one…".
First of all, sarcoidosis is not predominantly a Middle Eastern or Mediterranean disease. Far from being "not unknown" among the Irish and Scandinavians, those populations, along with Germans and Puerto Ricans, have the highest incidence of the disease.
I examined information from a number of physicians who specialize in treating sarcoidosis as well as information found in standard medical literature. The literature and MDs' definitions and etiologies of sarcoidosis invariably followed that of the National Institutes of Health. The NIH says," Sarcoidosis was once considered a rare disease. We now know that it is a common chronic illness that appears all over the world… It occurs in all races and in both sexes. Nevertheless, the risk is greater if you are a young black adult, especially a black woman, or of Scandinavian, German, Irish, or Puerto Rican origin. No one knows why…No one knows what causes sarcoidosis… Sarcoidosis is currently thought to be associated with a abnormal immune response. Whether a foreign substance is the trigger is [sic] a chemical, drug, virus, or some other substance; how exactly the immune disturbance is caused are [sic] not known". The article these comments are taken from can be found at
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/000076.htm .
Simply put, no one knows what causes sarcoidosis. Suggestions have included a virus, a fungus, a bacillus, and even pine pollen. A genetic connection has been suggested but has not been proven by scientific study. It is much more prevalent among the Irish than the peoples of the Middle East. In my view, if sarcoidosis has a genetic link, it certainly seems that someone named Kennedy would be more likely to trace the disease to the Irish than to the Turks.
Kennedy suggests that the similar sound of some Middle Eastern words compared to American words support his conjecture that Melungeons have a Turkish connection. Alabama for instance, according to Kennedy, sounds like "Allah Bamya" meaning God's graveyard in Turkish. The fact is, we don't know exactly where the word Alabama came from. It was the name of a southern Indian tribe who lived in what is now central Alabama. The term first appears in the accounts of the Hernando de Soto expedition of 1540. It was written Alibamo by Garcillasso de la Vega, Alibamu by the Knight of Elvas, and Limamu by Rodrigo Ranjel.
How this term could somehow come from the Turks is "jest-a-bit" fuzzy in my old brain. One writer (not Kennedy) suggested that Turks are somehow cousins of Native Americans through some mysterious Asian connection. I can only surmise that, according to this reasoning, the early Neo-Indians must have brought a bunch of meaningless (to them) Turkish terms with them when crossing the Bering Strait land bridge during the Ice Age and mysteriously applied the terms centuries later to themselves. Or maybe Turks somehow came to the Americas before 1540, headed for the backwoods, met a tribe of Indians and mentioned their term meaning "God's graveyard". The Indians didn't speak Turkish but must have thought Allah Bamya sounded neat and immediately changed the name of the tribe from whatever they had been calling themselves to "Alabama". Maybe not….
Cont. Here:
http://www.freedom4um.com/cgi-bin/readart.cgi?ArtNum=50142
By James S. Elder
Young Turks…
Recently we have seen an over-abundance of newspaper and magazine articles suggesting that Melungeons may have Turkish roots. Such articles are inevitably of the interview type in which the reporter doesn't actually do any research himself but instead lets subjects ramble on about their latest supposed discovery.
Journalists, with white space to fill, love every new conjecture. They neither know of the accuracy of these discoveries nor care if they are accurate. The comedian Carrot Top talking about physics would be as good as Einstein talking about physics for such "reporters". They are, after all, just reporting; and mindless babbling fills column space just as well as real research.
As far as I can determine, the Turkish Melungeon speculation seems to have started with Brent Kennedy and some apparently incorrect information. Kennedy is an entertaining man. I first heard him speak in Gate City, Virginia in October of 1995. According to his introduction at the talk, he holds a Ph. D. in Mass Communications from The University of Tennessee. He is certainly a good communicator. I still have an audiotape of that speech. He told the enthralled crowd about his brush with death from his Melungeon disease, let everyone hear the sound his Mediterranean teeth make when you pluck them with a fingernail, rubbed the bump on the back of his head, and spun a web of Turks stranded in 1586 by Sir Francis Drake at Roanoke Island who migrated to Hancock County and started the Melungeon race. It was an interesting, if not accurate, talk.
He says in the preface to his book that he is neither an historian nor an anthropologist. Nevertheless, he has managed to become a much-publicized name in Melungeon "research" over the past several years.. He certainly has charisma. Unfortunately, for his mass of partisans, his ideas don't appear to stand up to close, or even cursory, scientific examination.
