WEBVTT - Why the Mormon Church Loves Your DNA 0:00:09.119 --> 0:00:12.840 There's long been a complicated relationship between science and religion, 0:00:13.240 --> 0:00:19.239 but science owes a lot to religion. Despite the inherent tensions, Christianity, Islam, 0:00:19.280 --> 0:00:22.320 and Judaism, just to name the three main Western religions, 0:00:22.560 --> 0:00:25.960 have all made contributions to science at various times through history, 0:00:26.440 --> 0:00:30.920 advancing the fields of algebra, chemistry, astronomy, genetics, and more. 0:00:40.960 --> 0:00:44.840 Welcome to Prognosis, Bloomberg's podcast about the intersection of health 0:00:44.880 --> 0:00:49.320 and technology and the unexpected places it's taking us. I'm 0:00:49.320 --> 0:00:53.080 your host Michelle fay Cortes. This week we look more 0:00:53.120 --> 0:00:56.520 deeply into the study of family origins. It's an area 0:00:56.560 --> 0:01:00.760 where one religious denomination in particular has really had an impact. 0:01:01.200 --> 0:01:04.000 Here's Bloomberg Health reporter christ and b Brown with the 0:01:04.080 --> 0:01:13.880 story that you can Don's welcome the President and less 0:01:13.920 --> 0:01:25.880 International Steve ron Wood. You look grave. We are not 0:01:25.959 --> 0:01:31.280 going to have such a last this week. First, I 0:01:31.360 --> 0:01:34.520 want to give a little warm welcome to all of 0:01:34.600 --> 0:01:37.559 you who are enjoyed to share for the very first time. 0:01:38.400 --> 0:01:41.840 If you've ever doubted the market potential of consumer DNA testing, 0:01:42.080 --> 0:01:45.600 then you probably haven't been to roots tech. You might 0:01:45.640 --> 0:01:48.360 have thought then you were just coming to a Family 0:01:48.400 --> 0:01:51.880 History Congress will in eight days of places. But if 0:01:51.880 --> 0:01:56.800 you worried, you're about to find and more importantly, you're 0:01:56.840 --> 0:02:02.440 about to feel so much more than that. Roots Tech 0:02:02.560 --> 0:02:06.120 is like the consumer Electronics Show for family history hobbyists. 0:02:06.560 --> 0:02:10.200 It is the world's biggest genealogy conference, and I'm not 0:02:10.280 --> 0:02:13.480 kidding when I say big. This year, more than twenty 0:02:13.520 --> 0:02:17.280 thou people from every state and thirty eight countries blocked 0:02:17.320 --> 0:02:20.280 to Salt Lake City for the four day conference. To 0:02:20.360 --> 0:02:23.240 get a sense of how many people that is, consider 0:02:23.320 --> 0:02:26.240 that the conference fills downtown Salt Lake City Salt Palace, 0:02:26.440 --> 0:02:30.240 a seven hundred thousand square foot convention center that served 0:02:30.280 --> 0:02:34.519 as the media center when Utah last hosted the Winter Olympics. 0:02:34.520 --> 0:02:37.400 The multitudes make the pilgrimage to Utah every year for 0:02:37.560 --> 0:02:41.480 one reason, to find out about the latest and greatest 0:02:41.720 --> 0:02:47.760 genealogical technologies. At roots Tech, companies like ancestry, dot Com 0:02:47.880 --> 0:02:50.359 and twenty three and me show up to show off 0:02:50.400 --> 0:02:54.119 their latest products, and people waiting hours long lines for discounts. 0:02:54.560 --> 0:02:58.440 Celebrity genealogists give talks and teach classes, and there are 0:02:58.440 --> 0:03:02.480 people from genealogical ideas just roaming around and costumes their 0:03:02.560 --> 0:03:07.080 ancestors might have worn, like riches and pilgrim hats. My 0:03:07.200 --> 0:03:09.560 favorite thing there was this feature in the roots Take 0:03:09.600 --> 0:03:11.600 app that showed you how many cousins you had at 0:03:11.680 --> 0:03:15.040 conference and let you message them. There were these big 0:03:15.080 --> 0:03:18.760 digital displays everywhere with stats on how many cousins had connected. 