The photos below are of the NYC Co Leitrim Society St. Pat's dinner in 2005, 2004 and 2003. The Gaelic spelling of MacTighernan is used to stand for any variant of our surname.
The 2 photos below are of the MacTighernans that attended the NYC Co Leitrim Society dinner on March 12, 2005 and also the ones that had lunch earlier in the day. From left to right at lunch: Larry McTiernan, myself, Michael McTiernan in the T group, Joe McTiernan and Leo McTiernan who are both in the T3 DNA group. .
The photo below is at the dinner. Left to right: Mae Mcguire the mother of John Mcguire, John McGuire, Cathy McGuire, nee McTernan the daughter of Jim (NJ) and Cathy McTiernan, Leo McTiernan, Cathy and Jim (NJ) McTiernan and myself, Michael McTiernan. Jim (NJ) and Leo are a perfect match in the T3 DNA group baseline and I am in the T group. John Mcguire, one of the organizers of the affair and the husband of Mae Mcguire was off running the show and was not able to be in the photo.
The photo below is of the MacTighernans that attended the NYC Co Leitrim Society dinner on March 13, 2004 courtesy of Gwen Brogdon who came in from New Mexico for the dinner. Only 3 of the MacTighernans were able to attend, but it was still a lot of fun. From left to right, Gwen Brogdon, Cathy McGuire, nee McTernan the daughter of Jim (NJ) and Cathy McTernan and myself, Michael McTiernan
Below is the photo of the MacTighernans that attended the NYC Co
Leitrim Society
dinner on March 15, 2003. Everyone in the photo is either a
MacTighernan or
is
married to one.
Genetic
diversity equals age. The more diverse genetic make up
of a population in a specific area, the older it is. In all the world,
Africa has
the most diverse genetic
makeup. Ethiopia or the Horn of Africa, has the most genetic
diversity in all of Africa which
is where the first humans exited to populate the rest of the world.
Western
Europe has the least diverse genetic population of all areas on
earth. So in Africa the population moved and in western Europe
they
did not, genetically speaking.
The remaining mystery in our DNA bunch is if one of us is off a specific baseline by 3 or 4 mutations or rather events which implies that you are in a whole separate and distinct DNA group and you do not genetically relate to that baseline or your common ancestor is well beyond 2000 years back in time then that leaves the question of how we all ended up with identical surnames, if surnames only began in the year 1120. A guess is that way back in time before surnames came into use there existed in or around Cos Leitrim, Roscommon, Sligo or Cavan a tribe or clan whose leader was called MacTighernan. In Gaelic, MacTighernan means "son of Lord". When surnames first started all the male warriors might have just taken the chief's name for themselves which might be a reasonable explanation or guess as to how we all ended up with eight different genetic groups from one small area of Connacht, Ireland all with the same surname.
The MacTighernan men with names in the photo below took the DNA test. Leo, Jim (NJ) and Joe are in the T3 DNA Group, David (NJ) is in the T3a DNA Group and Ed (NJ) is in the T3c DNA Group. Myself on the end at the right in the T DNA Group. Cathy McTernan, Jim (NJ)'s wife sent in the photo and is seated right below Jim (NJ).
The townland of origin for all 27 MacTighernan testers, the DNA raw scores, how we all match up and ancestor lines are at http://mctiernan.com/dnatest.htm
The Rules of the DNA test and a good explaination as to what they indicate are at this web site; http://mctiernan.com/dnarules.htm
The MacTighernan graphical DNA Phylogenetic Tree Chart is at http://mctiernan.com/mctiernangrid.htm
Michael McTiernan N40 03' 09.4"
W75 24' 14.1"