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0 of 3 Premium Clicks used this month SUBSCRIBE Print + Online Subscriber Activation | Register x Forgot Password | Need an Account? e-edition | subscribe | newsletter | deals Classifieds Jobs Autos Real Estate FEATURED » NEWS NOW OHSU opens rural 'hub' campus in Klamath Falls ... Portland dispensary fined $2,500 for handing out products in parking lot ... Surveillance video captures Medford surgery center thief ... OHSU opens rural 'hub' campus in Klamath Falls ... Portland dispensary fined $2,500 for handing out products in parking lot ... Surveillance video captures Medford surgery center thief ... SUNDAY FOCUS: DNA TESTING Rogue Valley residents get surprising results from DNA kits Comment By Vickie Aldous Mail Tribune MailTribune.com By Vickie Aldous Mail Tribune Posted Aug. 30, 2015 at 2:00 AM By Vickie Aldous Mail Tribune Posted Aug. 30, 2015 at 2:00 AM --> Want to get your DNA tested? Kits cost anywhere from $99 to more than $350, depending on how deeply you want to delve into your ancestry and connect with possible relatives. Typi... » Read more X Want to get your DNA tested? Kits cost anywhere from $99 to more than $350, depending on how deeply you want to delve into your ancestry and connect with possible relatives. Typically, you swab your cheek and mail the sample back in the envelope provided with the kit. Results generally take between six to eight weeks. Companies offering DNA test kits include Ancestry.com, 23andMe and Family Tree DNA. Want to learn more? Expert Mike Witzeman of Redding, Calif., will discuss the current craze of DNA testing to uncover ancestral roots at 1 p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 30, at the Jackson County Genealogy Library, 3405 S. Pacific Highway, Medford. He will discuss popular test kits and how the testing works, and answer questions from audience members. » Social News With DNA test kits growing in popularity and falling in price, more and more Rogue Valley residents are taking the tests — revealing their ethnic makeup, long-hidden family secrets and unknown relatives. The tests typically cost about $100. They are becoming increasingly accurate as more people get tested and add themselves to databases kept by companies such as Ancestry.com , 23andMe and Family Tree DNA. People can learn about their ethnic makeup and find DNA matches with relatives and ancestors. Adoptee Miché LaCour of Medford knows the identity of her Japanese birth mother, but had no information about her biological father. “Being adopted, I knew I was half Japanese. The other half was a mystery,” she said. A DNA test confirmed LaCour is half Japanese, but solid percentages of Iberian Peninsula and Native American ancestry showed her father was Latin American. “On the one hand, it was great to find out. It was good,” she said. “On the other hand, it was a shock.” The test, which LaCour did through the biotechnology company 23andMe, did not reveal the identity of her father. Her birth mother is not willing to disclose his name to her. She did find a number of relatives whom she had never met. “I have a lot of cousins in Mexico and Texas,” she said. LaCour said she still has many questions about her parents despite the DNA testing. “It is a puzzle. You don’t have all the pieces,” she said. For Oregon Shakespeare Festival actor Tyrone Wilson, DNA testing through the company Ancestry.com offered him surprising information about his ancestry. While many people take the saliva-based tests to find relatives, Wilson said he was more interested in learning about his ethnic makeup. “I heard I had Native American blood. I assumed I had African American blood and I thought I had some Eastern European blood,” he said. “I really wanted to find out more about myself.” According to family lore, a Native American ancestor of Wilson’s fell in love with a young woman, but the woman’s father — who wanted to marry off his oldest daughter first — refused to let them wed. The young woman jumped on a horse with Wilson’s ancestor and they road off together into the sunset. But Wilson’s DNA test found no Native American ancestry. His ancestry came back as 92 percent African and 8 percent European. “My family has some explaining to do,” he said with a laugh. Based on the family story, Wilson said he'd long had an affinity for Native American culture, but now respects it for different reasons. He is intrigued by the breakdown Ancestry.com gave of his African roots, which showed he is descended from people in areas that include Benin-Togo, Mali and southeastern