volume 27, numer 1 first quarter, 2020 · volume 27, numer 1 page 5 first quarter 2020 a visit to...

VOLUME 27, NUMBER 1 PAGE 1 FIRST QUARTER 2020

VOLUME 27, NUMBER 1 FIRST QUARTER, 2020

Dear Members,

I have taken over as editor of Scattered Seeds from

Tina Korn, who should be lauded and praised for her

outstanding 10 years as editor. This issue is the first

effort under my watch.

This newsletter is by you and for you. I ask for your

suggestions, your submissions and your criticisms. Reach

me at [email protected].

Our next meeting will be held January 22, 2020, at 1:00 PM, at the

South County Civic Center, 16700 Jog Road, Delray Beach. See

page 8 for the schedule and topics of upcoming meetings.

Allan Huss

Contents of this Issue:

President’s and Editor’s Messages 3 Prenumeraten and Rutners 9

Library Reminder 4 Jacob the Liar 11

A Visit to the Remuh Synagogue 5 Records Added to Jewishgen.org SIG’s 15

Recollections of the 2019 IAJGS 7 Jewish Immigrants in the Civil War 19

Upcoming Meetings 8


JGSPBCI Officers and Board Members: President: Cindy Potter Taylor Vice President: Mona Morris Vice President: Joel Sisitsky Treasurer: Larry Schulman Secretary: Ina Getzoff

Board and Committee Assignments: Archivist/Sunshine: Phyllis Frank Brickwall: Mark Jacobson, Mona Morris Directory/Membership Records: Mona Morris Educational Events: Joel Sisitsky Liaison: Cindy Potter Taylor Library Coordinator: Barbara Nowak Luncheon: Dennis Rice Members at Large: Sylvia Nusinov, Beryl Cole Membership: Eric Sharenow Newsletter Editor: Allan Huss Parliamentarian: Dennis Rice Programming: Dennis Rice Media Publicity: Walter Rosenthal Membership Publicity: Marilyn Lane Reception: Barbara Nowak, Glenn Segal, Eric Sharenow, Joel Sisitsky Scholarship: Ina Getzoff, Speakers Bureau: Cindy Potter Taylor Webmaster: Barbara Nowak PAST PRESIDENTS: Mona Freedman Morris, Emerita Albert M. Silberfeld, z"l Alfred B. Leeds, z"l Sylvia Nusinov, Emerita Marvin Hamburg, z"l Dennis Rice, Emeritus Sandra Hirschhorn Mark Jacobson

Jewish Genealogical Society of Palm

Beach County, Inc.

P. O. Box 7796, Delray Beach, FL 33482-7796

561-450-9577

http://www.jgspalmbeachcounty.org

Member: IAJGS, Florida State Genealogical

Society

Request for Articles

Article contributions, preferably by email, are invited

for inclusion in Scattered Seeds. Quarterly

deadlines are December 1, March 1, June 1 and

September 1. Editor reserves the right to accept,

revise, condense or reject all submissions. To

increase computer compatibility, please send

without formatting in one of the following: .doc

or .docx (e.g., Word), .rtf (rich text format)

or .pages (Mac). Contact Editor: Allan Huss,

[email protected], or send typed articles to:

JGSPBCI, Attn: Editor, P.B. Box 7796, Delray

Beach, FL 33482-7796.

Copyright: Except where specifically indicated,

©2020, JGSPBCI. Unless articles indicate

prohibited reproduction, Scattered Seeds grants

permission to IAJGS member newsletters and

journals to quote articles, in whole or in part. Any

uses must credit original source, including

Scattered Seeds title, volume number and

publication date. Please inform JGSPBCI of those

uses.

Statement of Ownership: Scattered Seeds is the

publication of JGSPBCI, a not-for-profit educational

organization

The newsletter, issued quarterly, is a free

publication distributed to paid members and Jewish

genealogical societies throughout the world. Back

issues are available at no chrge on our website:

http://jgspalmbeachcounty.org




President’s Message

Cindy Potter Taylor

Another decade is in the books! Here we go 2020. May it be a wonderful year and free from strife. (Hah! Who am I kidding?)