0:03:19.520 --> 0:03:22.200 On the second day, I noticed one display that said 0:03:22.200 --> 0:03:25.320 more than seven thousand cousins had contacted each other through 0:03:25.320 --> 0:03:28.359 the app. I just love the idea that all these 0:03:28.400 --> 0:03:30.880 people were going to this conference and grabbing a cup 0:03:30.880 --> 0:03:33.679 of coffee with a family member they've never met. It's 0:03:33.720 --> 0:03:37.160 like family tree building in real time. I write about 0:03:37.240 --> 0:03:39.480 DNA testing a lot and all of the sort of 0:03:39.480 --> 0:03:42.640 surprising consequences that have come out of a growing consumer 0:03:42.680 --> 0:03:45.840 interest in it. Filling out the family tree used to 0:03:45.840 --> 0:03:49.800 be a hobby relegated to grandparents and great aunts. Now 0:03:49.920 --> 0:03:52.800 it seems like everyone is mailing away their DNA to 0:03:52.920 --> 0:03:57.000 find out about their roots. Seeing so many people gathered 0:03:57.040 --> 0:04:00.640 in one place to talk about genealogy really stallized for 0:04:00.680 --> 0:04:05.480 me just how popular this hobby has become. On Opening night, 0:04:05.560 --> 0:04:09.240 there was this live acapella show that thousands of people attended. 0:04:09.920 --> 0:04:18.599 Some people stood up in the aisles and danced. The 0:04:18.640 --> 0:04:22.120 place was a zoo. But maybe the craziest thing about 0:04:22.200 --> 0:04:25.000 roots Tech is that it is actually put on by 0:04:25.000 --> 0:04:29.120 the Mormon Church, or more precisely, the conference is put 0:04:29.120 --> 0:04:32.720 on by Family Search, a genealogy organization run by the 0:04:32.800 --> 0:04:35.680 Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints. As the 0:04:35.760 --> 0:04:39.560 church prefers to be called at the opening ceremony after 0:04:39.600 --> 0:04:43.600 that acapella group saying Family Search as CEO Steve Rockwood 0:04:43.640 --> 0:04:47.719 introduced several high ranking members of the church. Please welcome 0:04:47.720 --> 0:04:50.280 to the stage, the German of the Board of Family 0:04:50.320 --> 0:04:54.040 Seas International, a member of the Core of the Church 0:04:54.080 --> 0:05:00.359 of Jesus Christ of Lattery Saints, and my dear Brad 0:05:00.640 --> 0:05:07.400 Elder by Foster. At one point he told the crowd, 0:05:07.880 --> 0:05:11.200 we believe the Heavenly Father wants to connect us all together. 0:05:12.000 --> 0:05:14.839 This is a theme you here repeated frequently at roots Tech. 0:05:15.560 --> 0:05:21.279 We are all related. We're all one big family. To 0:05:21.400 --> 0:05:25.320 be clear, roots tech is not a religious conference, though 0:05:25.360 --> 0:05:29.200 atheist should beware that there are some pretty clear religious overtones. 0:05:30.839 --> 0:05:33.880 Roots Tech is a genealogy conference that is put on 0:05:34.000 --> 0:05:36.960 by the Mormon Church. Around half of the people who 0:05:37.040 --> 0:05:39.920 attend are not Mormon. If you missed the moment where 0:05:39.960 --> 0:05:42.920 they invoked God and called church elders out on stage, 0:05:43.160 --> 0:05:45.560 you might have never known there was a religious connection 0:05:45.600 --> 0:05:48.360 at all. But there's a good reason that the church 0:05:48.440 --> 0:05:52.240 puts on the biggest genealogy conference in the world. Genealogy 0:05:52.400 --> 0:05:56.159 is a longstanding Mormon interest. More than that, it's become 0:05:56.200 --> 0:06:01.040 intertwined with Mormon beliefs. Mormons believe that family spend eternity 0:06:01.080 --> 0:06:04.760 together in the celestial Kingdom or Heaven. They also believe 0:06:04.880 --> 0:06:08.159 in the baptism of the dead, a controversial practice in 0:06:08.160 --> 0:06:10.560 which those who did not find their faith on earth 0:06:10.760 --> 0:06:13.600 or given a chance of salvation and a chance at 0:06:13.640 --> 0:06:16.720 eternity with the rest of their family. This is where 0:06:16.800 --> 0:06:19.680 genealogy comes in. If you're going to save the soul 0:06:19.720 --> 0:06:22.159 of your ancestor, you need to know who they are. 0:06:22.920 --> 0:06:25.679 So in the nineteenth century, the church began sending Mormons 0:06:25.720 --> 0:06:28.680 