The Family Tree DNA Black Friday Sale runs from November 20th through November 30th this year. If you are thinking about taking a DNA test, these are great prices, especially the Y-37 and Big Y-700 sale prices. If you want to take a test and have any questions, let me know. Here are the prices for all of FTDNA's DNA tests for this sale:
Before jumping into STR testing results, a little refresher on STR testing is in order. Family Tree DNA offers three levels of Short Tandem Repeat (STR) testing: Y-37, Y-67, and Y-111. It is not necessary to understand all of the science behind this testing, but a few words on the basics might be helpful for understanding how these tests are used. According to the International Society of Genetic Genealogy (ISOGG): “A short tandem repeat (STR) in DNA occurs when a pattern of two or more nucleotides are repeated and the repeated sequences are directly adjacent to each other.” [1] According to the National Institutes of Health (NIH): “A nucleotide is one of the structural components, or building blocks, of DNA and RNA. A nucleotide consists of a base (one of four chemicals: adenine (A), thymine (T), guanine (G), and cytosine (C)) plus a molecule of sugar and one of phosphoric acid.” [2] STR testing counts the number of repeats on specific segments of Y DNA (called markers), which are designated by the letters “DYS” followed by a number. The marker values for two men are compared, and if the number of non-matching markers (a measure known as genetic distance) falls below established thresholds, there is a high likelihood the two men are related. We have used Y-37 STR testing in the Ackley Surname Project to determine group membership; i.e., to check if a tester is in the group of Nicholas Ackley descendants or a member of some other group.
The table below gives a list of all men in the project who have tested at the Y-37 level or higher. Although most of the members carry the Ackley surname and are descendants of Nicholas Ackley, we have a number of other men with similar surnames who have joined to see if they might be related to the Ackley surname. The testers are grouped by surname and color-coded for easy identification in later data tables. I realize the font in these pictures is quite small, but you can click on any table/picture to open a larger version. Note that the Nicholas Ackley descendants are divided into two subgroups; the men colored in darker orange are descendants whose connections to Nicholas Ackley are known, while those in lighter orange are men whose connections to Nicholas are not known, but are presumed to be descendants because they match all of the other Nicholas descendants whose relationships are known. The descendancy column shows how each tester descends from their earliest known ancestor.
Among the light orange group are men who are members of what has become known as the "New Jersey Line" (kit numbers 938425, 947514, and 950608); they are descendants of Daniel Ackley of New Jersey. While the exact line of descendancy from Nicholas is not known, we now know from Y-DNA SNP testing that they are likely descended from Nicholas's son Samuel. Likewise, kit number B16608 belongs to a man who is a descendant of Lewis Ackley, who is the progenitor of what is known as the "Ohio Line". See this post for a discussion of these two lines.
As mentioned above, relatedness between two men is measured by genetic distance. In theory, the higher the genetic distance, the less chance two men are related. The table below shows the degree of relatedness based on the number of markers tested and the calculated genetic distance.
Note that at 37 markers, any two men whose genetic distance is greater than 5 are considered "Not Related". FTDNA does not report genetic distances greater than 5, so I used a program called Still Another Phylogeny Program (SAPP) [4] to calculate genetic distances between all men in the project at 37 markers, which are shown in the table below. Note that there are many genetic distance cells that are red, indicating that the men being compared are not related. Most of these cells occur for comparisons between men who have different surnames; i.e., Ackley vs. Hackley, etc. There are a few exceptions, which will be discussed in more detail below. Also note that the genetic distances in all red cells are greater than 30, further validating the conclusion that the groups are unrelated to each other.
As mentioned above, there are a few men with the Ackley surname in the project who are not descendants of Nicholas based on their Y-37 test results. The first group of these are men who are descendants of Johan Hendrick Eckler whose ancestors changed their surname to Ackley (darker brown grouping toward the top of the table). We have three project members in this group. A more complete discussion of the Eckler-Ackler-Ackley group can be found in this blog post.
We also have two Ackley men with English heritage who have tested and are not related to the U.S. Ackley men or to each other (lighter brown grouping at the bottom of the table). One of these men was born in England and has a paper trail of English ancestors. The other was born in Australia, but his father was born in England and also has a paper trail of English ancestors. For more information on these men, see the posts here and here.
The line of descent for the second of the new testers is:
Benjamin Ackley (1758-1835) -> Benjamin Ackley (1810-1857) -> Uriah Ackley (1852-1928) -> Edward Ackley (1871-1946) -> Willard Ackley (1892-1967) -> Rexford Ackley (1913-2007) -> Private->Kit 1001089
This family lived in Bradford County, Pennsylvania for many generations. Some of the records for the earlier generations spell the name as Ackla or Acla rather than Ackley; as usual it is hard to know if those are misspellings or if the name was originally Ackla and gradually became Ackley. This tester did not match any of the other men in the project with any surname (grouped with the two UK men in the light brown group at the bottom of the table). As with the previous tester, more testing and research is needed.
