Pages

Thursday, June 30, 2022

MyHeritage's Theory of Family Relativity™ is updated with 25,636,711 Theories

 

The MyHeritage.com Theories of Family Relativity™ pull together billions of data points across family tree profiles and historical records to provide theories of how you and your DNA matches could be related. I currently have 196 such matches. The main value of these "theories" is to supplement and confirm the data I have accumulated over the past 40 years. Some of the paths examine relationships that connect through my 3rd Great-grandfathers or Grandmothers. I must admit that many of the people I am matched to are complete strangers and I would never have guessed a relationship absent a DNA test. 

To take advantage of this service you most certainly need a family tree on the MyHeritage website and also have a MyHeritage DNA test or have uploaded the DNA data from another test. You can learn more about this feature from the following video from Education.MyHeritage.com website. 

https://youtu.be/4BP60GUtQxQ

Using the Theory of Family Relativity™ to Research DNA Matches by Ran Snir

Friday, June 24, 2022

Plan ahead now for RootsTech 2023 in person and online

 

https://www.familysearch.org/rootstech/home

For many of us, as we grow older, our world seems to contract. The past three years of the pandemic have certainly added to the contraction. Being online has its advantages but it is a poor substitute for meeting with people in person. I have had contact with hundreds, perhaps thousands of people online over the past couple of years, but my in-person interaction has dwindled to close to zero. It has also been sad to watch some of my friends pass on. 

Now, we have one bright spot on the near horizon. RootsTech 2023 will have an in-person component. Some of us will be able to get together again during the week of March 2 - 4, 2023. We will have to wait and see how all this will look like and barring another international disaster, we just might get to see each other in Salt Lake City, Utah in a few months. 

Wednesday, June 22, 2022

BYU Family History Library Weekday Classes

 

https://fh.lib.byu.edu/classes-and-webinars/family-history-classes/

The BYU Family History Library is expanding its classes on weekdays. This is in addition to the Sunday Classes and Thursday evening webinars. Here is a copy of the current schedule but check the website (https://fh.lib.byu.edu/classes-and-webinars/family-history-classes/) for any additions or changes to the class schedule. Because the BYU Family History Library is part of the main Harold B. Lee Library on campus, we are subject to the academic schedule of school and holidays. 

Here are the upcoming classes. 

Family History Classes (day and time may vary)

Computer Tips | Research | Indexing

Join Email List Sign up to receive class updates.

Computer Tips & Tricks

Tuesdays and Thursday 3:00 p.m. Mountain Time

with Elder Van Celaya

Format: Q&A and open discussion with the presenter. These classes are not recorded.

Join via the Virtual Family History Help Desk (on Zoom) at the specified time. A greeter will direct you to the class breakout room.

Jewish Genealogy Research

Tuesdays 12:30 p.m. Mountain Time

with Elder Larry Bassist

June 28th – Jewish Genealogy: Getting Started

Format: Lecture with Q&A at the end.

Class recordings will be posted in the Virtual Classes Archive.

Join via Zoom at the specified time. You may also join in-person at the Family History Classroom at the BYU Family History Library.

Scotland Research

Fridays 12:30 p.m. Mountain Time

with Sister Erika Ward

July 8th – Where did your Scottish Ancestors live?  Understanding UK Geography & Census Records.

July 15th – Where did your Scottish ancestors’ worship?  Using Scotland Church Records to find Births, Marriages, and Deaths.

July 29th – What official records exist about your Scottish Ancestors?  Searching Scotland Government Vital Records.

August 5th – When did my Scottish Ancestors move? Understanding Scottish Immigration and Emigration Records.

Format: Lecture with Q&A at the end.

Class recordings will be posted in the Virtual Classes Archive.

Join via Zoom at the specified time. You may also join in-person at the Family History Classroom at the BYU Family History Library.

Indexing

1st Thursday of the Month 6:00 & 7:00 p.m. Mountain Time

with Sister Michelle Templeman

6:00 p.m. – Beginner’s Class

7:00 p.m. – Advanced Class

Information on FamilySearch Indexing and help with indexing, including foreign language indexing, especially French, Spanish, Italian and Portuguese. Helpful for indexing other languages as well.

