Susan Liebman – The Dressmaker’s Mirror: A Family Secret, a Deadly Gene, and the Records That Told the Truth<br>Spotlight Talk: <br>Linda Levine – Finding My Family’s Ashkenazi Gene Mutation that Leads to Cancer Risks

About this event

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Program Description:

A century ago, Susan Liebman’s four-year-old uncle was said to have been killed when his mother’s heavy dressmaker’s mirror fell on him. Had it really? Digging into old records, Liebman uncovered a family secret that told her there was a deadly mutation in her family, inherited from her father’s side. This presentation explains the value of genetic testing to genealogists who can use their skills to identify and warn living relatives who carry dangerous mutations.

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Speaker Bio:

Susan W. Liebman, PhD, is a Distinguished University Professor Emerita at the University of Illinois Chicago and Research Professor Emerita at the University of Nevada, Reno who has led her own genetics research lab. In researching her family’s genetic history after her pregnant niece’s sudden death, she helped identify a previously unknown heart disease gene and an Ashkenazi Jewish founder mutation within it. Today she writes and speaks widely on genetic testing, driven by a simple conviction: the science exists to prevent these deaths, and too few families know it.

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Spotlight Talk: Finding My Family’s Ashkenazi Gene Mutation that Leads to Cancer Risks

Program Description:

Linda shows how her genealogy research shed light on a rare genetic mutation revealed to her family when her sister developed breast cancer at 73 and did genetic testing. The mutation affects a gene that controls the growth of tumors, increasing the risk of multiple late-onset cancers. Her presentation follows this mutation and the associated cancer risk through multiple generations of her mother’s family tree.

Speaker Bio:

Linda Levine holds a certificate in genealogical research from Boston University. She is the founder of the Genealogical Study Group of Greater Boston that became JGSGB (our society!) over 40 years ago. She is especially interested in DNA for genealogy. She is researching her ancestral family from southwestern Germany, Lithuania and Belarus.

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From JGSGB