About us
Results shown here are for male descendants of a known or suspected Slaton or Slatten (etc.) heritage, regardless of surname used today. Since the site grid does not display full names, the data you enter for the oldest suspected (Most Distant) ancestor is quite important and required for membership unless the oldest ancestor is still living and you have no permission to do so. Any surname variant carrier is welcome even if unsure of descendancy. Many of the results are sponsored or managed by females, so membership is not restricted, and the admins welcome access to female results of Family Finder, though they do not show publicly at this site.
This Project makes it fairly clear that some "trees" on FamilySearch, Ancestry, and WikiTree, Geni, etc., showing common male ancestors for all of the men found in colonial America with similar surnames leading back to a single man named John, and John leading back to English parents, are unresearched patching together of both real and completely fictitious family groupings. Each American and one British grouping here leads back to ancestors whose roots before colonial America have not been traced genealogically. One grouping from the British has tracings in Burke's genealogies, not always an unimpeachable source.
YDNA can either help to place a male within a contextual pool of cousins, or create or deepen a mystery regarding a lineage. Do not assume that information shown on "Trees" on the Internet, including "citations", is valid. False citations are prevalent in postings from a certain individual showing non-existent birth and marriage records. DNA does not lie (so far) but might upset a traditional genealogy. Sourced documentary research with standards based on such literature as Blaine Bettinger, Milton Rubincam and Eugene A Stratton can be bolstered or questioned with "deep" connection results from YDNA. Neither DNA results nor traditional genealogy can substitute for each other; both tools are equally important in reconstructing a plausible family history.
Begun in in the late 1980s by Clinton Slayton, a genealogical newsletter project expanded to over 50 members by the late 1990s. Before consumer-available DNA testing was investigated as a tool, one (forrmer) member of the project published a "single origin" theory separately from the project's aegis, which muddies the waters of family research even after YDNA results show this to be more than a single male source. When Ancestry abandoned both YDNA and MyFamily sites and when RootsWeb software broke, the three main elements of the project were affected: 1) DNA Project grid, 2) a private social site for sharing images and citations to documentary finds, and 3) posted GEDCOMs on RootsWeb WorldConnect, which are now gone. A lot of work and contacts have been lost as a result of removal of support by Ancestry.com.
We established a replacement for Ancestry's DNA Project here on FamilyTreeDNA. Most of the Ancestry YDNA was transferred to FamilyTreeDNA, but not all, because of financial considerations and the inaccessibility of some members, some of whom are deceased. The non-transferred members are identical to groupings here, and would show larger "pools" of matches visually if transferred. Males who sampled YDNA with Sorenson/Relative Genetics/Ancestry cannot participate in FTDNA's haplotype predictor or "Matching" protocols unless they can be retested at FTDNA.
We found a replacement home for MyFamily on SPOKT.com, with two forums, Slaton Slaton Slayden and Descendants of Arthur & Rachel Slayden. This is not ideal, but anyone can be a member of either site if the administrators choose to invite them.
We have not found a replacement for the RootsWeb WorldConnect site, and are using WikiTree until a dedicated page can be developed. We cannot control the contents of WikiTree entries so this is not an acceptable replacement for presenting our interpretations and citations.
If you know or suspect descendancy from Thomas & Hannah Slaton/Slayton of Massachusetts, we would like to expand that pool of results. That line has also been connected to English ancestors on some trees with no strong proving documentation.
Any current sampler who has not expanded to Big Y is encouraged to do so, and in some cases, the Project might be able to underwrite some or all of the cost. Family Finder for autosomal DNA is also encouraged, because FamilyTreeDNA is now assigning SNPs (not terminals) from those results.
If this is unclear to you, contact Clinton at cslayton19@windstream.net or Wesley Miller at wamiller1313@gmail .com before asking to JOIN.
Members might be asked by the admin to join selected projects, such as Haplogroup Projects, with Privacy settings such that Most Distant Paternal Ancestor Name is not blocked. Please look at the existing grid for hints as to how to name your Most Distant Ancestor, these should be consistent. We might ask members to alter these for a consistent presentation. We request that any member will grant the Administrators ADVANCED access to their results to enable our research, but this is not a requirement
DISCLAIMER: Your Genetic Information is unique to you and your knowledge of it is irrevocable once revealed. You should not assume that any information provided to you will be welcome or positive. You should understand that you may learn information about yourself that you do not anticipate. This information may evoke strong emotions and has the potential to alter your life and worldview. You may discover things that are disconcerting and that you might not have the ability to control or change.