Format: Instruction with open discussion and Q&A. These classes are not recorded.

Join via the Virtual Family History Help Desk (on Zoom) at the specified time. A greeter will direct you to the class breakout room.

Use the Virtual Help Desk to ask questions about any of the scheduled classes. 


Tuesday, June 21, 2022

The Fifth Rule of Genealogy - a short video

 

https://youtu.be/kJUmVtCAuOk

Rule Number Five is “You cannot get blood out of a turnip.”

Granted, this Rule is an old saying usually applied to collecting debts. But I find it is very much applicable to genealogy. 

I would apply this Rule to all those genealogists who think that they are related to royalty or famous people simply by listing them in their pedigree. Really, I talk to people all the time who are so proud of their royal heritage when they have done nothing at all to document or prove an actual connection. Emperor’s New Clothes

Monday, June 20, 2022

Let's Just Think About What We Are Doing on the FamilySearch Family Tree

 


I am continually amazed at the entries I find in FamilySearch.org Family Tree. I recently found a series of examples of the type of entries that cause this amazement. I am not making this stuff up. Here is the first example. 


If you have to look more than a few seconds at this entry, you are likely part of the problem. This reminds me of a movie called Corpse Bride. But in this case, it was a corpse husband. 

Moving along, I guess I need to say that all these examples are still in the Family Tree. I did not feel compelled to correct the information. Here we go with the next screenshot. 


Talk about adding insult to injury in this Marshall family, look carefully at the birth dates of nearly all the children. Oh, by the way, most of them do not have any sources listed. What more can I say?

Here we go with the next example.


I thought you might want to see the details of the first child listed. I am certainly relieved that he was sealed to his two-year-old mother. 

Next,


This list shows how the other families in this part of the tree are faring as well. The purple icons show the individuals with no sources. 

On we go.


This is only the beginning of this particular line. Here is the next step. 


You might notice that Ann Atkins is named as the last child in the descendancy pedigree above as the last child of Ann Atkins and Samuel Marshall. You might also notice that her parents were supposedly married in Boston. Just wondering how there was a record from England?

Onward.


Here is the summary of the English record just in case you were wondering if it was logical considering that Ann Atkins died in 1786. 

This could go on and on with additional examples. I have recently been writing about the extensive changes being made to people who are fully documented. This is the other side of the coin. There is no real documentation at all for these individuals so far.

Seven Sure Steps to Discovering Your Ancestors

 

Step #1: Begin at the beginning.

The often-repeated admonition about searching for your ancestry is to work from what you know to discover what you do not know. This means starting with your own personal history. 

Who are you?
Where and when were you born?
Who are your parents?
How do you know the answers to these questions?
What documentation do you have to support your answers?

The key factor in every step of establishing a valid connection between you and your ancestors is discovering a valid, supportable, parent/child relationship. This means obtaining historical documentation that shows each individual as a child of a father and a mother. If you cannot establish that specific relationship, you are at the end of that particular ancestral line. Even if you inherit a substantial amount of information about your family, take the time to examine each relationship and support each relationship with documentation. Learning about your family is called genealogy. 

Step #2: Don't ever assume that the information you received from someone else is correct until it has been verified.

It is not uncommon with today's DNA tools for people to discover that that they are not related to their parents or grandparents. You might be surprised. Assuming a relationship, even from the very beginning of your search, can lead to a lot of wasted time and effort. However, you can choose to investigate any parent/child relationship: biological, adopted, step, foster, or any other such relationship in your own cultural history. If you inherited some genealogy from a relative who lived before computers and the internet, it is very likely that the information they found is already incorporated in an online family tree. Take time to go online and look beginning with the free, universal FamilySearch.org Family Tree. 

Step #3: Avoid the temptation to jump back generations. 

This step means you need to ignore the "fan chart illusion" of relationships. Too many people are attracted by the unknown empty spaces on a chart long before they know anything about the real people they are related to. Finding your ancestors is like building a bridge. You can't start in the middle or at the other end. You can only establish a valid pedigree step by step, person by person, document by document.

Step #4: Always identify the specific places where events occurred. 

