X-cs: R X-CS-Version: 1.0 From: IsraelP Dear Cousins, Quickly, before Rosh Hashanah begins. The biggest news since my last summary is probably the project that is looking at the male line of the Skalat Pikhollz families in the context of Spanish or Portuguese ancestry. An article on this project appears at https://www.academia.edu/25638614/Y-DNA_Evidence_for_an_Ashkenazi_Lineages_Iberian_Origin , though it does not mention the names of the families involved. During my summer trip to the US, I invited myself to the home of the lead author, Rachel Unkefer, to learn more about the entire subject. I wrote about it in greater detail in the first of my five blogs about the summer trip - http://allmyforeparents.blogspot.co.il/2016/08/a-month-abroad-part-one-iberia.html . This does not include the Rozdol family. The male line there is different and though I am now completely convinced that we are one family, not two, I am also convinced that the original Rozdol Pikholz is not Pinchas, but his wife Sara Rivka. (I have goine back and forth on this for years, as you know.) I was able to demonstrate the one-family theory as part of a new presentation which I first gave at the Seattle Conference. The link above to my blog, leads to the other four pieces about my summer trip and I recommend it to all of you. That trip had me speaking in Buffalo Grove Illinois, Pittsburgh, Baltimore, Fairfax VA, Charlotte, Durham, Cincinnati and three presentations in Seattle. Pittsburgh was part of a week-long course in genetic genealogy at the Genealogical Research Institute of Pittsburgh, which also gave me the opportunity to spend most of a week with Aunt Betty and Uncle Ken. In the last few months, my blogs include "Cousin Debbie" (In May), "Jeannie" (in June) and "Wendy and Caroline" (in July) - all of which introduce interesting people with whom I have a nice DNA connection, even though I was not able to nail down the precise relationships. As it happens, I met all four of these women during my summer trip. Jeannie drove from near Cleveland to hear me speak in Cincinnati. Caroline and her daughter came to hear me in Baltimore - she has thirty matches with people in my family DNA project, all from her unknown white grandfather. (When they arrived at the meeting and saw our surprised looks, Caroline asked Wendy "Did you tell them we're black?" And Wendy said "No, I thought I'd surprise them.") At my talk in Durham, I met the granddaughter of Sheva Pickholz Weinstein from Nemerow and she did a Family Finder test. Her two daughters and a son-in-law were there as well. (In fact, that's why that whole trip went down the east coast.) My theory was that Sheva has to be a sister of Nellie Pickholtz Rochester, whose family lives in Kansas City. WRONG! At least it looks wrong so far. Nellie's great-granddaughter Joyce does not match the Durham cousin. I still think that Joyce is an outlier and that testing a couple of her first cousins may give better results, but thus far I have not gotten any of them to test. I would like to ,ake contact with some of the other cousins in that family, but no luck so far. While I was in Fairfax, I did two television interviews, which you can see at https://youtu.be/ZmuDom3Gfw0 and https://youtu.be/wUyXPK5i0Fk In June, I blogged about my quick trip to London and Toronto and have written several times about the importance of testing several members of the same family. Siblings are different from one another and their DNA is different. We cannot know in advance what new information will show up - and it can be a long-term thing - but we have had enough successes to know that it is important. The cost of the Family Finder test has gone down from $99 to $79. I'd love to see some more of you in this project. Both those whom I have asked specifically and others. I am working on my winter trip with three talks set and a few others in discussion. I am speaking 22 January in Baltimore, 29 January in Philadelphia (where we were snowed out last year) and 10 February at the RootsTech conference in Salt Lake City. I hope to organize a separate meeting with some of the Philadelphia area family and perhaps a few other events in New Jersey and elsewhere in the area. The days after Philadelphia are available to anyone interested. Anyone who has some influence with organizations which might like to have me speak, please see what you can do. I have a few new talks in the works, so the fact that I have already been someplace needn't be a problem. No talks are planned for here in Israel. I have no good explanation for that. I was asked to post the following about a Pikholz granddaughter, not mine: "Since the Israeli team invited a select group who will train with your National team and my granddaughter is one of the invitees could you and your friends contribute? The Israeli team needed competition but this is the World Cup Year in lacrosse and our college kids are afraid of being hurt because an injury may cost them their scholarships. Sammy is 13 and only 1 of 2 goalies selected Better yet the team was supposed to consist of only juniors and seniors in high school but they made an exception for her https://www.gofundme.com/2rb8z2k " Brooke Schreier Ganz has had tremendous success the last few months in getting government agencies to make records available, often by force of the courts, at least in index form. Her project - Reclaim the Records - has just announced a database for New York City marriages for 1950-1995. See http://www.nycmarriageindex.com/ for that. "ENDOGAMY: One Family, One People" is still available directly from me for people in Israeli or at www.endogamy-one-family.com for everyone else. That's enough for now. May you and your families be written and sealed for a good year, with good health, prosperity, security and calm. Israel P.