Come May of this year, I will be replaced at the helm, and hope to have a bit more time to devote to my research. (Again, who am I kidding?) It has been a long but rewarding term. I have seen our society grow and flourish. Membership will always fluctuate, but we’ve held pretty steady at 325. I am most pleased with our library and the number of people who have visited for help with their research. As I’ve said many times, “We’re here for you, but YOU have to take the initiative and ask for help.” I realize not everyone is as passionate as I am about genealogy research, but even weekend warriors can benefit from our library tutoring sessions. I also want to remind you, and I’m sure you’ve already thought about it) that you must protect and preserve your research for the future. Talk to your family about who will take over the reins when you are no longer capable of doing the work. I know that the kids are too busy now. When they’re our age, perhaps they will find it worthwhile to continue the research. By that time, just imagine what will be on the internet, and what foreign records will have been translated into English. In early September, our JGS suffered the sudden death of our genealogy guru, Phyllis Kramer. As most of you know, Phyllis and I were quite close for many years. In 2020 and 2021 we hope to begin our workshops again. They will carry her name, as she was instrumental is getting them started with JGSPBCI. Phyllis will ALWAYS be in OUR hearts and minds. She was UNIQUE! We have already begun programming for the autumn of 2020 and year 2021. 2021 will be the 30th anniversary of JGSPBCI. If you already have your calendar for 2021, mark Sunday February 28 for the gala luncheon marking that event. We’ve already booked Indian Spring Country Club for it.

Cindy

Editor’s Message

Allan M. Huss

Fourteen members of the

JGSPBC, including Cindy

Potter Taylor, my wife

Susan Stallard and I, attended the 39th

annual meeting of the International

Association of Jewish Genealogical

Societies (IAJGS) in Cleveland last August.

In addition to a delightful dinner, we had a

week of presentations, hands-on learning,

meeting experts in the genealogical field,

and just schmoozing with other people

whose interests intersect.

For Susan and me, attending the

conference in Cleveland was a “no-brainer”.

Our summer home is in Ohio, on the shores

of Lake Erie, less than a two hour drive from

Cleveland. We are familiar with the

opportunities Cleveland has to offer. Both

of us are Midwesterners. Susan grew up in

Detroit, while I was born and raised in

Chicago. We raised our children in the

Detroit Metro area, and our eldest daughter

still lives there. Cleveland is a frequent

summer destination for the two of us.

In this issue, some of those members who

attended the Cleveland conference will

share some of their experiences with you. I

was thrilled by an experience I had at that

conference, as you will see.

I invite each of you to consider attending the

40th annual meeting of IAJGS, which will be

held in San Diego, California, at the

Sheraton San Diego Hotel and Marina, from

August 9-14. The opportunities to learn,

and to hone our craft, are simply amazing.

Allan


Library Hours:

The JGSPBCI Library will be staffed and open from Noon to 2:30 PM on:

Friday, January 24, 2020

Wednesday, February 5, 2020

Monday, February 10, 2020

Friday, February 14, 2020

Friday, February 28, 2020

Wednesday, March 4, 2020


Friday, March 27, 2020.

Location:

Temple Shaarei Shalom 9085 Hagen Ranch Road Boynton Beach, FL Be sure you bring a laptop and a flash drive so you can store your information.


A Visit to the Remuh Synagogue

Dr. Frances Smith

From the time I arrived in Berlin, my mind kept jumping ahead in anticipation of visiting a 15 th

Century synagogue in the heart of the historic Jewish quarter of Kazimierz, Krakow. I had been

there before while on a Jewish Tour of Eastern Europe, but at that time I was not armed with

important information I since gleaned from genealogical research. This story begins when I am a

baby.

In the 1940’s, the Nazis attempted to annihilate the Jewish presence in Europe which had been in

existence for two thousand years. Now, sixty years later, it is with fervor that many Jewish

genealogists in Israel and the Diaspora are reconnecting to our European past. The discovery that

my ninth great grandmother, Miriam Beila Isserles Horowitz, was the sister of the Founder and Chief

Rabbi of the Remuh Synagogue in Krakow allows me to

bridge a gap in the Mandel Family History. It provides a

source of pride and respect for my ancestors. I now have a

spiritual continuity with the past to share with my children.

Finally the day arrives. There stands the wall of the Remuh

Synagogue, built during the days of the Renaissance. This

Holy Place calls out to me, as I slowly walked towards its

outer walls. The courtyard is a sober place with plaques

dedicated to Holocaust victims on

the walls, but I do not allow sad

thoughts to dull the excitement I feel

as I approach the time-worn

wooden doors which mark the entrance to the Remuh.

As I step through the entrance to the sanctuary, its appearance is warm and

inviting. I slowly examine every detail of this holy place where Orthodox

Jews prayed since 1556. There are bench seats for about one hundred

men, with a separate women’s section on the left side. A curtain may be

closed separating husbands from wives, sisters from brothers.