Here's his basic story. According to his book, Kennedy became ill in 1988 with what eventually was diagnosed as erythema nodosum sarcoidosis. Kennedy and his wife went to the library and discovered sarcoidosis is "primarily of Middle Eastern and Mediterranean disease [sic], although it's not unknown among Irish and some Scandinavians as well…". Kennedy gets better, returns to his hometown in Virginia, talks to his family, and finds out his people were oppressed. He gets a research grant in 1995 from the Turkish government and goes to that country for a visit. He thinks that Turks and Melungeons look alike, eat alike, dance alike, dress alike, and have some similar sounding words. From all of this, he deduces that Melungeons are a mish-mash of people including Portuguese from Santa Elena, Dominicans, Jesuits, French Huguenots, Acadians, Drake's Turks and others who mysteriously decided to leave the Atlantic coast and go to the boonies, intermarry with Native Americans and become the Melungeons. He somehow divines "that the Turkish/Moorish element was at least in the beginning the predominant one…".
First of all, sarcoidosis is not predominantly a Middle Eastern or Mediterranean disease. Far from being "not unknown" among the Irish and Scandinavians, those populations, along with Germans and Puerto Ricans, have the highest incidence of the disease.
I examined information from a number of physicians who specialize in treating sarcoidosis as well as information found in standard medical literature. The literature and MDs' definitions and etiologies of sarcoidosis invariably followed that of the National Institutes of Health. The NIH says," Sarcoidosis was once considered a rare disease. We now know that it is a common chronic illness that appears all over the world… It occurs in all races and in both sexes. Nevertheless, the risk is greater if you are a young black adult, especially a black woman, or of Scandinavian, German, Irish, or Puerto Rican origin. No one knows why…No one knows what causes sarcoidosis… Sarcoidosis is currently thought to be associated with a abnormal immune response. Whether a foreign substance is the trigger is [sic] a chemical, drug, virus, or some other substance; how exactly the immune disturbance is caused are [sic] not known". The article these comments are taken from can be found at
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/000076.htm .
Simply put, no one knows what causes sarcoidosis. Suggestions have included a virus, a fungus, a bacillus, and even pine pollen. A genetic connection has been suggested but has not been proven by scientific study. It is much more prevalent among the Irish than the peoples of the Middle East. In my view, if sarcoidosis has a genetic link, it certainly seems that someone named Kennedy would be more likely to trace the disease to the Irish than to the Turks.
Kennedy suggests that the similar sound of some Middle Eastern words compared to American words support his conjecture that Melungeons have a Turkish connection. Alabama for instance, according to Kennedy, sounds like "Allah Bamya" meaning God's graveyard in Turkish. The fact is, we don't know exactly where the word Alabama came from. It was the name of a southern Indian tribe who lived in what is now central Alabama. The term first appears in the accounts of the Hernando de Soto expedition of 1540. It was written Alibamo by Garcillasso de la Vega, Alibamu by the Knight of Elvas, and Limamu by Rodrigo Ranjel.
How this term could somehow come from the Turks is "jest-a-bit" fuzzy in my old brain. One writer (not Kennedy) suggested that Turks are somehow cousins of Native Americans through some mysterious Asian connection. I can only surmise that, according to this reasoning, the early Neo-Indians must have brought a bunch of meaningless (to them) Turkish terms with them when crossing the Bering Strait land bridge during the Ice Age and mysteriously applied the terms centuries later to themselves. Or maybe Turks somehow came to the Americas before 1540, headed for the backwoods, met a tribe of Indians and mentioned their term meaning "God's graveyard". The Indians didn't speak Turkish but must have thought Allah Bamya sounded neat and immediately changed the name of the tribe from whatever they had been calling themselves to "Alabama". Maybe not….
Cont. Here:
http://www.freedom4um.com/cgi-bin/readart.cgi?ArtNum=50142
Friday, February 29, 2008
Geographical Location Of The Melungeons
by Joanne Pezullo
Beginning in 1849 and to this very day the researchers have headed to Newman's Ridge to find the Melungeons.
LITTELL'S 1849
You must know that within ten miles of this owl's nest, there is a watering-place, known hereabouts as 'black-water Springs.' It is situated in a narrow gorge, scarcely half a mile wide, between Powell's Mountain and the Copper Ridge, and is, as you may suppose, almost inaccessible. A hundred men could defend the pass against even a Xerxian army. Now this gorge and the tops and sides of the adjoining mountains are inhabited by a singular species of the human animal called MELUNGENS.
BURNETT 1889
It appears that the Melungeons originally came into east Tennessee from North Carolina, and the larger number settled in what was at that time Hawkins County, but which is now Hancock. I have not been able to hear of them in any of the lower counties of east Tennessee, and those I have seen myself were in Cocke county, bordering on North Carolina.
DROMGOOLE 1890
The Ridge proper is the home of the Melungeons. These people, of whom so little is known, inhabit an isolated corner of the earth, known as Newman’s ridge, in Hancock county. First, I saw in an old newspaper some slight mention of them. With this tiny clue I followed their trail for three years. The paper merely stated that “somewhere in the mountains of Tennessee there existed a remnant of people called Malungeons,......I merely mention all this to show how the Malungeons of today are regarded, and to show how I tracked them to Newman’s Ridge in Hancock County.....
