JewishGen.org Discussion Group FAQs
What is the JewishGen.org Discussion Group?
The JewishGen.org Discussion Group unites thousands of Jewish genealogical researchers worldwide as they research their family history, search for relatives, and share information, ideas, methods, tips, techniques, and resources. The JewishGen.org Discussion Group makes it easy, quick, and fun, to connect with others around the world.
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How is the New JewishGen.org Discussion Group better than the old one?
Our old Discussion List platform was woefully antiquated. Among its many challenges: it was not secure, it required messages to be sent in Plain Text, did not support accented characters or languages other than English, could not display links or images, and had archives that were not mobile-friendly.
This new platform that JewishGen is using is a scalable, and sustainable solution, and allows us to engage with JewishGen members throughout the world. It offers a simple and intuitive interface for both members and moderators, more powerful tools, and more secure archives (which are easily accessible on mobile devices, and which also block out personal email addresses to the public).
I am a JewishGen member, why do I have to create a separate account for the Discussion Group?
As we continue to modernize our platform, we are trying to ensure that everything meets contemporary security standards. In the future, we plan hope to have one single sign-in page.
I like how the current lists work. Will I still be able to send/receive emails of posts (and/or digests)?
Yes. In terms of functionality, the group will operate the same for people who like to participate with email. People can still send a message to an email address (in this case, main@groups.JewishGen.org), and receive a daily digest of postings, or individual emails. In addition, Members can also receive a daily summary of topics, and then choose which topics they would like to read about it. However, in addition to email, there is the additional functionality of being able to read/post messages utilizing our online forum (https://groups.jewishgen.org).
Does this new system require plain-text?
No.
Can I post images, accented characters, different colors/font sizes, non-latin characters?
Yes.
Can I categorize a message? For example, if my message is related to Polish, or Ukraine research, can I indicate as such?
Yes! Our new platform allows members to use “Hashtags.” Messages can then be sorted, and searched, based upon how they are categorized. Another advantage is that members can “mute” any conversations they are not interested in, by simply indicating they are not interested in a particular “hashtag.”
Will all posts be archived?
Yes.
Can I still search though old messages?
Yes. All the messages are accessible and searchable going back to 1998.
What if I have questions or need assistance using the new Group?
Send your questions to: support@JewishGen.org
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Follow this link: https://groups.jewishgen.org/g/main
So just to be sure - this new group will allow us to post from our mobile phones, includes images, accented characters, and non-latin characters, and does not require plain text?
Correct!
Will there be any ads or annoying pop-ups?
No.
Will the current guidelines change?
Yes. While posts will be moderated to ensure civility, and that there is nothing posted that is inappropriate (or completely unrelated to genealogy), we will be trying to create an online community of people who regulate themselves, much as they do (very successfully) on Jewish Genealogy Portal on Facebook.
What are the new guidelines?
There are just a few simple rules & guidelines to follow, which you can read here:https://groups.jewishgen.org/g/main/guidelines
Thank you in advance for contributing to this amazing online community!
If you have any questions, or suggestions, please email support@JewishGen.org.
Sincerely,
The JewishGen.org Team
Researching: NOGA from Poland/UK
#austria-czech
#poland
#unitedkingdom
Robert Fraser
Hi friends - I am researching the NOGA branch of my family. I seek information/contact re family descendants. The names include: Yenta-Zyrla KOLACZ and husband Isaak Mayer NOGA. Children: Joseph (b. c1877; married Fanny), Betsy (b. c1879; married Abraham Isidore GOLDMAN), Harry (b. c1881; married Alta), Leah (b. c1883; married Barnet KLEGER) and George (b. 1884; married Hilda GOODMAN). All had children.
My grandfather, George, was born in Nowy Kochin, Poland. The whole family migrated to UK (Manchester) in late 1880s. The sons all changed their surname to (Joseph) FOUST, (Harry) HARRIS, and (George) FINLEY. I would like to contact family members for genealogy research. Please respond privately. Georgina (Gina) Fraser Perth, Western Australia girof@...