The Remuh has painted limestone walls with large round windows at both

ends, and rectangular stained glass windows on the long wall. A Bemah, or

platform, where the Rabbi and Cantor stand to lead the ritual prayers is in the middle, near the front

of the room. Black wrought iron filigree fencing borders the sides of the Bemah. This ironwork shows

great craftsmanship with its many curlicues and scrolls creating a lacey effect. I examine it carefully

for several minutes admiring the artistry. The wrought iron is worked

so artfully that it appears to be light and airy giving the sense of a

heavenly gate. There is a brightly painted green wooden door

attached to the wrought iron which is decorated with a raised golden

menorah and a floral design below. The door had been rescued

from another Polish Renaissance period synagogue destroyed in

the Holocaust.


A Visit to the Remuh Synagogue (continued)

Glancing up, I saw several graceful brass chandeliers. Some are lit,

giving the room brightness, allowing me to examine the fine points of the

synagogue decoration. The arched ceiling was painted in a floral motif

with deep red, green and gold. On a border between the bright ceiling

and the walls there is a deeper hued design with paintings of animals

such as a Scorpion and a Lion. At first I think the scorpion is a crab —

puzzling to me as crabs are forbidden according to the rules of keeping

kosher. Another visitor points out that it is a Scorpion in a series of Zodiac

signs. For a second, I feel foolish.

I wished that I were able to read the Hebrew inscriptions around the wall and near the Torah.

The guide booklet noted that the Eternal Light near the Torah was dedicated to the founding

Rabbi, Moses ben Yisrael Isserles. Moses had lost a young twenty year old wife during an

epidemic, and his father, Yisrael was also widowed. They were a wealthy family, and built the

Remuh Synagogue in memory of both women. It seems to me that

this gem of a synagogue is the Taj Mahal of Jewish culture. The

interior décor has feminine appeal. I imagine that Miriam Beila, my

great-grandmother, might have participated in the design.

As I walk towards the marble Ark of the Covenant, I notice it has a

top piece showing the ten commandment tablet. Above the tablet

in the wall is a raised Golden Crown. These adornments remind

me of renaissance paintings. There was a warmth in this small synagogue that does not exist

in the gigantic Renaissance Cathedrals of many European countries. I feel at home in the

Remuh.

Inside the Ark was a Torah, hidden behind a black velvet curtain with white and gold

embroidery. I wished I could attend a Sabbath service there to experience the sense of

holiness which surely permeates this space. Fortunately a small group headed by a Belgian

Rabbi was visiting at the same time and the bearded leader chanted a short, heartfelt blessing

which enhanced my visit.

As I step outside, the Rabbi is nearby. He says “Here are the gravestones of Rebbe Moshe

Isserles and his family.” There are five or six raised gravestones behind a low wrought iron gate

which are carved with Hebrew writing providing the names, relationships, and more about each

person. “This one in the center is Rebbe Moshe, on the left is his father Yisrael, and further left

is his sister, Miriam Beila”. I cannot contain myself any longer, and burst out excitedly, “Rabbi,

Miriam Beila Isserles was my ninth great-grandmother!” The

Belgian Rabbi said “Oh! This is a SPECIAL day. It is wonderful

that you are here with your ancestors”. He smiled at me and set

to translating the writing on the stones. “What would Miriam

Beila think of me?” I said out loud, wishing at this moment that I

was a more observant Jew. The kind Rabbi from Belgium said,

“She would love you.”


Recollections and Impressions from the 39th Annual IAJGS Meeting in Cleveland, Ohio.

28 July—2 August, 2019

Siddy Rosenberg:

This was the first time I attended IAJGS. My expectations were more than exceeded. The

conference had a plethora of sessions to choose from, and making a decision was not always

easy. Sometimes, several sessions I wanted to attend were at the same time. I garnered lots of

information to help with my family search, and met many interesting people who were always

willing to help. I even met some mishpocha at the conference, as well as an acquaintance I hadn't

seen in many years. Make your plans now to attend the next IAJGS.

Dr. Frances Smith:

While attending the IJGS Meeting, I met a young man, Leo Cooper, who is a graduate student

working in the field of Y-DNA research with FamilyTreeDNA. When I mentioned to Leo that my

husband Bob was tested and the results placed him in the Y-E35 group, Leo said it was also his Y

and that the researchers would welcome an additional test sample. We entered the testing group

and are waiting to hear if the original “Y-DNA Founder” of the group can be identified or if Bob’s

male descendants were part of a Rabbinic circle.

Beryl Kroot Cole:

I learned a great deal from the IAJGS in Cleveland. On top of the educational sessions, I spent five

days looking at peoples’ name tags, looking for my maiden name. without success. The rest of the

week, I was looking at the locations where their ancestors were from. Late Thursday afternoon, a

tall woman and I literally bumped into each other. She saw my name tag and said she knew

people with my maiden name, and several of them lived in Cleveland! She connected me with the

Cleveland “cousins” and I am trying to find our connection. One of them just took a DNA test. I am

anxiously awaiting his results.


