A new generation of non-fiction readers among your family, students
and friends may not have had the opportunity to read the books of the
late Amos Elon. We have just reissued three as ebooks. Take a look at:
http://plunkettlakepress.com/ael.html

--
www.helenepstein.com
www.plunkettlakepress.com

A new generation of non-fiction readers among your family, students
and friends may not have had the opportunity to read the books of the
late Amos Elon. We have just reissued three as ebooks. Take a look at:
http://plunkettlakepress.com/ael.html

--
www.helenepstein.com
www.plunkettlakepress.com

http://www.jewishgen.org/Ukraine/GEO_town.asp?id=70

Try here and also look in JewishGen's Ukraine database--perhaps you can find the
family in the 1906 Duma voter lists database. I know there are entries for that town
there.

Evan WOlfson

http://www.jewishgen.org/Ukraine/GEO_town.asp?id=70

Try here and also look in JewishGen's Ukraine database--perhaps you can find the
family in the 1906 Duma voter lists database. I know there are entries for that town
there.

Evan WOlfson

We have received message this past year that thousands of Priluki records
have been added to the JewishGen Ukraine database. To date, I have found no
new Priluki records. In fact, entering only "Priluki" as a search term, very
few records come up.

I'm sure I'm doing something wrong...looking at the wrong database, or
having to log in in some other way.... Can anyone help me on this?

Peter Cohen
Pleasanton, CA

We have received message this past year that thousands of Priluki records
have been added to the JewishGen Ukraine database. To date, I have found no
new Priluki records. In fact, entering only "Priluki" as a search term, very
few records come up.

I'm sure I'm doing something wrong...looking at the wrong database, or
having to log in in some other way.... Can anyone help me on this?

Peter Cohen
Pleasanton, CA

My Denester family resided in Dusanow or vicinity in Ukraine.Does anyone have any
record of them?

Paul Safran

My Denester family resided in Dusanow or vicinity in Ukraine.Does anyone have any
record of them?

Paul Safran

Marcella:

The Hamburg departure list via Ancestry.com shows David ZALUK coming >from
Bialocerkow. Could be today's Bialozorka, Ukraine. See Jewishgen Kehilalinks:
http://kehilalinks.jewishgen.org/Belozerka/

David Rosen
Boston, MA

Marcella Shames marcellash@... wrote:

Marcella:

The Hamburg departure list via Ancestry.com shows David ZALUK coming >from
Bialocerkow. Could be today's Bialozorka, Ukraine. See Jewishgen Kehilalinks:
http://kehilalinks.jewishgen.org/Belozerka/

David Rosen
Boston, MA

Marcella Shames marcellash@... wrote:

Hi
I've posted a note >from marriage record in Scala (1898), written in old
German handwriting, for which I need a transcription. It is on ViewMate
at the following address...

http://www.jewishgen.org/viewmate/viewmateview.asp?key=VM37265

Please respond via the form provided in the ViewMate application.
Thank you very much.

Yossi Yagur
Israel

Hi
I've posted a note >from marriage record in Scala (1898), written in old
German handwriting, for which I need a transcription. It is on ViewMate
at the following address...

http://www.jewishgen.org/viewmate/viewmateview.asp?key=VM37265

Please respond via the form provided in the ViewMate application.
Thank you very much.

Yossi Yagur
Israel

Ukraine SIG volunteers have been very busy during December. The
following represents what has been accomplished over the last 31 days:

**Records Submitted to JewishGen for inclusion in Ukraine Databases**
2,337 birth records >from Nikolayev and Priluki
2,126 records >from the Odessa 1876 birth index

**Translations begun**
Vinnitsa Archives, Ternivka, 1903 census (50 pages)
Nezhin 486 images >from microfilm 2091574 -3

**In proofreading process**
2,350 records >from EIDB project
1,561 records >from Nikolayev 1875 census
128 records >from 1818 census Rozhev and Chabno, Radomysl'

**Translations/Transcriptions ready for proofreading**
Priluki 2192584
Item 28, deaths 1865 - males 20, females 33
item 30, deaths 1866 - males 42, females 33
item 33, deaths 1868 - males 54, females 38