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Re: Skuodas picture
#lithuania
#photographs
David Fisher
Thanks Carol It is the writing below I am referring to. See attachment
Regards Dave
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Yahoo Groups Off Line Effective December 15, 2020
#announcements
#general
Jan Meisels Allen
Apologies for my typo error in body of email- it should say December 15, 2020 . The subject title was correct. Jan Meisels Allen Chairperson, IAJGS Public Records Access Monitoring Committee
Verizon which purchased Yahoo in 2017 announced that Yahoo Groups will shut down on December 15, 2020 when the groups.yahoo.com webstie goes offline for good. Verizon cited they never planned to revive the service and there has been a steady decline in usage over the past several years.
See: https://www.zdnet.com/article/yahoo-groups-to-shut-down-for-good-on-december-15-2020/
Jan Meisels Allen Chairperson, IAJGS Public Records Access Monitoring Committee
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US Census Bureau Will Accept Census Data Collection Through October 15, 2020
#announcements
#records
#usa
Jan Meisels Allen
The US Census Bureau will end data collection on the 2020 Census on October 15, 2020 as a result of the U.S. Supreme Court emergency ruling on October 13 stating they need not collect data through October 31, 2020. Paper responses must be postmarked by October 15, 2020 and Internet responses will be accepted through October 15, 2020 11:59PM Hawaii Standard Time (6:00AM Eastern Daylight time) on October 16, 2020. Phone response will be available for its regularly scheduled time on October 15, 2020.
The Census Bureau reports that over 99.9% of housing units have been accounted for between self-response and field data collection operations. To see how your state did between self-responses and non-response follow-up go to: https://2020census.gov/en/response-rates/nrfu.html
If you have not completed the census you can still do so by Internet by going to : https://2020census.gov/en.html
To access the previous postings about the 2020 US Census see the IAJGS Records Access Alert archives at: http://lists.iajgs.org/mailman/private/records-access-alerts You must be registered to access the archives. To register for the IAJGS Records Access Alert go to: http://lists.iajgs.org/mailman/listinfo/records-access-alerts. You will receive an email response that you have to reply to or the subscription will not be finalized. It is required to include your organization affiliation (genealogy organization, etc.)
Jan Meisels Allen Chairperson, IAJGS Public Records Access Monitoring Committee
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Re: Skuodas picture
#lithuania
#photographs
Carol Hoffman
The writing on the bottom right hand side of the frame is the stamp of the photographer in Skudas - it has no relationship to identifying the people in the photo.
Carol Hoffman
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Heavy Rain Reveals Remains of Romanian Jewish Cemetery Destroyed in 1943
#romania
Jan Meisels Allen
A pit that rainfall exposed at a former Jewish cemetery in Iasi, Romania in October 2020, (©Dan Acostioaiei)
Heavy rainfall in northeastern Romania exposed an underground chamber full of headstones from a Jewish cemetery that was destroyed in 1943. The cave is in Tatarasi Park in Iasi. This is near the site where Nazi allies stole thousands of headstones from the ancient Ciurchi Street Jewish Street cemetery. Historian Adrian Cioflancc said the oldest documented graves in the cemetery date to 1467.
The pogrom in Iasi in 1941 murdered 15,000 Jews.
The cemetery, which had more than 20,000 graves, was razed on orders from Ion Antonescu, Romania’s wartime prime minister.
The Jews of Bucharest were allowed to move thousands of bodies to another cemetery, but thousands more were desecrated. The headstones removed were used as construction material on orders from Iasi’s mayor, Constantin Ifrim.
