Hittin' the Bricks with Kathleen

Secrets Revealed: Love & DNA

• Kathleen Brandt • Episode 27

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June is a busy month!
We start by celebrating Pride Month and ourJune Newsletter,  Secret's Revealed,  that gives hints on researching your ancestors' secrets.   
One of our best historical secrets held from textbooks takes us to  Southern Claims Commission, where ex-slaves and free coloreds joined enslavers to navigate the complexities of Civil War property claims. Were your ancestors  named in these underutilized documents? Now that's a way to celebrate Juneteenth!

Speaking of secrets, we uncover one held by FamilytreeDNA. Their policies are muddied by an unannounced policy change . Find out which policy has been proven not to be honored on FamilyTreeDNA. 
Join us on Hittin' the Bricks with Kathleen as we tackle genealogical and ethical secrets  uncovered.  

Be sure to bookmark linktr.ee/hittinthebricks for your one stop access to Kathleen Brandt, the host of Hittin' the Bricks with Kathleen. And, visit us on YouTube: Off the Wall with Kathleen John and Chewey video recorded specials.

Hittin' the Bricks is produced through the not-for-profit, 501c3 TracingAncestors.org.
Thanks to MyHeritage for their generous support to Hittin' the Bricks with Kathleen! Follow us on social media and subscribe to HTB with Kathleen in order to enter your name in our monthly MyHeritage Complete Package giveaway starting Jan 2024!

John:

Ladies and gentlemen from the depths of flyover country in the heartland of America, the Kansas City on the other side of the mighty Moe, welcome to Hittin' the Bricks with Kathleen, the do-it-yourself genealogy podcast that features your questions and her answers. I am John, your humble hubby host, wishing everyone a safe and happy Pride Month and, of course, a happy Juneteenth. Now let's start Hittin' the Bricks. Hey, baby.

Kathleen:

Okay.

John:

Happy Juneteenth. Thank you, yes and it is Juneteenth, which there are celebrations across the nation, so we're excited about that. There are still some that don't seem to officially recognize it. There are many that have observed it for one time but have not continued to put it as an official holiday as far as their state goes, even though it is a federal holiday. So they don't necessarily observe it.

Kathleen:

The states who do not recognize it as a national holiday. They are saying that those citizens in that state don't deserve to acknowledge it.

John:

Well, anyway, happy Juneteenth to everybody. Hopefully you find something fun to do and, if not, at least spend some time learning about history so that you're able to commemorate it in an appropriate way.

Kathleen:

I did put up a blog post this morning, so I did put on our web pages and social media information on the Southern Claims Commission and this is where the enslaved free colors and slave owners were able to ask for reimbursement on their Civil War property claims, and a lot of people didn't realize that this was possible or that the African-Americans also were able to make these claims the ex-enslave persons, that they also could make these claims. People did not realize that, and what they also don't realize is the slave holder and the enslaved person often were each other's witness and given testimony on behalf of each other. Oh, interesting.

Kathleen:

Yes and so. I put up a few examples on our webpage and so there's a.

John:

there's a lot to learn and a lot of ins and outs, and so, especially in those states that are anti-American history and only want to teach one side of it especially you folks that are extremely warm right now in the southern realm you have a blog to go to where you can get what your education department doesn't seem to want to actually let you know. So check out the A3 Genealogy blog and find out the truth of American history.

Kathleen:

Thanks for that plug and some information on Juneteenth. Thanks for that plug.

John:

The blog is free, of course. I don't receive any money from it.

Kathleen:

No, no one does.

John:

No, but it's volunteer, it's a labor of love, okay. So, kathleen, we need two or three things that we've discussed over a beverage in the evening, and so I want to ask you about what's been going on over in the office.

Kathleen:

I was honored to get an email from the National Archives asking me to assist them in helping one of their patrons out of College Park. She was looking for a missing ancestor Actually it was her father and she was last seen in Baltimore, Maryland, and she thought this person was on the SS Reyna Mercedes ship.

John:

That is a very and what year are we talking about here?

Kathleen:

About 1940s 1940s and 50s oh actually in her case it was 1952. Okay, so she was asking about this particular ship and she was pretty sure her father had been on it when he went earlier to the World War II and she couldn't figure out how to find a missing person. Now, whether it's African-American or not, that is not as important as a couple of these hints. That is not as important as a couple of these hints. When you're missing a person and you can't find anything about them. I can give you hints. One is we have to find something about them.

