May 5, 2022 - 4 Iyar 5782

Dear JewishGen Community,

Among the many virtues of placing family history information online, is coming across items of historical value. In honor of Yom Ha'Atzmaut, Israel Independence Day, here is the birth record of Theodore HERZL, born in Budapest on May 2, 1860, to Jacob HERZL and Jeanette DIAMANT. It was come across by the late Sam Schleman, z'l, as part of his work coordinating the JewishGen Hungarian Vital Records project.

As we celebrate Israel's 74th birthday, please take some time to explore some of the incredible Israel-related content on JewishGen. For example:

• U.S. Department of State: Jerusalem, Jaffa, and Haifa Consular Post Records: This database contains more than 9,000 entries, comprised of Foreign Service Post Records of the U.S. Department of State for Consular Posts: Jerusalem (1857-1935), Jaffa (1867-1917), and Haifa (1872-1917).
• Cemetery Research in Israel: A helpful article by Dahn Cukier to help those researching graves in Israel

In addition to records and information, here are some links to Israel-related articles contained in various Yizkor Books that JewishGen has translated. They contain perspectives and first-hand accounts of the dreams, yearnings, desires, and hardships that people experienced to reach the land of Israel.

• Plonsk, Poland: My Youth in Plonsk: This article was written by David Ben-Gurion, the first Prime Minister of Israel, and describes, in great detail, his desire to embrace the Hebrew language, and to live in Israel from a young age.
• Khorostkiv, Ukraine: Rabbi Mesholem Rath, the second to last Rabbi from Khorstkiv, and his position on Yom Ha'Atzmaut: In this article by Shalom Klinger, he writes of a visit to Israel and meeting with other "countrymen" from his youth who persuaded him to document his memories of growing up and living in Khorostkiv. Among many things, he describes the perspectives of Rabbi Mesholem Rath (the Rabbi of Khorostkiv for 30 years) with regards to the religious significance of establishing the State of Israel.
• Roktyne, Ukraine: I Made Aliyah on the Eve of the Holocaust (scroll down to p. 195): Anyone who has read the Leon Uris book “Exodus” or seen the movie will recognize this story written by Sarah Yasmin (Schwartzblat), a former resident of Roktyne. Sarah writes of the squalid conditions of the decrepit ships, the fears of people who knew the chances to reach 'Eretz Yisroel' "were dim” and the British efforts to turn away refugees.
• Bender, Moldova: In the days of the Second Aliyah: This article was written by Rivka Machneimythe, the daughter of Baruch Holodenko (a well-known educator, and delegate to the Zionist Congress), who made Aliyah at the age of 17, and against the wishes of her father.
• Divenishok, Lithuania: From Divenishok to Eretz-Israel (scroll down to page 119): A small article by Khenye Harari, from which one can almost feel the joy and anticipation the author felt as she approached Israel.

Wishing Israel a very happy birthday!

The JewishGen Team

My paternal grandfather was born in Kolomea but lived in Tlumaczyk before emigrating. In trying to learn about this village, I'm also finding references to Tlumacz. Were they the same place? I found Tlumaczyk on a map between Kolomea and Nadworna. I'm not finding Tlumacz. Can someone enlighten me?

Sherry Robinson, Albuquerque

Family History Today: Ask a Genealogy Librarian - Online & Archival Resources for U.S. Research

Wednesday, May 18, 7 pm Eastern Time / 4 pm Pacific Time (U.S.)

In our second genealogy Q & A session on Zoom, Moriah Amit, the Center for Jewish History's Senior Genealogy Librarian, will answer your questions about where to find specific types of U.S. records and how to use U.S. databases more effectively. This program is appropriate for beginner and intermediate-level researchers and for people from all Jewish communities, including those of Ashkenazi, Sephardi, and Mizrahi descent. We highly recommend that you send us your most important question in advance by replying to your registration confirmation email.

Tickets: Pay what you wish; register here for a Zoom link

This program is sponsored by the Ackman & Ziff Family Genealogy Institute at the Center for Jewish History. It is funded, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council. Live closed captioning has been made possible by a grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services.

--
Moriah Amit
Senior Genealogy Librarian, Center for Jewish History
New York, NY
mamit@...

Hi, the link in this post is blank (actually about:blank).

It should be: https://lublin.ap.gov.pl/nowe-skany-z-zasobu-apl-na-swa-od-14-03-2022-do-02-05-2022/

--
Jeff Goldner
Researching Goldner, Singer, Neuman, Braun, Schwartz, Gluck, Reichfeld (Hungary/Slovakia); Adler, Roth, Ader (Galicia); Soltz/Shultz/Zuckerman/Zicherman (Vitebsk, maybe Lithuania), Wald and Grunfeld (Secovce, Slovakia fka Galszecs)

The Kindertransport was not such an heroic rescue as it sounds. The UK government refused to allow any parents to come, so most of the children soon became orphans. At least 1000 of the older children were classed as enemy aliens and interned in the Isle of Man or sent to Canada, and they were all supposed to be sent back "when the crisi was over". Not much has changed.

Alan Cohen

Indeed, David. Re the Kindertransport, I attended a recent exhibition at the Jewish Museum in Vienna where I read that 90% of the children escaping from Austria in 1939 came to the UK. The remaining 10% went to other European countries, and the USA which took very few. Sadly, many of those who went to other European countries principally France and Belgium ended up being murdered anyway after 1940 or were left to escape on their own.

