Grandparents were married to different people
My grandparents per dna were not married to each other. They were married to other people when my dad was born. I can't figure out how to put my grandmother in my tree. When I try, it wants my grandfather's spouse, which she was not.
I also have tons of "helpful" people who see it, come in and add grandma's husband as my grandfather, which is super annoying.
Answers
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If it is appropriate to show your grandmother's spouse as your dad's stepfather this would help. Otherwise, as long as he remains shown just in that single relationship with his mother, others are likely to continue making the same error by "helpfully" attaching the spouse as his biological father.
You can add an "Alert Note", the wording of which might deter this mistake being perpetuated. Sadly, nothing will deter the more determined user from creating erroneous relationships, being convinced they are correct, in spite of any evidence presented to them.
So, apart from putting your father in some sort of relationship with this man (as illustrated) you might have to continue to endure these changes. Of course (if you haven't already done so), sending an internal message to those who are making this error could possibly help in stopping this recurring.
Adding this man with a non-biological relationship to your father will be carried over to the Details pages of both men and will be visible (but perhaps less clear) from your grandmother's page, too.
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People do this in one of two ways. Either works. Both have pros and cons.
In different couple boxes:
Or in the same couple box then deleting the empty couple event that is automatically created when you put them in the same box. You delete the event by opening the Couple Relationship pop up and scrolling to the very bottom where it has Delete Relationship.
(Again with the second example I would have Test Child with his mother and the man who raised him as a second set of parents.)
You set up these kind of relationships by using the Add Parent link at the bottom right hand side of the Family Members section and adding by ID. It will ask if you want to add just the one parent or both parents:
Then add appropriate notes.
To your second point: Family is far more than DNA. According to United States law, if your grandmother was married to someone when your father was born, then that man is your father's legal father and your legal grandfather. If that man raised him as his own son and your father always considered him to be his father, then he was his father and your grandfather in all ways that count. Legal, social, emotional, and family ties can be far more important than DNA and should be documented in Family Tree. Family Tree is our family, not just our DNA.
Those helpful people are entering information correctly. Just add a not that your legal/social grandfather is not your biological grandfather.
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Inadequate details were given to make any kind of legal conclusion. Also, unless it were a territory or District of Columbia, which "United States law" applied?
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I am doing family history research for an adopted relative of mine. This adopted relatives has 3 sets of parents all with the proper relationship. First are the adoptive parents. Second is birth mom and her spouse, with relationships of bio and "step" even though my adoptive relative never met him. Third couple is birth dad and his spouse, relationships of bio and step. I don't think my relative met this step mom, but it is possible. I never leave in-laws off the family tree because I have lots of endogamy on my mother's side and this adopted relative has even more. I discovered that birth mom married a second cousin, so the half siblings there are more than half.
The comment that Family is far more than DNA is a very odd statement. For adopted people, "family" is very multilayered. Legally and socially, adopted adults are part of their adoptive family, which I see in all of my adopted relatives. Even one adopted cousin who is deceased has NO reference on her death cert that she was adopted. Her adoptive parents are listed as parents and her legal name is the only one there. But none of my adopted relatives are interested in the family history of their adopted parents. They want to know the story of their bloodline, because those stories and events are about conspired for them to be born and have certain ethnic backgrounds. All the bloodlines have stories to tell.
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@Gail Swihart Watson "The comment that Family is far more than DNA is a very odd statement." Odd in what way? As you illustrate so well in your comment, families are very messy and as you stated, very multilayered. DNA caused people "to be born and have certain ethnic backgrounds" and gave them certain traits while the parents, whether biological, legal, adoptive, step, or foster, gave them traditions, values, and world views. Who they are is a total of all these influences both biological and societal. That is why I fall in the camp of insisting that all a person's family should show in Family Tree not just DNA lines.