HUMBLE 1897
The Blackwater Valley lies between Mulberry and Newman’s Ridges, and is from half a mile to mile wide. Twenty years ago it was still a wilderness, but is now under good cultivation, and divided into small farms upon which are rather poor dwellings and outbuildings. In this valley and along Newman’s Ridge, reaching into Lee County, Virginia, are settled the people called Melungeons. Some have gone into Kentucky, chiefly into Pike County, others are scattered in adjacent territory.
OTIS 1900
These people are called the Malungeons. ................ ......The Malungeons number between 400 and 500. They live on Black Water Creek, in Hancock County, which section they have inhabited for more than 100 years. ................ The records of Hancock County show that the Malungeon ancestors came to Powell's Valley as early as 1789, when they took up lands on the Black Water.
JARVIS 1903
Greasy Rock Creek, a name by which it has ever since been known and called since, and here is the very place where these Melungeons settled, long after this, on Newman’s Ridge and Blackwater. ............these friendly “Indians” live in the mountains of Stony creek, but they have married among the whites until the race has almost become extinct. A few of the half bloods may be found-none darker- but they still retain the name of Collins and Gibson, &c. From here they came to Newman’s Ridge and Blackwater and many of them are here yet....
CONVERSE 1912
The northern end is drained by Blackwater Creek, which winds its way leisurely northeastward through narrow strips of verdant meadow land. Here, along the banks of this sparkling stream and on the top and eastern slope of Newman's Ridge, is the home of the Melungeons.
WILSON 1914
Occasionally the student of ethnology may stumble upon a community that is a puzzle, as, for example, that one occupied by the 'Malungeons' of upper East Tennessee.
MOORE AND FOSTER
So far as is known they were first found in Hancock County on Newman's Ridge, soon after the Revolutionary War. Now they are settled in several counties, although still most numerous in Hancock County.
PLECKER 1942-1930
We have in some of the counties of southwestern Virginia a number of so-called Melungeons who came into that section from Newmans Ridge, Hancock County, Tennessee..............
August 5, 1930
Mr. J.P. Kelly.Trustee of Schools,
Gap,Lee County, Virginia
Dear Sir: office has had a great deal of trouble in reference to the persistence of a group of people living in that section known as "Melungeons", whose families came from Newman's Ridge, Tennessee.
CAMBAIRE 1935
It seems the Melungeons came into Hancock County between 1810 and 1851.
OSBORNE 1947
From what I gathered from Uncle Wash, the Melungeons started coming to Wise and Scott Counties about 1820. These people came in about equal numbers from Kentucky from Newmans’ Ridge and lower end of Lee County. A few came from North Carolina.
WORDEN 1947
Whatever they are—the Malungeons still are on Newman’s Ridge, in Hancock, Rhea and Hawkins counties of Tennessee, and a few across the border in Virginia. Many are scattered by ones or twos miles from the isolated ridge top they occupied for so long.
E. PRICE
The persistent folk tale, however, insists that the Melungeons are unusual racially; it identifies them as a dark-skinned people whose center is on Newman's Ridge in Hancock County. The Newman's Ridge-Blackwater area seems to be the locality where they have the deepest roots.
VINCENT 1961
colony of folks in this end of Tennessee settled along Newman's Ridge, and on Mulberry Creek in what is now Hancock County, and a few miles out from Sneedville.
DAVIS 1963
Trapped in poverty, snubbed by their fair-skinned neighbors, some of them withdrew to the poor land along Snake Hollow, deep in the rattlesnake-infested gorge in the shadow of towering Newman’s Ridge. Some of them settled along the northern end of the valley, at the Virginia line, where Blackwater Creek flows, and some settled on the Ridge.
BERRY 1963
For a century and a half, the prolific Melungeons have migrated in all directions from Newman's Ridge. .... There are fifteen hundred in Lee County, Virginia....Five hundred are in Scott Count, Virginia........A thousand are found in Wise County, where they are known as "Ramps."
GAMBLE
The only true Melungeons left, however, reside in the nearby mountainside areas known as Snake Hollow and Mulberry Gap.
H. PRICE
they occupied Newman's Ridge---rough and steep in places, but offering some table land and numerous hollows. Here they located near springs or creeks.
S. PRICE 1968
But whatever their origin, the group eventually settled in Hancock County, along Newman's Ridge and in settlements known as Blackwater, Snake Hollow and Vardy.
NORDHEIMER 1970
Newman’s Ridge overlooks Sneedville, a poor community of about 700 persons near the Virginia border. In the early 19th century nearly 350 Melungeons settled on the ridge, coming down into the valley only on rare occasions to forage for wild vegetables and sell moonshine whiskey. They lived apart from the whites for generations. The ridge was a hilltop sanctuary against the outside world and its prejudice.
FETTERMAN (Price) 1970
They bore the Melungeon names which appear on Newman's Ridge: Collins, Mullins, Brogan, Goins, Gibson, Bowlin. They were free of the restrictive legislation aimed at slaves and former slaves during the 1700s and 1800s.
