An Illustration of Thomas D Cooke's Y line daughtering out

I think sometimes in the pursuit of ancestors we fail to examine our own families closer.  I'm talking about around the level of Great Grandparents or Grandparents.  For my family I'm looking at the level of Grandparents.  While I am in my early 50's, all of my grandparents were born in the 1800s so this works best for me.  If you are using DNA research as a tool to add to your research evidence you have no doubt explored and examined your closer family to find testers from your branch.  

The above chart is an illustration of how my Grandfather's branch of the Cooke line "daughtered out."  You can click on it to see a larger version.

Top Level:  Papaw & Granny

2nd Level:  Their 4 daughters & 3 sons

3rd Level:  Their Grandchildren

4th Level:  Their Great Grandchildren thru Bill(their only son to have children)

Who of these have taken DNA tests?

Tom & Pearl's youngest daughter has taken an autosomal and an mtFull DNA test.

Four of Bill's five children have taken autosomal DNA test.  Bill's youngest son also did the Y-111

My Mom(Bill's widow) also did autosomal testing which has been helpful in determining whether matches are from her side of the family or thru Bill's lines.

So while Tom's Y line has ended at the grandchild level we did "capture" it thru my youngest brother's Y111 test.  It also is still being passed in the lines of Tom's brothers--minus any mutations which might have happened at Tom's level(or Bill or Bill's son).