Shared Photo: Descendants of Richard Sears of Yarmouth, Plymouth Colony

Question

I wanted to share this drawing i made of the family tree of Richard Sears with the community. Location: East Dennis, Barnstable (Cape Cod), Massachusetts. Date: 1639-present  Over 7,000 of RIchard's grand-children are represented by branches on this tree - individually placed with Microsoft Visio and color coded by generation (up to 14 generations). I had to blur the names out here to protect privacy but the actual tree allows you to trace each branch and see how it connects to its ancestors.

Click here for the image details page or here for the full-sized version (960 x 720).

Answer 1

I happened onto this site today for the first time, while doing research for a genealogy newsletter.  After bouncing around for a few minutes I landed on your page.  I am astounded by your work of art, and am more astounded to find the tree of Richard Sears of Yarmouth, Plymouth Colony. I was not searching for Sears, just browsing.  My Sears family starts with Silas b.1638 m. Anna Bursell d. Yarmouth 1697.  My tree is sketchy and has holes, but have been working on it for many years. Thank you for taking the time to document the tree in such a lovely form.

Comments

Hi Brenda- my line is Richard-Paul-Paul-Edmund-Elkanah-William-Elkanah-Leslie- Les, me.    I have recorded over 20,000 descendants of Richard, if you can tell me where some of the holes are in your tree i might have some info?  LRSears@gmail.com    In any case i would love to know where your ancestors would appear on  the tree.  All of Silas's Sears surnamed descendants are on the left side of this drawing.  I really like this Sears Coat of Arms painted by Joshua Mayo Sears, one of our Cape cousins.  https://www.wikitree.com/photo/jpg/Sears-3708-2

Regards

Cousin Ray

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Brenda, wed just love to have you join us as we build our Shared Tree. Whatever research you’ve done to date would be a great addition!

Answer 2

Wow, that's really cool.  Can you give some more specifics on how you made it & the process?  Thanks.

Comments

Hi SJ- yes i started with pencil and paper sketches- the trunk is easy, he only had two sons.     Then worked on the outer sub-branches generations 9-14.  There are 500 small trees from 9-th generation  out.   Then pasted all these 500 sub sketches onto a huge piece of paper  and connected generations 4-8 and started copying each branch to the Visio diagram- highlight each time a name was completed. You can generate a hierarchical listing of all descendants using your family tree software-i think it is the Anhnentafel report.

e.g.

1- Richard

2- Paul(2)

    4-Paul(3)
        8-Thomas (4)
         9-Paul(4)
         10- Ebenezer(4)
     5-Daniel(3)
     6-Richard(3)
      7-Samuel(3)
3. Silas(2)

Does that make sense?  Then repeat until you have all 7,000 branches.  There may be a better diagram software than Visio- that was the tool at hand.

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I forgot- for each of the 500 little 9th gen trees you need to put the branches that come before the ninth gen like this 5785. Herbert Wilbur⁹ Sears [FTM34094] (James Isaac⁸, Isaac⁷, Peter⁶, Peter⁵, Jonathan⁴, Josiah³, Silas², Richard¹)  so you know how the little tree connects to the big tree.

Answer 3

Wow L.Ray - this is fabulous and a very beautiful end result.  Looking forward to your answer to SJ's question.  Thank you so much for sharing this.

Comments

Hi Nicole- yes i was hoping it would look like a "tree" and i was surprised when you have that much detail that it really does become a tree.  One thing that struck me recently in a Genealogy DNA class i was showing the tree to: Every man on this tree has virtually exactly the same Y-DNA as me and Richard.  We all got that Y-DNA chromosome from Richard (barring any non-parental events, and minor mutations of markers that is)

Answer 4

Wow, this is just amazing! What a wonderful tribute to the Sears family!

Answer 5

That is so cool! Thanks for sharing it with us.

Answer 6

That's an amazing work of art/genealogy, Ray! Congratulations.

Answer 7

Thanks everybody- i am already working on version 8 because i have a couple hundred more branches to add!

Comments

I am awe-struck by this tree, just amazing! Can a copy be purchased? I am hung-up on John (The Elder) Siers/Sires born 1700-1779 from Prince William, VA (I think). Love the effort you put into your tree. How long did it take you? Much luck on your next undertaking.

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Hi Helen- yes you can buy it at:

https://www.bonanza.com/booths/LRSears    either download a digital copy or a print that i have made at Office Depot!   Thanks, yes i have collected a lot of Siers data too.  Have you got a male relative who could contribute to our YDNA project?  https://www.familytreedna.com/groups/sears   we have about 100 different Sears/Sayers/Cyr/Siers etc there