What to do about wrong information on someones tree

Question

What do you do if someone has one of your family members in their tree but they have the wrong information. My great grandfather has the wrong parents in their tree, and so the lineage is incorrect from that point on. They are unwilling to accept my imformation as correct. Thanks

Comments

Sometimes it is easy to see why there are disputes about parentage a few hundred years ago.

In more recent years it should be easier - if someone has made an honest mistake, and another person has found out more up to date information (backed up by good sources).  Collaboration, after all, is one of the key mottos of Wikitree.

Is your great grandfather's profile open?  If so, you can add the disputed information (bearing in mind that the other person presumably thinks that their information is correct).

If not, and the profile manager is resistant to your ideas, I can only suggest that you add your 2G grandparents and their ancestors separately, complete with sources.  Then add your greatgrandparent as a child.

I think that they would then show as an alternate set of parents, which may be the best  solution, if not the one that you feel is correct.

Someone who has been here longer may have another suggestion.

Margaret

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No, the alternative parents theory doesn't work like that.  Profiles only get one set of parents!

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I wasn't sure if that would work, Vincent.

The 2G grandparents could still give a link to the great grandparent though in the meantime, whilst waiting for other methods outlined below.  Gives Renee a chance to add information and sources to their profiles.

Margaret

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I like that answer and thought of it myself, but does that  not create a duplicate family, or family member?  Actually I have two sons linked to a father and both sons have the  name.  Haven't gotten far enough to address it tho.  Barb

Answer 1

A good way to deal with disputed parents and open the question to collaboration is to use G2G. Open up a question, and title it something like "Jim Jamieson born 1864 - Disputed Parents." Write that the existing profile has So-and-So and Whatsherface as parents, but you believe that Whoshisname and NameyMcName are the correct parents because of the sources you've gathered and the deduction you've made from these sources. At the bottom, there's a field asking for "WikiTree ID/URL if the question is about a person." If you fill this out, a link to the question will appear on the person's profile. That way anyone visiting the profile will see that there are questions about the parentage, and they can click over to see the discussion about it in G2G. A bonus is that you might get other members participating and adding more sources to support one set of parents over the other.

Answer 2

In most cases an easy way to do handle this is to contact the profile manager via the private messaging system, submit your suggested changes, provide sources & remain polite. Most likely the changes will be made quickly. In this case, I would provide the correct sources for the changes & let it go for a while. Hopefully, the profile manager will research your sources & make the correct decision.

After a sufficient amount of time has gone by ( enough time for emotion to no longer be an issue in decision making) & nothing has changed, you may need to ask a leader to weigh in as an informal or formal mediator.

http://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Category:WikiTree_Leaders

Answer 3

I have one of these with an Ancestry DNA match who is a 96% match with me.  When I clicked on my match's profile, I instantly knew how we are related, because I had actually studied her grandmother.   My match has the wrong parents for her grandmother, even though the correct parents are clearly stated in her grandmother's death certificate - which suggests that my match's tree is probably taken from family stories, etc.  

I have sent her two messages asking if she would like to compare notes since we have such a strong match (not even mentioning her grandmother's parents), but she hasn't responded yet - despite having logged in to Ancestry several times this month.

I have a feeling that I am never going to hear back from this woman.  My guess is that she isn't interested in hearing from anyone who is going to challenge her family stories.

Comments

I can appreciate your frustration. My actual family history is a lot different than the family stories that have been passed around thru the years. DNA is a wonderful tool for discovering the past. I am interested in learning the truth about my family heritage. Family stories can change a lot thru the years and you never know what is fact or a tall tell. Maybe your match just hasn't checked her email....all you can do is throw out the bait and hope something bites. Renee