While there is a great deal of testing to be done by male participants with the last name Keep, the Keep Family DNA Project has in its early stages discovered John Keep of Longmeadow's (d. 1676) ancestral connection to a Keep family in England.  It  is evident  now that his family lived in England and that he did not change his name upon arrival in this country, ending speculation about that.  This connection had been sought for over 300 years without success, but DNA science and the Keep Family DNA Project has accomplished it very quickly.  Much more American, British, and worldwide testing must be done in order to establish specific family lines.

		Walter KEP born about 1230 Astwood,  Buckinghamshire
		John KEP born about 1260 Astwood
		John KEP born about 1290 Astwood
		John KEEP born about 1320 Astwood
		John KEEP born about 1350 Astwood
		John KEEP born about 1375 Bozeat, Northamptonshire
		Thomas KEPE born about 1400 Bozeat
		William KEPE born about 1425 Bozeat
		William KEPE born about 1450 Bozeat
		William KEPE born about 1480 Ecton, Northamptonshire
		William KEPE born about 1515
		Francis KEEP born about 1555
		William KEEP born about 1585
DNA testing has shown that the English ancestor of  John Keep of Longmeadow is in the family line of John L. Keep of England, shown  à	à  in the right-hand column. More testing is needed to determine exactly which Keep in John L. Keep's line is that common ancestor. à	Thomas KEEP born 1610
John KEEP of Longmeadow DNA link Killed by Indians on 26 Mar 1676	John KEEP of Longmeadow DNA link Killed by Indians on 26 Mar 1676	John KEEP born 1651 Wellingborough
Samuel KEEP born 1670 Longmeadow, Massachusetts	Samuel KEEP born 1670 Longmeadow, Massachusetts	Thomas KEEP born 1682
Samuel KEEP born 1700 Longmeadow, Massachusetts	Samuel KEEP born 1700 Longmeadow, Massachusetts	Thomas KEEP born 1724
Samuel KEEP Born 1739 Longmeadow, Massachusetts	Samuel KEEP born 1739 Longmeadow, Massachusetts	Richard KEEP born 1765 Transported to Botany Bay in 1807.
Samuel KEEP born 1774 Longmeadow, Massachusetts	Heber KEEP born  1776 Longmeadow, Massachusetts	Joseph KEEP born 1794 Wootton
Nathan Cooley KEEP born 1800 Longmeadow, Massachusetts	Henry Augustus KEEP born 1811 Longmeadow, Massachusetts	Joseph KEEP born 1821
John Haskell KEEP born 1836 Boston, Massachusetts	Charles Davis KEEP born 1857 Alton, Illinois	Mark KEEP born 1856 Cardington, Bedfordshire
John Haskell KEEP Born 1869 Brooklyn, New York	Charles Russell KEEP born 1896 Hartford, Connecticut	Joseph Henry KEEP born 1879 St Albans, Hertfordshire
Donald Bruce KEEP Born 1900 Wells, New York	Charles Russell KEEP born 1929 New York, New York	Arthur Joseph KEEP born 1921 Higham Ferrers
Donald Bruce KEEP Born 1927 Syracuse, New York	Marcus Floyd KEEP born 1958 New York, New York	John Lister KEEP born 1949 Finedon Northamptonshire

 

 

Below are three family lines.  One is the Walter Kep/John Lister Keep line beginning in 1230 in England.  The other two are the John Keep of Longmeadow/Marcus Floyd Keep/Donald Bruce Keep lines, beginning in the 1660s in Longmeadow, Massachusetts.

 

The DNA results above show that the ancestor of John Keep of Longmeadow is in the line of Walter Kep/John Lister Keep of England.

 

                                               READ THIS CHART FROM THE BOTTOM UP

 

                                                                          

If you now compare the results of Marcus Keep to the results of John L. Keep, who lives in England,  you can see the 67 pairs of marker numbers are identical except for three (in red), which are only one number off.  This extraordinary early result indicates that the Longmeadow John Keep's ancestor exists in John’s English ancestral line.  (See that line below.)  By achieving an identical match to another participant, the probability of sharing a common ancestry exists.  The greater the number of matches in the number of markers tested the degree of probability increases. Consideration must also be given to variants in respect of markers that may appear in the test results, which may be caused by change or mutation of the Y- chromosome.  A factor of one would still indicate a common ancestry, but any higher variation would suggest that there is no link. Unfortunately these early test results did not show the particular family line of John Keep of Longmeadow that leads to that common ancestor, nor which particular ancestor of John L. Keep it is.  Much more DNA testing of participants is necessary.

 

The next person to participate in the project was Peter Ronald Keep, who relocated to America from England during the 1960s. We know that Peter was born in 1935 at Hendon, England, and is descended from Thomas Keep of Hammersmith who married Amelia Sarah Reynolds on 28 September 1872. Only two of Peter’s twelve markers matched Marcus’ results, and therefore we do not share a common ancestry. The importance of Peter’s test is that it clearly demonstrates that a shared family name does not confer a shared lineage or a genetic link.  As more testing is done over time by this project, it is hoped that Peter and other Keeps will discover their own family's genetic links.

 

The latest and most significant result are those of Donald Bruce Keep, who like Marcus can trace an unbroken line back to John Keep of  Longmeadow. Out of the 25 markers tested, 24 match Marcus’ results, but one varies by the factor of one. The same applies to John L. Keep’s tests, which puts a different perspective on the interpretation of Marcus and John’s tests. With the science still in its infancy, Donald’s result poses the question of the rate and frequency of variants in markers caused by change or mutation of the Y- chromosome. The more participants we attract to the project the greater our understanding and interpretation of the results and variants will become.

 

Much has been published and broadcast about the pitfalls of DNA Y-chromosome research as a tool in genealogy, but these pitfalls centre around the use of the science to determine our deep ancestry or Haplogroups, i.e. who our ancestors were over 10,000 years ago.  Whilst this is an interesting aside, it cannot detract from the tried and tested reliability of the marker comparisons that are being used here.

 

Many other projects provide detailed commentary about the tests and in depth explanations of the results, but we have elected to keep this section simple.  If you wish to find out more, we would recommend that you do so.  We are not professing to be experts in this field, and until we started this project had a very little knowledge of what it entailed.  However, in a relatively short period of time we have achieved some exceptional results, far beyond our original expectations and as such created a sound platform on which to advance the project to meet our set aims and objectives, namely to establish the parentage of John Keep of Longmeadow, and to try to establish links to others who share our common surname, or variations on it.

 

		Marcus Keep	John L Keep	Charles Russell Keep, Jr.	Peter Ronald Keep	Donald Bruce Keep
Locus	DYS#	Alleles	Alleles	Alleles	Alleles	Alleles
1	393	14	14	14	13	13
2	390	22	22	22	25	22
3	19	15	15	15	17	15
4	391	10	10	10	11	10
5	385a	13	13	13	11	13
6	385b	14	14	14	14	14
7	426	11	11	11	12	11
8