Kathleen:

You know where they were last seen. You know where they were, their name, you might know a birth date. You might know a little bit of history, like they were in the military Because of family folklore. Her story was he was on a particular ship that I happened to believe he was not on. So one of the things we do is we check our things right, we check what we think we know, and when I looked at the particular ship she was looking at ship. History ruled out the possibility that that is where he was.

John:

What was it that gave you a clue that she was not correct about the ship?

Kathleen:

What made me realize it was the ship history. We forget to look at the ship history. Get off your human and look up the things and the events. The ship stopped running at a certain point, From 1912 to 1957, it was just kind of a station ship and at that point it was bunking people in Baltimore.

John:

Okay, but what does that mean? It was considered as a shelter for the sailors and the military, so just a dock hotel it was docked in.

Kathleen:

Baltimore and it would go every once in a while to Quantico area, Annapolis area, Okay, but what we know about that ship when I did the history is that only white sailors were on it during that time frame.

John:

Oh, and this was an.

Kathleen:

African-American. Exactly, this was an African-American and she was looking for her african-american ancestor or father on this ship, and I know that the colored sailors, as they called it in the newspaper, they were on the uss cumberland. So my question is did she check this set of records? Because that would give her a little bit more about who she's looking for.

John:

Okay, great, thank you. All right, so now you're looking at not the person but the thing, and so you've eliminated this folklore already about what ship the person was on.

Kathleen:

Yes, now she needs to still look at the records, but one of the things she needs to do is find more about the person Now that we know that's not quite might not be this full story. She needs to find out well who is related to him. She could do that through DNA. She could do that through obituaries. There's so many ways that we find it in all of those public records that we this is what you provided to her that is correct and if he had a, if her name was on the birth certificate.

Kathleen:

I do not know that answer, but that makes a big difference also because now that tells me what she's entitled to. If he was in the military, did she look under the burrows, which is the burial records for the military? Did she look under the burials, which is the burial records for the military? So these are the kinds of things you're looking for to move forward on a missing person. That's more contemporary because this is only a one generation away.

John:

OK, so did you hear anything back, or was this? Do you know if she's been successful in her life?

Kathleen:

I don't know Now, remember I'm contacting only the National Archives.

John:

They're my person, they're passing, they're passing information. They can pass it in.

Kathleen:

They they're passing it on. I'm not. I haven't worked with the client, this person myself, okay got it.

John:

That makes that makes a lot of sense. Well, that's cool, it's. It's interesting that she would be able to, and she contacted the national Archives looking for this person and they said hang on a second, let me check with Kathleen.

Kathleen:

I'm not sure the full scenario, but I got her email. I got an email, you got her okay. And says, hey, can you help us on this? This is the issue and we can't find anything.

John:

Again, knowing your history really jumps up there of segregation in the military who was stationed where and where. The quote unquote colored troops were allowed to be and were not allowed to be.

Kathleen:

You know, John, sometimes you summarize what I talk about very succinctly, almost too so.

John:

But that is okay, sorry there's no, there's no nuance in my world.

Kathleen:

I see that so let's go to the next topic absolutely go for it.

Kathleen:

What's next kathleen was, was an australian research. Okay, I'm working with this british guy who lived a lot in australia, who came to america. We're looking for a passport or an obituary. We found neither. This would be in the 1920s I believe 1918, somewhere around there. He was born in the 1800s. And finally I got a small hint. The small hint was on a ship manifest. When I'm looking for his passport number and where his passport was even originated, there was no passport for him.

John:

So passports were a thing back then, right?

Kathleen:

Well, they became a thing about World War I. That's about the right time frame. He was in the country around 1912, and other people had at least originating information or passports. Next to his line it had nothing but a state stamp, and I mean state department stamp.

John:

Okay.

Kathleen:

And that state department stamp went of immigration of USCIS, probably when he came in it just said non-alien immigrant.

John:

You're going to have to help me with some definitions here. Non-alien immigrant. You're going to have to help me with some definitions. Non-alien immigrant, as opposed to, which means that they were here from another planet.

Kathleen:

No, it does not mean anything about other planets. That means that they were. There goes my conspiracy theory.

John:

That means that I was sure the state department was involved in knowing about area 51.

Kathleen:

That is not the kind of alien I'm talking about, those aliens.

John:

Let me get back into this.

Kathleen:

Those kind of aliens are TV aliens. The aliens I'm talking about are people who lived in America, who were not yet naturalized, and so there's lots of records on them because they were recorded especially during World War I and after. So he was not considered an alien, he was not considered as a citizen, he was a non-alien immigrant. So I'm still looking for where his paperwork allowed him to get in the United States.

