Free Hit Counter I run the machelsea-l list and i occasionaly post polish imigrants info to this list and i have a database of 170,000 names .Mtdna can beused to connect these people like san danato mentioned below, poland had many records destroyed in ww2 so how can mtdna play a part? simple locations,locations locations if you have a location which is heavely researched . just a ton of paperwork but some wives if mentioned had no maiden names.So you dont know maybe who this women is except for the name Mary Now you have the females decended from Mary Marys husband was a pratt. you have in your database 7 people who decend from that couple 2 might be males decended from Samual Pratt's 6 sons but 5 are females who are decended thru the female lines off of Mary's 7 daughters. these members are luke warm to all this since maiden names arent available. How can you be sure all the paperwork is true and people did what they said they did so you get all 7 to test .the two males match making them decendents of Samuel. Now the 5 females test and match exactly proving that they are decendents of Mary so all 7 are related .immediatly all their paperwork merges and their trees spread wider more like an elm now then a fir. but does it stop there you have done the genealogy of this tri town area and have many Pratts. Included in this paperwork are familes suspected but not proven to be near these pratts and some never thought to be Pratts Do you stop testing with these 7 hell no and people seeing the results fell maybe i can get some new people. As new people test those suspected to be close to the Pratts with no proof maybe they lived in prattville . they get their brother to test and his mtdna matches the 5 sisters decendents and his ydna is his surname Dearborn. Dearborn recruits his uncle to make sure they match they do but the uncle surprises everyone and matches the 5 women decended from mary. Uncle Dearborn has his tree past the Samuel Pratt and Mary. He looks at his time table to see who might be the conection. sure enough in the period his tree has Jacob Dearborn and Priscilla they had 8 kids 5 seemed to survive but only 3 were known to have paperwork past birth .one of the two undocumented was a Mary so this means using his paperwork we find a female decendent of Priscilla. we test her and sure enough she matches the five decendents of Mary ,Mary,Uncle dearborn, nephew Dearborn, this means somehow nephew dearborn's mom and uncle dearborns mom were related to priscilla Jacob's wife now you merge all the trees involved and the research on the community has guidance on what to expect to find. I dont know how many of you have done towns genealogys I have and this is more then possible even probable Now i just started The Frosinone Project.Many people migrated to parts of the world. Now 50+ years later the children want to know am i related to all mazzolas from san danato as i am a mazzola from there . They pilgramage to there yearly.one problem its 8 miles from monte casino. In the battle with the germans there was mass bombings all buildings were leveled . all records destroyed. all grave yards destroyed. only 50 -100 years and no answers wanna bet ydna makes the families but mtdna connects them. So whats needed is a large database with decendents families .Most know the ggrandparents from american death certs and grave yards,ect.as you accumalate the surname lines and the mtdna lines the process above will pay off at least to connect the mazzolas of the world to san danato maybe it isnt easy but who said it would be genealogy never is