@EvFinStephen Sorry that I made a somewhat sloppy statement. A better phrasing might have been, "according to the current laws of most states in the United States, the default legal father of a child is the man to whom the mother is married to at the time the child was born." For example see: https://ww2.nycourts.gov/COURTS/nyc/family/faqs_paternity.shtml#:~:text=If%20the%20mother%20was%20married%20at%20the%20time%20the%20child,he%20is%20not%20the%20father and https://www.boydlawsandiego.com/california-paternity-testing-laws/#:~:text=In%20California%2C%20if%20two%20parents,when%20a%20child%20is%20born.
This is also the case in Norway: https://www.skatteetaten.no/en/person/national-registry/birth-and-name-selection/paternity-and-parental-responsibility/#:~:text=If%20you%20(a%20man%20and,the%20father%20must%20declare%20paternity.
This talks about Japan and Australia: https://www.familylawincanberra.com.au/family-law-around-the-world-the-curious-way-that-japan-decides-legal-paternity/#:~:text=Under%20our%20Family%20Law%20Act,the%20child%20was%20born%3B%20or
To be such a broad assumption that the mother's husband is the father and that it is set in law makes me assume that this has been the general case for a long, long time.
In the case in the initial post, it was rather clearly stated that the concern is that people keep adding the husband of the child's mother as his father. Since only DNA testing, which is very recent, showed he was not the biological father, one would assume that he was raised by that husband as his son and it was viewed by everyone including the child that that husband was his father both socially and legally.
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@Gordon Collett First, I am also in the camp of putting all parent connections, birth and all others, to the child records when it applies. Yes, I firmly believe in documenting people's lives.
But, I probably didn't finish my thought as to why Family is NOT far more than DNA, at least in the long run. In the short run, yes, but I define "short run" as one or two life times. Genealogy is much more than one or two lifetimes.
For the adopted person, there is a lifelong bond, both legal and "family" to the non-related group that raised them. As it should be. The bond may go another generation or two, but the gift one person received will eventually become a footnote rather than family history. I have numerous adopted relatives. They are MY (or my husband's) relatives, but several generations from now, their descendants interested in family history will never focus on the adopted side. It is simply not their story. My great grandmother was raised by other people. They are connected to her on the world tree as guardianship, but I feel nothing compelling me to learn about those people and their ancestors. They are really not family.
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What is interesting, though, is that before the days of DNA testing and before the openness about adoption, it would have been very rare for anyone to know that that extended generational line that was their focus of family history and which they viewed as their heritage had no connection to their genetics.
That great-great-great-great-grandmother a person feels a great connection to because of the family heritage but who is too far back to show any DNA match at all and is not a direct maternal line so there are no M-DNA clues may have adopted all of her children and there be no record of that at all. Is that feeling of family then fake?
This article talks about the difference between a family tree and a dna tree: https://whoareyoumadeof.com/blog/is-a-genetic-family-tree-the-same-as-a-genealogical-family-tree/#:~:text=A%20genetic%20family%20tree%20is%20different%20than%20your%20%E2%80%9Cregular%E2%80%9D%2C,DNA%20in%20common%20with%20them.
So does this one: https://familytreemagazine.com/dna/genealogical-vs-genetic/
Families are so complex and everyone can be in such different situation, that each person is going to feel his or her own connections and have his or her own research interests. That is perfectly fine. But people should not try to remove from a shared tree actual history and actual family connections just because they have no interest in or like for a certain branch.
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@Gordon Collett Yes, you are absolutely correct. A 15 year old girl who died in childbirth in the early 1800s may never have been recorded as a wife or mother, depending on location. The child might have been recorded in later years as born of the man's later wife. These lost events are now whispering to in us our DNA matches, at least for those who know how to find it. After I did my DNA I learned several previously unknown things about my family. I have learned not to feel the romantic kinds of connections you talk about, but to keep an open mind and try to find the truth. I have also decided not to be either ashamed or proud of my ancestors. They were who they were and I had no impact whatsoever. My goal is to try and reveal as much as I can for future generations.
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