John:

Right, because I'm going visa work visa, you know, very, that's a very good guess, but there wasn't anything.

Kathleen:

Well, it's kind of like that Our artist, a performer who is only here from, let's say, australia or England, to perform on our theater, in our theater.

John:

In our theater. Is it theater? Yeah, it's not a theater. In our theater, it's a theater?

Kathleen:

Yeah, it's not a theater, our artists who were here to perform in the theater or doing a performing art stint.

John:

Any kind of show. Right Any kind of show or for any period of time.

Kathleen:

They came under a performance immigrant status. Their show could have been extended or shortened, so they did not need a normal. Yes, they did not need a normal. Yes, they did not need a normal passport.

John:

So if you're bringing art, which we probably desperately needed, if you were bringing performance art from Australia or England, then they just they were like, yeah, you don't need a passport, just come on in and do your gig and then you can leave afterwards.

Kathleen:

But they were registered.

John:

Would you stamp yeah?

Kathleen:

they were registered, but finding their records are not with our normal passport records. They are not with the USCIS but with the State Department. So the non-alien immigrant passport or visa was a new one for me and I had seen it once before, but I did not really know what it was until I actually was searching for it and where to find it.

John:

Is this something that will show up on ship records, or will it show up on census too?

Kathleen:

The only thing I saw it on was on the ship manifest. I did not see it as a.

John:

Because theoretically they wouldn see it as a census Because theoretically they wouldn't be answering a census would they?

Kathleen:

Well, even if they did, it would just say alien probably.

John:

Again, another fun thing to learn about and also the ease of entry, it would seem Not blocking people from entering without, let's say, specific documentation, in order to make it easier for, let's say, performances in art and artists to come and enrich our culture.

Kathleen:

Exactly, that was the idea at the time. So the last two days I've been fighting John with family tree DNA.

John:

Okay, you've been fighting, fighting with, and these are the phone conversations I found a bit disturbing and required a little bit of uh grease at the end of the day to get through some of those conversations with. You know a nice camas vineyard. Um, this, this conversation, was brought to you by camas vineyards.

Kathleen:

So, John so the last few days we aren't drinking right now. Okay, so the last few days I've been going back and forth to Family Tree DNA. A client paid $400 for a YDNA for his nephew to take, since his brother is deceased and they are looking for their paternal family. After paying another $59 to get the autosomal, the nephew was able to totally remove us from all access.

John:

You said he took a Y-DNA test. Yes, now that's different from the autosoma, that's correct, the autosoma. And is that more expensive?

Kathleen:

or what's the deal with that. The Y was a $400 test, the autosoma was $59. It's like an ancestry, but they're all from family tree DNA.

John:

They're all from family tree. Yes, okay.

Kathleen:

So by rights, his DNA is always his. It's his biological DNA, so he had the right to remove it, I mean, or remove us even, but that should have come with compensation, because we were told we could have the access until he paid us back in full.

John:

We don't own his DNA, but we do have access, considering that's what we paid for. Okay, so somebody paid for the $400 test. Your client paid for that and then paid for another $59 test. Yes, so he should be able to access everything, and you're saying his nephew has blocked his access yes, the nephew has blocked his access and mine as as the manager of the the kids. Okay, and why, why, what? What would be the the point?

Kathleen:

well, because the information was a bit shocking, because they found out that the father of the two boys was not the husband of their mother, the man who raised them.

John:

So they did not. The man they thought was their father right was not their biological father.

Kathleen:

Right, and it gets a little bit more complicated.

John:

Okay.

Kathleen:

Because the two brothers didn't even have the same father and it wasn't the father who they were raised with.

John:

So then back another generation? No, is that true?

Kathleen:

No, the nephew took it for his father, who is deceased. So there's really who we're talking about are two brothers, but one brother's deceased.

John:

Okay, so the two brothers one deceased the nephew of or the son of the deceased brother is the one who has taken over this and pulled all the records because apparently he's not happy with the idea that his father is not who he thought his father was. That's correct. Your client is okay with learning this information.

Kathleen:

My client is 78 years old. He's a disabled pet. Okay, he was shocked about his brother Not, you know, not only being a half brother. But then in my research I realized he also is not his father's son, but he had a different father than his other, his half brother. Now they're still half brothers because they had the same mother.

John:

Right.

Kathleen:

But neither one of them was raised by their biological father.

