Phone App Tells Two People How They Are Related

satellite image of Iceland

In Iceland, three software engineering students have written a smartphone app that can immediately tell two people how they are related.  Iceland is probably the only country where such a program could be written, at least for now, because most people descend from the 9th-century Vikings who settled the island, and therefore are distantly related (at least) to each other.

The app is based on the Islendingabok ("Book of Icelanders"), an online database of residents and their family trees that goes back 1,200 years.  The database was created using information from censuses, church records, family records, and other sources.  The company that developed it claims it includes 95% of all Icelanders who have lived in the past 300 years.  The database is available to any Icelandic citizen or resident; the app makes the database accessible from a smartphone.  When two people with the app "bump" their phones, the app tells them their family connection.  There's an article about the app at Huffington Post.

I suppose if we ever get to the point where everyone's family tree is online and connected (pretty much what the LDS Church is aiming for with the new Family Tree) non-Icelanders will be able to do the same thing.  That's probably a long way off for the rest of us, though.

Reappearance of the War Bride

Last December, I posted about the story of a war bride who disappeared, which was published in The Oregonian.  Yesterday, The Oregonian published the epilog to the story:  The fate of the war bride has finally been learned.  Esther escaped her abusive relationship and made a new life on the other side of the country.  Lilly Oddsdottir, who helped piece the information together previously, found her family.

I have to admit I didn't think Esther had survived her relationship in Oregon.  I'm so glad to read that this story had a happier ending.

Disappearance of a War Bride

An interesting but sad story was published in The Oregonian this week.  An Icelandic woman married an American soldier after the end of World War II and left her home to move with him to Oregon, where his parents lived.  Communication between her and her family was erratically received.  She had two children, then divorced her husband in 1951.  Then she disappeared.

Only recently have efforts made by the bride's relatives in Iceland produced information.  They hired professional genealogist Peggy Baldwin in Portland, Oregon, who found living relatives there.  Several people working together have pieced together much of the history of the woman's life and of her children.  One of the key facts still to be learned is the specifics of her eventual fate.

The five installments of the story can be read at http://www.oregonlive.com/portland/index.ssf/2011/12/war_bride_esther_gavin.html.