Location, location, location. Your ancestors, beginning with your parents, lived real lives in real places. Those places must be specifically identified. For example, "Germany" is not a place. It is an excuse for a place. Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Oberbayem, Bavaria, Germany is a place. All genealogically helpful records are located geographically. Finding those records is the main component of finding your ancestors. Before looking for names, look for places. 

Step #5: Learn the history of every location where your ancestors lived. 

Genealogy is history and all history is really genealogy. Your ancestors did not live in a vacuum. Knowing the history of every place where your ancestors lived is crucial to knowing who they were and how they lived. Knowing the history of every place mentioned in your ancestry is also crucial to finding records about your family. 

Step #6: Carefully document every event in your ancestors' lives.

Keeping a copy of every record you find about your family makes verifying the information and extending your research much, much easier. Now that we can digitize records and use digital copies of records, keeping copies of all the records or links to where copies can be found does not mean that we must dedicate a room in our homes to records. 

Step #7: Use all the available resources to learn how to find your ancestors.

Where do you begin? I have one constant suggestion for anyone who is beginning to discover their family. Study the FamilySearch.org Research Wiki. Here is the link. https://www.familysearch.org/en/wiki/Main_Page

If you are not familiar with the Research Wiki, here are some videos that might help. 




You might also find the entire BYU Family History Library YouTube Channel to be helpful. 

For free step-by-step instructions that go way beyond this post, study The Family History Guide.

Thursday, June 16, 2022

MyHeritage adds 1.3 BILLION historical records in 37 collections in April and May

 

Yes, you did read that right. MyHeritage.com did add an additional 1.3 billion records in April and May, 2022. 

Here is the list of countries where records were added.

During April and May, MyHeritage added 1.3 billion historical records in 37 collections from all around the world. These records are from the U.S., the U.K., Belgium, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Portugal, Romania, Scotland, Spain, Switzerland, and Ukraine, and they include birth, marriage, death, military, census, newspaper records, and more. Many of the collections include high-quality images alongside the indexes. With this update, the total number of historical records on MyHeritage has now reached 18.2 billion.

If you have a MyHeritage.com data subscription, you can go to the Collections Catalog under the Research tab and see a list of all the collections and then sort them by date updated. This will give you an idea of what kinds of records have been added to the collections.  Here is a screen show showing some of the updated records. 

This list of new records is very long. Of course, all these records are indexed and searchable. 

RootsTech 2023 Will Include Online and In-Person Event

 

We kept hearing rumors that RootsTech 2023 would be a hybrid conference with both online and in-person components and we finally got the following announcement from FamilySearch. 

SALT LAKE CITY, UTAH—RootsTech, the world’s largest family history gathering is back in 2023 with an in-person event in Salt Lake City to complement its massive online conference. Mark your calendars for March 2–4, 2023, to join millions of virtual and in-person attendees for inspiring keynote addresses, instructive classes, innovative technologies, and most of all, the ability to connect people to their family—past, present, and future.

FamilySearch is thrilled to continue the legacy of hosting RootsTech in the effort of uniting families. The 2023 event marks the 13th year of this global gathering. In 2022, over 3 million people participated online. Since the beginning, innovation has been a guiding principle for RootsTech. Each year, the event organizers adapt the content to appeal to people worldwide and to stay current. The 2023 event will be no different.

 “We feel compelled to keep learning and evolving,” said Jen Allen, RootsTech event director. “We are constantly seeking new ideas to help expand reach outside the industry and create engaging and educational experiences for RootsTech attendees.”

The 2023 event will welcome speakers from all over the world covering a host of genealogy-related subjects. There are many announcements yet to come about RootsTech 2023, but Allen said the virtual experience will remain free and open to everyone all over the world. The in-person event will have a cost (to be determined) associated with registration and will feature exclusive classes with enhanced features like live Q&As or in-depth workshops and case studies. In addition, the in-person event will have unique connection experiences and of course, the energetic expo hall, which is a favorite of past RootsTech attendees.

Unless you read this closely, you might miss the news that RootsTech 2022, which was completely online and had over 3 million participants. Many of us who have participated in the past could not see how FamilySearch could ignore that fact and go back to an in-person conference. I guess the question that everyone has to answer is whether or not we all want to spend our time and money to go to an in-person conference when it will be online also. I would go in-person if that were to be possible simply because I live an hour away from Salt Lake City. 