Priluki 2192583
Item 4, divorces 1855 - 2

**Awaiting donations to complete translation project**
1875 Zinkov revision list: 8680 names

**EIDB towns**
Sumy, Kharkov

**Scans of Microfilms Acquired**
Priluki 2423897:
Item 14 Volume 1530-6/119 Deaths 1896 - 38 images
Item 15 Volume 1530-6/120 Divorces 1896 - 12 images
Item 16 Volume 1530-6/121 Births 1897 - 7 images
Item 17 Volume 1530-6/122 Deaths 1897 - 35 images
Item 18 Volume 1530-6/123 Marriages 1897 - 37 images
Item 19 Volume 1530-6/124 Births 1898 - 69 images
Item 20 Volume 1530-6/125 Deaths 1898 - 35 images
Item 21 Volume 1530-6/126 Marriages 1898 - 34 images

Priluki 2323898
Item 1 Volume 1530-6/126 (cont.) Marriages 1898 - 21 images
Item 2 Volume 1530-6/127 Births 1899 -170 images
Item 3 Volume 1530-6/128 Deaths 1899 - 71 images
Item 4 Volume 1530-6/129 Marriages 1899 - 44 images
Item 5 Volume 1530-6/130 Divorces 1899 - 9 images

Moshny 2289406
Item 2 1886 births - 30 images

Moshny 2289407
Item 4 1889 births- 50 images
Item 5 1890 births - 46 images

**Records acquired**
Metrical (vital) records for Letichev uyezd, >from the Khmielnitsky
archives. There are a total of 1,430 images, about 4.5 gigabytes. They
include most (but not all) years between 1838 and 1852. These records
cover many towns including Zinkov, Medzhibozh, Letichev, Derazhnya and
other towns

"Di Yidn fun Mayn Benkshaft" (The Jews I remember), by Mordechai (Max)
Cooper, a Yiddish memoir of the local personalities and life in Shargorod

**Town Leaders (added since August)**
Mel Grizer & Roy Gerber - Ozeryany, Rivnenski oblast, Volhnya Guberiya
Scott Whittman - Gaysin
Les Shipnuck - Ignatovka, Kiev
Vladimir Talsky - Ovruch
Steve Wernick - Vinnitsa

**New members of discussion list (since August)**
81 (we now have 3491 members)

Dr. Janette Silverman
JewishGen Ukraine-SIG Coordinator
ukrainesig.coordinator@...
http://www.jewishgen.org/Ukraine/default.asp
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Ukraine-SIG/180102942060505

Ukraine SIG volunteers have been very busy during December. The
following represents what has been accomplished over the last 31 days:

**Records Submitted to JewishGen for inclusion in Ukraine Databases**
2,337 birth records >from Nikolayev and Priluki
2,126 records >from the Odessa 1876 birth index

**Translations begun**
Vinnitsa Archives, Ternivka, 1903 census (50 pages)
Nezhin 486 images >from microfilm 2091574 -3

**In proofreading process**
2,350 records >from EIDB project
1,561 records >from Nikolayev 1875 census
128 records >from 1818 census Rozhev and Chabno, Radomysl'

**Translations/Transcriptions ready for proofreading**
Priluki 2192584
Item 28, deaths 1865 - males 20, females 33
item 30, deaths 1866 - males 42, females 33
item 33, deaths 1868 - males 54, females 38

Priluki 2192583
Item 4, divorces 1855 - 2

**Awaiting donations to complete translation project**
1875 Zinkov revision list: 8680 names

**EIDB towns**
Sumy, Kharkov

**Scans of Microfilms Acquired**
Priluki 2423897:
Item 14 Volume 1530-6/119 Deaths 1896 - 38 images
Item 15 Volume 1530-6/120 Divorces 1896 - 12 images
Item 16 Volume 1530-6/121 Births 1897 - 7 images
Item 17 Volume 1530-6/122 Deaths 1897 - 35 images
Item 18 Volume 1530-6/123 Marriages 1897 - 37 images
Item 19 Volume 1530-6/124 Births 1898 - 69 images
Item 20 Volume 1530-6/125 Deaths 1898 - 35 images
Item 21 Volume 1530-6/126 Marriages 1898 - 34 images

