I am the OP. I did know it could be recovered. I tried unsuccessfully to get it reopend several months ago. At the time, I edited the question to try to address some of the issues. One issue with reopening is the comments don't make as much sense wrt to the edited question. That was one reason I requested it be deleted. The other reason I requested it be deleted is because it sent a very wrong message in my opinion (the one currently being sent) - that the question as worded 'is not a real question'. Maybe the original wording wasn't, but I feel the current wording is a valid question.

There were several issues with the original wording that got closed. Note it was closed 'as not a real question' AFTER the valid answers mentioned above (which seems contradictory to me). I believe the newly worded question addresses all of them other than the issue of whether specific ancestors is 'too narrow' and is valuable to too few people. I was hoping the group would allow a more liberal interpretation and now allow the question.

If the issue is the majority of members feel this question as worded 'is not a real question', then I agree it's a duplicate and should be closed. If however, we are considering 'narrow' questions about a specific ancestor then I would hope that it could remain. I believe the new question is cleaner than reopening the old question which contains byplay on whether I'm descended from this person or not (which I feel is immaterial to this specific question - I'm interested in these particular facts, why doesn't matter).