John:

I'll be honest with you. I do not understand why the nephew is the one with the issue.

Kathleen:

We are not sure either, but he is a leader in the LDS church, and so that could be a form of embarrassment of some sort.

John:

In what century? Yeah, I would, okay, fine, but I mean, even though there's a lot of people working to put us back in the 1850s, it really is not. It's still 2024. I mean, anybody might find out, I don't know Something that's embarrassing. I don't know why I would be if my uncle, if I were to find out that my uncle, let's say, was only a half brother to my mother.

John:

Which is exactly what you found out. I mean, what does that have to do with me other than at this point? It's an interesting point that I'll never know the true answer to, but it does show me that guess what I'm descendant of humans.

Kathleen:

What would you feel like, John, if you found out that you were not your father's son?

John:

Well, first off, it would answer a whole raft of questions and concerns that I've always had. A whole lot would make sense if I was not my father's son. Unfortunately there's too many genetic markers. But if I did find out that I was not my father's son again at this point in my life, you know, it would be interesting. I would have maybe a different point of view and an appreciative point of view with the way I was raised, because he treated me just as badly as he treated the other two brothers, your father was fine, you're horrible.

John:

No, he was fine, he was fine.

Kathleen:

So I think for me it's a point of empathy. He was fine, so I think for me it's a point of empathy. My biggest issue is I often turn to the LDS records and their stories and they have a lot of things documented because of the way the church runs. I often turn to that for a paper trail, but I know that all paper trails can be proven wrong now because of DNA. It didn't happen when I first started in genealogy. I don't think that this person in Utah has that awareness and I think it's because there's so much writing, because I have seen a lot of the LDS writings from his father, who he thought was his father. I have seen these writings and they're quite beautiful oh, the father.

Kathleen:

So he's invested, maybe, with the father's position in the church but this would have been his and he's, he is, he is involved in the church in idaho is the fact that he is carrying a surname of the of a grandfather or of his father, but that would not be his biological name. Now, spiritually, I was told that because they were all baptized much later after all of this happened, they should just accept what they were told in the first place.

John:

Again, you can appreciate what's the difference between a biological father and a dad. You know who, who raises you? I don't, I don't.

Kathleen:

I mean that's for the people to decide, and maybe it comes with age, because my client, as I said, is a 78 year old man, he's seen it all he is. He wants to know, well, in that case, who did father me as biologically, because my father is still my father, my mother is still my mother and I honor both of them but who did father?

John:

me.

Kathleen:

Luckily for my client, his YNA did not match his nephew, so his YNA proves that I can still work with that DNA and his results to find out who might be his father, which is a whole nother story, because I probably will never find out, because it's Finnish and Swedish and they all started intermarrying.

John:

Wow, that just sounds like a mess and maybe he just needs some time to. You have to, at some point, put down the fairy tales and the folklore of who your family is, who you believe your family is, who you believe people to be, and look at the reality of where everybody's human and they're making the same choices that you struggle with today.

Kathleen:

So, John, that's not really my biggest issue with it, because I can't change what this guy did right. I can't change who the mother is. I can't change who the mother is. I can't change who the father is. But family tree DNA is supposed to make sure we have access or that we are reimbursed 100%.

John:

Wait a minute. How do you know that it?

Kathleen:

is on their actual policy. There is a whole policy and it also came. They referred me to their parent company, which is Gene by Gene. There's a whole paragraph on third party and how the process works. Gene by Gene sent me back to them. Family Tree DNA says well, we don't have anything that contradicts our parent and, yes, that's probably what we should do, but we don't follow that policy.

John:

Wow, I'm sorry. So basically you got the bird, huh, well, we did Except.

Kathleen:

I advised my client to go back to the credit cards and go back to his credit card on the 400. And I did the same on the 59 upgrade and dispute it, because we pay for a product we never received If we can't see it, we didn't receive it.

John:

Then it must have been lost in the mail, exactly.

Kathleen:

They wouldn't even escalate it for me. I had to go back to the parent company, who already told me this is the policy.

John:

I had to write to both their privacy department and their ombudsman website or email address, and nothing's resolved yet not yet, but that was just yesterday, wow yeah um, I find it interesting, uh, that somebody would say, yeah, that's our policy, but you know, we're just not going to adhere to it I mean, what's the point basically? What's the point?

