Dear BONNER Kith & Kin, It has been a little while since I last gave an update on the BONNER Surname DNA Project. This is because we have had no new results to report recently. I thought I would write a note to you in an effort to renew interest in the project. And what better way to do that than to give some overview of what has been learned thus far? We have tested 14 BONNER men, and have arrived at 8 different DNA types. None of these 8 types (arbitrarily assigned letter values A thru H) seem to be very closely related genetically. The eight patriarchs identified thus far seem to be: A = James Bonner (Donegal County, Ireland > Philadelphia, Pennsylvania) B = John Bonner (Albemarle Parish, Virginia) C = Henry Bonner (Chowan County, North Carolina) D = Matthew Bonner (Clarke County, Ohio) E = John Bonner (Ireland > South Carolina) F = Michael Bonner (Ireland > Philadelphia, Pennsylvania) G = Benjamin B. Bonner ([England] > Ohio > Cook County, Illinois) H = James Bonner (Ireland > Monroe, Alabama) [Note: The above patriarchal lines could probably be extended further back, but accounts vary with respect to descent, so some executive decision was made as to how to represent them.] This leaves the exact matches, which prove a kinship unambiguously. 1. The Bonner line of Prince George County, Virginia was shown to match exactly with that of the Bonner line of Albemarle Parish, Virginia (Type "B"). 2. The line of Dempsey Bonner and the line of Redding Bonner were shown to be identical to that of Henry Bonner of Chowan County, North Carolina (Type "C"). So clearly, the above Virginia line (Type "B") and the North Carolina line (Type "C") are not from the same BONNER family. The utility of the DNA test is several fold. You may think that you have solid paper evidence of descent, but want to be sure that your biological descent actually matches your legal descent. You may also be having trouble placing your BONNER family at all, and want to see if you match any of the above types. Some of these DNA types above are confirmed, and thus provide a kind of 'litmus test' for descent from those lines. You may want to trace your line to a particular "homeland" (I am working on getting samples from English and Irish BONNERs, and it will be interesting to see where they fit in). In short, there are many reasons to get tested. But it will not matter how many reasons there might be if few people do it, and thus our matching possibilities are limited. The more people that get tested, the more likely we will be able to make matches and sort out the lines. Please help the project, and help yourself, by getting your BONNER line tested. If you are a male BONNER, then please participate. If you are not a male BONNER, but have interest, then please hunt down a male BONNER who represents your line, and convince them to participate :) More information about the project can be found here: http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~gbonner/bonnerdna/ (I encourage all present participants to correct me if I have mis-stated your line, or to make other comments, suggestions, etc.) And as always, I am happy to try to answer any questions you may have about the project. Cheers, Gregg Bonner BONNER-L ListAdmin BONNER Surname DNA Project Group Administrator