back to Europe to scour family records, and in the 0:06:28.720 --> 0:06:32.240 century since, the Church is actively thought to bolster the 0:06:32.320 --> 0:06:37.440 science and industry of genealogy, including by more recently putting 0:06:37.440 --> 0:06:41.720 on roots deck. A century before consumer market even existed, 0:06:42.240 --> 0:06:44.480 the Mormon Church had a need for better ways of 0:06:44.480 --> 0:06:49.800 doing genealogy, and in pushing genealogical techniques and technologies forward, 0:06:50.400 --> 0:06:52.960 it has set the stage for this crazy moment we're 0:06:52.960 --> 0:06:55.159 living in right now, a time when you can buy 0:06:55.160 --> 0:06:58.720 a DNA hit for and find out how Scottish you are, 0:06:59.240 --> 0:07:02.120 or discover your dad isn't your dad, or even help 0:07:02.200 --> 0:07:06.719 the police touch a serial killer. It was this convergence 0:07:06.760 --> 0:07:09.880 of science, industry and religion that had brought me to 0:07:09.960 --> 0:07:14.760 roots Tick. Honestly, I just found it fascinating. At the conference, 0:07:14.800 --> 0:07:17.600 I sat down with Steve Rockwood, the CEO of Family 0:07:17.640 --> 0:07:20.760 Search that I mentioned earlier. He explained to me how 0:07:20.800 --> 0:07:23.760 genealogy has become such a big part of the Mormon faith. 0:07:24.560 --> 0:07:28.280 While it is universal, it is it is innate desire 0:07:28.320 --> 0:07:31.320 to know where you come from. Different people enter this 0:07:31.360 --> 0:07:34.360 and actually start putting resource towards it for different reasons. 0:07:35.200 --> 0:07:38.920 And in the Church of Jesus Christ celebrity saints, there's 0:07:38.960 --> 0:07:43.280 actually a doctrinal reason why members of the church wanted 0:07:43.320 --> 0:07:47.000 to learn their their family history, and it's a simple 0:07:47.320 --> 0:07:50.400 that's a simple principle that we believe that families can 0:07:50.440 --> 0:07:55.560 live together forever and that that's a multi generational experience. 0:07:55.600 --> 0:07:59.120 So that you can live with your your loved ones 0:07:59.160 --> 0:08:01.960 that you knew um while you lived here on earth, 0:08:02.000 --> 0:08:03.840 in your immediate family, but you can also live with 0:08:03.840 --> 0:08:06.600 your grandparents and your great grandparents. And we just believe 0:08:06.640 --> 0:08:11.440 families are forever. Many early Mormons were pioneers escaping discrimination 0:08:11.520 --> 0:08:15.360 back east to eventually settle in the Great Salt Lake Valley. 0:08:15.400 --> 0:08:19.040 This is how genealogy entered the picture. The early members 0:08:19.080 --> 0:08:23.080 of the church back in the eighteen hundreds, their homelands 0:08:23.120 --> 0:08:25.600 were in the eastern United States, they were in the UK, 0:08:25.960 --> 0:08:30.200 there in northern and western Europe, and as they were 0:08:30.240 --> 0:08:34.360 converted to the Gospel of Jesus Christ, they gathered together 0:08:35.400 --> 0:08:39.079 in different parts of the Eastern United States, the Midwest, 0:08:39.120 --> 0:08:43.600 and ultimately out here to the Inner Mountain West. And 0:08:43.679 --> 0:08:46.679 so to hear, you have these pioneers that went through 0:08:46.720 --> 0:08:49.440 all of this to come here, and they had left 0:08:49.440 --> 0:08:51.800 their homelands, they had left their families. But there's this 0:08:52.000 --> 0:08:55.040 doctrine that families can be together. And if you perform 0:08:55.120 --> 0:08:58.520 certain ceremonies and rites in the in the temple of 0:08:58.559 --> 0:09:01.440 the Church of Jesus Christ larities saints, then you can 0:09:01.480 --> 0:09:04.960 give that offering to your ancestors well. In order for 0:09:05.000 --> 0:09:07.319 them to do that, they need to have the records, 0:09:07.320 --> 0:09:10.400 and the records were back home, the records were thousands 0:09:10.440 --> 0:09:13.720 of miles away. In order to fulfill a key part 0:09:13.760 --> 0:09:17.240 of their faith, Mormon pioneers needed to access