Dr.Ginther- Questions To Ask Him

[lexi4]

How about back to the topic. Maybe then we can keep this thread from being locked.

[helenazar]

You know Helen, Penny is not here to defend herself...
 

I wouldn't be so sure, Michael  

You know Helen, Penny is not here to defend herself...

 

...I think some of these comments in you post are  totally uncalled for, regardless of your past dealings with Penny.

They are very called for, for one thing, someone asked about the chimera theory and I told them what happened. Perhaps you feel that I can be slandered and accused of unethical behavior on a public forum where I use my real name, but don't have the right to defend myself? You know very well Michael that I was not the instigator of all the nastiness, I was just trying to relay accurate information, for which I was attacked. Believe me, there is a lot more I can say about this, but of course I won't...

...in all fairness to Penny and her outstanding work on FOTR with Greg Wilson, all of the evidence needs to be looked at, not just the DNA side of it...

It's Greg King BTW, unless those two have now fused into one being... (a chimera perhaps?)

But, seriously folks, we were talking about DNA, and this is why I brought this up. People need to be aware of what had been brought up in the past when this subject was discussed, that's all. I didn't say anything about anyone which was not true or slanderous, just recounted facts...

And this is all I am going to say, as I have no intention of getting dragged into these discussions again.

And now back to the topic, sorry for digressing a bit, but it was sort of inevitable when the question about chimeras was asked.

[etonexile]

But a CHIMERA theory...?...Grasping at Oompa-Loopas there...

[Finelly]

I tend to disregard the subjective content of the discussion and focus on the issues....so I'd be very interested to hear from all sides.

Passionate people have passionate ideas.  And passionate arguments.  I'm just utterly fascinated by the ideas....

[AGRBear]

....[in part]....

My point is, this just goes to show you the extreme lengths some people will go to in order to try to prove themselves correct in this AA/FS saga, even coming up with theories that don't come close to reality in anyone's wildest dreams. So please be careful of what you read here, even if it comes from someone who seems to be a credible source... Sad, but true.

Here we are trying to clearify a point and we're being attacked....

Yes, I place myself with Penny, Michael and others who still are not convinced that AA and FS are the same person.

Just go over and look at the threads of the Differences between AA and FS which has evidence that there are differences and then go and look at the thread with the Similarities between AA and FS and there is hardly anything that is the same accept a similar look from one photo of FS and other a few of AA.

Both of those threads eliminate the DNA question.  And if FS and AA are the same person than one would think the Similarity thread would overwhelm the thread on Differences, but, it doesn't.

I for one think that the DNA testing as well as all the other evidence should take us to the same point that AA and FS are the same person, so, why doesn't it?  Are we missing something important?  If we are, what is it?

When I discovered there wasn't a birth certificate for Gertrude Ellrick,   I stepped back and viewed what everyone had been saying from a different angle.

At this time, without a birth or baptismal certificate, we do not know if Gertrude and FS had the same mother.  If we do not know this important fact then we can not prove FS and Gertrude had the same mtDNA.

Yes, we can assume that Gertrude and FS had the same mother since they were both raised in Anton Schanzkowska's home as sisters.

However, during my 30 years of  doing family history, it has not been unsual to find a thought-to-be-a-sibling not a sibling.   Nor was it unsual for the person, who had been raised in a family,  not know they were not a sister or a brother to the other children being raised in the same household.

How was this possible?  One has to understand that death was common place when there wasn't any miracle drugs.  Entire familes died from the flu or typoid.....  If a child managed to survive it was usually taken in by an old sister or brother  OR and aunt or uncle.....  Sometimes a friend's family .... Sometimes by someone who had just lost their own baby and had plenty of breast milk to care for a baby....

No, it's no unsual for one child out of ten to not be recorded, however, if the family is religious, then there is usually found a certificate of baptism.  

Penny and others have sent in researchers to find Gertrud's information.  They have found the other children's records of Anton Schanzkowska but not Gertrud's.

Unfortunately, all we have of mtDNA are from Gertrud's desc. .

Let me, again, say,  I have no agenda.  I have thought AA and FS were the same person.  But,  I'm not ready to close this case because at this time,  my thoughts are still open and I'm still willing to study this theory that AA and FS might not be the same person.

Just because I haven't reached the same conclusion as Helen and others who take mtDNA and close their eyes to other evidence and make assumptions about Gertrud's mother,  doesn't make me a wild extremist.  I think my hestitation is genuine and I see no reason I need to make up my mind today or tomorrow.  Heck,  I've been doing research on this family since the 1950s and a few more days or months or years isn't a big deal.

