Robert Cook born ~ 1360 and who lived in Lavenham, Suffolk, England was a real person.
Sir Thomas Cooke KB (c.1410-1478) and Mayor of London, formerly attached as a son of Robert was also a real person. Except that Sir Thomas was actually Robert's grandson, and there was another (well documented) Thomas Cooke (c.1385-1458) to fit between them.
This extra Thomas has now been created, but it pushes Robert's dates well back into the 14th century, and he is now the same age as his father Sir Norman Cooke and older than his mother Myrtle Upton. Both Norman Cooke and Myrtle Upton are unsourced, and Norman originates in the LaGrande Tree on Rootweb which stretches back in an unbroken line of Cookes to before the Norman Conquest. An equivalent tree on Geni has been labelled "Fictional" after discussion.
We firstly propose to disconnect Robert as a son of Norman and Myrtle - this is now an impossible relationship.
We are also continuing to investigate the line back from Norman and Myrtle to see if they were real people or candidates for the Disproven Existence Project. Our work so far is here (link to FSP) which lists all 30 profiles of the Dubious Cooke family. If you have any information about any of these people which would flip them into the "Real People" category that would be grand. Please note this is way before parish registers were introduced in England.
The 1558 Visitation of Essex Cooke pedigree doesn't go back far enough to capture any of these people. This pedigree is also wrong for the generation before Sir Thomas Cooke, as it gives his father's name as John.
Thanks for any help you can give to this problem.
Jo, England Project Managed Profiles Team Coordinator
