Dear Dian: I will address the "how many DNA Projects" question first. There is ONE WEBB DNA Project, and its website is _www.webbsurnamedna.org_ (http://www.webbsurnamedna.org) . We are registered with and have participants at several different testing companies (all the major ones). We accept testees from any testing company, any country, any ethnicity -- that is we are open to any WEBB anywhere in the world, regardless of race, religion, gender, etc. We have both Y-DNA and mtDNA branches. If there is another WEBB Project, I'm unaware of it. Now to address your other questions... 1) If William and I were descended from the same immigrant, would that be provable (or highly probable) by the DNA tests? If William and your line of WEBBs are descended from the same immigrant ancestor, your DNA results should have a high number of matching markers. A "marker" is a location on the Y-DNA strand, and each has a name (example DYS393). The more markers on which you match, the more recently you have a common ancestor, in GENERAL terms. As an example, I began this project to see if a George Washington Webb who was born in GA c. 1825 and first appears in CA c. 1853 was related to my line of Webbs, which goes back to Elias Webb c. 1785, NC or GA, and who had a son G W born about 1824, about whom we knew nothing after about 1845. Traditional paper work had eliminated the other candidate G W Webbs by virtue of incorrect birth date, known parentage, etc. Either this was Elias's son, or Elias's son had died. I got my cousin to test, and a descendant of the Geo. Washington Webb in CA tested. Both took 25 marker tests and matched 25 markers /25 markers. We subsequently found additional paper trail evidence, and as a consequence, we are now certain that the CA Geo. Washington Webb is the son of Elias Webb. We have had several matches on DNA since then, and are working on making the connections between Edward Webb who died in Essex Co, VA in 1749 (24/25 match), and Jesse Webb who was born in the Isle of Wight Co, VA c 1756 and died in Franklin Co, NC in 1837 (25/25 match). We need to get additional markers to narrow the timeframe for the common ancestor. DNA can prove you are related, or are not related, and can give an estimate of the timeframe. Traditional genealogical paper trail has to take over from there. What DNA cannot do is tell us the name of the common ancestor or his precise relationship to yours and William's lines-- that is he might be the father of William's oldest documented ancestor and the grandfather or great uncle of your line. It does narrow our focus to specific times and locations, and limit us to the families whose DNA matches ours closely. We can then use traditional paper trails to eliminate the impossible connections. For example, we have two 24/25 matches to Elias Webb's line coming from c. 1810-20 TN. These MUST be some kind of cousin or brother to Elias, as they were born at the same time Elias was having children in GA. 2. Do the lines of numbers need to be an exact? In general, the more closely in time you have a common ancestor, the more markers you will have that are exact matches. However, there are documented cases of cousins who do not have exact matches. I know of some WEBB third cousins with mismatches (3 of 37 I think it was). I know of another surname in which third cousins had 5 mismatches. So there is some "grey area" regarding the timing of common ancestors and the number of mismatches. 3) Is there anything I have missed? The more folks of a given surname that test and supply their lines of desc ent, the easier it is to figure out how the lines are connected. So I would encourage you to rustle up a willing cousin and get testing done. There are a variety of options ranging from free but you may have to wait years to be able to "mine" the results to "everything on the market to date" which will run several hundred George Washingtons. Please email me offlist for more details, as specific costs are prohibited on this list, as well as naming specific companies. Anne Webb Nelson In a message dated 8/9/2006 7:43:29 P.M. Central Daylight Time, dianmah@juno.com writes: Hello Listers, I would like to hear from any of you with your opinions - pro and con for doing DNA testing. Since I'm a girl I can't participate directly. But before I go looking for a cousin to ask if they might be interested I have some questions. Since William Webb's family and my Webb line both came from Northumberland Co. VA. I will use this as an example for my questions. Bill, I hope you don't mind. 1) My brick wall on my Webb family is nine generations back from me. I'm not sure how many generations William's line would be, but let's say the John Webb he is documenting is also nine generations back from him. Then another 2 or 3 generations back to the immigrant ancestor.Since I am fairly certain I have his line documented to 1647 - that would be about 350 years back. If William and I were descended from the same immigrant, would that be provable (or highly probable) by the DNA tests? 2) I assume that those getting the test results also get an explanation of how to read the results. I have been to a couple of web sites reading about the testing and to some of the sites for Webb DNA projects. I can't tell who is closely related to who. Do the lines of numbers need to be an exact? 3) Is there more than one DNA project? On message boards and on lists I have read that there are probably at least two projects. If there are two or more, can results from the various projects be compared? If they can be compared, how do you contact the people who have a close match? 4) Is there anything I have missed? Thank You, Dian

Please switch this To: <WEBB-DNA-L@rootsweb.com> thanks Dan M ----- Original Message ----- From: <AWNRDC@aol.com>