Priluki 2323898
Item 1 Volume 1530-6/126 (cont.) Marriages 1898 - 21 images
Item 2 Volume 1530-6/127 Births 1899 -170 images
Item 3 Volume 1530-6/128 Deaths 1899 - 71 images
Item 4 Volume 1530-6/129 Marriages 1899 - 44 images
Item 5 Volume 1530-6/130 Divorces 1899 - 9 images

Moshny 2289406
Item 2 1886 births - 30 images

Moshny 2289407
Item 4 1889 births- 50 images
Item 5 1890 births - 46 images

**Records acquired**
Metrical (vital) records for Letichev uyezd, >from the Khmielnitsky
archives. There are a total of 1,430 images, about 4.5 gigabytes. They
include most (but not all) years between 1838 and 1852. These records
cover many towns including Zinkov, Medzhibozh, Letichev, Derazhnya and
other towns

"Di Yidn fun Mayn Benkshaft" (The Jews I remember), by Mordechai (Max)
Cooper, a Yiddish memoir of the local personalities and life in Shargorod

**Town Leaders (added since August)**
Mel Grizer & Roy Gerber - Ozeryany, Rivnenski oblast, Volhnya Guberiya
Scott Whittman - Gaysin
Les Shipnuck - Ignatovka, Kiev
Vladimir Talsky - Ovruch
Steve Wernick - Vinnitsa

**New members of discussion list (since August)**
81 (we now have 3491 members)

Dr. Janette Silverman
JewishGen Ukraine-SIG Coordinator
ukrainesig.coordinator@...
http://www.jewishgen.org/Ukraine/default.asp
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Ukraine-SIG/180102942060505

JewishGen is proud to announce its 2014 year-end report for the
Memorial Plaques Project database. The MPP database can be accessed
at

http://www.jewishgen.org/databases/Memorial/

The MPP database includes the data >from plaques and Yizkor lists >from
synagogue and other organizations. Many of these sources include
patronymic information.

This update adds approximately 15,000 new records and 11,000 new
photos >from 20 synagogues/organizations. The database now includes
more than 75,500 records >from the US, Israel Canada and Morocco.
These records come >from 111 different synagogues and other
institutions.

We believe that the MPP is a good example of how users of JewishGen's
databases can "give back". If you are a member of a synagogue or
other organization with memorial plaques or Yizkor lists, please
consider helping us to grow this database. You can find more
information on submitting data at

http://www.jewishgen.org/databases/Memorial/Submit.htm

If you have additional questions, please contact me directly.

This update includes US data sets >from California, Connecticut,
District of Columbia, Georgia, Massachusetts, New York, Pennsylvania,
South Carolina and Texas. Also included is a new data set >from
Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.

Nolan Altman
NAltman@...
JewishGen Acting VP for Data Acquisition
December, 2014

JewishGen is proud to announce its 2014 year-end report for the
Memorial Plaques Project database. The MPP database can be accessed
at

http://www.jewishgen.org/databases/Memorial/

The MPP database includes the data >from plaques and Yizkor lists >from
synagogue and other organizations. Many of these sources include
patronymic information.

This update adds approximately 15,000 new records and 11,000 new
photos >from 20 synagogues/organizations. The database now includes
more than 75,500 records >from the US, Israel Canada and Morocco.
These records come >from 111 different synagogues and other
institutions.

We believe that the MPP is a good example of how users of JewishGen's
databases can "give back". If you are a member of a synagogue or
other organization with memorial plaques or Yizkor lists, please
consider helping us to grow this database. You can find more
information on submitting data at

http://www.jewishgen.org/databases/Memorial/Submit.htm

If you have additional questions, please contact me directly.

This update includes US data sets >from California, Connecticut,
District of Columbia, Georgia, Massachusetts, New York, Pennsylvania,
South Carolina and Texas. Also included is a new data set >from
Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.