While STR testing has been used to test group membership as discussed above, we have used SNP testing to define the Ackley branches on the Y haplotree (sometimes known as the "Tree of Mankind"). This approach has been helpful in defining genetic branches for the sons of Nicholas Ackley, which in turn has helped some project members refine their genealogy research. SNP testing identifies Single Nucleotide Polymorphisms. From Family Search: “A single-nucleotide polymorphism (SNP is pronounced snip) is a DNA sequence variation occurring when a single nucleotide - adenine (A), thymine (T), cytosine (C), or guanine (G) in the genome (or other shared sequence) differs between members of a species or paired chromosomes in an individual.” [3] For example, the substitution of a C for a G in the nucleotide sequence AACGAT, producing the sequence AACCAT, is a SNP. The Big Y test examines over 700,000 locations on the Y chromosome looking for SNPs. SNPs found are compared to a known, named list of over 260,000 SNPs (named variants in FTDNA terminology), and the individual is placed in the tree at the lowest (most recent) named variant for which he has tested positive. The FTDNA SNP test is known as the Big Y-700 test.
Of the 19 men in the Nicholas Ackley group, 12 have done a Big Y test. The results of these 12 tests have created a branch on the Y haplotree for Nicholas and sub-branches for 3 of his 4 sons who had male children. We have not yet had a descendant of Nicholas's son Thomas join the project. A fifth son, Nathaniel, does not appear to have had any children. FTDNA uses a graphic known as a block tree to represent branches of the haplotree. Here is the block tree for the Nicholas Ackley branch and sub-branches:
I am writing this post to make readers aware of a website that I put together a few years ago while working with one of the members of the Ackley Surname Project that I administer at Family Tree DNA. After doing a Y-DNA test that led to the discovery that he was a descendant of Johan Hendrick Eckler on a line that had changed their name to Ackley (see this post for a discussion of that line), he put together a family tree for the Eckler/Ackler/Ackley family using a genealogy published by A. Ross Eckler in the 1970s as a starting point. He painstakingly went through the entire genealogy and added every individual to his tree and then expanded many of the lines to more recent generations, adding many sources for each individual along the way. The result is a well-documented, quite comprehensive tree for the Eckler/Ackler/Ackley line
Before discovering the Eckler connection, he had also started work on a tree for the Nicholas Ackley family, using the same meticulousness he had used to build the Eckler/Ackley/Ackley tree. That is to say, he found as many sources as he could to support the individuals he put into the tree, and didn't add anything he couldn't support. He granted me edit permissions to the tree, and I have continued to add individuals with the same care that he used. While this tree is in no way comprehensive at this point, I believe it is a good starting point that will only get better.
Both of these trees were built on Ancestry, and we thought it would be helpful to make them available on a website not tied to any subscription service so that anyone could view them for free. I created a website using the outstanding "The Next Generation of Genealogy Sitebuilding" software, and it has been available online for about two and a half years. We didn't publicize it at all because we considered it a work in progress, but it occurred to me that we aren't helping anyone if they don't know about the site and we also can't enlist the help of all you Ackley researchers to make the trees better if you don't know about it.
The web address for the website is:
and the home page looks like this:
The functionality of the website is pretty self-explanatory. There are several different ways to view the tree structure, and each individual has their own profile page with the usual vital dates and references to supporting sources. Photos and documents for each individual can be viewed on their profile page as well as in a master list of documents and photos that can be accessed from the main menu. In addition to the supporting documentation for each individual, we have uploaded several reference documents that are useful for researching the Ackley surname.
The website currently has only the trees for the Nicholas Ackley family and the Eckler/Ackler/Ackley family. I am in the process of researching British Ackleys and Canadian Ackleys as well as a couple of other U.S. Ackley lines that appear to be unrelated to either of the known U.S. Ackleys. As this research gets further along, I will add trees for these other family groups to the website.
As I've mentioned in previous posts, I believe genealogy is more fun when people collaborate. I would love for this website to grow with the help of anyone who is interested in the Ackley surname. If you have pictures, documents, or any other items that you'd be willing to share on the website, please send me an email. Additionally, if you have information on Ackley individuals that are not found in our trees that you would like to share, we would love to have that as well. If it is a large number of individuals, you can share a GEDCOM file with me and I can merge it into one of our existing trees.
I have recently registered the Ackley surname with the Guild of One-Name Studies, and the new website announced above will be useful in publishing the information I learn as part of that study. I have already been doing many of the activities typically undertaken in a one-name study, so it seemed like a no-brainer to register the Ackley name and make the data available to a wider audience.