I am sure we will hear more soon. You can keep posted at RootsTech.org.

Saturday, June 11, 2022

Unrehearsed Genealogy Research, Episode 11: Confirming what is known, in New York and New England

 

https://youtu.be/tDW1OYc-b7g

Unrehearsed Genealogy Research, Episode 11: Confirming what is known, in New York and New England is a review of what is known and unknown. There is no way to actually contribute new information to the huge FamilySearch.org Family Tree without going through a similar process. If you are just starting out, you may have a "clean slate" for a while but as you connect with others, if you fail to look at all the sources and read about everything that shows up in the Family Tree, you will be duplicating effort in the least and adopting inaccurate and incomplete data at the worst. 

New Developments in Helping with the 1950 US Census

https://www.familysearch.org/1950census/

The review of the names on the 1950 Census on FamilySearch are rapidly being completed. Here is the status as of the date of this post. 



However, FamilySearch is still quite far away from finishing the project. The reason is that the families also have to be reviewed before the census records can be opened to searching. 


Recently, the process of reviewing families has been made easier and faster. Here is a blog post explaining about family review. 


https://www.familysearch.org/en/blog/1950-family-review-volunteers

Here is a link to a tutorial video about the review process.

https://youtu.be/a__AtwzV7dU


The Fourth Rule of Genealogy

 

https://youtu.be/AkWs4q0aWAU

Rule Number Four is “There are always more records.”

This is one rule that you could argue about for hours. Many genealogists claim that they have reached a “brick wall” and that there are no more records for their ancestor. But what this really means is that the genealogist hasn’t found the ancestor in the records that have been searched so far. Actually, no one has every argued with me about this or any of the other rules, although I have had a few comments. You can see all the videos so far on my YouTube Channel.

https://www.youtube.com/user/jamestanner45


Monday, June 6, 2022

My Revolving Door Ancestor: Francis Cooke

 

Plymouth Rock defaced with spray paint
https://turnto10.com/news/local/plymouth-rock-defaced-with-spray-paint 

When someone defaces a historical artifact or monument such as the famous Plymouth Rock in Plymouth, Massachusetts, it makes the news but day by day, week by week, for years people have been changing, essentially defacing, the settled historical information about the Mayflower passenger Francis Cooke and no one who could prevent the online graffiti altogether has done anything to prevent it. This paticular damage is being done to an entry in the FamilySearch.org Family Tree. 

Francis Cooke (b. about 1583, d. 1663) ID #LZ2F-MM7. This is another instance where the number of unsupported changes, to this person, are overwhelming. I would venture to guess from trying to scroll through the unending list of changes, that his record has been changed almost every day, day in and day out, since the day he appeared in the Family Tree around 2012. I am again guessing that there have been over 5,000 changes made or about 2 to 3 a day for ten years. This is a mammoth waste of time and duplication of effort. This would be a serious issue if it was isolated to this one individual, but there are thousands, perhaps millions, of individuals who are changing more or less at the same rate. Think of the benefit of people were actually doing productive work instead of the equivalent of graffiti.

I suppose I need to give some reason why the changes are not necessary or appropriate. The main reason is this book. 

Wood, Ralph V., and Lucy Mary Kellogg. 2015. Mayflower families through five generations: descendants of the Pilgrims who landed at Plymouth, Mass., December 1620. Vol. 12 family of Francis Cooke.

This book contains almost all we know about Francis Cooke. There is no need for even one change unless someone has done more research than the Mayflower Society. 

Concerning this subject, I get comments like this regularly:

Any web-based platform, whether Facebook, Twitter, or the FamilySearch Tree, without a means of vetting contributors, is likely to be overrun with uninformed, inaccurate, and in some cases absolutely malicious postings. I contributed to the FamilySearch Tree when it first became possible to link from Legacy Family Tree software. A few months later, a cousin (now deceased) made a number of ridiculous, and un-sourced, changes to the information that I had shared. I no longer even look at the FamilySearch Tree. Why bother?

