Date: October 14, 2024
Title: Be Your Own Detective: Uncover Identities and Family Relationships from Your DNA Match List
Learn creative ways to become a detective and figure out who your DNA matches are and how they’re related to you—even if they don’t have useful family trees, use their real name or respond to messages. Learn how to proceed with your match list (whether at Ancestry.com, MyHeritage, 23andMe or FamilyTreeDNA) and gather valuable genealogical connections. We will look at real examples of how to find a person’s identity by using shared matches, social media platforms such as Classmates, YouTube, LinkedIn and Facebook, obituaries and people search sites. We will see how the Leeds Method and What Are the Odds can be helpful to get a more complete picture. Learn some tricks of the trade that can help such as contacting mortuaries and cemetery offices.
Speaker: McKell Keeney
McKell Keeney is a connector of people and families, both living and dead, through her work as a family historian and genetic genealogist. She has been enthralled with family history since she was a teenager. In 2016, she dove into the genetic genealogy world, attending CeCe Moore’s Institute for Genetic Genealogy (i4GG), week-long courses on Genetic Genealogy at the Salt Lake Institute for Genetic Genealogy (SLIG) and other advanced training. She has been honored to be a presenter at RootsTech the past five years and at the Southern California Genealogy Jamboree. She is a search angel (volunteer) for adoptees and people with unknown parentage, using DNA matches to help identify over 200 biological parents or grandparents and help people learn of their additional ancestors. She leads a DNA Interest Group each month at the Mesa, Arizona Temple Visitors’ Center and FamilySearch Center. It is also available online and people attend online each month from different parts of the world. Mckell loves everything about family history stories and family memorabilia. She helps cities and towns fill in their local history, tying people together, with the Connected MyTown project. She can be found online at her website, mckellkeeney.com, and contacted at mckell11@gmail.com.
There is no handout for this meeting
In-person meetings are held at the First Presbyterian Church located at 12225 N. 103rd Ave., Sun City, AZ. (click here for map) – will open in new tab in your web browser)
Please arrive after 12:30 pm to sign up for classes, SIGs, or the 2025 Seminar, ask questions of a Board Member or Committee Chairperson, etc. Note: We will not be offering coffee at this time.
The short business meeting will start at 1:00 pm sharp followed by our featured speaker.
Another great opportunity from your WVGS Duplicate Book Sales Team!
Join us at the Membership Meeting. We have a selection of genealogy research and related titles.
Take some home for $5.00 each – Cash only please!
Jill Mitchell, Elaine Wright, and Della Jones
WVGS Duplicate Book Sales team
Please bring Aluminum Cans & Plastic Bottles to the
Membership Meeting
We appreciate your efforts to collect these items and dropping them off at our Membership Meetings. We especially thank you for collecting from your neighbors and friends. Please be sure to let these helpers know the best way to help us collect and recycle.
Remember, bring them to the church, NOT the Library!
| Not These | Only Clear Plastic |
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| These are NOT accepted and need to be hand picked out of the collection or the whole bag will be rejected. Please, only CLEAR plastic bottles. |
ALUMINUM CANS & CLEAR PLASTIC BOTTLES ONLY Drop-off |
Guidelines for dropping off Aluminum Cans/Clear Plastic Bottles:
- Place aluminum cans and clear plastic-water/soda bottles in separate bags.
- Cans do not have to be crushed, but should be rinsed and empty.
- Water bottles can take up less room if they are smashed before putting the cap back onto the bottle.
Please, NO glass, prescription bottles, milk bottles, or food cans as these items need to be hand picked out. Also, NO bags with holes, as any item not rinsed may leak.
$$$ for WVGS