Nolan Altman
NAltman@...
JewishGen Acting VP for Data Acquisition
December, 2014

JewishGen is proud to announce its 2014 year end update to the
JOWBR (JewishGen's Online Worldwide Burial Registry) database. The
JOWBR database can be accessed at

http://www.jewishgen.org/databases/Cemetery/

If you're a new JOWBR user, we recommend that you visit our screencast
page at

http://www.jewishgen.org/databases/Cemetery/Screencasts/

and take a look at the first two explanatory screencasts.

This update adds approximately 102,100 new records and 45,200
new photos. The database is adding and/or updating 639 cemeteries.
This update brings JOWBR's holdings to 2.37 million records >from
almost 4,970 cemeteries / cemetery sections representing 104 countries!

Once again, donors for this update include a mix of individuals,
Jewish genealogical societies, historical societies and museums. We
appreciate all our donor's submissions and the transliteration work
done by a faithful group of JewishGen volunteers.

I want to particularly thank Eric Feinstein who has been helping
me to find and gain permission to add many of the German towns in
addition to records >from under-represented countries. Eric's group of
volunteers includes Alla Aizenberg, Sharon Duckman, Helen Furnell,
Henry Graupner, Maurice Kessler, Harriet Mayer, Amit Pinsler, Guy Haber,
Sari Tuomioja, and Paula Zieselman. In addition, without our volunteer
transliterators, led by Gilberto Jugend, we would not be able to add
the information >from some very difficult to read photos.

Significant additions to the database include collections from
Johannesburg Cemeteries - Braamfontein Cemetery, Brixton Cemetery,
and West Park Cemetery.
Moldovan Cemeteries - Balti, Doyna Cemetery (Saint Lazarus Cemetery,
and Tiraspol.
Berlin, Germany's Weissensee Cemetery.
Stockholm, Sweeden's Sodra Judiska Begravningsplatsen.
Switzerland's Jewish cemetery in Veyrier.
Rabat, Morocco's Cimetiere Israelite (Vieux) in Rabat
Lomza, Poland's Jewish Cemetery
Chernivtsi, Ukraine
Home of Peace (San Jose) Cemetery in San Jose, California
Montrepose Cemetery in Kingston, NY
Also included in this update are thousands of records in the
first installment of Jewish veteran burials in military cemeteries
predominantly >from World War I in France, Italy and Belgium and
other cemeteries around the world.

This update also includes our first records >from 19 new
countries, many are for veteran burials; Angola, Bahrain, Bulgaria,
Cambodia, Cape Verde, Colombia, Cyprus, Ethiopia, Ghana, Iceland,
Lebanon, Madagascar, Malawi, Monaco, Mongolia, Norway, Pakistan,
Philippines, and Uzbekistan.

Visit

http://www.jewishgen.org/databases/Cemetery/tree/CemList.htm

for a complete listing of cemeteries currently in the JOWBR database.

We appreciate all the work our donors have done and encourage you
to make additional submissions. Whether you work on a cemetery /
cemetery section individually or consider a group project for your
local Society, temple or other group, it's your submissions that help
grow the JOWBR database and make it possible for researchers and family
members to find answers they otherwise might not. Please also consider
other organizations you may be affiliated with that may already have
done cemetery indexing that would consider having their records
included in the JOWBR database.
Nolan Altman
NAltman@...
JewishGen Acting VP for Data Acquisition
December, 2014

JewishGen is proud to announce its 2014 year end update to the
JOWBR (JewishGen's Online Worldwide Burial Registry) database. The
JOWBR database can be accessed at

http://www.jewishgen.org/databases/Cemetery/

If you're a new JOWBR user, we recommend that you visit our screencast
page at

http://www.jewishgen.org/databases/Cemetery/Screencasts/

and take a look at the first two explanatory screencasts.

This update adds approximately 102,100 new records and 45,200
new photos. The database is adding and/or updating 639 cemeteries.
This update brings JOWBR's holdings to 2.37 million records >from
almost 4,970 cemeteries / cemetery sections representing 104 countries!

Once again, donors for this update include a mix of individuals,
Jewish genealogical societies, historical societies and museums. We
appreciate all our donor's submissions and the transliteration work
done by a faithful group of JewishGen volunteers.