The Guild is based in England, and members are committed to assisting each other with their studies. Although the usual genealogy techniques are used, a one-name study is a bit different from regular genealogy in that all occurrences of a surname are studied rather than just your own line. Here is a description of the elements of a one-name study from the Guild's website:
A One-Name Study (ONS) is a project researching all occurrences of a surname, as opposed to a particular pedigree (ancestors of one person) or descendancy (descendants of one person or couple).
A one-name study may concentrate on aspects such as geographical distribution of the name and the changes in that distribution over the centuries, or it may attempt to reconstruct the genealogy of the lines bearing the surname. A frequent aspiration is to identify a single place of origin for the name, especially if the name appears to derive from a place name. However, for many names – for example those indicating an occupation like Butcher, or a patronymic-type surname such as Peterson – there will not be a single origin. Some one-namers also run an associated DNA surname project to assist with the analysis of origins.
The objective of a one-name study is not just the collection of data; collection is a means to an end. A one-name study aims to research the genealogy and family history of all persons with a given surname (and its variants). As part of this, it attempts to ascertain such things as:
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| Chief Willard Leroy Ackley (Gaabaisgon) (photo from Pamela Burley on Ancestry) |
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| Headstone of Willard L. Ackley from Find-A-Grave (photo by Kathleen Engelbretson) |
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| Map from Wisconsin First Nations Website [9] |
"The introduction of bingo and casinos drastically altered unemployment on the reservation from 80% to 10% in just a few years. It helped to reduce the need of federal dependency for many tribal members. Today the tribe plans to utilize much of its revenue by spending it on cultural restoration projects, environmental planning of the resources, education of its members and social programs that enhance the general health of the tribe." [8]
"When the government forced the original inhabitants of northern Wisconsin, the Ojibwe, onto reservations a fraction of the size of their territory almost 200 years ago, tribal leaders knew exactly which tracts of land would be best for their people.
They chose areas that had the best lakes and wetlands that produced wild rice unique to this part of the world.
'When the BIA (Bureau of Indian Affairs) agent came to ask why we chose this place for our reservation, our chief showed him a handful of wild rice,' said Peter McGeshick III, a rice chief with the Sokaogon Community of Mole Lake Band of Lake Superior Chippewa, who has been harvesting rice for more than 50 years on the reservation in Forest County in northeast Wisconsin." [10]
Wild rice harvesting remains an important part of the Sokaogon culture, and the Sokaogon Community sponsors a manoomin camp to teach the traditional harvesting techniques to local youth. Most of the rice is harvested for home and ceremonial use.
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| Arlyn Ackley, Jr. and a manoomin camper harvest rice on the reservation [10] |
Modern times have brought some modern problems for the Sokaogon Chippewa Community. In 1975, a large zinc-copper sulfide deposit was discovered adjacent to the Mole Lake Sokaogon Chippewa Reservation. The Exxon Minerals Company was planning to mine about 55 million tons of sulfide ore during the 30 year life of the project [19]. As is the case with many projects of this type, the positive economic benefits of the project were pitted against the negative environmental impacts to the area.
The Sokaogon Chippewa Community was especially concerned about the impacts on groundwater and the lakes and rivers in the area, as well as the potential to disturb ancient burial sites. A 28-year fight over the project ensued, and the Sokaogon Chippewa Community joined a coalition of sports fishermen, environmentalists, and the Potawatomi, Menominee, and Mohican tribes to oppose the mine. The conflict played out in the press and the courts, including a case that went all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. In 2002, the Supreme Court ruled that the concept of "Treatment as a State" status for Indian nations applied to setting and enforcing environmental standards. This meant the tribes could set their own, potentially far more restrictive limits than those of the state Department of Natural Resources, essentially meaning a potential Crandon mine would have to be completely free of pollution [20]. This made the project economically unviable for the mining company, and in 2003, the Sokaogon Chippewa Community and Forest County Potawatomi Tribe joined together and bought the proposed mine site and the mineral and timber rights for $16.5 million using casino revenues. The tribes have no plans to mine the mineral deposits [21].
In the 1980s and early 1990s, the Ojibwe became embroiled in a controversy over fishing and hunting rights. In the treaties of 1837 and 1842 mentioned above, they had retained their rights to hunt, fish, and gather wild rice and maple sap on the lands they had ceded to the federal government. In the years following those treaties, the tribe and the state of Wisconsin argued almost continuously about those rights, including whether the rights extended to all land ceded to the government or only land on reservations. The fight finally came to a head in 1983 when a federal appeals court in Chicago "asserted that Wisconsin had no rights to regulate fishing on Ojibwe reservations and, more importantly, that the 1837 and 1842 treaties guaranteed Ojibwe rights to hunt and fish off their reservations without being bound by state regulations. This decision, commonly called the Voigt Decision, was upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court that same year." [25]
The court win did not end the controversy. As the Ojibwe began to exercise their rights, non-Indian sports fisherman began to protest.