family records 0:09:17.280 --> 0:09:21.400 that they didn't have. So in the church founded the 0:09:21.440 --> 0:09:25.480 Genealogical Society of Utah, sending Mormons as far afield as 0:09:25.520 --> 0:09:28.640 Europe to track down original documents that would allow people 0:09:28.679 --> 0:09:31.400 to fill out their family trees. And it started as 0:09:31.400 --> 0:09:34.280 a service, and then the technology came and so it 0:09:34.320 --> 0:09:37.040 went from service to let's use this technology, and that's 0:09:37.040 --> 0:09:40.160 when we started sending out camera crews to go start 0:09:40.200 --> 0:09:43.040 taking the pictures and all the archives. So it's a 0:09:44.040 --> 0:09:46.480 that's that's the root of it, and it's evolved now 0:09:46.559 --> 0:09:51.680 for over a hundred years. Like Steve mentioned, at some 0:09:51.760 --> 0:09:54.520 point the church started to get really interested in new 0:09:54.520 --> 0:09:56.880 technologies that could help it do a better job of 0:09:56.960 --> 0:10:02.400 collecting family records and ultimately connecting families in heaven. In 0:10:02.440 --> 0:10:06.800 the nineteen thirties, the church began using microfilm, photographing original 0:10:06.840 --> 0:10:10.280 documents so that they would be better preserved and more accessible. 0:10:10.960 --> 0:10:13.880 In the nineteen eighties, as home computers became a thing, 0:10:14.360 --> 0:10:17.040 the church introduced software so that people could create and 0:10:17.080 --> 0:10:21.239 share their family trees electronically. With the advent of the Internet, 0:10:21.280 --> 0:10:24.960 the church realized that the genealogical Society of Utah could 0:10:25.000 --> 0:10:28.280 have a far wider reach and re christened it Family Search. 0:10:29.040 --> 0:10:33.360 The family Search website eventually launched in nineteen, three years 0:10:33.400 --> 0:10:37.479 after Ancestry dot com. Ancestry dot com, by the way, 0:10:37.720 --> 0:10:40.840 also has Mormon roots. It was started by two Brigham 0:10:40.840 --> 0:10:43.439 young grads who got their start selling Latter day Saints 0:10:43.520 --> 0:10:47.920 publications on floppy disk. The church even created jed com, 0:10:47.920 --> 0:10:51.319 which is the file format still used today for genealogical 0:10:51.440 --> 0:10:56.719 data today. The church record collection includes billions of digitized 0:10:56.760 --> 0:11:00.000 online records, along with more than two point four million 0:11:00.320 --> 0:11:04.559 rolls of microfilmed records, seven hundred forty two thousand microfiche, 0:11:04.960 --> 0:11:08.680 and hundreds of thousands of books and periodicals, all stored 0:11:08.760 --> 0:11:11.520 and the Family History Library on Temple Square in Salt 0:11:11.600 --> 0:11:14.400 Lake City and in the Granite Mountain Records Fault, which 0:11:14.440 --> 0:11:17.800 is basically a climate controlled bunker for records built under 0:11:17.840 --> 0:11:20.959 seven hundred feet of rock to withstand a nuclear blast. 0:11:21.600 --> 0:11:26.160 Here's Steve again. Our role is simply to connect members 0:11:26.160 --> 0:11:28.840 of the Church of Jesus Christ, Hilary Saints, and those 0:11:28.840 --> 0:11:31.840 who aren't members of the church, to just simply connect 0:11:31.880 --> 0:11:34.080 them to their homelands and connect them back to their families. 0:11:34.760 --> 0:11:39.120 Exporting the enthusiasm for genealogy. The Church's betting is good 0:11:39.120 --> 0:11:43.800 for everyone. It means better technology, more access to records, 0:11:43.880 --> 0:11:48.640 and an easier path to salvation. The Church, Rockwood told me, 0:11:49.040 --> 0:11:52.760 wants to be a catalyst for the entire industry. That's 0:11:52.800 --> 0:11:55.720 actually why it started roots Tech back in two thousand eleven. 