John:

that's what they did tell me so, yeah, this is, this is uh, this is where you get into the disturbing part of that is um, that hopefully we'll we'll have a good resolution and bring that out, because I would be extremely disturbed if I was working with that, with gene by gene and um who's the then family, family tree, dna? I'd be really, really wary at this point, because what's to stop them from simply not producing or losing data and simply saying, well, yeah, but that's on you, you need to retake the test, right, and that'll be another $400, please, right? That would give me great concern in doing that.

Kathleen:

So hopefully we'll have a better resolution and we'll figure out what's going on with that and we'll have a better resolution and we'll figure out what's going on with that. Well, I'll give our listeners an update as soon as I find out. In the meantime, as I said, we both channeled shit on our credit cards.

John:

Right, so watch the blog that. Probably this will appear on the A3 Genealogy blog before it appears on Hitting the Bricks with Kathleen. So watch the A3 Genealogy blog you can find it through your link tree that you subscribe to. That gives you all the great stuff that goes on with tracing ancestors, hitting the bricks with Kathleen and A3 genealogy all that fun stuff at just a click of a button. And you know that if you subscribe to that you are eligible for a monthly drawing that will give you the MyHeritage. There we go, a MyHeritage Complete Package that is a $300 value and you get to use all their excellent resources throughout the year. Boy, this is okay. So what do I need?

Kathleen:

I need more ginkgo in my diet or something. Yes, so, john, while we're on that, because you did mention my heritage package, this month I also did a special giveaway. I don't know if you've seen it. I just just decided to do it without any board member agreement oh well, that's, that's nice. Don't, don't consult us the giveaway is an ancestry dna kit and as if they are a subscriber and they go and solve a 1912 puzzle on the sunday quiz, so this is the sunday quiz this is what happened okay, so I found a 1912 sunday quiz for readers, so it is posted on our link tree for a giveaway.

John:

On the hitting the bricks link tree.

Kathleen:

On the hitting the bricks link tree. Yes, I put it up there there's a link. They could click on it and go and learn. Make sure they follow all the rules so that we can get the answers.

John:

And what do they get if they get all the answers?

Kathleen:

Ancestry DNA kit. Oh winner.

John:

And what do they get if they get all the answers? Ancestry DNA kit oh cool, I would ship them. And what's the value on that?

Kathleen:

I think it's $99.

John:

Yeah, oh well, that's cool it does expire, so you only got a couple weeks. One way or the other, it does expire.

Kathleen:

June 30th.

John:

June has 30 days, so as of the 30th at 1159 PM pm, this offer will be null and void. Yes, poof gone, yes. So what else then, kathleen?

Kathleen:

One is our June newsletter is out and it is filled with information. I got a lot of questions Our last podcast on the artificial intelligence, so I did do some examples on that, along with a lot of other information, but one of the big ones was about women. Again, I was working on a client about two or three weeks ago, okay. So in our June newsletter, one of the things I talk about for Pride Month are these terms that I had never heard before as far as describing a lesbian relationship. One was the Boston marriage.

John:

A Boston marriage.

Kathleen:

A Boston marriage.

John:

Oh, this sounds kind of fun, exactly. But these aren't okay. But what is the context of them? These weren't derogatory.

Kathleen:

No, it was not. This was just how you said yeah, exactly.

John:

Lots of fun stuff in the newsletter. Especially Do you have the winner.

Kathleen:

I do John, Hold on one second. I think it's Jane Potts. I told you I was going to ask. I know Jane Potts and that was for May.

John:

Okay for May. Congratulations to Jane Potts who will be getting the MyHeritage Complete Package $300 value, and thank you so much to MyHeritage for that, so that we can pass the fun along to the listeners of Hittin' the Bricks with Kathleen.

Kathleen:

So, john, I think that's pretty much. You were asking me what have I been doing the last two weeks? And these are just some of the fun things I did.

John:

I didn't ask the last two weeks. I was talking about just this afternoon, Kathleen. Well, congratulations, You've made it to the end of another episode. Thanks so much for staying. Thanks to MyHeritage and Legacy Family Tree webinars. Thanks to Chewy Chewbacca Brandt, our part-time philuminist and full-time broliologist, for his unwavering lack of interest in anything we're doing. The theme song for Hittin' the Bricks was written and performed by Tony Fisknuckle and the Clowders Watch for their next appearance at the Ratskeller behind the Student Union at Wilberforce University. You can find us wherever you listen to your favorite podcasts. Do you have a genealogical question for Kathleen? Drop us a line at HittintheBricks at gmailcom and let us know.

People on this episode

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Kathleen Brandt

Host
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John Brandt

Co-host