Bantu. Wilson said he has used dialects from those areas in plays. “Those are the dialects I feel most comfortable doing,” he said. “When I looked at those areas, I said, ‘Oh my gosh! I’ve done dialects from in and around those areas.' There’s a powerful sense of connection based on the work I’ve been attracted to and cast in. Some kind of connection is still operating in me.” As for Wilson’s European roots, those ancestors were mainly Scandinavian with sprinklings of Finnish-Russian, western European and British. “A friend said, ‘You have a little Viking in you,’” Wilson said. He said the newfound knowledge about his European side may prompt some family conversations. “There’s a picture in my mother’s house of an older woman who looks very light-skinned. We didn’t talk about why she was so light-skinned. Maybe we can talk about that now,” Wilson said. Wilson said he has been most interested in finding out about his ancestral ethnic roots and has less interest in tracking down relatives. Medford resident Rhonda Rockwell, in contrast, was on a quest to find her sister. After Rockwell’s mother passed away, Rockwell was reading her mom’s journals and found she had been sent to a home for unwed mothers in the 1940s, where she gave birth to a daughter who was taken away and put up for adoption. Meanwhile, Rockwell’s sister was searching for her biological relatives and turned to DNA testing, which eventually led her to an uncle and cousin of Rockwell. When the cousin told the sister Rockwell was searching for her, the sister burst into tears. “She didn’t even know she had a sister,” Rockwell said. Rockwell and her sister have since enjoyed visits with each other and found a remarkable number of similarities. “You realize someone is your half sister and you’ve lived totally separate lives, but the parallels are unbelievable,” Rockwell said. At one point, they lived five miles from each other in California. Both owned aircraft that they kept at the same airport. Rockwell’s adoptee sister and another sister who wasn’t given up for adoption both were motorcycle racers, and Rockwell and her adoptee sister both worked as Realtors. Rockwell’s adoptee sister named her own children with names that are eerily similar to the biological relatives she had never met, and her husband has the same name as her biological brother. The reunited siblings are now trying to make up for the years they were apart. “It makes you feel like you lost so much,” Rockwell said. Even seasoned genealogists who are experts at tracking down historical documents are turning to DNA testing to flesh out information on their backgrounds. Local genealogist Melinda Henningfield has ancestry that dates back to colonial America, but without a more recent immigrant history, she found it difficult to dig back to Europe or other regions of the world. DNA testing by the company 23andMe found she was almost completely European, while the company Family Tree DNA said she has a smattering of Middle Eastern mixed in with her mainly European ancestry. “I don’t doubt it. I have olive skin,” she said of the Family Tree DNA results. Henningfield said she is more interested in learning about specific ancestors and relatives than exploring her ethnic heritage. She said DNA testing can uncover surprising information. Her husband took a DNA test and found he is not biologically related to his great-grandfather, although he is related to his great-grandmother. Henningfield used traditional genealogical research and found a document that showed his great-grandmother had a baby before she was married to her husband. That baby was not biologically related to the husband. The infant's baptism certificate listed no name for the father, but unusually for the time, the priest overseeing the ceremony did not write that the child was illegitimate, Henningfield said. She said DNA testing reveals both happy and sad information — and almost always contains surprises. “If you don’t want to find out the skeletons in the closet, don’t open the door,” she said. Staff reporter Vickie Aldous can be reached at 541-776-4486 or [email protected] . Follow her on Twitter at www.twitter.com/VickieAldous . By Vickie Aldous Mail Tribune MailTribune.com By Vickie Aldous Mail Tribune Posted Aug. 30, 2015 at 2:00 AM » Comment or view comments Reader Reaction » STAY INFORMED Email NewsLetter Sign Up Today Sign up for our newsletter and have the top headlines from your community delivered right to your inbox. Southern Oregon Directory Featured Businesses Loading... 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