0:11:56.400 --> 0:11:59.680 Genealogists and technologists weren't talking to each other, and the 0:11:59.760 --> 0:12:04.000 Church wanted to change that. We don't compete with absolutely 0:12:04.000 --> 0:12:06.720 anyone here at roots Teck. We don't compete with anyone 0:12:06.880 --> 0:12:10.040 in the industry. We want to see what they bring 0:12:10.600 --> 0:12:12.560 to the party. We want to see if what we 0:12:12.600 --> 0:12:16.280 can add to it, and then find ways that baby, 0:12:16.320 --> 0:12:19.800 there's a more synergistic approach, and we've been very, very 0:12:19.840 --> 0:12:22.960 successful in doing above and beyond all else. We just 0:12:23.000 --> 0:12:27.080 want to be the trusted partner and the trusted, honest, 0:12:28.280 --> 0:12:31.559 neutral entity here and that's why we created roots Tech. 0:12:31.640 --> 0:12:35.760 We were the one organization um that could actually bring 0:12:35.840 --> 0:12:40.240 everyone together. Root stick exists to cement the church's role 0:12:40.320 --> 0:12:43.520 at the center of the genealogy industry. I talked with 0:12:43.559 --> 0:12:47.240 Donald Atkinson, a historian at Queen's University in Canada, for 0:12:47.320 --> 0:12:49.960 some perspective on the contributions the Church has made to 0:12:50.000 --> 0:12:53.560 the field. Almost a decade ago, Donald wrote a book 0:12:53.559 --> 0:12:56.920 about the Mormon Church and genealogy. He told me he 0:12:57.000 --> 0:12:59.280 doesn't think the Church gets enough credit for the role 0:12:59.360 --> 0:13:01.840 it has played in field. This is something I've heard 0:13:01.880 --> 0:13:04.880 before from people in the industry that the church really 0:13:04.880 --> 0:13:07.200 set the stage for the industry that would follow it. 0:13:07.880 --> 0:13:12.120 The church was going to it helped the first big 0:13:12.360 --> 0:13:19.480 wave of democratization of genealogy. If you if we talked 0:13:19.480 --> 0:13:23.520 in the year eighteen fifty, let's say, you know, before 0:13:23.559 --> 0:13:27.400 the church did this, but eighteen fifty, genealogy was something 0:13:27.520 --> 0:13:32.600 rich people did. If you're talking nineteen fifties, starts to 0:13:32.679 --> 0:13:40.120 become possible, using often by Mormon sources to start too, 0:13:40.720 --> 0:13:43.439 for everybody if they'll take the time to start to 0:13:43.520 --> 0:13:46.600 learn about their family, and then it gets just easier 0:13:46.600 --> 0:13:51.520 and easier, and it's snowballs. Um. So, yeah, the democratization 0:13:51.559 --> 0:13:58.680 of genealogy is in large degree caused by made possible 0:13:58.760 --> 0:14:03.960 by the at Roots Tech, the biggest draws classes where 0:14:03.960 --> 0:14:07.520 people learn things like how to sturge scandinating archives or 0:14:07.559 --> 0:14:12.520 read an ancestor sloppy, hard to decipher handwriting. Increasingly, people 0:14:12.559 --> 0:14:15.720 are really interested in DNA testing, which in the past 0:14:15.720 --> 0:14:18.600 decade has gotten really easy and cheap. For a lot 0:14:18.640 --> 0:14:22.600 of people, DNA testing is like the gateway drug to genealogy. 0:14:22.720 --> 0:14:24.400 They send in a tube of spit to find out 0:14:24.400 --> 0:14:26.720 about their heritage just for fun, and all of a 0:14:26.720 --> 0:14:29.560 sudden they were messaging with third cousins and obsessively trying 0:14:29.600 --> 0:14:32.200 to fill in the gaps on their family tree. All 0:14:32.240 --> 0:14:35.080 of the major DNA testing companies have multiple classes at 0:14:35.120 --> 0:14:37.920 roots Tech, as well as huge booths where they're doing 0:14:37.920 --> 0:14:42.520 demonstrations and selling kids. I talked to a lot of 0:14:42.560 --> 0:14:45.400 people about why they were there. Some of them got 0:14:45.400 --> 0:14:48.360 the genealogy bug from a grandparent or had a friend 0:14:48.480 --> 0:14:51.360 or family member that was into it. Here's one woman 0:14:51.400 --> 0:14:56.720 I met, Jan My husband is big into genealogy, and 0:14:56.760 --> 0:14:59.840 so I'm just I'm I'm starting and loving it and 0:15:00.040 --> 0:15:03.680 I'm loving to find my family. Okay, so you're being 0:15:03.680 --> 0:15:06.760 a supportive spouse, a supportive spouse, but now I love 0:15:06.760 --> 