As residents of the area surrounding Ridley Road, my family was delighted when they had the opportunity to 'migrate' to North West London
--
Ian Charles
London, UK

One of my families committed suicide together in Prague in 1942, rather than join a transport.   The father was a doctor, and injected his wife, daughter and son-in-law before injecting himself with a substance which took their lives.  Their bodies were found by the wife's brother, my great uncle.   I suppose that this would technically be a murder/suicide, but the family has always understood that this was a consensual arrangement.   As you say, these deaths occurred under very difficult conditions.

Julia Trainor
Canberra, Australia

Thanks for this and your previous correspondence, Hans!

I will indeed follow up with the Hannover Archives.

As for Schiffgraben 55 (the family's main home in the 1930s), it does indeed look lovely now, but when my father, his siblings, and one or two cousins sued for its lawful return to the family (in the 1950s), I recently (sadly) learned that it was nothing more than a bombed-out pile of rubble.  :-(  As such, they recovered a paltry sum when they sold it.  But at least they won the court case to have the Nazi-era sale of it to a well-connected (Nazi?) lawyer (at pfennigs on the Mark) overturned.
--
Marc Stevens
Toronto

This is a Ketuba (Jewish mandatory marriage contract) between Chaim son of Mordechai and Sarah daughter of Chaim Dov. 

--
Yitschok Margareten

The first document is a contract between the Tiferes Yisroel synagogue and Chaim Preissman for a seat sale. 

The second document is a Tena'aim (prenuptial agreement) between Eliezer Dov representing his brother the groom Chaim and Chaim Dov representing his daughter Sara. 

--
Yitschok Margareten

First of all, this is Hebrew, not Yiddish.
Although I'm fluent in Hebrew, the language here is very archaic and it would be a huge effort for me to translate.  I'll do it if no one else can.
In the meantime, this looks like some sort of marriage contract - maybe even a very 'rough' ketuba - dated the 21st of Shevat 5635 (January 27, 1875).
---------------------------------------------------------------
Steve Goldberg
Jerusalem, Israel
Researching:
Sagan/Shagan family from Veliuona (Velon), Lithuania
Goldberg family from Vidukle, Lithuania
Susselovitch/Zuselovitch family from Raseiniai (Rassein), Lithuania

A few things to mention in order to create some balance.

The Jewish community in and around Ridley Road left of its own accord as it prospered, not on trains to death camps.

Kindertransport

The benign conditions for internees on the Isle of Man

Etc, etc.

David Cantor

--
The Lublin branch of the Polish State Archives announced on 2 May 2022 that the national headquarters has released additional scans of records from the Lublin and Zamosc Archives and posted them on the PSA’s website. These scans had been available temporarily on a special Lublin website (LAC.gov.pl) until they were incorporated into the national site: https://szukajwarchiwach.gov.pl/. As a result, most of these scans have been taken down from the temporary LAC website.

 

The new release is for additional years of vital records for the Jewish Communities of Ryki, Baranow, Bilgoraj, Biskupice and Bychawa. Most have already been extracted by JRI-Poland and interested researchers can learn more about them by contacting the associated volunteer town leader through the new JRI-Poland.org website by visiting the Town Explorer card and clicking on the brown rectangle that reads “Contact Town Volunteer Leadership”.

The newly uploaded images add to the collection of Lublin area vital records scans for Jews and all religious denominations found in pre-1826 Roman Catholic Parish registers. (These churches served as the civil registrars for all residents prior to 1826.)  Most Jewish records in the parish registers of the Lublin and Zamosc area have been extracted by JRI-Poland and are already available to qualifying contributors of our associated town data projects.

By Summer, we expect to have these (and other) early Lublin and Zamosc vital records spreadsheets (1820-1825) available for download to all JRI-Poland members in good standing as a thank you for your annual membership. (Annual membership differs from becoming a qualifying contributor to a particular project.)

The Lublin Archives has posted a list the newly available scans:

https://lublin.ap.gov.pl/nowe-skany-z-zasobu-apl-na-swa-od-14-03-2022-do-02-05-2022/

--- 

Robinn Magid

Berkeley, California

Assistant Director, JRI- Poland & Lublin Research Area Coordinator

Robinn.Magid@...

 

Shelley Pollero

Severna Park, Maryland

Zamosc Research Area Coordinator

rkpollero@...

 

This is Hebrew, not Yiddish.
Quite an effort to translate, even though I'm fluent in Hebrew.  I'll let someone else try to tackle this archaic Hebrew.
It looks like a contract/'bill of sale' for seating places in the synagogue.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Steve Goldberg
Jerusalem, Israel
Researching:
Sagan/Shagan family from Veliuona (Velon), Lithuania
Goldberg family from Vidukle, Lithuania
Susselovitch/Zuselovitch family from Raseiniai (Rassein), Lithuania

Kurator: curator, trustee, guardian

Norma Klein

If you upload it to ViewMate, translators will be able to rotate it to it's correct orientation with ViewMate's interface. 
ViewMate - Instructions (jewishgen.org)
This will be very helpful for the translators.
Your image will get a ViewMate identification number.  And it will be there, onscreen for a whole week without being pushed down to page 2 or 3 or whatever. It will then be archived. Should the need ever arise in the future, you can request a repost of that specific image on viewmate, and you can even edit the explanation with further info. This will be very useful for you.


--
Odeda Zlotnick
Jerusalem, Israel.

On Wed, May 4, 2022 at 08:54 PM, Judith Kazen wrote:

Als Kuratorin fungierte Pesie Mariem Schustak

Pesie Mariem Schustak functioned as a guardian.
 
--
Odeda Zlotnick
Jerusalem, Israel.