Who's your gateway?

Erica!!! lol!! U go Girl!!!

Maven merged the Elizabeths, the wife of Hugh, for us! Thank you!
And I've added Esther Grosvenor (Clarke) twin 's brother Ebenezer to be situat el in the right place in the Tree, at "curators please, help" thread.
He is currently his father's brother... rotfl!!

Thank you, again, Private User
Ebenezer Clark looking good, in his rightful place! 😘

I fear that I have started an avalanche since I first posted in this discussion group 2 days ago with Message #61, the first post since Oct. 11 (7 weeks). Now we have ove 90 postings.

At 6:06 this eveing, Erica, you posted "In my newsfeed, William Arthur Allen updated a first arriver to the colonies". Yes I did. That is because I am interested in my ancestor Mary Clark (Hobart) (1574-1642) and her motivation for making the journey across the Atlantic Ocean. I suspect that she was influenced considerably after her father, Thomas Hobart, was burned at the stake circa January, 1599 for heresy when he refused to give up Protestantism. Mary was age 24 at the time. The profile for Mary's father is Thomas Hobart "The Martyr" which I believe is a highly relevant label. I wish he were called by the same name elsewhere in Geni where he is given the bland name "Thomas Hobart, of Plumstead." Erica, will you update his name to Thomas Hobart, "The Martyr" to reflect his sacrifice which is an icon for the motivation of so many folks to cross the Atlantic to America to escape persecution? He, of course, was not the only one to be persecuted in this period of European history.

I can understand why Mary Clark (Hobart) is a a gateway person for you, Erica, because it allows you to tap into one of my direct lines of ancestry (a line shared by a huge number of people). Mary Clark (Hobart) (1574-1642) is my 10th great grandmother. Her father Thomas Hobart, "The Martyr" (1537-1599) is my 11th Great Grandfather. If I carry back in the Hobart line Jeffrey Hobart (1324-1409) is my 16th Great Grandfather. If I want to spin off at a maternal branch and follow the line back to Foulques d'Angouleme (1015-1087), my 23rd Great Grandfather, Mary Clark still is in the relationship path. For me there are what appear to be a multitude of gateways if I want to check out personalities that are not in my direct line. There are enough relationships and gateways to keep a researcher busy for years. Meanwhile I have 999+ merges awaiting my attention so I know I will not live long enough to get to them all, especially since I now see how promptly researchers jump on studying the fresh data beyond their own gateways.

Of course, all of these relationship paths and gateways are subject to accuracy tests. I think we need to understand that some links could be false or illusions. If we believe all of the Geni links at face value, especially the ones deep in history or ones where some Geni users have posted false or speculative data, I believe we may be deluding ourselves.

Two weeks ago I started a project entitled "Geni as Illusion?" There already is vigorous dialogue in two separate discussion groups that have flowed from that project. For those who are interested in that topic and ways to be more confident in Geni's relationship paths I invite you to join that project.

Finally, Erica, thanks for your dedication in the Discussion "Who's your gateway?" It is a wonderful forum!

I think there has been some family mythmaking at work here. By 1599 there was no longer any danger in being a Protestant in England (Queen Elizabeth herself was one) - it was *Catholics* who were getting the raw end of the deal. (Puritans faced social disapproval and mockery - see "Twelfth Night" - but weren't otherwise hassled if they committed no crimes.)

Per Familysearch:
Thomas Hobart is not same man as Thomas "The Martyr" Higbed
· 22 October 2015 · 0 Comments
Thomas Hobart thought to be the same as Thomas Higbed "The Martyr" who refused to recant his Protestantism. One of 300 burned at the stake on May 26, 1555, Essex, England. During Mary Tudor's troublesome reign, a local landowner, Thomas Higbed, was accused of heresy. He was put on trial, found guilty and sentenced to be burned at the stake. This execution took place for his Protestant faith. in an area at the rear the Bell.

NOTE: This is almost 50 years earlier than the death of Thomas, father of the emigrant Edmund Hobart/Hubbard.

Thomas Hobart of Snoring Manor in Plumsread of the County of Norfolk, England, was born between 1525-1537 and christened in Hingham Parish. He died on 17 Jan 1599 in Hingham, Norfolk, England.
Parents: son of Miles Hobbart (b. Abt 1479, Norwich, Norfolk, England) and Ellinor Blaverhasset (b. Abt 1507, of Norfolk, Norfolk, England - d. Bef 22 Feb 1557, of , Norfolk, England)
https://familysearch.org/photos/stories/20036907

Erica,
Arthur Mackworth, Gent. of Falmouth, Cumberland, Maine c1658 is my 6th cousin, 13 times removed. Interesting but it likely is too far off my direct line to do much with him. See
Arthur Mackworth, of Falmouth

Mavern B. Helms,
Thanks for your observation about "family mythmaking". Your example is one that would enrich the discussion in Project 30589 (Geni as Illusion?) at http://www.geni.com/projects/Geni-as-Illusion/30589. No one has used the term "family mythmaking" there. I invite you to join the project as a collaborator and tell us about your experience with identifying cases of "family myth making".