0:15:09.640 it taking on a life of itself. It is. It's 0:15:09.720 --> 0:15:13.239 just fun to know where we came from. And also, um, 0:15:13.280 --> 0:15:16.960 we have grandchildren, and the stories that we're finding from 0:15:16.960 --> 0:15:20.400 our history, I really think strengthens our grandchildren as we 0:15:20.440 --> 0:15:23.800 tell them, Gosh, look what your great great grandparents live through, 0:15:23.880 --> 0:15:28.240 you can live through today. It seems like more than ever, 0:15:28.600 --> 0:15:30.800 we just want to know who we are and where 0:15:30.840 --> 0:15:34.720 we came from. Within the Mormon faith, enthusiasm for roots 0:15:34.760 --> 0:15:39.080 is baked into the culture. Within most Mormon congregations. There's 0:15:39.120 --> 0:15:41.160 a person whose duty it is to help people with 0:15:41.200 --> 0:15:44.960 their own family history. Bringham Young. The university owned by 0:15:44.960 --> 0:15:48.920 the church, even produces a popular Greatest Race style reality 0:15:48.960 --> 0:15:52.640 TV show in which participants forego technology on a hunt 0:15:52.680 --> 0:15:57.240 to find and meat relatives get ready for a race 0:15:57.520 --> 0:16:01.280 unlike any other. Our family round we rolled. For the 0:16:01.320 --> 0:16:03.760 first time in my life, I met a little piece 0:16:03.800 --> 0:16:06.760 of my dad. I've gained a better appreciation for family. 0:16:07.360 --> 0:16:09.800 I talked for a long time with Sydney Orton, an 0:16:09.800 --> 0:16:12.200 eighteen year old by Youth student who has been into 0:16:12.200 --> 0:16:15.120 genealogy since she was a little kid. She talked a 0:16:15.160 --> 0:16:17.480 lot about what genealogy means to her as a more man, 0:16:18.160 --> 0:16:21.800 but also about just how fun it is. I started 0:16:21.840 --> 0:16:24.120 when I was eleven years old. I am a member 0:16:24.160 --> 0:16:26.240 of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints, 0:16:26.360 --> 0:16:28.880 and I was part of that religion. Our church leaders 0:16:28.920 --> 0:16:31.920 really pushed us to be involved in genealogy, and one 0:16:31.960 --> 0:16:34.640 aspect that they were particularly focusing on in two thousand 0:16:34.680 --> 0:16:38.960 eleven was um indexing, and I thought, Okay, I'll try it, 0:16:39.000 --> 0:16:40.600 so I did, and I fell in love with it. 0:16:40.960 --> 0:16:43.520 She told me what really got her hooked on genealogy 0:16:43.920 --> 0:16:47.360 were the stories she uncovered. There were stories behind the records. 0:16:47.400 --> 0:16:50.440 Were like weird things I'd find in records, like kids 0:16:50.440 --> 0:16:53.560 who died because they were born two heads, or this 0:16:53.600 --> 0:16:55.720 whole family where they named They had nine kids and 0:16:55.720 --> 0:16:58.120 they named every single kid after a character from the 0:16:58.160 --> 0:17:00.840 Bible or not a character of sent from the Bible. 0:17:01.160 --> 0:17:03.200 And then their last kid they named Lucifer, which I 0:17:03.280 --> 0:17:06.480 just really wanted to know the story behind. Sydney started 0:17:06.480 --> 0:17:10.159 out helping the church index other people's records, but eventually 0:17:10.320 --> 0:17:13.560 she also got curious about her own family. Some of 0:17:13.560 --> 0:17:17.560 her ancestors were Mormon pioneers, people who traversed North America 0:17:17.600 --> 0:17:21.159 with hand pulled carts to get to Utah. But this 0:17:21.280 --> 0:17:25.000 particular family, as I learned their story, I was just 0:17:25.080 --> 0:17:27.639 so blown away by their strength or their determination and 0:17:27.720 --> 0:17:31.959 loyalty to God into each other. One of her distant 0:17:32.040 --> 0:17:35.360 great grandmothers, Jane James, lost a baby on the boat 0:17:35.400 --> 0:17:38.200 to America from England and her husband on the truck 0:17:38.200 --> 0:17:42.080 to Utah. Her son got frostbite and couldn't walk. Sidney says, 0:17:42.160 --> 0:17:44.879 Jane and her daughter survived on four ounces of flower 0:17:44.880 --> 0:17:47.639 a day pulling their carts to Utah and the snow. 0:17:48.359 --> 0:17:51.960 In other words, this relative was pretty tough. So they 0:17:52.000 --> 0:17:56.239 had so much unwavering faith in God. It's yeah. So 0:17:56.280 --> 0:17:58.080 it's really touched me. And I thought, well, if they 0:17:58.119 --> 0:18:00.840 have that much strength and I came from them and 0:18:00.920 --> 0:18:03.480 other ancestors like them, than I have a lot of 0:18:03.480 --> 0:18:10.840 strays because they're my family. At Roots Tech, I met 0:18:10.840 --> 0:18:12.800 lots of Mormons who were proud of the role the 0:18:12.840 --> 0:18:16.080 faith has played in popularizing an interest in family history. 0:18:16.520 --> 0:18:20.040 Paul Nada, a spokesperson for Family Search, told me that 0:18:20.119 --> 0:18:22.199 he thought the church has played a big role in 0:18:22.240 --> 0:18:25.800 influencing a lot of areas of the technology, like online 0:18:25.840 --> 0:18:29.600 family trees. The scrap booking craze of the eighties and nineties, 0:18:29.600 --> 0:18:33.480 he said, even began in Mormon circles. Many credit the 0:18:33.480 --> 0:18:37.640 beginnings of that movement to one Utah Mormon Family Church. 0:18:37.720 --> 0:18:40.800 Tenants in modern science, of course, aren't always in sank 0:18:41.560 --> 0:18:45.080 far from it. While the Mormon Church has embraced DNA testing, 0:18:45.560 --> 0:18:49.199 the technologies helped confirm scientific findings, also at odds with 0:18:49.240 --> 0:18:52.440 the core Mormon belief The Book of Mormon holds that 0:18:52.520 --> 0:18:56.119 Native Americans descended from Jews fleeing the conquest of ancient 0:18:56.200 --> 0:19:00.080 Israel by the Assyrians nearly three thousand years ago, but 0:19:00.200 --> 0:19:04.600 population genetics support earlier work by archaeologists and anthropologists. The 0:19:04.600 --> 0:19:08.200 show humans first walk to North America about fourteen thousand 0:19:08.280 --> 0:19:11.840 years ago over a land bridge linking present day Siberia 0:19:11.920 --> 0:19:15.600 with Alaska. That hasn't stopped the church from forging ahead 0:19:15.640 --> 0:19:18.600 with new technologies that it hopes can make genealogy more 0:19:18.680 --> 0:19:22.919 interesting and accessible. For the first time. This year, Family 0:19:22.920 --> 0:19:26.959 Search will hold a second Roots Tech conference in London. Steve, 0:19:27.240 --> 0:19:30.360 the Family Search CEO, told me that Family Searches are 0:19:30.400 --> 0:19:33.280 in d arm Is exploring how it might use artificial 0:19:33.280 --> 0:19:37.480 intelligence to help with archiving and searching records. It's also 0:19:37.520 --> 0:19:40.199 thinking about how it could help bolster the burgeoning field 0:19:40.240 --> 0:19:43.760 of consumer DNA testing. He said. Long term planning for 0:19:43.800 --> 0:19:47.960 the church isn't a decade or two that's short term. 0:19:48.000 --> 0:19:49.919 They're planning for what the world might be like in 0:19:50.080 --> 0:19:53.840 hundreds of years, for the probability that future genealogists will 0:19:53.880 --> 0:19:56.680 suffer from having too much data instead of too little. 0:19:57.040 --> 0:20:00.240 There's this incredible emotion, even a spirit of the work, 0:20:00.280 --> 0:20:04.800 that you feel when you've find out um how you're connected, 0:20:05.040 --> 0:20:08.359 either in general to your homeland or in general to 0:20:08.480 --> 0:20:13.600 your family. It's a feeling of of completeness, of connectiveness 0:20:13.920 --> 0:20:20.840 belonging in Utah, I visited the Family History Library, the 0:20:20.880 --> 0:20:23.440 place where so many of the church's records were kept. 0:20:24.400 --> 0:20:28.080 The prominence of the library, right on Temple Square, directly 0:20:28.119 --> 0:20:30.960 across from the towering spires of the Salt Lake Temple, 0:20:31.600 --> 0:20:34.520 says a lot about the importance of genealogy to Mormons. 