YARBROUGH 1972
Those left in Snake Hollow, Blackwater, Vardy and Mulberry - are few in number, Most have left the hills for jobs in cities far and near. And time is catching up with those remaining. In 1931 there were 40 Melungeon families living on Newman's Ridge above their ancestral home.
LYNCH 1973
And the white man forced them high into the Clinch Mountains, principally Newman's Ridge just outside present day Sneedville, Hancock County, Tennessee.
BIBLE 1975
In East Tennessee, they have spilled over into the neighboring counties in an extension of the Hancock County families...... ......... "Melungeon surnames were noted in southwestern Virginia as early as 1820, but the families were not classified until 1870, when the census enumerators in Lee County listed the county and state of birth of each person. Of forty-six families whos names suggest they were Melungeons, thirty had one or more members who had BEEN BORN IN HANCOCK or HAWKINS County. Eight had members born in Scott County, and at least one of these also had been born in HANCOCK COUNTY. One person was born in Letcher County, Kentucky of parents born in HANCOCK and Scott Counties. The adults of a Goins family (one of the few listed as mulatto) were born in Surry and Ashe Counties, North Carolina; their children were born in Knox, HANCOCK and Grainger Counties, Tennessee. This is the best direct evidence available to confirm the relationship between several different groups of Melungeons and the importance of NEWMAN'S RIDGE as a CENTER OF THEIR DISPERSAL, but it is evident that the secondary Melungeon localities were also fed from North Carolina and Virginia
HAUN nd
Most of the mountain people refer to them as Blackwaters and Ridgemanites.” But even in that long gorge, winding some 20 miles in a half-mile-wide band between Newman’s Ridge and Powell Mountain there are few “pure Melungeons” left today.
WINKLER 2003
The only people who were called Melungeon 100 years ago were those who lived in or near Hancock County, Tennessee--including Lee, Scott, and Wise Counties in southwest Virginia.
Historical Melungeons
Beginning in 1849 and to this very day the researchers have headed to Newman's Ridge to find the Melungeons.
LITTELL'S 1849
You must know that within ten miles of this owl's nest, there is a watering-place, known hereabouts as 'black-water Springs.' It is situated in a narrow gorge, scarcely half a mile wide, between Powell's Mountain and the Copper Ridge, and is, as you may suppose, almost inaccessible. A hundred men could defend the pass against even a Xerxian army. Now this gorge and the tops and sides of the adjoining mountains are inhabited by a singular species of the human animal called MELUNGENS.
BURNETT 1889
It appears that the Melungeons originally came into east Tennessee from North Carolina, and the larger number settled in what was at that time Hawkins County, but which is now Hancock. I have not been able to hear of them in any of the lower counties of east Tennessee, and those I have seen myself were in Cocke county, bordering on North Carolina.
DROMGOOLE 1890
The Ridge proper is the home of the Melungeons. These people, of whom so little is known, inhabit an isolated corner of the earth, known as Newman’s ridge, in Hancock county. First, I saw in an old newspaper some slight mention of them. With this tiny clue I followed their trail for three years. The paper merely stated that “somewhere in the mountains of Tennessee there existed a remnant of people called Malungeons,......I merely mention all this to show how the Malungeons of today are regarded, and to show how I tracked them to Newman’s Ridge in Hancock County.....
HUMBLE 1897
The Blackwater Valley lies between Mulberry and Newman’s Ridges, and is from half a mile to mile wide. Twenty years ago it was still a wilderness, but is now under good cultivation, and divided into small farms upon which are rather poor dwellings and outbuildings. In this valley and along Newman’s Ridge, reaching into Lee County, Virginia, are settled the people called Melungeons. Some have gone into Kentucky, chiefly into Pike County, others are scattered in adjacent territory.
OTIS 1900
These people are called the Malungeons. ................ ......The Malungeons number between 400 and 500. They live on Black Water Creek, in Hancock County, which section they have inhabited for more than 100 years. ................ The records of Hancock County show that the Malungeon ancestors came to Powell's Valley as early as 1789, when they took up lands on the Black Water.
JARVIS 1903
Greasy Rock Creek, a name by which it has ever since been known and called since, and here is the very place where these Melungeons settled, long after this, on Newman’s Ridge and Blackwater. ............these friendly “Indians” live in the mountains of Stony creek, but they have married among the whites until the race has almost become extinct. A few of the half bloods may be found-none darker- but they still retain the name of Collins and Gibson, &c. From here they came to Newman’s Ridge and Blackwater and many of them are here yet....
CONVERSE 1912
The northern end is drained by Blackwater Creek, which winds its way leisurely northeastward through narrow strips of verdant meadow land. Here, along the banks of this sparkling stream and on the top and eastern slope of Newman's Ridge, is the home of the Melungeons.
WILSON 1914
Occasionally the student of ethnology may stumble upon a community that is a puzzle, as, for example, that one occupied by the 'Malungeons' of upper East Tennessee.