So, let's get back to Dr. Ginther's tests because that is why this thread was created.

AGRBear

[AGRBear]

As for the "chimera" theory.  That is what it is at the moment a theory.  Penny introduced the theory.  If it turns out wrong, it turns out wrong and we move foreward.   Since Helen think's the theory as absolutely ludicrous, that's fine.  My only problem with this was when I asked Helen a long time ago if there was a possible answer to this DNA linking AA to Gertrude without them being related, she voiced that there WAS one way it was possible.  When I asked Helen about more detail,  she said she had been  pulling our leg and did not explain farther.  When I went back to find this particular post, she had removed it.  Months later, when Penny introduced the theory of "chimera", Helen admited this was the one possible but improbable theory she had hinted at earlier.  And,  I voiced my disapointment in Helen.  Why not?  I had thought she was open and honest about all of this DNA stuff.  

To me, this "chimera" theory doesn't seem probable, and, if Helen had just told us about it, given us all the reasons it wasn't  probable,  I would have just thought "okay" and forgotten about it, but Helen didn't and went as far as eliminating her post, so,  my trust in Helen was shaken, so,  I wasn't  sure what to think. After some thought,  I tend to think that  this was just a error in judgement on Helen's part and not anything more.   However her attacks on Penny in this thread,  makes me nervous and apprehensive....

Being a very honest bear who is just looking for the truth,  I do hope we don't end up locking up another thread, but this is what I experienced, and, this is what I feel.

And, yes,  I've jumped off topic right after I tried to direct us back on to the topic.  But glancing over the "chimera" posts,  I have gotten quite upset, again, by the way  posters, who have a great deal to offer ALL of us, are chased awayby other posters, and, I'm not just talking about Penny and Greg having  fallen as victim.      There have been many many others who were attacked and left with a bitter taste in their mouths because the majority of them had been  honest and had had facts and experiences to offer us  so we could have  a better understanding of the various subjects from their perspective.   Gosh, when I first posted I was a target and almost didn't return after my first post and every now and then I'm still lampooned, but,  I find it important to keep vigilance over the "truth box", so,  I'm here and hope to hang around for a long time.

AGRBear

[Finelly]

One problem I am experiencing is that nobody has written and published anything about this entire thing, as far as I know, in a long time.

I read Kurth's website and am unsure what it is he believes at this point.  Penny and Greg haven't published their book.  I can't find any good summaries of the various theories that aren't accompanied by opinions of the summarizer.

[Mgmstl]

They are very called for, for one thing, someone asked about the chimera theory and I told them what happened. Perhaps you feel that I can be slandered and accused of unethical behavior on a public forum where I use my real name, but don't have the right to defend myself? You know very well Michael that I was not the instigator of all the nastiness, I was just trying to relay accurate information, for which I was attacked. Believe me, there is a lot more I can say about this, but of course I won't...  

Helen, while I admit you were attacked, so was she, & not just by one, by three, four or five people.  Yes it got nasty, and I don't think you were wrong for defending yourself, it's just that as I remember, and I may be wrong her posts are no longer on line to show evidence of this, so why don't we just bury it, the fight is over.  I will say that I have had no argument with you, and have always respected your opinion, and I realize it upset you, just as I was upset about what Vera did to me, but we survived it didn't we?  

[Mgmstl]

One problem I am experiencing is that nobody has written and published anything about this entire thing, as far as I know, in a long time.

I read Kurth's website and am unsure what it is he believes at this point.  Penny and Greg haven't published their book.  I can't find any good summaries of the various theories that aren't accompanied by opinions of the summarizer.

I don't think that Kurth has made a statement of his current beliefs on the case, and the validity of AA=FS
or not, it would be interesting to find out, however I understand he is ill, so that may be preventing him from making further statements.

[lexi4]

Was Dr. Ginther involved with the original team that did the DNA testing when the IF bodies were found??? What exactly was his role? I can see that he did testing on the blood slide, but have no idea how involved he was in any other testing. Can anyone help me out here?