Recollections and Impressions from the 39th Annual IAJGS Meeting in

Cleveland, Ohio.

28 July—2 August, 2019 (continued)

Allan Huss:

While at the IAJGS meeting in Cleveland, I attended the Austria-

Czech Special Interest Group (SIG) meeting. Randol (Randy)

Schoenberg is the chair of the SIG.

For those who do not know him, Randy is the lawyer who helped

Maria Altman obtain the return of six paintings by Gustave Klimt

commissioned by her family, including the portrait of her aunt — “Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer I”.

The works were stolen by the Nazis, and kept by the Austrian Government, after World War II. The

story is depicted in the movie, “The Woman in Gold”, and Randy is played in the movie by Ryan

Reynolds (Helen Mirren played Maria Altman).

At the meeting, Randy asked each person present to stand, and tell the group who they were

researching. When it was my turn, I said that I was researching my maternal great-great grandparents,

Edward Bulowa and Wilhelmina Deiml, who came to the U.S. from the area near Prague. Randy

paused, and said, “I didn’t know Bulowa’s had married Deiml’s. See me after the meeting — we’re

related.”

After the meeting, Randy asked me to bring up my tree on geni.com (Randy is a geni.com curator. A

few keystrokes later, he had linked my tree to his on geni.com, and added over 80 people to it. Each

entry had supporting documentation he had found. And, yes, we are fourth cousins.

Next Meeting:

Wednesday, January 22, 2020: Nolan Altman — “Patronymic Naming and Cemetery Records: Their Importance in Jewish

Genealogy”.

Our Jewish ancestors recognized the permanence of stone to memorialize their lineage. Descendants honored generations past by including relationships on cemetery records and tombstones, a process called Patronymic Naming.” At the monthly meeting of the Jewish Genealogical Society of Palm Beach County (JGSPBCI) on Wednesday, January 22, Mr. Nolan Altman will speak on the importance of this important research source. He is Director of Research for the International Association of Jewish Genealogical Societies and responsible for Jewish Online Worldwide Burial Records (JOWBR), memorial plaques and the Holocaust Database.. As usual, the meeting will be held at 1:00 PM at the Palm Beach County Civic Center, 16700 Jog Road, and Delray Beach.


Prenumeraten and Rutners

Lara Diamond

https://larasgenealogy.blogspot.com/

• Back in the day, when people wanted to publish Jewish scholarly books, they'd often need to get funding in advance in order to pay for printing costs. To do this, they got people to "subscribe" to their book--basically those people would pre-pay for a copy of the book, and in exchange, their names would be published in the eventual release of the book. These "prenumeraten lists" could contain your ancestors!

I was able to use "Sefer HaPrenumeranten," a kind of index to those listed in prenumeraten for about 800 books, to find references to books sponsored by people from Kolodne. And look who's listed in one of those books. (More information on how to use this book below.) In the prenumeraten of the book אמרי שהםby משה

there were a few Kolodne men who hadבן דן שהם, sponsored the book. And I'm related to at least three of them:

• Shmuel Moshe Rutner. This could well be my great-great grandfather! However, there were two men by this name living in Kolodne, so it could also have been his second cousin. • Chaim Mordechai Rutner. This could have been my great-great grandfather Shmuel Moshe Rutner's

brother--so my great-great-great uncle. But again, there were two men with this name in town, so it also could have been my second cousin four times removed

• Yaakov Feintuch. There was only one man by this name in town. His wife, Yocheved Rutner Feintuch, was my second cousin four times removed.

While it's frustrating that I can't know which Shmuel Moshe/Chaim Mordechai it was who helped sponsor this book, it's still cool to show that my relatives valued learning enough to pay toward this book's publication. So how do you see if any of your relatives are listed in books' prenumeraten? Well, first read this good overview by JewishGen: https://www.jewishgen.org/InfoFiles/prenumerantn.htm Realize that Sefer HaPrenumeranten is now available online here: https://www.hebrewbooks.org/46561 so you don't have to hunt for it in obscure libraries. Once you have a list of books in which your town appears, you need to look for the prenumeraten in each book. I was a little puzzled about where to go from here, but Elli Fischer pointed me to https://hebrewbooks.org, which had every single book I was looking for. (Fun fact: Elli and I were in playgroup together back in the day!) Good luck prenumeraten hunting!