MOORE AND FOSTER
So far as is known they were first found in Hancock County on Newman's Ridge, soon after the Revolutionary War. Now they are settled in several counties, although still most numerous in Hancock County.
PLECKER 1942-1930
We have in some of the counties of southwestern Virginia a number of so-called Melungeons who came into that section from Newmans Ridge, Hancock County, Tennessee..............
August 5, 1930
Mr. J.P. Kelly.Trustee of Schools,
Gap,Lee County, Virginia
Dear Sir: office has had a great deal of trouble in reference to the persistence of a group of people living in that section known as "Melungeons", whose families came from Newman's Ridge, Tennessee.
CAMBAIRE 1935
It seems the Melungeons came into Hancock County between 1810 and 1851.
OSBORNE 1947
From what I gathered from Uncle Wash, the Melungeons started coming to Wise and Scott Counties about 1820. These people came in about equal numbers from Kentucky from Newmans’ Ridge and lower end of Lee County. A few came from North Carolina.
WORDEN 1947
Whatever they are—the Malungeons still are on Newman’s Ridge, in Hancock, Rhea and Hawkins counties of Tennessee, and a few across the border in Virginia. Many are scattered by ones or twos miles from the isolated ridge top they occupied for so long.
E. PRICE
The persistent folk tale, however, insists that the Melungeons are unusual racially; it identifies them as a dark-skinned people whose center is on Newman's Ridge in Hancock County. The Newman's Ridge-Blackwater area seems to be the locality where they have the deepest roots.
VINCENT 1961
colony of folks in this end of Tennessee settled along Newman's Ridge, and on Mulberry Creek in what is now Hancock County, and a few miles out from Sneedville.
DAVIS 1963
Trapped in poverty, snubbed by their fair-skinned neighbors, some of them withdrew to the poor land along Snake Hollow, deep in the rattlesnake-infested gorge in the shadow of towering Newman’s Ridge. Some of them settled along the northern end of the valley, at the Virginia line, where Blackwater Creek flows, and some settled on the Ridge.
BERRY 1963
For a century and a half, the prolific Melungeons have migrated in all directions from Newman's Ridge. .... There are fifteen hundred in Lee County, Virginia....Five hundred are in Scott Count, Virginia........A thousand are found in Wise County, where they are known as "Ramps."
GAMBLE
The only true Melungeons left, however, reside in the nearby mountainside areas known as Snake Hollow and Mulberry Gap.
H. PRICE
they occupied Newman's Ridge---rough and steep in places, but offering some table land and numerous hollows. Here they located near springs or creeks.
S. PRICE 1968
But whatever their origin, the group eventually settled in Hancock County, along Newman's Ridge and in settlements known as Blackwater, Snake Hollow and Vardy.
NORDHEIMER 1970
Newman’s Ridge overlooks Sneedville, a poor community of about 700 persons near the Virginia border. In the early 19th century nearly 350 Melungeons settled on the ridge, coming down into the valley only on rare occasions to forage for wild vegetables and sell moonshine whiskey. They lived apart from the whites for generations. The ridge was a hilltop sanctuary against the outside world and its prejudice.
FETTERMAN (Price) 1970
They bore the Melungeon names which appear on Newman's Ridge: Collins, Mullins, Brogan, Goins, Gibson, Bowlin. They were free of the restrictive legislation aimed at slaves and former slaves during the 1700s and 1800s.
YARBROUGH 1972
Those left in Snake Hollow, Blackwater, Vardy and Mulberry - are few in number, Most have left the hills for jobs in cities far and near. And time is catching up with those remaining. In 1931 there were 40 Melungeon families living on Newman's Ridge above their ancestral home.
LYNCH 1973
And the white man forced them high into the Clinch Mountains, principally Newman's Ridge just outside present day Sneedville, Hancock County, Tennessee.
BIBLE 1975
In East Tennessee, they have spilled over into the neighboring counties in an extension of the Hancock County families...... ......... "Melungeon surnames were noted in southwestern Virginia as early as 1820, but the families were not classified until 1870, when the census enumerators in Lee County listed the county and state of birth of each person. Of forty-six families whos names suggest they were Melungeons, thirty had one or more members who had BEEN BORN IN HANCOCK or HAWKINS County. Eight had members born in Scott County, and at least one of these also had been born in HANCOCK COUNTY. One person was born in Letcher County, Kentucky of parents born in HANCOCK and Scott Counties. The adults of a Goins family (one of the few listed as mulatto) were born in Surry and Ashe Counties, North Carolina; their children were born in Knox, HANCOCK and Grainger Counties, Tennessee. This is the best direct evidence available to confirm the relationship between several different groups of Melungeons and the importance of NEWMAN'S RIDGE as a CENTER OF THEIR DISPERSAL, but it is evident that the secondary Melungeon localities were also fed from North Carolina and Virginia
HAUN nd
Most of the mountain people refer to them as Blackwaters and Ridgemanites.” But even in that long gorge, winding some 20 miles in a half-mile-wide band between Newman’s Ridge and Powell Mountain there are few “pure Melungeons” left today.