Jan Meisels Allen Chairperson, IAJGS Public Records Access Monitoring Committee
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Supreme Court Says US Census Count Can End Now
#announcements
#records
#usa
Jan Meisels Allen
The U.S. Supreme Court approved a request from the Trump Administration to suspend the lower federal court’s order that extended the census count to October 31.The Court offered no explanation for the decision, which required the support of at least five justices. Justice Sonia Sotomayor issued a written dissent. She called the harms from ending the count early “avoidable and intolerable.” Further she said, “even a fraction of a percent of the Nation’s 140 million households amounts to hundreds of thousands of people left uncounted,” she wrote. “And significantly, the percentage of nonresponses is likely much higher among marginalized populations and in hard-to-count areas, such as rural and tribal lands.”
The ruling was a result from the Justice Department’s emergency request made last week. Previously, 9th Circuit Federal Appellate Court Judge Lucy Koh, said the count was to continue through October 31. The extension was made due to COVID-19 and the October 31 date had been proposed by the Administration last April which they then changed their mind in July.
As the previous Judges have ruled, the October 31 date would give the bureau a better chance of getting an accurate and complete count of the country's residents, which is used to determine how political representation and federal funding are distributed among the states over the next decade. The numbers, in turn, also determine how many Electoral College votes each state has to determine who becomes the U.S. president in 2024 and 2028. The count also determines how approximately $1.5 trillion in federal spending is directed. The proposed deadlines would have pushed field collection until the end of October, with each state's congressional districts being submitted to the president by April 30, 2021, instead of the year-end statutory deadline.
Justice Department attorneys say the Census Bureau is under pressure to meet a legal deadline of Dec. 31 for reporting to the president the first set of census results — the latest state population counts that determine each state's share of the 435 seats in the House of Representatives. Experts, both inside and outside the agency, have expressed concern over a shortened timeframe for the constitutionally mandated count, arguing that a politically motivated, shortened timeline due to the pandemic threatened the census on two ends: both the actual enumeration and the data processing that follows. A report from Commerce Department's Office of Inspector General in September found that the decision to accelerate the census schedule “was not made by the Census Bureau” and that it “increases the risks to obtaining a complete and accurate 2020 Census.”
The Census Bureau is under the Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross. If the Secretary of Commerce were to present the new state counts to the White House by Dec. 31, that would ensure that even if President Trump did not win reelection, he could attempt to carry out the unprecedented change he wants to make to who is counted when determining the reallocation of House seats.
A different legal fight before the Supreme Court which they have not said when they will hear, is the requirement of "whole number of persons in each state" and the president's limited authority over the census. President Trump wants to exclude unauthorized immigrants from being counted.
and https://www.politico.com/news/2020/10/13/supreme-court-allows-census-count-to-cease-429248
To read more see: To access the previous postings about the 2020 US Census see the IAJGS Records Access Alert archives at: http://lists.iajgs.org/mailman/private/records-access-alerts You must be registered to access the archives. To register for the IAJGS Records Access Alert go to: http://lists.iajgs.org/mailman/listinfo/records-access-alerts. You will receive an email response that you have to reply to or the subscription will not be finalized. It is required to include your organization affiliation (genealogy organization, etc.)
Jan Meisels Allen Chairperson, IAJGS Public Records Access Monitoring Committee
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Art For Jewish Friends-Creativity From Despair
#holocaust
Lowell Nigoff
I was sent this video (see attached) by a friend (not jewish) who I have volunteered with in Israel. I found the video to be very creative and moving.
Lowell
Sorry if you get multiple emails. LN
creativity from despair
--
“I would rather live my life as if there is a God and die to find out there isn't, than live as if there isn't and to die to find out that there is.” Albert Camus
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Jews employed by the Czars
#russia
Deanna Levinsky <DEANNASMAC@...>
I've recently seen several references (on JewishGen) to Jews employed by the Czar. Considering the general distain Russians exhibited (and still exhibit) towards Jewish people, was this a reality?
-- Deanna M. Levinsky, Long Island, NY
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Re: Help with a town/village in Russia - Kaliskovkeh
#general
Arkady K <arkadyka@...>
Received a very kind email from someone who explained what Kaliskovkeh was. It was actually a large estate, a folwark specifically and it was largely dismantled by the Russian Czar somewhere around 1902-ish. Searching for it right now yields zero results, because it was never a town/village/etc, just a large plantation.
