Dear Joe and Namrita and Kenneth,

You've perfectly articulated my own "weirdness." Like you, I come from large families scattered around the world. My Ancestry "shared DNA" has bajillion distant relatives with trace amounts in common. Unfortunately, the four people with supposedly second and third cousin connection have not replied to my (twice) repeated requests for information. Ditto on this site and J-Roots and Facebook Messenger posts. However, I did make two major scores with people who responded. One gave access to his extensive research about my great-grandfather's family, but our personal communication went nowhere. Another connection was made with a tentative Facebook private message that was almost instantaneously acknowledged. Although this very distant cousin in St. Peterburg couldn't provide any information about his grandfather, he and I formed a bond with frequent email correspondence. I write in English and he responds in Russian -- sometimes relying on Google Translate to decipher my expressions.

Like Joe wrote, in spite of the maudlin Ancestry.com and 23andMe commercials, I don't think most people are interested in ancient family history. Certainly no one in my immediate family. Plus Soviet families carry a lot of trauma and secrets. But interestingly, the Russian-language J-Roots has A LOT of researchers looking for their families. It's also a goldmine of Jewish wedding, birth, and some death registries, where I can make my way through the gorgeous calligraphy with my third-grade Soviet education. One of the most fascinating and rewarding discoveries were Kiev city directories from the early 1900s. If reading the proverbial phone is your idea of excitement, you'll find a snapshot of a city in a superbly organized publication.

Be well,

Mikhailina Karina

 

 

I have often tried contacting relatives or potential relatives, and each case is different.

One reason could be language, and I have a story to tell concerning this.

Possibly, my most disappointing case was when, a few decades ago before the days of Google translate, someone tried contacting my through MyHeritage in German and although I responded in English saying that I did not understand his message he never replied to this. Eventually, I revisited this message (with Google translate), and it was from the son of the husband (will call this husband "great-uncle" although am not biologically related to him) of my great-aunt, through his first marriage. Actually, after my great-aunt passed away, I and also my parents z"l (who lived in England) became relatively close to this great-uncle and when I visited England, he would often treat my brother and I for a meal at Blooms (kosher restaurant in NW London). He had asked me to try and search out any relatives of his, but he wasn't specific.

So, it was approx. half a year after this great-uncle passed away that this message was received, but I only understood what it was about many years later when it was too late.

It is true that most people are not interested in their roots, and in general, they do not want to be bothered if it is not family they know. I did manage to find a third cousin who is happy to stay in contact with me socially but has a hard time with accepting we are cousins because all the evidence comes from the "paper trail", and he trusts this less than I do. Neither of our families on the mutual ancestry talked about their family.

--
David Ziants

Ma'aleh Adumim, Israel

I imagine rich people receive solicitations from would-be "friends" or "family" more often than the rest of us do, and famous ones have people to keep that sort of nonsense from reaching them. Anything you sent would probably have been caught in that net.

Robert Roth
Kingston NY

Joe, 

I usually find there is one "Genealogy Nerd" in every branch of the tree. You just have to luck into the correct person. I always approach it by outlining the direct connection if I now it. i.e. draw a line from me to this person exactly how we're related. To the muggles who aren't into genealogy, I imagine it comes off kind of "stalkerish". I do find that it is usually worth taking the chance as I have connected with some very interesting people along the way. The more it is personalized, the less you sound like the Nigerian Prince who has left you millions of dollars. 

I would do one email address at a time, maybe trying a second one if there is no response from the first. I've never gone the snail mail route. 

Scott P. Dann
spd@...

Lucy Baras survived the Nazis in Skalat, and wrote a memoir that is housed in the Archives Dept of Library of UWisconsin - Milwaukee. She called her story "Twentieth Century Cavemen." It's 300+ pages long, detailed and excellent. Her birth name was Lusia Rothstein. She was born in Skalat in 1911 and died in Wisconsin 2002.  Perhaps there is some way this work could be added to info in the new edition of the Skalat Yizkor book.
 
Baras, Lucy [WorldCat Identities]

Excerpts appear in Because of Eva: A Jewish Genealogical Journey. 

Susan J Gordon
BIALAZURKER - Zbaraz
LEMPERT, SCHONHAUT - Skalat
Also Lvov, Chernivitsi

Date:  Sunday, March 7, 2021

Time:  1:00-1:30 EST check in, chat, and schmooze.  
Official program starts promptly at 1:30 EST

Guest Speaker:  Joel Spector

Joel is a Past President of the Jewish Genealogical Society of Greater Philadelphia, where he has also been chairperson of its Russian Special Interest Group. Joel has given presentations and workshops on the Russian language, both contemporary and pre-Revolutionary, and has provided translations of documents to individuals and groups. Currently Joel is a member of the Ukraine Research Group and serves as its Director of Metric Record Projects. Joel has been actively engaged in genealogy for over 30 years and has been conducting research in several historic Russian language encyclopedias. He has produced a unique English language Index to the Russian language Evreiskaya Entsiklopedia.

 

 

 Topic: “Finding Your Ancestors: How to Get Started and Where to Go.”  The presentation will focus on how to find information about your ancestors, both those you know and those you didn’t even know you had. We will explore what data is immediately available and review what information can be derived from the many types of resources - local, national, and international - and from on-line resources. Throughout, we will focus on the excitement in discovering information about your little-known ancestors and on the various types of information that make the search in Jewish genealogy fun

I think it depends on what info you have and what they know of their own family.

--
Diane Jacobs, Somerset, New Jersey

ZOOM MEETING

March 9, 2021, 7:00 PM Eastern Time

Never Give Up –

Strategies for Taking Your Genealogy Research to the Next Level

Speaker:  Marion Wehrle

 

Are you facing another brick wall? Or have your research efforts plateaued out with nothing new on the horizon?