WINKLER 2003
The only people who were called Melungeon 100 years ago were those who lived in or near Hancock County, Tennessee--including Lee, Scott, and Wise Counties in southwest Virginia.
Historical Melungeons
Monday, February 25, 2008
Melungeon DNA Project
Amateur and professional genealogists and historians have been researching records, newspapers articles, Bibles, church records and more, plus listening to family stories for years to try and document the Melungeon people.
The Melungeon Project is a study of males and females who have proven known Melungeon ancestors, according to old records, and agreed on by some of the top serious Melungeon researchers. The participants must descend in a genealogical useful line; i.e., father to son to son, etc. for the Y chromosome testing and Mother to daughter to daughter, etc. for the mtDNA testing. The DNA results, combined with extensive genealogy research, hopefully will open some new windows for research on the Melungeon people.
DNA information is to be used in conjunction with historical and traditional research. DNA results do not often “prove” a relationship, but can be quite helpful in guiding research. If a profile does not match, obviously a hypothesized relationship may be incorrect. At other times it may point to an unknown adoption in the family, or some other so-called non-paternity event.
Everyone joining must present genealogy in a reasonable time. There will be two groups Group 1: Core Melungeon Group 2: Melungeon related.
Core Melungeon:
Bunch, Goins, Gibson, Minor, Collins, Williams, Goodman, Denham, Bolin, Mullins, Moore, Shumake, Boltons, Perkins, Mornings, Menleys, Breedlove, Hopkins, Mallett, with various spellings of these names.
More names may be added as this is an ongoing research project and these names will be in Group 1. If these names are in your family but are not in a direct line that follows Y DNA or mtDNA testing you will be in Group 2.
Saturday, February 23, 2008
Foreign Lobby Interests Using Private Citizens for their own Agenda
July 20, 2007
Advocacy groups have asked Americans to tell their congressmen plenty of things. "I’m opposed to recognizing the Armenian Genocide" may be one of the strangest.
In a video posted on the Capitol Broadcasting Service Earlier this week, Former Rep. Bob Livingston (R, Louisiana) makes an 8-minute plea for Americans to urge their legislators not to make a colossal mistake: endorsing the bill that would officially acknowledge that Armenians were slaughtered by the Ottoman Empire during World War I.
The issue has been controversial in Washington for years. While the "supposed-genocide" is routinely denied by Turkish government officials – whom Livingston has represented for more than seven years – most credible historians have gone out on a limb and described the genocide as fact. According to the Encyclopedia Britannica:
"In what would later be known as the first genocide of the 20th century, hundreds of thousands of Armenians were driven from their homes, massacred, or marched until they died."
Not all of Livingston's address is devoted to casting doubt on the genocide’s occurrence -- he also argues that the symbolic resolution could have tangible consequences. Given that Turkey is an ally in a very unsteady part of the world -- and that the nation currently has troops massed on the border of Iraqi Kurdistan -- Livingston's case against unnecessarily angering them highlights valid strategic concerns.
But some of the statements the former congressman makes veer into ideological territory.
"Nobody really knows, in this day and age, unless you're a historian, what really happened 90 to a hundred years ago," Livingston, whose family roots in America date back to the 17th century, declares.
And while he attributes the argument to “The Turks and many historians,” Livingston comes awfully close to suggesting that any possible killing of Armenians would have been committed in self defense: "It was simply a lot of Turkish people getting fed up with their people getting killed and massacred," he states.There’s also a linguistic case to be made against the genocide, Livingston observes: It couldn’t have happened, he said, because the word “genocide” didn’t exist yet. The term, he correctly notes, "was coined in 1947, long after the instance of 1915 and so forth."
A rose by any other name, indeed.The video has already prompted a response by The Armenian National Committee of America, which can be seen here.
Permalink
Advocacy groups have asked Americans to tell their congressmen plenty of things. "I’m opposed to recognizing the Armenian Genocide" may be one of the strangest.
In a video posted on the Capitol Broadcasting Service Earlier this week, Former Rep. Bob Livingston (R, Louisiana) makes an 8-minute plea for Americans to urge their legislators not to make a colossal mistake: endorsing the bill that would officially acknowledge that Armenians were slaughtered by the Ottoman Empire during World War I.
The issue has been controversial in Washington for years. While the "supposed-genocide" is routinely denied by Turkish government officials – whom Livingston has represented for more than seven years – most credible historians have gone out on a limb and described the genocide as fact. According to the Encyclopedia Britannica:
"In what would later be known as the first genocide of the 20th century, hundreds of thousands of Armenians were driven from their homes, massacred, or marched until they died."