https://larasgenealogy.blogspot.com/

https://larasgenealogy.blogspot.com/2016/04/the-other-shmuel-moshe-rutner.html

https://larasgenealogy.blogspot.com/2016/04/the-other-shmuel-moshe-rutner.html

https://www.jewishgen.org/InfoFiles/prenumerantn.htm



http://www.hebrewbooks.org/46561

https://www.hebrewbooks.org/46561

https://blog.hamapah.org/

https://hebrewbooks.org/

https://hebrewbooks.org/

https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ubF0cNsBaZQ/XgPMAL-1LWI/AAAAAAAAOW4/uUfG9UdC4OAjx9uLFXdE4GadI7VXAIVDgCLcBGAsYHQ/s1600/RutnerPrenumeratenHebrewBooksOrg_37086_page_124.JPG


JACOB THE LIAR

Mark Glickman

My great-grandmother, Anna Lederer, was born in 1884 in Wlodawa, Seidlce,

Poland. She married Jacob Bluser from Tomashow, Lubline, Poland in 1904. He

was a year younger than Anna. Jacob moved to Chicago in 1904, and Anna

arrived in 1905, seven months pregnant. Anna Bluser traveled at age 21, six

months pregnant, on the SS Bavarian, and landed in Halifax, Canada on March

5, 1905. She had a train ticket to Chicago to join her husband, Jacob Bluser.

She was examined on April 5, 1905, to cross into the US in St. Albans, VT. She

could not read or write, and had less than $50 with her. Their daughter, Celia

Bluser (later to become Sylvia Bluser, my grandmother) was born in Chicago on June 3, 1905. Their address

at the time was 430 S. Union St, and that was where Sylvia was born (not in a hospital). Jacob earned a

living as a very talented painter, did realistic portraits and also painted murals in people’s homes. Later in

life, he painted houses as well. He also played the mandolin.

Jacob served time in the Cook County (Chicago) Jail for passing bad checks. Soon after getting released, he

moved the family to New York City, where their second child, Fannie (later called Faye) was born on May

7, 1910.

In 1914, Jacob fathered a daughter with a woman named Sara Katz in Philadelphia. The child was named

Gladys Gertrude Wise, and the father was listed as Jacob Wise. It is unclear if he gave Sara a fake name, or

if she made up the last name. But his wife, Anna Bluser, was aware of the birth.

Jacob served in the U.S. Army in World War I in 1918 as a translator, and did not go overseas. He spoke

Polish, German, Yiddish, and English. When he finished his service, he was given his Certificate of

Naturalization on December 3, 1918, in Washington, DC. He changed his name to John Daniel Bluser, and

the certificate includes him, his wife, and two daughters, aged 13 and 8. Shortly after receiving his

naturalization papers and returning home to NYC, he disappeared in the middle of the night, never to be

seen or heard from again by his family.

Anna Bluser could not afford to keep both of her daughters, so she put Faye

into foster care for five years. The record from the Hebrew Sheltering

Guardian Society of NY Orphan Asylum shows “Father deserted, Mother

destitute.”

He moved to Baltimore, where he met Matilda Elizabeth Stark at a dance. He

lied and told her that he was a Christian Prussian from Poland, and that he had

stowed away on a ship to escape the Czar’s troops. They were married on

December 26, 1919, moved to NYC for a short time, and then moved to Los

Angeles in 1920. They soon had two children, Marion Rosalie in 1921 and John

Randall in 1923. A decade later, they then had three more children, Leon

Daniel in 1932, Melva Ruth in 1934, and Marlene Elizabeth in 1936. They

raised their children as Christians.


Jacob the Liar (con’tinued)

On February 7, 1935, Jacob received a new Certificate of Citizenship, which referenced his naturalization on

December 3, 1918 in Washington, DC, and had the identical serial number.

Jacob did not allow his wife Matilda to answer the phone. Several times, after getting phone calls, he

announced that the family had to move immediately.

While painting houses with his son Leon Daniel Bluser,

Jacob told him they were descended from the famous

Von Blucher family in Poland, and there was a Von

Blucher castle in Poland. He told his daughter Melva

that she was named for his sister, Melva. None of

that was true.

Around 1944, Anna Bluser was struggling financially.

Her daughter, Sylvia Bluser Glickman (my

grandmother) wrote to the Social Security

Administration and asked, “Is my father still alive?

And if he is, since he never divorced my mother, is she entitled to some of his Social Security benefits?” After

a few weeks, the SSA wrote back to say, “Yes, he is alive and living in California with a new wife. Because he

never divorced your mother, she is entitled to benefits.” She began receiving checks. When John Daniel died

in 1947, Anna received a $250 death benefit check. He was buried in a Veteran’s cemetery in Los Angeles

with a cross on his gravestone.

