Genealogy begins with what we have been told, our oral tradition. We verify and build on this by looking to public records – census data, birth and death certificates, church records, baptismal and marriage records. We learn the value of wills, of land transaction records, military records, newspaper articles, county histories, city directories, cemetery records and tombstones, etc. We eventually reach the point where there is nothing more we can discover. We have hit the “brick wall.”
At this point DNA genealogy can help.
We are a surname project: both daughters and sons inherit a surname but only sons inherit and retransmit the Y-chromosome.
When a scientist looks at the Y-chromosome of a father and son, he sees a common signature, one that is shared by all brothers, paternal uncles and their sons, the paternal grandfather and all his paternal grandsons, and so on. This is the Signature of the Fathers. It is a living document, a memory that extends beyond the “brick wall”. In a surname DNA Project, it identifies which participants are descended from the same distant forefather: They’ll have the same signature. The genetic family has been discovered. Volunteers group the participants into their genetic families based on DNA results. Collaboration is now focused. The genealogy of one now pertains to all. Leads are thus multiplied for pursuing common and more distant ancestors. This is how we attack
the “brick wall”.
The House of Lindsay dates back nearly 1000 years. The Lindsay International Surname DNA Project was started in 2001. Now, with well over 300 participants, we have given scientific evidence that the Lindsay surname persists in a finite and relatively small number of paternal lineages. We are beyond proof-of-concept and are seeking to move this historic undertaking into the high definition phase. To support this endeavor and to learn where you fit in on the Lindsay
landscape, please consider joining us.
