Update, October 2019:

A)  Big Y testing has revealed how the Hassloch, Beerfelden, & Berwangen Sterner groups relate to one another.

     Y chromosome sequencing (Big Y DNA tests) of several project members was performed to explore deep Sterner ancestry, i.e., how closely related are the three known J1-haplogroup, southern-German Sterner groups, and which one branched off from the others first?

    Identification of various unique SNP mutations in one Hassloch, one Berwangen, and two Beerfelden descendants shows that, as suggested by the STR results, the J1 Sterner group is relatively unique and does not share a paternal ancestor with anyone else in FTDNA's Y-DNA database within many hundreds of years.  Furthermore, the sharing of two specific novel SNP's (A17373 & A17374) between Berwangen and Beerfelden descendants proves that these two groups are more closely related to each other than to Hassloch Sterners.  In other words, hundreds of years ago, the J1 Sterners split into at least two lines, one of which is represented by the Hassloch group.  At some later time, the other line split, resulting in the Sterner lines of Beerfelden and Berwangen.  The relationships are depicted in the following dendrogram:

                                             _____ Hassloch group

                                            |

ancestral Sterner/Stirner/Störner (J1) _____|      _____ Beerfelden group

                                            |_____|

                                                  |_____ Berwangen group

B)  The father of two previously mysterious 1800's Maryland/Pennsylvania Sterner patriarchs has been identified.

     The Sterner "brick wall" that started this project has finally come down!

     The Sterner DNA project's first-ever Y-DNA test was performed in 2013 to try to eventually identify the father of Samuel Sterner (1811-1890), who was born in Maryland but lived in West Manheim Twp., York County, Pa.

     Now, a combination of genetic and public-records evidence has revealed that 1) Samuel Sterner's father was Adam Sterner (1776-1828) of Maryland, and 2) Adam Sterner also had a younger son David R. Sterner (1810's-1867), in addition to his seven better-documented, older children (Nathan, Henry, Jacob, Judith, Elizabeth, Susan, and Lydia).  Adam was a son of Christoph/Christoffel Sterner of Beerfelden, Germany.

     Although an explicit birth record for Samuel Sterner has not been found, the paternity revelation was made possible by the discovery of two specific Y-DNA mutations (at STR markers DYS458 & DYS452) that must have occurred in Adam Sterner himself.  Previously, both mutations were found in tested paternal-line descendants of Adam's known sons Nathan and Henry and in descendants of Samuel, but not in any other tested Sterners/Starners, including a descendant of Adam's brother William Sterner (1763-1814).  This month, an initial Y-DNA test of a descendant of David R. Sterner has shown the key result DYS458=18, confirming the theory that he was also a member of Adam's family.

C)  J2 Sterners of York County, Pa., are related to descendants of the Stirnimann families of Switzerland.

     Descendants of two sons of Nicholas Sterner (1776-1851; a son of Bernard Sterner of York County, Pa.) were previously found to have the J2 haplogroup, and their Y-DNA tests have subsequently been upgraded to 37 markers.  Interestingly, their closest relatives in the Y-DNA STR database are members of American Stirnaman/Stirniman/Sterneman families (https://www.familytreedna.com/public/Schrock-Schrag?iframe=ycolorized) that trace back to Stirnimanns of Switzerland.  The similarity of Sterner to the Swiss surnames raises the possibility that the shared paternal ancestor may have had a surname that evolved in one or more lines.  But was the original surname something like Sterner or something like Stirnimann?  Further information about the origins/history of the Pennsylvania Sterners and the Swiss Stirnimanns will be needed to answer this question.

D)  We have a new banner image of Pennsylvania Dutch country where Sterners have lived for over 250 years.

     The project's new banner image is a view of farms in Maxatawny Township, Berks County, Pennsylvania, on July 7, 2018.  According to his 1748 estate papers, Caspar Sterner lived near this township ("Naer Maxethania").  Also, according to tax records, Caspar's sons Henry and Valentine lived in this township in 1768 and the 1770s/1780s, respectively, while distant cousin Christoph Sterner lived not many miles away, in what is now Lehigh County, from the 1770s to the 1790s.