0:20:35.320 --> 0:20:39.000 It is a five story temple to genealogical research, but 0:20:39.080 --> 0:20:43.280 unlike Mormon temples, the libraries open to anyone. When I 0:20:43.280 --> 0:20:46.280 went inside, I'm not really sure what I was looking for. 0:20:46.720 --> 0:20:50.080 A young and very enthusiastic church missionary sat me down 0:20:50.080 --> 0:20:53.320 at a computer and showed me the ropes. We decided 0:20:53.359 --> 0:20:55.480 to see if we could find any records related to 0:20:55.520 --> 0:20:59.560 my great grandfather Manuel, who swam to Texas from Mexico. 0:21:00.760 --> 0:21:03.760 Since Manuel was not a legal immigrant, I was surprised 0:21:03.760 --> 0:21:07.320 that we actually found some things. Like Sydney, I found 0:21:07.320 --> 0:21:10.200 the most fascinating things were the stories behind the records. 0:21:10.680 --> 0:21:14.359 From census record I learned that he had worked eighty 0:21:14.400 --> 0:21:16.639 hours a week as a waiter, and that he and 0:21:16.680 --> 0:21:20.280 my great grandmother had a lodger. I imagined his long 0:21:20.400 --> 0:21:22.840 days at the restaurant, coming home to his wife and 0:21:22.880 --> 0:21:27.320 my young grandfather. I wondered who that lodger was. There 0:21:27.359 --> 0:21:30.879 was also another record, one that just might have been him, 0:21:31.040 --> 0:21:33.200 record of a man who at least shared his name 0:21:33.240 --> 0:21:36.400 and age, crossing into America at about the right time. 0:21:37.320 --> 0:21:41.080 It was powerful the young missionaries zerox the record for me. 0:21:42.160 --> 0:21:45.240 Helping people connect to their past, he told me, was 0:21:45.320 --> 0:21:49.119 really really cool for me, though, there was something slightly 0:21:49.200 --> 0:21:53.400 uncomfortable about finding pieces of my very Catholic great grandfather's 0:21:53.440 --> 0:21:57.240 history enshrined in a building belonging to religion to which 0:21:57.280 --> 0:22:01.280 neither of us belonged. Then again, if the Church hadn't 0:22:01.280 --> 0:22:04.119 preserved so many of these records, who's to say they 0:22:04.119 --> 0:22:07.439 would still exist at all. For me, the records may 0:22:07.440 --> 0:22:09.560 not be a path to heaven, but at least they 0:22:09.560 --> 0:22:12.280 are path to knowing a little bit more about my past. 0:22:26.440 --> 0:22:29.399 That's it for this week's prognosis. Do you have a 0:22:29.440 --> 0:22:32.159 story about healthcare in the US or around the world 0:22:32.600 --> 0:22:34.800 We want to hear from you. Find me on Twitter 0:22:35.080 --> 0:22:39.200 at bay Cortes or email me m Portes at Bloomberg 0:22:39.240 --> 0:22:41.520 dot net. If you were a fan of this episode, 0:22:41.920 --> 0:22:44.480 please take a minute to rate and review us. It 0:22:44.600 --> 0:22:47.639 really helps new listeners find the show. This episode was 0:22:47.680 --> 0:22:51.160 produced by Liz Smith. Our story editors were Drew Armstrong 0:22:51.280 --> 0:22:54.720 and Rick Shine. Francesca Levie is head of Bloomberg Podcasts. 0:22:55.359 --> 0:22:57.679 We'll be back in two weeks on May night with 0:22:57.760 --> 0:23:52.240 a new episode. See you then, m HM, and that's 0:23:52.280 --> 0:23:55.960 it for this week's prognosis. Thanks for listening. Do you 0:23:56.000 --> 0:23:58.280 have a story about healthcare in the US or around 0:23:58.280 --> 0:24:00.679 the world we want to hear from you. Find me 0:24:00.760 --> 0:24:04.040 on Twitter at fa Cortes or send me an email 0:24:04.600 --> 0:24:07.560 m cortes at Bloomberg dot net. If you are a 0:24:07.560 --> 0:24:10.080 fan of this episode, please take a moment to rate 0:24:10.119 --> 0:24:13.400 and review us. It really helps new listeners find the show. 0:24:13.920 --> 0:24:17.080 This episode was produced by Liz Smith. Our story editors 0:24:17.080 --> 0:24:20.480 were Drew Armstrong and Rick Shine. Francesca Levi as head 0:24:20.480 --> 0:24:23.159 of Podcasts. We'll be back on May ninth with our 0:24:23.240 --> 0:24:27.399 next episode. See you then. Francesca Levie is head of 0:24:27.400 --> 0:24:28.480 Bloomberg Podcasts.