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Re: Update to the Family Tree of the Jewish People
#JewishGenUpdates
Laura Gold
I want to be a town leader for Shatava but have not received any response to my previous emails. I also want to submit material for the Odessa site and have not been able to make contact with the town leader. Please assist in connecting me with someone in JewishGen who can make this happen.
Laura Gold
Vice President of the Jewish Genealogical Society of Los Angeles
-----Original Message-----
From: Avraham Groll <agroll@...> To: main@... Sent: Fri, Oct 9, 2020 2:16 pm Subject: [Special] [JewishGen.org] Update to the Family Tree of the Jewish People #JewishGenUpdates JewishGen is pleased to announce a significant upgrade to the Family Tree of the Jewish People (FTJP), enabling the addition of 555 new family trees, representing 454,416 individuals. In total, the Family Tree of the Jewish People now includes 7,684 trees which represent approximately 8,642,345 individuals.
While small in comparison to Family Tree collections at major commercial sites, the JewishGen Family Tree of the Jewish People provides researchers with unique access to vital Jewish family history information that is available in no other facility. We encourage everyone to utilize this valuable resource that we hope will continue to grow on an ongoing basis.
Improving the FTJP was labor intensive and required the navigation of many complex systems and processes. In this regard, please join me in expressing our gratitude to volunteers Gary Sandler (Director of Systems Administration) and Iris Folkson (FTJP, Support and IT Coordinator) for the dozens of hours they spent analyzing and upgrading our system, adding trees for the first time since in 2018, and ensuring that the FTJP can be updated on a monthly basis going forward.
To submit a Family Tree, please visit: https://www.jewishgen.org/gedcom/
Shabbat Shalom & Chag Sameach.
Avraham Groll
Executive Director
JewishGen.org
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Re: Help with a town/village in Russia - Kaliskovkeh
#general
Leah and Eli Teicher
Hi,
The name of the village I imgine is KULACKOWCE pronounced Kulchkovtse.
It is now in Ukraine by the name KLITVICI pronounced Klitvichi.
It is south Kolomyya near the town Zablotiv now, then Zablotow.
These places were south Poland, today in Ikraine.
In that billage was born my father inlaw.
It held at most 150 Jews.
Working in farmers' works.
Leah Teicher
נשלח מסמארטפון ה-Samsung Galaxy שלי.
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Re: Researching family in Saint Petersburg, Russia
#russia
GRSN@...
I spoke with my husband and he said that we were told that my Great Grandfather Alexander Borisovich was in charge of the Hospital at Kronstadt. When he did not come home it was on the same day of the Revolution when the Czar was arrested.
My Great Grandmother Nechama (Anna) Alterman Shneyer worked for the Czar as well. She was able to return to Riga with Theodore, Fanny, Lida and William when Alexander was murdered. Thank you for your information and kindness. I will continue my research. I did add some info about the Revolution and death of my Great Grandfather as we know it. Gail Nussbaum
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Re: Kremenets region - Village of Kolosova
#ukraine
Arkady K <arkadyka@...>
Alexander,
I was wrong in my original premise, it was not Kolosva Ukraine - it was this place: https://radzima.net/eng/miejsce/kalyskovka-347.html Some kind of village that no longer exists, but very close to Dolginovo. -- Arkady Kamenetsky
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Re: Kremenets region - Village of Kolosova
#ukraine
Arkady K <arkadyka@...>
So I tracked it down to this https://radzima.net/eng/miejsce/kalyskovka-347.html . Looks like it was a village that existed near Dolginovo.