"They believed the federal court had given the Ojibwe special privileges. Whites also complained that the Ojibwe were allowed to harvest fish using methods employed by their ancestors but which were illegal for other fishermen. For centuries, the Ojibwe used torches on the ends of their canoes to attract fish and then speared them. The Ojibwe continued to use this method but used flashlights, metal spears, and aluminum boats." [25]
The protests turned ugly, and at times were racist and violent. Protesters showed up at boat landings, harassing tribal members, including throwing rocks and full cans of beer at the Ojibwe fishermen. The protests sprang from a complete ignorance of the customs of the Ojibwe and lack of understanding that the practice had been part of their culture for hundreds of years. As Wayne LaBine, an Ojibwe fisherman put it, "I never thought that people could be so cruel about fish and not recognizing somebody’s culture and how they did things. I mean, we’ve been doing this for thousands of years." [26]
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| Photo of protesters from WXPR Public Radio [26] |
The controversy mostly died down in the early 1990s. The Ojibwe people demonstrated their commitment to be responsible stewards of the fish population early on. For example, in 1987 the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources established a limit of 82,000 walleye fish that could be taken by the Ojibwe; they actually harvested only a little over 21,000, while non-Indian sports fisherman caught over 839,000 walleye. The Ojibwe have established their own fish hatcheries, and restock the lakes with a number greater than the number they take out every year [25]. The harvest is also highly regulated. During spearfishing season teams from the Great Lakes Indian Fish and Wildlife Commission are stationed at all of the boat landings, and they weigh, measure, and document every fish brought in by tribal members. Violations of size and/or number of fish can result in a tribal court citation or even loss of fishing privileges [26]. Ojibwe of today are showing the same respect and reverence for nature's bounty as their ancestors did a thousand years before them.
The Ackley Surname Project has had two new Big Y tests of Ackley men complete recently, and I wanted to report on the results. Before we discuss their specific results though, I would like to take some time to explain the project in some detail to give readers an understanding of the goals and benefits of becoming a member of the project and participating in Y-DNA testing.
The overarching goal of the Ackley Surname Project is to provide data in the form of test results and interpretations of those results that can help project members with their genealogy. The testing strategy should support these project goals. One way we can do this is to help “unattached” project members discover their connection if there is one. We also want to use tests appropriate for defining branches (SNP tests vs. STR tests), and test individuals who can help define family branches. The testing framework should be designed to keep overall testing costs to a minimum. I will give some concrete examples of these ideas below.
We use two different types of Y-DNA testing in the project: STR testing to determine family membership and SNP testing to place people on branches in the Y-haplotree. Based on a haplotype analysis I did a while back (see here for a full explanation of this analysis), Y-37 should be sufficient for new members to determine family membership. Y-37 testers who are over the FTDNA threshold but “close” can upgrade to Y-67 and check DYS617. For existing members who are looking for more information on their branch, the Big Y test would give the most information, but cost may be a factor. Another approach could be to do a custom SNP panel based on other project Big Y results.
Family Tree DNA offers three levels of STR testing: Y-37, Y-67, and Y-111. According to the International Society of Genetic Genealogy (ISOGG): “A short tandem repeat (STR) in DNA occurs when a pattern of two or more nucleotides are repeated and the repeated sequences are directly adjacent to each other.” [1] According to the National Institutes of Health (NIH): “A nucleotide is one of the structural components, or building blocks, of DNA and RNA. A nucleotide consists of a base (one of four chemicals: adenine (A), thymine (T), guanine (G), and cytosine (C)) plus a molecule of sugar and one of phosphoric acid.” [2] STR testing counts the number of repeats on specific segments of Y DNA (called markers), which are designated by the letters “DYS” followed by a number. The marker values for two men are compared, and if the number of non-matching markers falls below established thresholds, there is a high likelihood the two men are related. We have used Y-37 STR testing in the Ackley Surname Project to determine group membership; i.e., to check if a tester is a descendant of Nicholas Ackley or not.
SNP testing identifies Single Nucleotide Polymorphisms. From Family Search: “A single-nucleotide polymorphism (SNP is pronounced snip) is a DNA sequence variation occurring when a single nucleotide - adenine (A), thymine (T), cytosine (C), or guanine (G) in the genome (or other shared sequence) differs between members of a species or paired chromosomes in an individual.” [3] For example, the substitution of a C for a G in the nucleotide sequence AACGAT, producing the sequence AACCAT, is a SNP. The Big Y test examines over 700,000 locations on the Y chromosome looking for SNPs. SNPs found are compared to a known, named list of over 260,000 SNPs (named variants in FTDNA terminology), and the individual is placed in the tree at the lowest (most recent) named variant for which he has tested positive.
