The Kaski & Untiedt Family Trees

George John Wilhelm Mann was a grandchild of Louise Ahrendt & Wilhelm Mann, and first cousin to my grandmother, Bernice (Mann) Untiedt. He married Gladys Salzman. As part of my early, family history research, I would write letters to try and capture the content I was seeking. Below is an October 2000 letter Gladys wrote to me.  Here are some of the highlights: "I came to Luverne after attending MN School of Business in Mpls - to work in the Rock Co. Bank + then met George and that is how I got "into" the Mann family. My home town is Lake Benton, MN - an hours drive north of Luverne - at that time Bernice + a bunch of us gals were all working jobs in town + had to have fun times in the evening." "We remember going to [Paul & Bernice Untiedt's] home in Kanaranzi to play cards. Their home was always open to all the kids in Kanaranzi. Mann picnics each summer was always a highlight especially for the aunts + uncles (Bernice's parents, George's p...

Despite decades of work building out our family tree from stories, records and pictures, there was always a risk that something was wrong. I’m glad to report that tonight looking at the list of my 8 great-grandparents that I have confirmed DNA matches to everyone of them. This confirms that my paperwork and my genetics are in-sync. No midwestern cold nights of hanky panky!

Each person has 2 biological parents and 4 biological grandparents. If we assume that the average age of becoming a parent is 25 years old, over 100 years 4 generations would be born and a total of 16 great-grandparents (2 times). For Christimas this year, my husband framed a beautiful copy of my family tree showing the last 5 generations. 32 great-grandparents. There's still some holes, but 32 family surnames is a lot to track and master. But if I set my goal to understand the last 500 years of my families' histories I would need to document 1,048,576 great-grandparents (17 times). Well, that feels overwhelming! Makes my 10,000 persons accomplishment seem so miniculse.

 The tree has grown to 10,000 people!!! Crazy.  There's so much data out there now, and it just grows and grows.

 I think I just uncovered a weird coincidence. Two different children, biologically related to me, were given up for adoption. Those two children were raised together in the same home as siblings. However, the two children are from different branches of my family, that at the time, didn't even know each other and didn't live in the same towns. Still vetting and lots of questions, but the DNA is clear that they aren't related to each but are related to me, and the data is clear that they were raised in the house, both equally acknowledged in the obituaries of their parents. Wild.

Grrr....software applications for genealogy are such a nightmare right now. There aren't really great solutions. Here's some of the Pros and Cons of what's on the market. Ancestry.com Pros Excellent for finding source documentation and ancestry records Great matching of records so that you actually find your "John Doe" and not an unrelated "John Doe". Intuitive and easy to get started. Media is stored on their site, not locally on your PC. Easy to share records and media with others. Has DNA matches. Syncs with Ancestry and Family Search. Cons Isn't really a good Family Tree application: inadequate reporting; inconsistent data management (same city can be listed multiple ways); lack of searching within your tree; hard to identify errors and manage database integrity. DNA Matches relate to living people, but living people are hidden in other person's trees. These privacy restrictions make true collaboration very difficult. Does not encourage regis...

In 1882, Heinrich "Henry" Untiedt, his wife, Magretha, and son, Paul Christian Sophius, lived in Hanerau-Hademarschen, Schleswig-Holstein, Germany. Hanerau-Hademarschen sits in what is now northern Germany, in the district of Rendsburg-Eckernförde, about 100 kilometers south of the Danish-German border. Paul Christian Sophius was born in 1870 in Alsen, approximately 20 kilometers to the east. Between Hanerau-Hademarschen and Alsen was located the village of Beringstadt, which had been the residence of Paul's future in-laws, Anna Wiebener and Jurgen Schwager.  During the last generation, the Untiedts had migrated away from their ancestral home in Schönberg on the Ostsee coast. Likely the migration began around 1858 when this Heinrich's father, Hinrich, was enlisted in to the Prussian army serving in Rendsburg. As a carpenter, Heinrich probably traveled south of Rendsburg for work. The Untiedts immigrated to the United States in two phases. First, in March 1882, Heinric...