My husband did a DNA test for ancestry so we could use the results to add to the tree through the new feature they have that helps you map your DNA matches to your tree. He has hundreds, maybe thousands of matches I’m wading through. The other night I added a 4th cousin 2x removed who was the grandmother of a DNA match of his. It’s a shirttail relation, but DNA confirmed. I noticed this cousin, Virginia Shelley “McFadden” died in Orange County California in 1994 and her name didn’t match her husband or her father, so it made me curious to look up more about her. Turns out she was an actress, though I can only find one movie she’s listed in on IMDB, a Barbara Stanwyck movie called “The Locked Door” in which she played the “girl on the rum boat”. She is most famous for marrying Frank Albertson. Frank is credited on IMDB with over 200 appearances in television and movies from 1923 to 1964, including my personal favorite- Sam Wainwright in It’s a Wonderful Life.
Chris is related to Virginia’s father, Thomas Shelley through his mother, Theodocia Chipman. The Chipman’s were a Mormon family that lived in American Fork Utah after Amanda Washburn moved there from Ontario sometime after 1840. Chris’ 4x great grandfather was Seneca Washburn, Amanda’s brother. The Washburn family originally came over on the Mayflower but Seneca’s father and grandfather, both called Stephen Washburn, moved to Ontario around 1788. The elder Stephen Washburn had fought in the revolutionary war.- but that’s a story for another time.
Seneca’s granddaughter Lucy Brown was the mother of Ada Chrisman, Christopher’s paternal grandmother, Alberta Chrisman Kelly‘s mother.