Frankly, I've had quite a bit of experience with that, from "Lady Frances White Wells" to "Lady Grace O'Neill". The former turned out to be possibly a half-truth, the latter was a complete fiction.

@Gov. Thomas Dudley (10th GGF)
@William Leete, Colonial Gov. of New Haven and Connecticut (9th GGF)

I was wondering if other people had tree building stories anything like mine.

I was struggling along many months tree building without being able to connect to the Geni World Family tree.

I finally had a brainstorm: maybe I should aim to connect to an existing "notable?". Problem was - the closest I came to knowing of anyone kind of famous was a retired football player. So I got him in my tree but it didn't actually help the "connect me" cause. So I started looking St the spouses of great great aunts and uncles and so on, and noticed a "Gore" name.

I asked family if they knew who this was: and any relation to former Vice President Al Gore?

The answer was: "no clue, but Gore Vidal is one of my favorite writers."

And -- it turns out: Geni says: Gore Vidal is your fourth great aunt's third cousin four times removed!

My gateway ...

Who was yours?

By Erica - Original Post

I did similar with my tree, de Savary, because one married a Duthy, and many others, the notables have the records and, odds are on you can connect some how.

My family have been ridiculing me for years that I am obsessed with nobility, not so, you have to start somewhere.

Been doing the same with settlement of South Australia as my software gives me the line to connect, then move it to the tree.

Its like a gigsaw :)

It so happened that my great-grandmother was an Anne Arundel Waters, which gave me access to all that patiently accumulated genealogical information collected and published by Harry Wright Newman (Waters was one of the families he studied most closely). That provided a number of links, one of which (a Cheney ancestress) has remained stable through all changes.

It was much harder on the other side of the Chesapeake, but I *knew* my grandmother's grandfather was a Northampton County Hanby. After one false start (she had identified the wrong man), I found him in the Miles Files (he started as a footnote and now has a full entry) and built back from there. The exact line is sketchy in places but clearly descends from Richard Hamby/Hanby I, who went to take up his inheritance from Lady Elizabeth Dale (the Dales and Hambys were neighbors back in Leicestershire).

I have my brick walls too, like great-great-grandfather John Smith(!). He's on my mother's side and I have been absolutely unable to get past him. (Just to make things worse, he married a Maria Murphy....)

Had a brick wall in my direct paternal line, but Y-DNA research poked a peephole in it. Seems my brother is a full-on match to one Georg Helm, who emigrated from Airlenbach in the Odenwaldkreise and settled down in Winchester, VA. Georg's paper trail says he is not a direct ancestor, so Daniel Helms I must have been a male-line cousin in some degree. (There was quite a large German colony in Baltimore County in the 18th-early 19th centuries.)

Lincolnshire, my bad.

Probably some of those ancestors were Lincolnshire Poachers. :-)

When I was bound apprentice in famous Lincolnshire,
Full well I serv'd my master, for more than seven year,
Till I took up to poaching, as you shall quickly hear.
Oh, 'tis my delight on a shining night, in the season of the year.

As me and my companions was setting of a snare,
'Twas then we spied the gamekeeper – for him we did not care,
For we can wrestle and fight, my boys, and jump o'er anywhere.
Oh, 'tis my delight on a shining night, in the season of the year.

As me and my companions were setting four or five,
And taking on 'em up again, we caught a hare alive,
We took the hare alive, my boys, and through the woods did steer.
Oh, 'tis my delight on a shining night, in the season of the year.

I threw him over my shoulder, and then we trudged home,
We took him to a neighbour's house, and sold him for a crown,
We sold him for a crown, my boys, but I did not tell you where.
Oh, 'tis my delight on a shining night, in the season of the year.

Success to every gentleman that lives in Lincolnshire (Or: Bad luck to every magistrate)
Success to every poacher that wants to sell a hare,
Bad luck to every gamekeeper that will not sell his deer.
Oh, 'tis my delight on a shining night, in the season of the year.

Interesting Private User my son is a Smith, husband has Murpheys. DNA will be the answer, hope they start to test graves soon :)

Robert Abell (1605-1663) Robert Abell , a New England immigrant, is related to several people of stature in English society in his maternal line. Geni reports Robert Abell (1605-1663) as my first cousin 7 times removed’s husband’s grandfather. Geni shows Robert Abell with a different bloodline than me based on the colours of the names. In the relationship path between Robert Abell and me (William Arthur Allen), Geni reports that Mary Hazen (c1664-1727) is my 7th great aunt and her name is the same colour as my bloodline. Mary Hazen . Geni reports that Mary Hazen’s mother Lydia Howlett (1640-1715) (born Lydia Peabody and named Lydia Perley during her first marriage to Thomas Perley who died in 1709 when Lydia was about age 69) is my 7th great grandmother. Lydia Perley and Lydia Perley .
Since Mary Hazen was born Mary Perley and since her mother at the time of her birth was Lydia Perley I find it confusing that the relationship path names Lydia as Lydia Howlett not Lydia Perley. That aside I need to determine whether there is a “Gateway person” in the relationship path between Robert Abell and me. I suspect that there is not but would appreciate comments to assist me. Thanks.

