I’m looking for advice on how to handle some delicate situations that I’ve come across while researching into my various family branches, both on US sites and on Jewishgen. I’ve enjoyed sharing everything that I’ve found with family, have reconnected with distant relatives, have been on Zoom calls with those relatives, and have generally enjoyed the whole process.

However, with my relatives seeing the plethora of records that I’ve uncovered, a few have asked me why I haven’t located certain things. For instance: Have I discovered yet how we are descended from one or another of the famous Kalonymus rabbis? Or: Have I found any records of our great great grandfather Aaron Lock (Lak) of Zagare, Lithuania, because someone once met someone who remembers he was an administrator in a Jewish high school there.

I don’t know what to answer people when asked these questions. The records I’ve found firmly show our extended families were simple working class Litvak Jews from northern Lithuania, with no connections to any rabbinical dynasty. As for Aaron Lock/Lak, I found an 1892 tax record listing him as a poor cabman in Zagare. Based on an 1834 revision list, he was born in 1821, far too early to have been a high school administrator in the early 1900s.

So, I’m interested in how others have handled such situations when they’ve come up.