I used online image translation of his tombstone and there is no real information about him, just some torah sayings. What frustrates me more than anything is that Dolginovo or otherwise, this is roughly the same region/county of Belarus. All belonging to the Russian Empire. JewishGen has Belarussian birth records, but none for these members of the family. I have their names: Kamenetsky/Kaminecki (Yakov, Hayim, Dveira) Birth dates: 1891 Location: Vileyka Region Nothing comes up. At all. Is it possible that they simply were not registered and that is why the Belarus database contains nothing? -- Arkady Kamenetsky
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Re: Help with a town/village in Russia - Kaliskovkeh
#general
Arkady K <arkadyka@...>
Marcy, It is this thing: https://radzima.net/eng/miejsce/kalyskovka-347.html
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Dieveniskes (Divenishok), Lihuania, Photo for Identification
#photographs
#lithuania
Adam Cherson
This is one of a series of high-definition photographs obtained from town residents/for identification. Year: about 1928
Comments: front row from viewer’s left: unknown-A/unknown-B/Tsvi Hersh ROGOL (confirmed)/unknown-D/Basyeh RUDNIK (?); middle row from viewer’s left: unknown-E/Yakov BENYAKONSKI (confirmed)/Breyneh RUDNIK (confirmed)/Sholem ROSENBLUM (?); standing from viewer’s left: Avraham KARCHMER (confirmed)/Shlomo LEVINE (?)/ unknown-H/unknown-I/unknown-J/Bilkhe CHERSON (confirmed)); NB: Unknown A and Unknown I are believed to be siblings. Adam Cherson MORRISON, MULLER, OZER, PALLETZ, PALMANTER, PENN, PRENSKY, RABINOWITZ, RAMSAY, RAPHAEL, RAYBIN, RECKON, REINES, RIVESMAN, ROBBINS, RODER, ROSEN, ROSENBERG. ROSS, ROTHBERG, RUBENSTEIN, RUBIN, RUDBERG, RUDNITSKY, RUTBERG, SAGAN, SAGANSKI, SCHMIDT, SCHNITZER, SCHWED, SECONDHOUSE, SHOHAM, SHULMAN, SILVERMAN, SIMKO, SINDEROVSKY, SMITH, SOLKOFF, SOLOMON, SPIRT, STAMLER, STAUFFER, STREISAND, STROMBERG, TELENT, TILZER, TOW, VINSON, VURGAIT, WADLER, WAGNER, WEINSTOCK, WEITZMAN, WHITE, WHITMORE, WILLIAMS, WOLF, ZEIDMAN– California/Florida/ Massachusetts/ New Jersey/New York/Pennsylvania/Texas/Australia/England/Ireland/Israel/Spain/Venezuela/Vilna/Svir/Lida/Voronova/Konvalishki
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Re: Kremenets region - Village of Kolosova
#ukraine
Sherri Bobish
Arkady, You can post a request to the discussion list asking for someone who can read Hebrew to translate the stone for you. I tried to find Yakov Kamenetsky's passenger manifest, but could not, even using soundex search on both the first and surname. I tried using Jacob instead of Yaakov. He supposedly arrived in Seattle in 1937, according to: https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/kamenetsky-yaakov I cannot find a manifest for his wife, Etta HELLER. Quite a mystery! Regards, Sherri Bobish
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Re: Help with a town/village in Russia - Kaliskovkeh
#general
koshka5@...
Dear Arkady,
My maternal great-grandparents came from a shtetl in Vitebsk, Belarus called Kolyshki. Sometimes it is called Kalisk. Marcy Kalvelage
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"Restoring a Pre-Holocaust Torah, and a Family" in DOROT
#announcements
#hungary
sjgwed@...
Sometimes, writers receive unexpected payoffs when their words spur readers into action. My article describes what happened when a cousin I never knew read my memoir, BECAUSE OF EVA: A Jewish Genealogical Journey. It's in the Fall 2020 issue of DOROT, Journal of the Jewish Genealogical Society of New York.
LINK - Susan J. Gordon sjgwed@... ZBARAZ, SKALAT, BUDAPEST, LVOV Bialazurker, Lempert, Schoenhaut
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