The Van Santen Family Project seeks to find common heritage through the sharing of information and DNA testing. Participation in this project is open to anyone anywhere in the world with potential Van Santen ties. Van Santen DNA Project Goals: 1) Gain insight into the origin of the Van Santen surname. 2) Establish or estimate the number of different ancestral lines found among Van Santen families worldwide. 3) Assist genealogy researchers in identifying, validating and tracing currently known and unknown Van Santen lineages to common ancestors. 4) To find the common genealogical links raised from the exceptionally close DNA results between the Van Santen family and that of Ward, Wardle, Warden, Worley, Cole and McCormick - the apparent roots of which may originate with the Romans bringing into Europe over two thousand Syrian bowman, considered at the time the best fighting men available for hire. Please visit our website or contact the administrator, Robert van Santen. We have extensive genealogical research detailing many extended branches originating from our earliest common ancestor, Maarten van Santen b. abt 1550 in Naaldwijk, Zuid Holland, father of Arent, b. abt 1575. The Genographic Project is a research partnership between National Genographic and IBM, with support from the Waitt Family Foundation. Having traveled all over the world, its researchers have collected enough DNA samples to be able to map out how earth was populated and which routes were followed by small groups of people after they left East Africa about 60,000 years ago. I was intrigued when I learned about this and submitted my DNA sample, the results of which have allowed me to find where my ancestors traveled. I also selected to have my results transferred to the Family Tree DNA Project, where it will be held for 25 years.