Sometimes our ancestors seem to have appeared out of nowhere. That was the case with William Emmitt Hunter whose life before his 1910 Oklahoma marriage was basically unknown. One record—his application for a Social Security account number—provided self-reported information about his birth in North Carolina and his parents’ names. But his alleged parents could not be found. Without DNA, this case would not have been solved. But DNA revealed that William was born as a Beddingfield, not a Hunter. Additional research identified his name at birth and traced him through multiple marriages, divorces, another alias, and indicated the possible reason why he changed his name and left behind his family and friends to start a new life in Oklahoma.
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You need to read about my Grandpa, he gad 5 wives, 6 kids, so far, and 3 aliases, went awol, so his 1st wife thought he was dead, and carried on marrying 4 maybe 5 more wives..I found my cousin, we have talked, they gad no idea about anything…ge was Post Master in Ontario too…
Could W. H. Young be the wedding officiant or Justice of the Peace or town clerk, maybe?
I enjoyed this webinar very much and use your Leeds method on every case that comes my way. Thank you!
Awesome research! I really learned about how important it is to pull out specific similar pieces of DNA.
Dana Leeds, is in a league of her own. Literally, without the LEEDS System, I would have never broken through my materal grandfather “brickwall”. After 13 years, I finally discovered who he was, where he was from and trace his family pedigree back generations. Similar to William Emmitt Hunter: he had multiple names, multiple locations and multiple family members who did the same. THANK YOU Dana! For Everyone, use the LEEDS System to follow the DNA, research, construct trees and verify. You can do it too!
Cram-packed with info, but easy to follow. Excellent presentation.
I learned tips and techniques that will help me identify an individual who must have changed his name. The step by step visuals and explanation of the Leeds DNA Method were very helpful and I’ve been using the Leeds DNA Method for a few years. Ordering a Social Security Application record was new to me.
Excellent in so many ways! One of the best webinars I have seen, and it has given me food for thought on routes I can take to solve a similar issue in my family.
Fantastic evidence for your research question