Not all of Livingston's address is devoted to casting doubt on the genocide’s occurrence -- he also argues that the symbolic resolution could have tangible consequences. Given that Turkey is an ally in a very unsteady part of the world -- and that the nation currently has troops massed on the border of Iraqi Kurdistan -- Livingston's case against unnecessarily angering them highlights valid strategic concerns.
But some of the statements the former congressman makes veer into ideological territory.
"Nobody really knows, in this day and age, unless you're a historian, what really happened 90 to a hundred years ago," Livingston, whose family roots in America date back to the 17th century, declares.
And while he attributes the argument to “The Turks and many historians,” Livingston comes awfully close to suggesting that any possible killing of Armenians would have been committed in self defense: "It was simply a lot of Turkish people getting fed up with their people getting killed and massacred," he states.There’s also a linguistic case to be made against the genocide, Livingston observes: It couldn’t have happened, he said, because the word “genocide” didn’t exist yet. The term, he correctly notes, "was coined in 1947, long after the instance of 1915 and so forth."
A rose by any other name, indeed.The video has already prompted a response by The Armenian National Committee of America, which can be seen here.
Permalink
Friday, February 22, 2008
Arlene Eakle's Virginia Genealogy Research Notebooks pt. 2
Arlene Eakle’s Virginia Genealogy Research Notebooks pt. 2:
Now you can get extra help with your Virginia genealogy research using these aids collected by and used daily by Dr. Arlene H. Eakle. Maps, little-known name lists, migration patterns, record checklists, jurisdiction facts, source collections, surname lists by locality–aids that will shorten your prep time and ensure that you find your hard-to-find ancestors.
CONTENTS
V: Map: Land Claimed by the Indiana Company. Land Speculations–Assets for Quick Return. Indiana Company Accounts. A Select Guide to the Manuscript Court Records of Colonial Virginia. Court Chart for Virginia. Maps: Virginia in Context, Virginia Migration from Tidewater Settlements, Gloucester County Churches, Mitchell’s Map of North America 1775: Virginia Section. Soldiers at the Battle of Point Pleasant. West Augusta: Research in Virginia’s District of West Augusta. Original Map of District of West Augusta, West Augusta and Ohio Valley Surnames–An Alphabetical List. Maps: French Occupation of Ohio Valley, Western Land Cessions 1780-1802, Western Parts of Colony of Virginia. Muster Rolls–Frontier Defense on the Upper Ohio 1777-1778.
VI: The One Hundred Wealthiest Men in Virginia. The First Residents of Jamestown. The History of Virginia from Its First Settlement to the Present Day. Map: Virginia. Names of the Adventurers for Virginia As They Were in the Year 1620. Virginia Genealogy Resources: The Antient Press, Jeannette H. Austin, Marian Dodson Chiarito, Genealogical Books in Print, Amelia C. Gilreath, Iberian Publishing Company, Peggy S. Joyner, Mrs. John C. Mullins, Rocky Ridge Press, Shenandoah History, T. L.C. Genealogy.
VII: Virginia Colonial Censuses. Virginia Censuses and Indexes. Virginia Census Information by County. Virginia Churches. Ages of Lower Norfolk County People. Potomack Company: Workmen at the Great Falls, 1786-87. Virginia Sources. Early War Records. Virginia Military District Records. Southside Virginia Publications. Genealogical Research in Virginia: A Migrational Approach.
VIII: Map: Historic Virginia: Counties, County seats, Cities. Historic Virginia: “The Mother State of the Nation:” General Description of Virginia, Names–County situated and Population of 217 Virginia Towns and Cities. Records Lost in Virginia Counties, Benjamin R. McBride. Separate Jurisdictions. County Tax Lists: Personal Tax List: Fayette County (now part of Kentucky), 1787, Land Tax List of Charles City County, 1787, Land Tax List of Campbell County, 1782, Land Tax List of Westmoreland County, 1782, Land Tax List of King and Queen County, 1787, Land Tax List of King George County, 1782, Personal Tax List: Fayette County, 1788. List of the Original Members of the Society of the Cincinnati in the State of Virginia. Virginia Stations: Place Description, Date. Map: The Colonial Churches of Spotsylvania and Caroline Counties, George Carrington Mason. Virginia Censuses and Indexes.
