DNA Lady
"On this day in 1776, the Declaration of Independence was approved by Congress, setting the 13 colonies on the road to freedom as a sovereign nation" according the U.S. Census Bureau website. If our ancestors had only maintained better family records along the way, we wouldn't have the burgeoning business of DNA testing. Luckily your ancestors left clues in your DNA that can determine your deep ancestral origins. Your local DNA collections expert can provide access to a database of DNA collected around the world. Who would think that Genealogical and DNA testing would become such an important past time in the United States and the world? Genealogical tests are dedicated to helping families find lost relatives, build family trees, establish roots and discover your true past. DNA tests allow you to determine what region of the world your family is descended from including true Native American ancestry.
In July 1776, the nation's population was estimated to be 2.5 million mostly from European backgrounds but without true genetic testing, we're only guessing. Approximately, 14 years later the first official census was taken by U.S. Marshals on horseback (the first mobile collectors - although they didn't collect DNA then) and the population grew to 3.9 million people which by then were of Native American, European, African and Asian descent. However, it was not until the Census taken in 1870 (a full 100 years later) that all inhabitants were counted as whole persons. There has been a census taken every 10 years since 1790. The estimate headcount for the 2010 Census is 306,800,505 inhabitants in the United States, DC, PR and the Islands and whose descent is from all regions of the world. The estimated world population is 6,768,138,476 (looks like and IP address)! The U.S. Census information collected from individuals is not made public for 72 years after the census is taken. For businesses, the information becomes public after 30 years.
The census is a count of everyone residing in the United States - but you don't have to be an American to be counted. If you live or sleep most of the year in any of the 50 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico and the Island Areas you must be counted. This includes people of all ages, races, ethnic groups, citizens and non-citizens. Prior to 1999, the data extracted from the Census was used for congressional apportionment. Because it was recognized in the 1990 Census that there was a net under-count (non-response) and a statistical adjustment was created, the Supreme Court ruled before the 2000 Census was taken that the population data could not be used for congressional apportionment.
The difference in 2010's census vs. previous years is that all addresses will receive a short form questionnaire, whereas in the past everyone received a short form and one in six households received a long form with socioeconomic questions. The socioeconomic information is now gathered by a separate survey conducted (ACS) every 3 years on a rolling basis from approximately 250,000 addresses per month. The Census Bureau submits population totals to the office of the President of the United States.
Here are some facts taken from recent (last 100 years) Census:
FACTOIDS FROM PREVIOUS CENSUS:
Most Common Surnames Occurring in 2000 Census
- Smith
- Johnson
- Williams
- Brown
- Jones
- Miller
- Davis
- Garcia
- Rodriguez
- Wilson
Most Common Spanish Surnames Occurring in the 1990 Census
- Garcia
- Martinez
- Rodriguez
- Lopez
- Hernandez
- Gonzalez
- Perez
- Sanchez
- Rivera
- Ramirez
- Torres
- Gonzales
Spanish surnames can originate in Europe, South, Latin or Central America. You can find out the family's migration by having your ancestral Y-DNA or Mt DNA analyzed and mapped. For fun, you can then log onto a website to find others with similar genetic profiles and surnames and are also searching for their relatives and ancestry. Y-DNA is the paternal side of the family and is passed only from father to son; thus we can perform very conclusive Paternity Tests especially in a father/son test. MtDNA is passed from a mother to all of her offspring. To gain a complete picture of your ancestral origins, have a male's DNA collected from each generation. For example, have one male tested to obtain a history of his father's family via Y-DNA testing, which will exclude any influence from the female side of the family.Then have the same male tested to obtain a history of his MtDNA which will exclude any influences from his father's side of the family.The end result will be a genetic profile and map of the individuals in a generation (and therefore his sisters and brothers) both paternal and maternal migration over the past 50,000 to 150,000 years.Make sure you explain to your local DNA collections expert the exact relativity of everyone being tested and if you are interested in logging onto an internet site to find other people in the world with similar genetic profiles.
Leading Country of Birth of a Foreign Born Inhabitant in the 1930 Census was Italy. This Indicates that the individual was born in Italy, but not necessarily of Italian descent.
To find out if you are truly from Italy, why not have your DNA tested to determine what genetic markers you possess that are in common with other "native born Italians" in our database.
Leading Country of birth of a Foreign Born Inhabitant in the 2000 Census
- Mexico
- China
- Philippines
- India
- El Salvador and Vietnam
- Korea
- Cuba
- Canada
- Dominican Republic
Arabic Population in the 2000 Census
Is your genetic profile more closely related to Abdullah I bin al-Hussein, King of Jordan or Muhammad Anwar Al Sadat, 3rd President of Egypt?
- 30% of the inhabitants of the United States in the 2000 Census reported they were of Arab descent. Arab descent includes individuals from Lebanon, Egypt, Syria, Palestine, Jordan, Morocco, Iraq, Arab or Arabic and "other" Arabic countries.
- 42% of the population reported having more than one Arab ancestry.Ethnic questions are based on one's place of origin, descent, roots, heritage and it is usually only asked on Census questionnaires to establish that the respondent had a connection to or self-identified with a particular ethnic group. However, as we have found many times, our connection to a particular ethnic group, does not always include our entire ancestral roots.
There is a number of DNA Ancestry testing options that can outline your ancestral origins. A local DNA collections expert will be able to sort through the testing options most suited for your interests. A recent activity at many family reunions, is to have a local DNA collections expert available for anyone in the family who would like to trace their ancestry and prove the genetic relationship.
To find out more about the current U.S. population, visit the www.census.gov site which provides a host of information in various formats (pdf and xls). All the facts and figures presented here are taken the from the www.census.gov website. The information is meant to inform the reader that we all have our roots in the cultures and traditions of our childhood whether that was in the United States or somewhere else. Each of us has the right to be proud of our culture and we should be able to share our traditions and indeed find the similarities in our traditions with other cultures. However, for today July 4th, let everyone know you are an American, with a proud history of independence, opportunity, privacy and the responsibility to protect those rights.
Leave a comment