I want to particularly thank Eric Feinstein who has been helping
me to find and gain permission to add many of the German towns in
addition to records >from under-represented countries. Eric's group of
volunteers includes Alla Aizenberg, Sharon Duckman, Helen Furnell,
Henry Graupner, Maurice Kessler, Harriet Mayer, Amit Pinsler, Guy Haber,
Sari Tuomioja, and Paula Zieselman. In addition, without our volunteer
transliterators, led by Gilberto Jugend, we would not be able to add
the information >from some very difficult to read photos.

Significant additions to the database include collections from
Johannesburg Cemeteries - Braamfontein Cemetery, Brixton Cemetery,
and West Park Cemetery.
Moldovan Cemeteries - Balti, Doyna Cemetery (Saint Lazarus Cemetery,
and Tiraspol.
Berlin, Germany's Weissensee Cemetery.
Stockholm, Sweeden's Sodra Judiska Begravningsplatsen.
Switzerland's Jewish cemetery in Veyrier.
Rabat, Morocco's Cimetiere Israelite (Vieux) in Rabat
Lomza, Poland's Jewish Cemetery
Chernivtsi, Ukraine
Home of Peace (San Jose) Cemetery in San Jose, California
Montrepose Cemetery in Kingston, NY
Also included in this update are thousands of records in the
first installment of Jewish veteran burials in military cemeteries
predominantly >from World War I in France, Italy and Belgium and
other cemeteries around the world.

This update also includes our first records >from 19 new
countries, many are for veteran burials; Angola, Bahrain, Bulgaria,
Cambodia, Cape Verde, Colombia, Cyprus, Ethiopia, Ghana, Iceland,
Lebanon, Madagascar, Malawi, Monaco, Mongolia, Norway, Pakistan,
Philippines, and Uzbekistan.

Visit

http://www.jewishgen.org/databases/Cemetery/tree/CemList.htm

for a complete listing of cemeteries currently in the JOWBR database.

We appreciate all the work our donors have done and encourage you
to make additional submissions. Whether you work on a cemetery /
cemetery section individually or consider a group project for your
local Society, temple or other group, it's your submissions that help
grow the JOWBR database and make it possible for researchers and family
members to find answers they otherwise might not. Please also consider
other organizations you may be affiliated with that may already have
done cemetery indexing that would consider having their records
included in the JOWBR database.
Nolan Altman
NAltman@...
JewishGen Acting VP for Data Acquisition
December, 2014

Dear fellow Sub-Carpathia researchers,

As another successful year comes to a close, I wanted to issue a year-end
wrap-up:

1. All Sub-Carpathia researchers are strongly encouraged to subscribe to
this list, so they do not miss important announcements in the future. As
of this writing, we have 395 researchers registered. Every e-mail I receive
is checked against the member list and I have noticed that there are still
many more Sub-Carpathia researchers who are not subscribed to it. I
encourage them to join the Sub-Carpathia SIG list because it will be important at
some point in the future. I follow-up on all who contact me for one reason
or another and, as a result, many have joined the list.

2. We now have 222 Sub-Carpathia KehilaLink web sites for those villages
and towns, most of which where a Jewish cemetery was found and
photographed. [Six KehilaLink web sites have been created by others.] Of particular
note, the Sub-Carpathia SIG portal indicates great worldwide interest in
this area. With that in mind, all of the web sites I have created can be
translated now to other languages for everyone's world-wide benefit. I should
explain my zeal in creating these web sites: When I first started
researching my shtetl on the Internet, I found nothing, so I created a KehilaLink
web site on JewishGen for it. Since then, it has become my passion to
create KehilaLink web sites so that others do not hit a brick wall when
attempting to research their shtetl, as I did. Furthermore, because many of you
are not able to travel to Sub-Carpathia to visit your ancestral village or
town, you can do so virtually via the KehilaLink web site, even performing a
"kavarous" finding your ancestors' tombstones. I wish to thank all
researchers who have contributed photos, documents, etc., to memorialize their
family members and to enhance the KehilaLink web sites for current and future
researchers.