IX: New Sources for Virginia Research: Online Virginia Resources, New Resources for Virginia Research. Map: Enrico County Virginia. Heads of Families–Virginia Tax Rolls Used as Substitute Census, 1790. Personal Property Taxes on Microfilm, Library of Virginia. Land Taxes on Microfilm, Library of Virginia. Virginia County Marriage Records. Map: A New and Accurate Map of Virginia and Maryland From Surveys, Eman Bowen. Virginia Land Records in Kentucky and Ohio: Richard Clough Anderson Collection. How to Find Your Property on the Ground. References Bibliography. Pioneer Possessions: A Study of Wills and Appraisals of Southwest Virginia, 1745-86: A Review. Virginia County Records. Why Genealogies are Important. Why County and Local Histories are Important. Using the Virginia Historical Index. Computer News from Virginia. Burned Counties, Lost Records, and Substitute Evidence. Newly Discovered Records for Virginia. Abridgment of all the Public Acts of Assembly of Virginia, 1759–Counties, County Courts, Ferries, Parishes, Inspectors’ Notes: Tobacco Warehouses, Papists, Soldiers. Map: Colonial Gloucester. VIRGINIA: Contents. Virginia Genealogy: Sources and Resources.
http://virginiagenealogyblog.com/2008/02/21/arlene-eakles-virginia-genealogy-research-notebooks/
Now you can get extra help with your Virginia genealogy research using these aids collected by and used daily by Dr. Arlene H. Eakle. Maps, little-known name lists, migration patterns, record checklists, jurisdiction facts, source collections, surname lists by locality–aids that will shorten your prep time and ensure that you find your hard-to-find ancestors.
CONTENTS
V: Map: Land Claimed by the Indiana Company. Land Speculations–Assets for Quick Return. Indiana Company Accounts. A Select Guide to the Manuscript Court Records of Colonial Virginia. Court Chart for Virginia. Maps: Virginia in Context, Virginia Migration from Tidewater Settlements, Gloucester County Churches, Mitchell’s Map of North America 1775: Virginia Section. Soldiers at the Battle of Point Pleasant. West Augusta: Research in Virginia’s District of West Augusta. Original Map of District of West Augusta, West Augusta and Ohio Valley Surnames–An Alphabetical List. Maps: French Occupation of Ohio Valley, Western Land Cessions 1780-1802, Western Parts of Colony of Virginia. Muster Rolls–Frontier Defense on the Upper Ohio 1777-1778.
VI: The One Hundred Wealthiest Men in Virginia. The First Residents of Jamestown. The History of Virginia from Its First Settlement to the Present Day. Map: Virginia. Names of the Adventurers for Virginia As They Were in the Year 1620. Virginia Genealogy Resources: The Antient Press, Jeannette H. Austin, Marian Dodson Chiarito, Genealogical Books in Print, Amelia C. Gilreath, Iberian Publishing Company, Peggy S. Joyner, Mrs. John C. Mullins, Rocky Ridge Press, Shenandoah History, T. L.C. Genealogy.
VII: Virginia Colonial Censuses. Virginia Censuses and Indexes. Virginia Census Information by County. Virginia Churches. Ages of Lower Norfolk County People. Potomack Company: Workmen at the Great Falls, 1786-87. Virginia Sources. Early War Records. Virginia Military District Records. Southside Virginia Publications. Genealogical Research in Virginia: A Migrational Approach.
VIII: Map: Historic Virginia: Counties, County seats, Cities. Historic Virginia: “The Mother State of the Nation:” General Description of Virginia, Names–County situated and Population of 217 Virginia Towns and Cities. Records Lost in Virginia Counties, Benjamin R. McBride. Separate Jurisdictions. County Tax Lists: Personal Tax List: Fayette County (now part of Kentucky), 1787, Land Tax List of Charles City County, 1787, Land Tax List of Campbell County, 1782, Land Tax List of Westmoreland County, 1782, Land Tax List of King and Queen County, 1787, Land Tax List of King George County, 1782, Personal Tax List: Fayette County, 1788. List of the Original Members of the Society of the Cincinnati in the State of Virginia. Virginia Stations: Place Description, Date. Map: The Colonial Churches of Spotsylvania and Caroline Counties, George Carrington Mason. Virginia Censuses and Indexes.
IX: New Sources for Virginia Research: Online Virginia Resources, New Resources for Virginia Research. Map: Enrico County Virginia. Heads of Families–Virginia Tax Rolls Used as Substitute Census, 1790. Personal Property Taxes on Microfilm, Library of Virginia. Land Taxes on Microfilm, Library of Virginia. Virginia County Marriage Records. Map: A New and Accurate Map of Virginia and Maryland From Surveys, Eman Bowen. Virginia Land Records in Kentucky and Ohio: Richard Clough Anderson Collection. How to Find Your Property on the Ground. References Bibliography. Pioneer Possessions: A Study of Wills and Appraisals of Southwest Virginia, 1745-86: A Review. Virginia County Records. Why Genealogies are Important. Why County and Local Histories are Important. Using the Virginia Historical Index. Computer News from Virginia. Burned Counties, Lost Records, and Substitute Evidence. Newly Discovered Records for Virginia. Abridgment of all the Public Acts of Assembly of Virginia, 1759–Counties, County Courts, Ferries, Parishes, Inspectors’ Notes: Tobacco Warehouses, Papists, Soldiers. Map: Colonial Gloucester. VIRGINIA: Contents. Virginia Genealogy: Sources and Resources.
http://virginiagenealogyblog.com/2008/02/21/arlene-eakles-virginia-genealogy-research-notebooks/
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