I also get comments like these:

Only you James Tanner can do such a thorough job of illustrating the major issue with the FamilySearch tree. Thank you again for raising the concern. Many of us who work with the FS tree or counsel others have grave concerns that the accuracy of the FS tree may be in fact declining instead of improving. A statistical spot audit might help determine the changing accuracy of the tree. Somehow our overall level of confidence in the tree needs to increase in order for the original version of the FS tree to be realized. 

I agree and wish that there was something we could do to help solve the problem but so far I have had no success. I also do very little updating to FamilySearch. I do still use the site because some of the entries are well sourced and a good place to get started.

I see 2 potential contributory causes. (1) I'm reluctant to say it but some part of FS Management values participation over accuracy. (2) Some FS contributors are doing this because they are not interested in genealogy but they regard the basic entries as the end product.  
Over the years, I have participated in an ongoing dialogue over ways that both the goal of general participation and accuracy could be achieved, however, I have yet to hear about any meaningful efforts at the resolution of this issue. 

Sunday, June 5, 2022

Why are there so many changes to Abigail Warren in the FamilySearch.org Family Tree?

 

Genealogically speaking, Abigail Warren Snow (b. 1619 - d. 1693) ID# 9WP3-6QP had the misfortune of being born to Richard Warren and Elizabeth Walker. Presently, in the FamilySearch.org Family Tree Change Log between June 4, 2022 (the same day this post was written) and January 29, 2012, when it appears that the original entry was made, there have been literally thousands of changes. I counted over 500 and then quit and spent a considerable time scrolling down to find the first entry. I probably scrolled for over ten minutes. Here is a screenshot of the first entries. 


The amount of time and effort wasted on this one person is massive. The first thing I noticed was the tremendous number of duplicate entries merged but the duplicates are not even beginning to be addressed. 


In my previous blog post, "Why are there so many changes to Elizabeth Walker?" I showed her husband, the Mayflower passenger Richard Warren with the Family Tree ID number of KXML-7XC. This Abigail Warren ID #9WP3-6QP already has a duplicate and her father is Richard Warren with the ID number of GXZG-WFS identified as "Master Richard Warren" ID number GXZG-WFS. Interestingly, while I was writing this post, someone deleted her from that entry. The Master Richard Warren entry married to Elizabeth Walker has zero sources attached but lists 17 children only two of which have any sources attached. 

At one point, I decided to try and get involved in this huge mess, but I gave up because I had too much valuable and historically accurate work to do. At the rate the changes are being made to this one family, I suspect it would be a full-time job keeping out the unsupported changes. Now that I found this entry for "Master Richard Warren" ID number GXZG-WFS the website suddenly shows duplicate entries for both Elizabeth Walker Warren and Abigail Warren Snow. By the way, every Vital Record entry for "Master Richard Warren" ID number GXZG-WFS shows the reason that the information is correct to be GEDCOM Data.


Here is all the Mayflower Society has to say about Abigail Warren Snow:

Abigail Warren, born in England, circa 1618; died at Marshfield, after 3 January 1692/93; married at Plymouth, 8 November 1639, Anthony Snow; they had six children: Lydia, Josiah, Abigail, Sarah, son, and Alice Snow.

This and the brief entry in the following book are about all we know about this person. 

Wakefield, Robert S., and Judith H. Swan. 2004. Mayflower families through five generations. descendants of the Pilgrims who landed at Plymouth, Mass., December 1620 Volume 18, Part one, Plymouth, MA: General Society of Mayflower Descendants, Volume 18, Part 1, pages 7-8.

Once again, this is a massive duplication of effort and an almost total waste of time. It might be productive if the huge amount of time adding unsupported information and by volunteers correcting the misinformation had resulted in some additional valuable information but there are only a scarce seven sources for Abigail in the Family Tree. Apparently, there are some good reasons for allowing this massive amount of waste to continue but it seems link allowing the changes to settled, specifically supported, accurate information to go on for over ten years cannot be excused because of any overriding reason. 

A number of suggestions have been made to FamilySearch that would help to improve the situation without any constructive response. I have been and will continue to be a staunch supporter of FamilySearch and of the Family Tree, but I cannot see any reason for not directly addressing these obvious problems. 

Saturday, June 4, 2022

Why are there so many changes to Elizabeth Walker?