Who's your gateway? It turns out that I have many gateway ancestors, including some with links back to some of the 25 Magna Carta Barons. Other researchers may want to check the list of names at http://www.magnacharta.com/bomc/bomc-gateway-ancestors/
If they are like me they recognize several of the gateway names because they were familiar immigrants to British North America before there was a United States of America. Good luck searching for those who use this list of gateway ancestors.

Thank you for sharing that list! It's great to understand how all those noble names suddenly pop into view on the Geni tree. It baffled me for a long time. :)

What does gateway mean, pertaining to here?

I found the link someone posted several comments ago and I skim through it. Still not sure. I gather it's an ancestor that connects one ancestor in one country to another in another country , thus linking up with a chain of ancestors.In that case I too have several of them

Not just a different country, but within a country to a different group. The traditional meaning is an ancestor that leads to royalty.

Well, that's I figured after reading it but in my case to lead to Royalty and I do inseveral lines, we have to leave the country and work backwards. The first one I located , I found by accident years ago. My Parker connected with my Taylor and the Taylor line once zig zagging backwards, mostly through the female lines got me to Baron and Kings ete.Then of course, over the years, I found many other connections. But in the beginning I was just focus on Parker and people married to them and their families in USA

Judy, thanks for making your posts here about "zig-zagging". If you check upthread in this discussion you will see that back on 11/14/2014 Erica commented that "double cousin stuff is kind of freaky". Yesterday in another Discussion (http://www.geni.com/discussions/152147) I told the story of a case in my tree where because of the intermarriage of cousins "I have a "Braided Line" back to the original parents. Geni gives me the relationship path only through the eldest child." That's not freaky. It's just a feature of all trees which Geni does not acknowledge. What I have found is that the vast majority of real pathways are NOT documented in Geni. The further back in time we go the more we have incidents of intermarriage of "distant cousins". So zig-zagging, freaky double cousins because of cousin intermarriage, missing or convoluted Geni pathways or undocumented shadow "Braided lines" because of rigid and restrictive Geni policy, all are inter-related issues that are so huge that thay likely deserve their own project so that researchers understand the limitations that Geni currently offers and, therefore, understand what Geni really is. Let's set that idea aside for now. For now the dialogue about these matters may best be expressed in Discussion 152147 "Geni is a leopard, not a cheetah".

William, I do not find it freaky either. I have several people in my tree who did this and they were 1st cousins,. In fact in one case one person's wife was both his cousin and his aunt, a great aunt but an aunt. This was because the wife was the youngest and married down the generation tree.,

Cousin - cousin marriages were not uncommon in the frontier USA due to the lack of available people. I have several in my tree in Missouri in the 1800s. Even one where a man married his cousin and when she died, he married her sister

I also have a case where a man married sisters the same day. LDS of course.

New England , it happened all the time. And if you were early settler families you are bound to be related to someone or another.

Major William Hathorne III (1606-1681) of Salem MA, acknowledged by Geni to be my 8th great grandfather per Major William Hathorne, of Salem, is one of my "Gateways". Geni refers to Major William Hathorne by two names - Major William Hathorne and William Hathorne, III but he is just one man. He is my Gateway back to Magna Carta Baron Hugh Bigod, Heir to the Earldoms of Norfolk and Suffolk and listed by Geni as my 21st great grandfather and as "Hugh Bigod, 3rd Earl of Norfolk, Surety of the Magna Carta" per Sir Hugh Bigod, 3rd Earl of Norfolk, Surety of the Magna Carta .

Justin, would you mind commenting on the authenticity of the relationship path between Hugh Bigod, 3rd Earl of Norfolk, Surety of the Magna Carta and Major William Hathorne III? Thanks.

William,

>Geni refers to Major William Hathorne by two names - Major William Hathorne and William Hathorne, III

What you are seeing is the difference between the way data has been entered into the profile's name fields (ie: First Name=William, Surname= Hathorne, Suffix=III) and what data has been entered into the Display Name Field (ie: Display Name=Maj. William Hathorne).

As this is not a locked profile any Geni user can change these data fields to whatever they like, for example i am about to change the Display Name field from "Maj. William Hathorne" to "Major William Hathorne" because not everyone knows what a "Maj." is.

And I'd "yell" at you for that change, Alex. We deliberately abbreviate military prefixes in the US tree so they don't get mistaken for names.

Remember Major Major Major from M.A.S.H.? He's not the only one ...

:).

I should also add to Alex's good description of field names by adding there is no prefix field and no known plans for one. So display name is where it goes.

I don't remember Major Major Major, he sounds like a major pain in the butt.

The problem with abbreviations is working out what the full word is, okay very simple in this example, but it become harder across eras and languages.

Feel free to change it back ;)

Only the next time I have to undo or spend five hours fixing a tree. :):)

It's just a convention we've worked out based on what's worked out best for the most in the US tree.

Probably started when I tried to merge member Dan Cornett into the profile for Cornet Jeffrey Parsons, because I had "no idea" what a "cornet" is, so was sure it was a turned around name. Oops.

(Dan will never forgive me I fear ....)