Marion Wehrle has a cure for that with suggestions for new avenues to explore and new strategies for finding information. Join us at our next Zoom meeting and learn how to dig deeper into resources to advance your family history.

Marion Werle began family history research over 25 years ago, researching family from Lithuania, Latvia and Belarus, who settled in the US, Canada, UK, and Israel. She has been on the boards of the Jewish Genealogical Societies of both Los Angeles and Conejo Valley, is a past president of the Latvia SIG (Special Interest Group) and a co-director of the JewishGen Latvia Research Division. She has spoken at several IAJGS conferences, as well as genealogical societies in the Southern California area, and is scheduled to give multiple virtual presentations in the coming year. She was a member of the Southern California Genealogical Society Writers Group for several years, which gave her the opportunity to hone her family history writing skills. She teaches a writing class for JewishGen education.

Registration is required for this meeting.  Send an email to jgsgo.blogger@... asking to be registered.  You will receive an acknowledgement of registration.  A link to access the Zoom meeting will be sent to you a few days before the meeting.

--
Diane M. Jacobs
Winter Park, Florida

My mistake, my family and my inquiry are about 
Carei (Nagykaroly), Romania
and not Nagy Kalo
--

Moishe Miller
Brooklyn, NY
moishe.miller@...
JGFF #3391

The attached snippet was taken from an 1869 Hungarian Census page and concerns the employment relationship of one of the household residents.
I cannot decipher all the words but see "munka" (work) and "utánil" (after) but I am unable to figure out the letters of the first word.
Can someone tell me what the first word is and then tell me the meaning of the phrase?

Thank you
Alex Magocsi
Currently working on GREIF, Hungary / Slovakia

Hi Ralph,
Yes I had heard about the Jackson Heights store but was never there.  There was also one in Inwood but that closed up as well.  Where to get aufschnitt these days?  Well there is the "competition", i.e., Abeles & Hyman, and maybe one or two others claiming to have cervelatwurst but none of them can touch my father-in-law's product.  I know people still lament it to this day.

David Cherson

Would anyone be able to translate the document attached to the Lin below
Thanks
Deborah Ross

https://www.ancestry.co.uk/imageviewer/collections/60749/images/45209_srep100^047194-00026?treeid=69486696&personid=220172520503&hintid=1048075764973&usePUB=true&_phsrc=ElU5&_phstart=default&usePUBJs=true&pId=604198307German

I am looking for descendants os my mother’s birth family who fled from Drohobych, Galicia in 1914 (my mother was born in Vienna, fostered and later adopted). Her eldest brother Josef Jakob Horoschowski, b. 1905, came to see her in 1927 to say he was trying to get to what was then Palestine, with one of his sisters (probably Chaje Sarah born 1910). Are there records of immigrants to Palestine from this period? I would be looking for 1927 onwards.
--
Veronica Zundel, London
Searching descendants of Josef Jakob Horoschowski b. 1905 Drohobych

Dear Cole                                                                           2nd March 2021

First of all, I wish you success, to be able to discover your biological parents and connect with  them,  their descendants , if any.

Sadly you are not alone, who have no alternative but to navigate this extremely sensitive journey.

I wonder, may I  politely suggest to research not only the family name  White, but Weisz/Weiss as well.


I am aware many Weisz/Weiss  families changed their surname to White.  

Also, I came across often Iren--the Jewish name is Rifka 

As for Estelle,( La May)  I wonder, it might be Esther--I call my grand-daughter, Esty--Estelle etc.

Please try to allocate time and check not only secular but Jewish Synagogue--birth marriage death--cemetery records

Best wishes and good luck
Veronika Pachtinger
London UK

My batting average is well below .500 for people who do not have any sort of presence on genealogy websites.  And even of those on the genealogy websites there still are some non-responses.

There are exceptions both ways, of course.  But the fact is that while genealogy is a very popular thing, a majority of the population simply is not interested.

-- KHR
--
Ken Ryesky,  Petach Tikva, Israel     kenneth.ryesky@... 

Researching:
RAISKY/REISKY, ARONOV, SHKOLNIK(OV), AEROV; Gomel, Belarus
GERTZIG, BRODSKY; Yelizavetgrad, Ukraine
BRODSKY, VASILESKY; Odessa, Ukraine
IZRAELSON, ARSHENOV; Yevpatoriya, Ukraine (Crimea)

My great aunt (mother's mother's sister) was born in Germany and lived in Kew Gardens. Members of her husband's family, also Jews from Germany, lived nearby as did a lot of friends. My paternal grandparents, as I mentioned on another thread, were in Jackson Heights.
--
Ralph N. Baer        RalphNBaer@...       Washington, DC

Yes this is a regular occurrence.... my Grandfather’s Grandfather was one of ten and so the family (originally Pick) that I am researching is big but even with solid DNA links some people don’t want to check their distant relatives while others are really excited to do so. So it all depends who the receiver of the email is! If you hit someone with a similar passion and interest its superb as if brings the past to life, and links those of us alive to eachother in a very rewarding way. 

All the best in your searches. 
Namrita Chow

Interesting Times of Israel blogpost; relatively long read but worthwhile:

https://blogs.timesofisrael.com/one-mans-lead-on-a-fight-to-save-jewish-history/

--
Ken Ryesky,  Petach Tikva, Israel     kenneth.ryesky@... 

Researching:
RAISKY/REISKY, ARONOV, SHKOLNIK(OV), AEROV; Gomel, Belarus
GERTZIG, BRODSKY; Yelizavetgrad, Ukraine
BRODSKY, VASILESKY; Odessa, Ukraine
IZRAELSON, ARSHENOV; Yevpatoriya, Ukraine (Crimea)