 Elizabeth Walker (b. 1583 - d. 1673) ID# M9MF-PND was the wife of Richard Warren (b. 1585 - d. 1628) ID# KXML-7XC and except for the fact that her husband was one of the original Mayflower passengers very little is generally known about her life.  Elizabeth was not a Mayflower passenger. She came to America in 1623 on the ship Anne with their five daughters. They later had two sons. All their children lived to adulthood, and their descendants probably constitute one of the largest number of descendants of any of the Mayflower passengers. See the following:

Anon. n.d. “Warren.” MayflowerHistory.Com. Retrieved June 3, 2022 (http://mayflowerhistory.com/warren).

An exhaustive published source for information about this family and their descendants for five generations is contained in the following three-volumes from General Society of Mayflower Descendants "Silver Books."

Wakefield, Robert S., and Judith H. Swan. 2004. Mayflower families through five generations. descendants of the Pilgrims who landed at Plymouth, Mass., December 1620 Volume 18, Part one, Plymouth, MA: General Society of Mayflower Descendants, Volume 18, Part 1.

Wakefield, Robert S., John Bradley Arthaud, Jane Fletcher Fiske, and Judith Haddock Swan. 2011. Mayflower families through five generations. descendants of the Pilgrims who landed at Plymouth, Massachusetts, in December 1620 Volume 18, part 2, Plymouth, MA: General Society of Mayflower Descendants, Volume 18, part 2.

Wakefield, Robert M. 2001. Mayflower families through five generations: descendants of the Pilgrims who landed at Plymouth, Mass. December 1620. Plymouth, MA: General Society of Mayflower Descendants, Volume 18, part 3. 

Until 2003, Elizabeth's surname was unknown. In an article in the American Genealogist, convincing arguments were made as to the identity of her parents. See the following:

Davies, Edward J. , "The Marriage of Richard Warren of the Mayflower" Davies, The American Genealogist, v78, no2 (whole no 310; Apr 2003).

Elizabeth's husband, Richard, died just four years after she arrived in the colony. However, this extraordinary woman became very influential as the most successful businesswoman in the Plymouth Colony. See the following:

Anon. n.d. “How Elizabeth Warren Became Plymouth Colony’s Most Successful Businesswoman.” Mayflower. Retrieved June 3, 2022 (https://www.mayflower400uk.org/education/how-elizabeth-warren-became-plymouth-colonys-most-successful-businesswoman/).

Baker, Peggy M., Director Emerita, Pilgrim Society & Pilgrim Hall Museum, "A Woman of Valor: Elizabeth Warren of Plymouth Colony," Published by Pilgrim Hall Museum, undated, (accessed 3 June 2022 https://pilgrimhall.org/pdf/Elizabeth_Warren_Essay.pdf).

Anon. n.d. “Elizabeth Walker (MtDNA) - Mayflower DNA.” Retrieved June 3, 2022 (https://mayflowerdna.org/wiki/index.php/Elizabeth_Walker_(mtDNA)).

It is interesting that so much has been written about this woman and yet there is so much of this history that is missing from the sources and memories on the Family Tree. It is readily apparent that those who keep changing the entries on the Family Tree are unaware of Elizabeth Walker Warren's history and have done little or no research except to add what they have in old GEDCOM files and Family Group Records. As you can see from the article from 2003, research is on-going but is still incomplete. It is a real shame that the contributors to the Family Tree think that changing existing information without doing any research is more important than knowing any of the history behind the person they claim as an ancestor. 

Despite the existence of all this information about Elizabeth Walker Warren, her entries in the FamilySearch.org Family Tree continue to change several times a week. This situation will not change until there is a serious effort by FamilySearch to ameliorate the huge amount of duplication of effort and lack of control that presently haunts the Family Tree. It is sad to think of all the time spent by good genealogists correcting the changing ignorantly added entries when time could be better spent adding real historical information to the Family Tree. The resistance of FamilySearch to this major issue is inexplicable. 

Friday, June 3, 2022

Another Unrehearsed and Live Research Video with Goldie May Episode 10

https://youtu.be/722lZaqHB94
 

Episode 10 takes us back to the same family used as the example in Episode 9 but goes well beyond what was previously covered. We realized that Episode 9 had been left with too many loose ends and so both Richard Miller and I backtracked a bit and went into more detail about how the research should proceed. You can see the new video and all the preceding ones on the Goldie May YouTube Channel. I will be out of the country for a couple of weeks but will be back to pick up with a continuation of the series. Stay tuned. 