When he died, his wife Matilda contacted the Social Security Administration to start receiving benefits. She

received a letter back, saying that he had another wife and children in NYC, and she was therefore not

entitled to any benefits. Her daughter Melva was with her when she opened the letter. Matilda angrily said

to her, “I was married to this man for 27 years, and I never knew he had another family. And you’re all

bastards.”

In 2018, my mother gave me an Ancestry DNA kit as a Chanukah gift. My test results showed I was 99% East

European Jewish. Among my top 20 close DNA matches were Marlene, Leon, and Melva Bluser, as well as

eight of Jacob/John Daniel’s grandchildren. One of his grandchildren, Ronda Bluser Payne, lived in St.

Augustine. Her Ancestry family tree contained photos of John Daniel that matched mine, as well as his

matching Certificate of Citizenship. I contacted her to say, “Well, I found you. Our family knew about you,

did you know about us?” I heard back from her a few days later. She had contacted her father (Leon) and

her two aunts. She said, “As you can imagine, this was quite a shock for our family. But now all of the pieces

of the puzzle fit together.” Her father and two aunts all showed up as about 50% Jewish, and the eight

grandchildren were all around 25% Jewish. They figured Ancestry was screwed up, because both John and

Matilda were Christian. Now the test results made sense. As Ancestry says, “The blood does not lie; this is

science.”

Four of my close matches were named Tucci. (My mother was very excited, maybe we were related to the

actor Stanley Tucci!). All four of them were also close DNA matches to the Blusers. It turned out that


Jacob the Liar (con’tinued)

their grandmother was Gladys Gertrude Wise (Jacob’s illegitimate daughter from Philadelphia), who

married Joseph Tucci. They were all aware that their grandmother was Jewish, so they were not surprised

that they were around 25% Jewish.

Jacob/John Daniel had eight children with three different women. My grandmother was his first child, my

father was his first grandchild, and I am his first great-grandchild. My father was born in 1927, so his

grandfather was alive until he was 20, but they never met or spoke to each other. Because Jacob had three

children so late in life in the 1930’s, they are still alive, and are all younger than my father. His

grandchildren are all younger than I am, although I am a great-grandson. I have been in contact with many

of them. Most are thrilled to learn that they are of Jewish descent. One of his daughters is a devout

Catholic. She is furious that I have contacted their family, does not believe her father was a Jew, and wants

to know why I am doing this (I must want money, or something else).

We have uncovered so many lies that he told to his second wife and children that our family now refers to

him as “Jacob the Liar.” His three surviving children only have fond memories of him as a loving father.

You never know what you will find when you have your DNA tested!

Hats Off To Our Devoted Proofreaders:

Mike Abramson

Beryl Cole

Marilyn Lane

Marcy Levine

Mark Jacobson

Siddy Rosenberg

Tina Korn

Andy Wakshul


SAVE THE DATE

SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 16, 2020

FAMILY TREE MAKER AND ANCESTRY ARE

COMING TO DELRAY BEACH

SOUTH COUNTY CIVIC CENTER

EXPERT GENEALOGY SPEAKERS

EXHIBIT AREA AND SPECIAL PRICES

FAMILY TREE MAKER SUPPORT

LIGHT REFRESHMENTS


Records Added to Jewishgen.org Special Interest Group Databases at Year End 2019

The bulk of data additions to Jewishgen.org is made possible through the

various Special Interest Groups for regions in Europe. The records added to the

databases of SIG’s at the end of 2019 include the following:

Bessarabian SIG:

Bessarabian Databases. Updates: -- Revision List set of records were sent to JewishGen in December of 2019. 10,873 records from 3,451 families were transcribed and translated from following towns: Beltsy, Brichany, Faleshty, Ismail, Reni, Khotin, Kishinev, Leovo, towns in Orgeev and Soroki uezd. See the list of all added records: https://www.jewishgen.org/bessarabia/files/databases/RevisionsDecember2019.pdf We have an excellent group of translators for the Bessarabia Revision Lists. The total records of Bessarabia Revisions we completed as of December 2019 is more than 214,000! Many thanks to our members who participated in this set translation: Alan Levine, Milla Donet, Evgeniy Veretennikov, Michael Richman, Alex Matlin, Bena Shklyanoy and Yefim Kogan. -- See updated article about the set from Kishinev 1910 Family List, written by Alan Levine. Here is a direct link to the article: https://www.jewishgen.org/bessarabia/files/databases/SetArticles/Kishinev1910FamilyList.pdf

French SIG:

