Bumping.

I would just start with the Basic, especially if his ancestry is mostly American back a few 100 years. He would still pull in DNA matches outside of the U.S., but wouldn't be able to access records from outside of the U.S. Once he gets used to what the basic offers, he could add or change level when it renews.

I have found a lot of information on Newspaper.com which you subscribe to through Ancestry. Older Obituaries often contain a lot of information. I resisted paying extra for it for years, but finally broke down and subscribed and I've gotten my moneys worth and wish I had done it earlier. You can also add in Fold3 through ancestry for military records.

I subscribe to World since I have a lot of more recent European and Canadian ancestry.

what exactly do you mean about belonging to a data base? If he wants to get geeky and play around with where he matches a person on which chromosome, etc, he won't get that from Ancestry. Ancestry give you the amount of cM's you share with a match but they don't tell you on which chromosome. There are no tools to do that on Ancestry. They will narrow it to cousin level , ie: suggest it is at a 4-6th cousin level. If he wants to get his Y designation ( his all male line) he would have to test at FTDNA

There are not, as far as I know, different plans with respect to Ancestry DNA. But, here's info on the different membership plans for Ancestry.com. I have the All-Access membership, and pay annually. In fact it just renewed last month for $389 ($1.07 per day).

And this shows what is included in each plan:

I did my DNA testing probably three years ago. About a month later, they sent a link with my results.

Since then, I haven't paid for any type of plan. But once a month or so I get a DNA Results Updated email with a link to changes in my heritage. When I first was tested, my result was a European-lumped number. More people have joined, and they've fine-tuned the locations. Now I'm from Scotland, Ireland and Wales.

I also get emails about finding new hints and new cousins. I suppose there would be new uncles and aunts if someone joined in that none of us knew about. I have a sister and brother who do deep research using Ancestry and it's interesting to see what they come up with.

Just start with the basic package. You can work up from there but it takes a lot of hours and can be frustrating. You could spend an entire day just clicking, reading, etc.

I was born to my mother when she was nearly 50. As a result, my brothers were adults when I was born. My father died when I was six and I barely remember him. All grandparents were dead when I was born. My brothers are gone as is my mother, so I had no one to ask about names, etc. which would appear on the tree. Names I had never heard.

I couldn't find anything about my father as he was an only child and I had no idea about his family or even their names.

I found the search so frustrating, I gave up.

They keep your DNA so you can always go back or upgrade if you find it easy to search. I didn't and had no reason to upgrade.

Jane

Thanks to all. You've been very helpful!

I have the full shebang World Explorer membership, but I buy it as a "gift" for myself on Black Friday for six months - and then another one during the Mother's Day sale. You can buy gift subscriptions and just use your own email. It's pretty sweet because I think it's like half price. There's also a very active (albeit sometimes quite "complain-y" lol) FB group that posts when deals/discounts are available.

Even if you don't maintain a membership, I would log in on occasion to look at new matches and see if there are messages from others looking to contact or help with brick walls.

@jane__ny, I'm sorry to hear you gave up. Are you active on FB? There are a lot (and I mean a lot) of genealogy groups, including the Ancestry one I mentioned, that can be very helpful and have many kind individuals, if you're still interested in pursuing your family history or finding relatives.

Jane just a suggestion but look up your mother to see what their marriage license states. Depending on era some will mention parents names. I have found members of my father's family by looking at DNA matches for those who show "common ancestor". I then look at shared matches. Those who have made family trees sometimes put as many members as possible on their trees vs. just their immediate family. Pay attention at the top under the name for relationships such as "uncle" etc. can give you family linkage to trace. Then trace back to find information about your father.

sushipup I agree that Newpapers is one of the things that should be included. Without it the older obituary's that can give many hints as to family connections is not available. I did not find Fold 3 of much use to me but it can be cancelled at any time. Be aware that once he has his DNA record he can download it to other sites like GenCom which may be what he is interested in or My Heritage which is more interesting for family connections.

I've not been interested in doing a DNA test (or having my DNA in a database) but I've done Ancestry off and on. Last time I subscribed to the full meal deal and found newspapers.com to be fascinating - both for ancestry info but also for the general historical info. There wasn't much about my family in newspapers because they lived in small towns that didn't have much on there. However DHs family lived in the city and there was all kinds of fascinating society page info on them. Back then the newspaper provided day to day goings on that people now post on Facebook.