[AGRBear]

Dr. Ginther in the early time frame was working under Dr. King:
Dr. King of UC wrote:  "I have been working for the past seven months on the identification of the skeletal remains of the the nine indiviauls believed to include Tsar Nicholas II and members of his family, " she said, "I have also received blood and tissue samples from descendants of Tsar Nicholas and his wife, Alexandra.  I am in the process of preparing a report on my findings.  I am familiar with DNA research into the remains from Ekaterinburg being conducted by Dr. Peter Gill.  If there is sufficient mtDNA bearing materinal, it would be ideal to have two qualified laboratories carry out the mtDNA testing and compare the results.  I have spoken with Dr. Gill and ould like the opportunity to work collaborateively with him in the analysis of the samples."

Maurice Remy continued to work to get AA's tissue into the hands of  Mary-Claire King at UC.

When Remy asked for the results of the Ekaterinuburg test from King but done came forth.

It was discovered that King had not done the testing but her someone else in King's lab.  The person was Dr. Ginther, who had extracted mtDNA fro the Ekaterinburg material.

Ed Deets, who was in control of the tissue, was contacted to see if he'd release some of AA's tissue to Dr. Ginther.

Meanwhile, Dr. Ginther, who didn't want to do anything without Dr. King's approval, waited until she approved of his testing and released the compartive samples.  Dr. King approved and released the samples.

Dr. Ginther discovered Dr. King had not turned all he samples over to him so he worked with what she gave him.

Dr. Ginther for the second time, derived mtDNA from the Hessian and the Romanov materials.  Hee, also, extracted mtDNA from Margaret Ellerick, the daughter of Gertrude S., who is thought to be FS's sister.

By July of 1994 Ginther did not have the AA tissue.

Remy went to find another source and he found Professor Stefan Sandkuhler, a former hematologist from Heidelberg University, who had exaimined Anna Anderson on 6 June 1951.

Sandkuhler had tested AA's blood for hemophia and therefore had AA's blood samples on glass slide.  It was this slide Remy broke in half.  He sent one half to Dr. Ginther and the other half to Prof. Bend Herrmann, a specialist in short tanden repeat (STR).  Hermann did get DNA from his half and sent his material to Ginther.

Ginther found p. 234 of Massie:  "..this DNA did not match the Hessian pofile... nor did it match the Schazkowska profile as derived from Margaret Ellerick."

There is mention of the slide as having been contaminated and that is why C1 is going directly to Dr. Ginther to understand what happen and if Massie's conclusion was accurate.

AGRBear

The following was the start of Dr. Ginther's letter:

July 6, 2005

Dear J.A. Hubert,

I realize from going through my files that there is a large amount of "Romanoff" material there.  In addition, I have copies of lab notebooks that have details of the work (and that I have not been able to find yet.)  Since your questions pertained mostly to the Anna Anderson slide, I will send you the information that surrounds that part of the data.  I do have some caveats.  This work was done over 10 years ago, and so many details are vague to me.  To be completely honest, I had forgotten about some of the experiments and only had my memory jogged by the documents in my files.  In addition, this work was done when DNA forensics was experimental in the truest sense of the word.  Of the workers active in mtDNA identification at the time, I would generally believe the work of Mark Stoneking (Penn State), Mark Wilson  (FBI),, Mitch Holland (US Army), Peter Gill and Kevin Sullivan  (Forensic Sci. Service, UK), Also note, the Anderson sequence often referred to is the standard sequence used for most mtDNA comparisons,  It was the first mtDNA sequence done, and Anderson refers to the scientist who led that work, and has nothing to do with Anna Anderson.  So here is the material from my two folders that relates to Anna Anderson:
(See next post)

 

[AGRBear]

UC = University of California at Berkeley which has a UC system which touches other universities such as UCLA [Universty of California at LosAngles].  UC is number one in public schools in the USA.

Someone asked this earlier in this thread.

The symbol of UC is  the California grisely bear.... GO BEARS!

AGRBear

[Forum Admin]

UC = University of California at Berkeley which has a UC system which touches other universities such as UCLA [Universty of California at LosAngles].  UC is number one in public schools in the USA.

Someone asked this earlier in this thread.

The symbol of UC is  the California grisely bear.... GO BEARS!

AGRBear

Excuse me, BUT, the symbol of UC Berkely is the bear. We at UCLA are BRUINS! Go BRUINS!! Blue and Gold is a much nicer combination.


FA (UCLA class of '81)

[AGRBear]

UCLA Bruins are "baby" bears in powder blue and gold.

UC Papa Bear is Oski who wears navy blue and gold.

We may be in the same school system but we are competitive against each other.  .

AGRBear from Bear Territory

[lexi4]

Do we know why King did not give all the samples to Ginther? Did she ever turn them over? That seems curious. Did King actually do any of the testing?
Go Bears!