If you have ancestors or family members who died in France between 1970 and 2019 you will find this dataset of interest .The National Institute of Statistics and Economic Studies (French: Institut national de la statistique et des Etudes Economiques), abbreviated INSEE, has released the index of all persons who were deceased in France from 1970 to 2019. Search using https://en.geneanet.org Hungarian SIG: I am happy to report that finally all the Hungarian uploads of this past year made it into the databases. We must thank our new tech-guy, Scott Seidenstock, who put his shoulders into clearing the huge backlog for all the SIGs at JewishGen. In the Hungaran database we have now over 36 000 newly uploaded entries. Some of these are additions to previous collections, others are new place names. The list is as follows: Arpasto BMD, Berczel D, Bethlen BMD, Brasso BMD, Bonyhad BMD, Gyongyos M, Hidalmas BD, Kemecse BMD, Liptoszentmiklos D, Munkacs D, Nagykoros B, Nagyvarad BMD, Nyitra BM, Oradna BMD, Szendro MD, Szabadka BM, Szekesfehervar BM, Zsadany MD. The work is ongoing, a new upload is prepped right now to be submitted in the near future, new material is acquired almost weekly, and our volunteers are busy at transcribing the wealth of incoming material.

https://www.jewishgen.org/bessarabia/files/databases/RevisionsDecember2019.pdf

https://www.jewishgen.org/bessarabia/files/databases/RevisionsDecember2019.pdf

https://www.jewishgen.org/bessarabia/files/databases/SetArticles/Kishinev1910FamilyList.pdf

https://www.jewishgen.org/bessarabia/files/databases/SetArticles/Kishinev1910FamilyList.pdf

https://en.geneanet.org

https://en.geneanet.org


Records Added to Jewishgen.org Special Interest Group Databases at Year End 2019 (con’t)

Gesher Galacia SIG: Since the last update a few months ago, indexes of the following vital records have been added to the All Galicia Database, at: https://search.geshergalicia.org/ Vital records - Podhajce (Pidhaitsi) Jewish births 1853-1881, 1884, 1886-1889 (4,627 records) - Stanislawow (Stanislav, Stanislau, Ivano-Frankivsk) Jewish deaths 1845-1863 (4,790 records) Jewish deaths 1927-1931 (1,626 records) - Nowy Targ Jewish births 1919-1926 (445 records) Jewish marriages 1924-1927, 1930, 1934, 1936, 1937 (169 records) Jewish deaths 1927, 1931, 1938 (95 records) Jewish deaths (index book) 1937 (33 records) - Mikulince (Mykulyntsi) Jewish births 1901, 1926 (132 records) Jewish marriages 1899, 1932, 1934-1936 (53 records) Jewish changes of name 1905, 1926 (2 records) - Lezajsk (updating of earlier records, already on the database) Jewish births (index book) 1881-1890 (1,358 records) Jewish marriages (index book, grooms only) 1877-1938 (1,239 records) - Zborow (Zboriv) Jewish marriages (supplementary records) 1921-1931 (71 records) Earlier this year, as announced at the time, we finished indexing all the Tarnopol vital rec-ords held in the Ukrainian state archives. As regards records from Stanislawow in the Ukrainian archives, we are not quite at that point. In the past several years, we have in-dexed and uploaded to the database almost 18,000 vital records from this town. There remain, though, some birth, marriage and death records from the 1930s from Stani-slawow, which we will index in early 2020. In doing this, we will have completed all the vi-tal records from Stanislawow held in the Ukrainian archives. Other vital records coming soon in 2020 include birth, death and marriage records from Kroscienko nad Dunajcem from the 1920s and 1930s, and 19th-century birth records from Kosow (Kosiv).

https://search.geshergalicia.org/


Records Added to Jewishgen.org Special Interest Group Databases at Year End 2019 (con’t)

