October 17, 2013

--Golden Arrow Military Research
--What is the Minimal Amount of Information Required to Identify an Individual?

Golden Arrow Military Research 

The following information was distributed to Genealogy Societies and other organizations.  I am not familiar with the organization and have not used their services; but am just passing along the information to those of you who may be interested in obtaining records of your ancestors who served in the U.S. Military.

I did explore their web site and read through several testimonials.  They were all very good; but it isn't likely they would have posted any that were not good. Prices for most of the research ranged from $75 to $100.  I couldn't find any statement regarding the charge if they found no records.  That would be something I would ask them before using their services.

I am guessing that their Lead Researcher, who sent out the announcement, and others on the staff are former workers at the National Archives.

We specialize in tracing the steps of individual WWII Veterans to show where they were and what they did during the war. This is a unique process that we have devised as a way to help genealogists, family members and historians gain a better understanding of the experiences of individual WWII Veterans.  This service is not offered by the National Archives or any other company in the United States, and it is especially exciting because so many Army and Air Corps Personnel Files were destroyed in the 1973 Personnel Center fire.  Many times we can actually reconstruct the service history of those whose records were lost in the fire. Our research specialists are on-site at the National Archives and can access records pertaining to individual veterans that most folks would not know how to find.

In addition to tracing the steps of individual WWII Veterans we also offer Official Military Service Records of WWII Veterans.  In most cases we are less expensive than going directly through the government and can have the exact same records ready within about 2 weeks. It can take the government 4 months just to respond to a family member’s request for their veteran’s records. If you have dealt with the government in requesting records then you know how frustrating it can be. We offer an alternative to the red tape and frustration of dealing directly with them.

 We believe that folks who visit your site could benefit greatly from the work that we do and we would like to ask you to link to our website from your site.  Please feel free to browse our website to see all of the exciting opportunities we offer for researching individual WWII Veterans: www.goldenarrowresearch.com
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Biological Parents as an Identifying Feature of Every Individual

James Tanner, who authors the blog Genealogy's Star had an interesting discussion in yesterday's blog.  In a book he had been reading the author claimed that there were "six elements that uniquely identify an individual".  They are as follows:  

• Names
• Places
• Dates
• Relationships
• Occupations
• Gender

Without getting carried away in all the details James claimed that he thought only the first three were required.  However, he further thought about it and then made the following statement:

"My concept of the human family tree is relatively simple. In can be stated as the following rule:

Every person who ever lived or will live on the earth has a unique set of biological parents coupled with a unique birth order." 

This got me to thinking about some relatively recent developments in our society--sperm banks and women donating eggs to other women in order to conceive.  I think in both cases one could argue that the "biological parents" might be the donors.  However, is any record kept of who these people are?  Does the birth certificate indicate that John Doe donated the sperm; but the mother, Mary Jones, husband was Tom Jones.  I am not sure; but am guessing it doesn't.  With the gaining popularity of DNA testing, one can imagine an adult 20 years from now tracing their family tree through both digital records and DNA coming up with some questions, especially if their parents didn't tell the person he/she had a donor father or mother.  How does one distinguish between this situation and an illegitimate or adopted child?

Does James' theory still hold up, and even if it does; how will genealogists and the descendants be able to sort it all out?  What do you think? 

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