Thanks, wiscokid and maifleur03. The problem I ran into were the names. I remember hearing my brothers talk about Kingfish which is what they called my mother's father. I don't know his real name. My brothers died 20 yrs ago. I know the last name was Sherry which was my mother's maiden name. I know her mother's name was Mary Sherry but don't know her maiden name. They immigrated from Ireland and I don't know if they married in Ireland or in the US. I know my mother had two brothers but I never met them.

My father is even more difficult because my mother always said, 'your father's family came over on the Mayflower!' Who knows. The Irish are famous for their story telling. I know his mother's first name and his fathers. His mother died when my father was born (at least that's what my mother said). So my grandfather raised my father alone. Grandfather married another women when my father was young and, I was told my father was so upset he left home and never spoke to his father again.

Who the heck knows! I have so little info to work with. If my brothers were alive they would be the link, but I never had any interest in knowing my roots when I was younger. My mother was never forthcoming and rarely talked about her family or my father's.

Jane

My sister does a lot of Ancestry searching and compiling. From what she has told me, it sounds like you may have more to work with than you realize. One thing you didn't mention was a birth certificate or birth certificates (yours, your brothers, your mother's, etc.) That would help get both parents' names, a town, an address. Each little bit of information can be something that may lead to another thing. That's why it becomes such a thing for the people who get going on it,

My sister has found newspaper articles, obituaries, cemetery records, wedding announcements as well as marriage records, immigration records and more. There are times when county records are lost in floods or fires. That makes it much harder. I would like to trace DH's family, especially his father's side to see if we could connect all the dots between his grandparents or great grandparents and the explorers who came from Europe, but he says records were lost in a major disaster. I haven't looked, but we should at least try.

It helps if you like to solve puzzles - jigsaws, word puzzles, whatever - because a lot of times it's really what it is, a giant puzzle. Especially if you are dealing with DNA and an unknown parent a couple of generation back....

Sushipup -- I hope you go ahead with at least one of these plans. I want to hear about how you've lost your DH to the genealogy bug!

My husband, daughter and I used 23&Me. And my daughter just sent screen shots of at least four DNA "relatives" that share DNA with both me AND my husband, yet my husband and I don't share any DNA. And it turns out, his cousin (who biologically is not his cousin), knows one of the DNA relatives. So now I want to know how both my husband and I share DNA with this woman, whose aunt shows up as my husbands 1st cousin, whom we both know.

Although I did not want to be married when I was younger and it just sort of happened in my mid 30s I knew most of the people where we lived were related either by blood or marriage so most would have been out even if I had been interested. Couple of days before we were married my mother sort of stammered something about since we did not want children our getting married did not matter. Since I have been on Ancestry and 23&me I have been looking for a connection since she always changed the subject. Earlier this year I found a 3rd cousin who was related to both of us. I found out that he had passed away about the time I sent a message asking for information. Looking at obituary's I discovered that my family lived about 2 miles north of where his grandparents owned a small store. I doubt if she meant when the different sides were ordered to wed each other to end a dispute back in 1500s.

sushipup2 I just did an Ancestry DNA test. There are only two now, as far as I can tell. One is a basic DNA test and the other includes "personal traits your genes could influence". They now cover both sides of your family. Your DNA is divided and your results will show what you received from Parent 1 and Parent 2.

The research membership part is separate from the DNA test. I would start with a 6 month U.S. gift plan to see if he wants to continue. He can do a lot of research in 6 months, and he can then upgrade to a world membership if he gets hooked.

@WittyNickNameHere ;) How much DNA do you and your husband share with these matches? There is what is called "DNA noise", which is almost statistically insignificant, but some testing companies don't throw it out. (23andMe includes X segments in their matches too, which can alter results.)

Have your daughter her results and upload to GEDMatch, she can run the "are my parents related?" Unless, you know, you don't want to know :P

"So now I want to know how both my husband and I share DNA with this woman, whose aunt shows up as my husbands 1st cousin, whom we both know."

You and your husband share DNA with this woman because one of your ancestors and one of your husband's ancestors got together at some point in time, had a child, and this woman is a descendant of that child.

An aside: DH and I are currently watching an Acorn presentation, "Code of the Killer". It's based on a true story of the first use of genetic codes to find a serial rapist and murderer. It took place in GB 1986. Stymied after killings a year apart, police called for volunteers living within five miles of the killings to take blood tests to compare with the DNA of the killer, (obtained from his victims). Based on the characteristics of sperm collected from the bodies, they were looking for a man age 18 - 34. Because the killings were a year apart, police believed the man was local to the area. (We haven't reached the concluding third episode yet.)