3. I, and many other Sub-Carpathia researchers, attended the 34th IAJGS
Jewish Genealogy Conference in Salt Lake City, Utah, this year. We had
quite a few people stop by our table during the Share Fair, and the
Sub-Carpathia SIG meeting went very well. At the end of my presentation, we had a
roundtable discussion which was enjoyed by all. I will be attending the 35th
IAJGS Jewish Genealogy Conference, 6-10 July 2015, in Jerusalem, Israel.
If you plan on attending, please contact me, off-list. During the
conference week, I will be meeting with a very large group of Carpathia Jewish
ex-pats who now live in Israel as well as visiting several museums and
libraries. In 2008, I visited Yad Vashem with my cousin, Rudy KATZ, a Holocaust
survivor. Of particular note, Abraham SPIEGEL, who funded the children's
memorial at Yad Vashem, was in camps with Rudy and it was Rudy who pulled out
his gold teeth so they could be traded with the camp guards for a few rotten
potatoes.

4. The transcription of tombstones is progressing very nicely due to the
terrific group of volunteers helping me. As of this writing, only two (of
26) remain that are in-progress >from 2011. >from 2012, only 11 (of 60)
remain that are in-progress. >from 2013, four are in-progress and 52 (of 89)
remain to be transcribed. >from 2014, eight are in progress and 22 (of 32)
remain to be transcribed. If you are not already transcribing tombstones and
can help with this very important project, please contact me. I can also
use help with transcribing the Russian inscriptions on the tombstones. In
case you missed my previous announcement, I completed photographing the
Uzhhorod (Ungvar) cemetery this year. It took three weeks, over a span of two
years, to photograph all the nearly 5,000 tombstones in Sub-Carpathia's
largest cemetery (over 13,000 images).

5. I am currently organizing my travel plans for Sub-Carpathia in 2015.
There are a few places I will be returning to since I have learned the
exact location of their Jewish cemeteries. Also, one researcher informed me
that where I had said there was no (visible) cemetery, there was, in fact, a
family member buried there, so I will return and consult the village elders
again, since I saw no visible cemetery at the spot where they indicated
the cemetery was located. If I have not visited your ancestral village or
town, to date, contact me, but first, please review the list of hamlets
visited in previous years which are documented in my 2011-2014 Trip Reports on
the Sub-Carpathia SIG portal.

< http://www.jewishgen.org/Sub-Carpathia/ > SEE: Travel Planning, then
Trip Reports

6. Several ongoing projects are taking much longer than expected,
primarily due to their sheer scope and cost. That having been stated, if you can
help financially, please contribute to the Sub-Carpathia SIG General Fund
here:

< http://www.jewishgen.org/JewishGen-erosity/v_projectslist.asp?project_cat=50 >

7. The Sub-Carpathia SIG portal has been updated in the following areas:
Event Calendar, Current Weather, Synagogues, Cemeteries, Photo Gallery, SIG
Survey, KehilaLinks and Interview. I was interviewed by Ukraine TV
(Tysa-1) in 2013, and again in the studio in 2014. That interview can now be
found on the Sub-Carpathia SIG portal. There are three segments to the
interview: a brief introduction in Ukrainian, followed by background information
filmed in 2013, then an in-studio interview in English and Ukrainian.
Lastly, I am working on adding missing villages and towns to the Sub-Carpathia
Gazetteer of villages and towns today. The Latin-character spellings have
been changing due to the gradual switchover >from the Russian-based
orthography to the Ukrainian-based one. Today, there are over 750 villages and
towns in Sub-Carpathia and I am informed that JewishGen will soon update its
Gazetteer with missing Sub-Carpathia villages and towns, some with
Ukrainian-based orthography changes.

< http://www.jewishgen.org/Sub-Carpathia/ >

8. I mentioned in my 2014 Trip Report that I would be willing to set up a
tour for researchers and two people have responded positively. For this
to come to fruition, and to be cost-effective, we need a group of at least
10 people to undertake a tour in Sub-Carpathia. If you are interested,
please notify me off-list by 15 January 2015. Our region is far removed >from
the unrest in Eastern Ukraine. It is business as usual and there is no cause
for alarm. U.S. and European passport holders do not need a visa. I am
not sure about other countries, but you can check if you need a visa on the
Sub-Carpathia portal.