Jewish taxpayers project The following record sets have been added to the All Galicia Database. - Skala (Skala Podilska) 1936 (138 records) - Trembowla (Terebovlya) 1936 (180 records) Taxpayer records from the 1930s coming early in 2020: - Olesko, Podkamien (Pidkamin, Tarnopol province), and Sasow (Sasiv). Thanks as always to Mark Jacobson and Eddy Mitelsbach for their continuing work on the Tax-payers project. Holocaust project For Holocaust Memorial Day in January 2020, we plan to be able to announce uploads to the All Galicia Database, including: - some 7,000 records of Jewish residents in Stanislawow, 1941-1942 - death certificates from Rzeszow and Tyczyn, from 1942 and 1943. Since introducing our improved online inventories for individual archives earlier this year, we have worked to upgrade their functioning. These inventories can be found in the pull-down menu in the horizontal bar on the Gesher Galicia home page, at: https://www.geshergalicia.org/ . Our online inventories cover all known Jewish Galician vital records from state archives, as well as some Jewish community records, held at: AGAD, Warsaw; three state archives in western Ukraine (in Lviv, Ivano-Frankivsk, and Ternopil); and the Polish state archives in Przemysl, Rzeszow, Sanok, Nowy Sacz, Tarnow, and Bochnia. The main archive missing from this list is the National Archives in Krakow. Once the new archive building in Krakow has opened in 2020, reassembling the large number of archival files from cur-rently five different locations around and outside the city, we will add a new inventory to our web-site for the Krakow archive. We maintain our existing online archival inventories on a regular basis, adding new files to them as they are made available by an archive, making necessary corrections to existing entries, and adding new sets of scans. Part of this work involves being in contact with the archivists, including sometimes making visits to the archives. One of our staff will be in the Nowy Sacz archive in the next few days, for this same purpose. Other visits are planned in 2020 to various archives across southeastern Poland and western Ukraine. The Global Search A powerful new tool is now freely available with our inventories. This is a "Global Search" facility, which searches all Gesher Galicia's online inventories of Jewish vital records, censuses, Holo-caust-period records and community records. Please find it, and experiment with it, at: https://inventories.geshergalicia.org/ . Further refinements will be added to this facility, and it will also be extended to cover those Jose-phine and Franciscan cadastral survey records from Galicia that we are aware of, as well as Jew-ish taxpayer records and some other types of record.

For more information on Gesher Galicia's Global Search facility and other online inventories, or for general questions or information about Gesher Galicia, please contact: [email protected] .

https://www.geshergalicia.org/

https://inventories.geshergalicia.org/

mailto:[email protected]


Jewish Immigrants in the Civil War

Peter Rosenbluth

Jewish history and culture have not been preserved and promoted as well as they should

have been. As anti-Semitism grows globally, we are responsible for fighting back through

education and experience. As part of this struggle, I am making a documentary film about

the European Jewish freedom fighters of 1848 who later became heroes in the American

Civil War. This film will be the first colorised film on Jews and the American Civil War.

The film presents an untold part of Jewish history that emphasizes the Jewish contribution to

the Union’s victory and highlights the role of the Jews in

the fight against slavery. These volunteers brought

significant military experience to the US, as they were

mostly veterans of the Hungarian, Austrian and German

Revolutions of 1848. They were one of the reasons for the

Union’s victory.

Have you ever heard of August Bondi? He was a young

Jewish hero who was riding next to John Brown, the most

famous abolitionist. They fought together in Kansas to free

slaves. How about General Frederick Knefler? He was

the highest-ranking Jewish officer in the US army and a

former teenage soldier of the revolutions. He’s also known

as one of the founding fathers of the first Jewish Federation

in Indianapolis. The film's poster shows Colonel Frederick

G. Utassy, and General Julius Stahel in Union uniform.

Both were Jews, and both were 48’ers.

Jews have long military traditions. There are records of Jews being armed in the 15th and

17th century Hungary and Ottoman Empire. But modern Jewish military history begins with

the Jewish role in the European Revolutions of 1848, and the veterans of those Revolutions

in the Civil War.

To see a trailer of the film, go to: : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MIYHXmT7Znw The

film is fiscally sponsored by the International Documentary Association (IDA),

Jewish documentaries that unveil heroic moments of our history can make a change at a

time when anti-Semitism is on the rise and when Jews are accused of being the cause of

slavery. You can also learn more by visiting the film’s official website.

http://jewishdocumentaries.info/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MIYHXmT7Znw

https://jewishdocumentaries.us19.list-manage.com/track/click?u=e2f47ae82428b74d93ccd4137&id=f43b22f694&e=c31495d8ae

https://jewishdocumentaries.us19.list-manage.com/track/click?u=e2f47ae82428b74d93ccd4137&id=c6fb27956c&e=c31495d8ae


Upcoming Events

Special Event: All Day Genealogy Conference

Hosted by Family Tree Maker and Ancestry, with Ancestry, Family Search et al

Sunday, February 16, 2020


An Introduction to Genetic Genealogy

Barbara Nowak, Ph.D.

Wednesday, April 1, 2020 Note different starting time: 1:30 PM

SOS: Share Our Successes

Dennis Rice, Moderator

At South County Civic Center

Wednesday, May 13, 2020

Panel Discussion

Dennis Rice Moderator

Mona Morris, Questions and Answers

All Events at South County Civic Center, 16700 Jog Road, Delray Beach

Jewish Genealogical Society of Palm Beach County, Inc.

P.O. Box 7796

Delray Beach, FL 33482-7796

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