Unrehearsed Genealogy Research, Episode 10: Browsing Church Records and Books

Is this family history or even history at all?

 

One of the major issues with the FamilySearch.org Family Tree is the fact that people can actually contribute information about nearly everyone who ever lived. Of course, this includes famous, infamous, and those who were totally obscure. Recently, my wife and I had an occasion to discuss Sir Francis Drake with a patron of the Family History Library. We noticed that there were a substantial number of changes being made to this one entry. However, this is the case with many entries in the Family Tree,

The interesting thing about Sir Francis Drake from a genealogical standpoint is that he had no documented children. So why do so many people think they need to spend their time adding and correcting information about this one person? From reviewing some of the changes, I can only surmise that these people all believe they are related to Sir Francis simply because they have the same surname. It is also abundantly apparent from looking at the Family Tree that Sir Francis Drake is not the only object of constant change.

Historians commonly believe that Sir Francis Drake was born illegitimately, See Wikipedia: Francis Drake. It is also very commonly observed that his father was a poor tenant farmer and whose Sir Francis' mother most certainly was not a member of the English nobility (as shown in the Family Tree). One source indicates that his father left England after being arraigned for assault and robbery in 1548. 

See Anon. n.d. “Sir Francis Drake | Biography, Routes, Ship, Born, Death, Accomplishments, & Facts | Britannica.” Retrieved June 3, 2022 (https://www.britannica.com/biography/Francis-Drake). 

In addition, the first source cited in the Family Tree also states that his father was a tenant farmer in Devon, England. 

See Anon. n.d. “Sir Francis Drake.” Retrieved June 3, 2022 (https://library.princeton.edu/visual_materials/maps/websites/pacific/drake/drake.html).

In the Family Tree, his father has been elevated to the English nobility as the son of Sir John Drake V. despite the lack of any documentary evidence showing a parent/child relationship. 

Surprisingly, one of the sources listed for Sir Francis is a newspaper obituary from the Charleston, South Carolina newspaper, The Evening Post for Monday, February 11, 1985, see https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:3Q9M-CS1M-VSVZ-V?cc=2860782&personaUrl=%2Fark%3A%2F61903%2F1%3A1%3AQ537-7PPJ

There is also an article cited as a source from The Drake Exploration Society, see http://www.indrakeswake.co.uk/Society/descendants.htm. Here is a quote from that article. 
The Issue of the Drakes' Descendants
Extensive research has been conducted by society member Susan Jackson on Drake's family tree. Therefore, we are prepared to assist the serious researcher in this area. However, we wish to emphasise our opposition to those claiming to be descended from Sir Francis Drake. Our view is based upon the following facts.
  1. It is impossible for anybody to be descended from Sir Francis Drake. Although he was married twice, he did not produce any children. Furthermore, there is no evidence whatsoever, of any illegitimate issue.
  2. Descent from his brother Thomas could be possible but highly remote. Thomas only fathered two children and the direct male line died out in the 18th century. There are indirect descendants of Thomas via the female line; in England, America and Switzerland. However, the relationship is very distant and tenuous.
  3. Descent from a cousin is not possible. Sir Francis only had two paternal cousins, being John and Robert Drake; both of whom died without issue. The word cousin or kin were very loose terms in Elizabethan England and covered a multitude of relationships. Some of these were very distant.
  4. We are not overtly interested in descent from a 16th century Drake, unless a direct relationship can be proved. A descendant, even from a 16th century Tavistock Drake does not prove an ancestral link to Sir Francis. Therefore, unless substantial contrary evidence emerges, we regret that the direct line of the Drake's of Crowndale died out in the 18th century.

It is abundantly apparent that Sir Francis Drake is not the only object of constant change in the FamilySearch.org Family Tree despite the fact that his family has no living male descendants which indicates that if your name is Drake, you are not a descendant of Sir Francis. 

This is only one of thousands of examples of irrational changes being made to the Family Tree every day. When will something be done to stop this huge waste of time and effort.