< http://www.jewishgen.org/Sub-Carpathia/ > SEE: Travel Planning,
General Information

9. In 2014, the 70th anniversary of the deportations in Sub-Carpathia, I
attended several remembrance events in Sub-Carpathia, including being
invited to make a presentation at the Hungarian University in Berehove
(Beregszasz). In 2015, there will be additional events to commemorate the
liberations, and once again I have been invited to give a presentation on my work in
Sub-Carpathia.

10. Lastly, until now, this has been a two-person effort by myself and
Amos Israel ZEZMER to establish and sustain a Sub-Carpathia SIG. We started
this process in late 2009 and it took until May of 2011, against strong
resistance and great interference to get this SIG established. We are now
looking for others to step up and become members of a board that will sustain
the SIG in the years to come. This requires little or no work on your
part, but will ensure the continuity of our SIG. If you are moved to
volunteer, please contact me, off-list.

Respectfully,
Marshall Katz
JewishGen Sub-Carpathia SIG coordinator

Dear fellow Sub-Carpathia researchers,

As another successful year comes to a close, I wanted to issue a year-end
wrap-up:

1. All Sub-Carpathia researchers are strongly encouraged to subscribe to
this list, so they do not miss important announcements in the future. As
of this writing, we have 395 researchers registered. Every e-mail I receive
is checked against the member list and I have noticed that there are still
many more Sub-Carpathia researchers who are not subscribed to it. I
encourage them to join the Sub-Carpathia SIG list because it will be important at
some point in the future. I follow-up on all who contact me for one reason
or another and, as a result, many have joined the list.

2. We now have 222 Sub-Carpathia KehilaLink web sites for those villages
and towns, most of which where a Jewish cemetery was found and
photographed. [Six KehilaLink web sites have been created by others.] Of particular
note, the Sub-Carpathia SIG portal indicates great worldwide interest in
this area. With that in mind, all of the web sites I have created can be
translated now to other languages for everyone's world-wide benefit. I should
explain my zeal in creating these web sites: When I first started
researching my shtetl on the Internet, I found nothing, so I created a KehilaLink
web site on JewishGen for it. Since then, it has become my passion to
create KehilaLink web sites so that others do not hit a brick wall when
attempting to research their shtetl, as I did. Furthermore, because many of you
are not able to travel to Sub-Carpathia to visit your ancestral village or
town, you can do so virtually via the KehilaLink web site, even performing a
"kavarous" finding your ancestors' tombstones. I wish to thank all
researchers who have contributed photos, documents, etc., to memorialize their
family members and to enhance the KehilaLink web sites for current and future
researchers.

3. I, and many other Sub-Carpathia researchers, attended the 34th IAJGS
Jewish Genealogy Conference in Salt Lake City, Utah, this year. We had
quite a few people stop by our table during the Share Fair, and the
Sub-Carpathia SIG meeting went very well. At the end of my presentation, we had a
roundtable discussion which was enjoyed by all. I will be attending the 35th
IAJGS Jewish Genealogy Conference, 6-10 July 2015, in Jerusalem, Israel.
If you plan on attending, please contact me, off-list. During the
conference week, I will be meeting with a very large group of Carpathia Jewish
ex-pats who now live in Israel as well as visiting several museums and
libraries. In 2008, I visited Yad Vashem with my cousin, Rudy KATZ, a Holocaust
survivor. Of particular note, Abraham SPIEGEL, who funded the children's
memorial at Yad Vashem, was in camps with Rudy and it was Rudy who pulled out
his gold teeth so they could be traded with the camp guards for a few rotten
potatoes.

4. The transcription of tombstones is progressing very nicely due to the
terrific group of volunteers helping me. As of this writing, only two (of
26) remain that are in-progress >from 2011. >from 2012, only 11 (of 60)
remain that are in-progress. >from 2013, four are in-progress and 52 (of 89)
remain to be transcribed. >from 2014, eight are in progress and 22 (of 32)
remain to be transcribed. If you are not already transcribing tombstones and
can help with this very important project, please contact me. I can also
use help with transcribing the Russian inscriptions on the tombstones. In
case you missed my previous announcement, I completed photographing the
Uzhhorod (Ungvar) cemetery this year. It took three weeks, over a span of two
years, to photograph all the nearly 5,000 tombstones in Sub-Carpathia's
largest cemetery (over 13,000 images).

5. I am currently organizing my travel plans for Sub-Carpathia in 2015.
There are a few places I will be returning to since I have learned the
exact location of their Jewish cemeteries. Also, one researcher informed me
that where I had said there was no (visible) cemetery, there was, in fact, a
family member buried there, so I will return and consult the village elders
again, since I saw no visible cemetery at the spot where they indicated
the cemetery was located. If I have not visited your ancestral village or
town, to date, contact me, but first, please review the list of hamlets
visited in previous years which are documented in my 2011-2014 Trip Reports on
the Sub-Carpathia SIG portal.

< http://www.jewishgen.org/Sub-Carpathia/ > SEE: Travel Planning, then
Trip Reports

6. Several ongoing projects are taking much longer than expected,
primarily due to their sheer scope and cost. That having been stated, if you can
help financially, please contribute to the Sub-Carpathia SIG General Fund
here:

< http://www.jewishgen.org/JewishGen-erosity/v_projectslist.asp?project_cat=50 >

7. The Sub-Carpathia SIG portal has been updated in the following areas:
Event Calendar, Current Weather, Synagogues, Cemeteries, Photo Gallery, SIG
Survey, KehilaLinks and Interview. I was interviewed by Ukraine TV
(Tysa-1) in 2013, and again in the studio in 2014. That interview can now be
found on the Sub-Carpathia SIG portal. There are three segments to the
interview: a brief introduction in Ukrainian, followed by background information
filmed in 2013, then an in-studio interview in English and Ukrainian.
Lastly, I am working on adding missing villages and towns to the Sub-Carpathia
Gazetteer of villages and towns today. The Latin-character spellings have
been changing due to the gradual switchover >from the Russian-based
orthography to the Ukrainian-based one. Today, there are over 750 villages and
towns in Sub-Carpathia and I am informed that JewishGen will soon update its
Gazetteer with missing Sub-Carpathia villages and towns, some with
Ukrainian-based orthography changes.

< http://www.jewishgen.org/Sub-Carpathia/ >

8. I mentioned in my 2014 Trip Report that I would be willing to set up a
tour for researchers and two people have responded positively. For this
to come to fruition, and to be cost-effective, we need a group of at least
10 people to undertake a tour in Sub-Carpathia. If you are interested,
please notify me off-list by 15 January 2015. Our region is far removed >from
the unrest in Eastern Ukraine. It is business as usual and there is no cause
for alarm. U.S. and European passport holders do not need a visa. I am
not sure about other countries, but you can check if you need a visa on the
Sub-Carpathia portal.

< http://www.jewishgen.org/Sub-Carpathia/ > SEE: Travel Planning,
General Information

9. In 2014, the 70th anniversary of the deportations in Sub-Carpathia, I
attended several remembrance events in Sub-Carpathia, including being
invited to make a presentation at the Hungarian University in Berehove
(Beregszasz). In 2015, there will be additional events to commemorate the
liberations, and once again I have been invited to give a presentation on my work in
Sub-Carpathia.

10. Lastly, until now, this has been a two-person effort by myself and
Amos Israel ZEZMER to establish and sustain a Sub-Carpathia SIG. We started
this process in late 2009 and it took until May of 2011, against strong
resistance and great interference to get this SIG established. We are now
looking for others to step up and become members of a board that will sustain
the SIG in the years to come. This requires little or no work on your
part, but will ensure the continuity of our SIG. If you are moved to
volunteer, please contact me, off-list.

Respectfully,
Marshall Katz
JewishGen Sub-Carpathia SIG coordinator