Click here to read the entire article from "The State"
(hat tip:Deborra Wood)
Wednesday, February 1, 2012
Cheating the death train
Israeli woman tracks down local vet, others to thank them for saving her father during the Holocaust.
Click here to read the entire article from "The State"
(hat tip:Deborra Wood)
Click here to read the entire article from "The State"
(hat tip:Deborra Wood)
Announcements: JGS of Cleveland
Please Join Us at the Next Meeting of The Jewish Genealogy Society of Cleveland on Sunday, February 5, 2012, at 1:30 PM.
The topic will be: Locating and Using Naturalization Records -- A Tool For Finding Your Family's Shtetl
The meeting will take place:
Park Synagogue East
27500 Shaker Boulevard
Pepper Pike, Ohio
Yizkor Books Update: January 2012
Posted by Lance Ackerfeld
Shalom,
Here we are again, at the end of the month, the activity in which can be categorized with some endings and also some new beginnings in our Yizkor Book Project.
As far as endings go, this last month we completely uploaded all the entries received from the "Litvak Heritage" series that were generously donated by Joel Alpert and Josef Rosin. Together with the existing online entries, I believe we now have a remarkable amount of information on a myriad of Lithuanian communities but we certainly aren't stopping here and even more translations are going on for these and other communities, as we "speak".
Amongst the new beginnings that took place this month was the grateful receipt of the complete translation of two books and, hopefully, they will be totally online within the next few weeks. The first donation is for the Csenger, Hungary Yizkor Book which was kindly donated by Stanley and Renee Fishkind. The second book, in English and Polish, is for a book on Lopuszno, Poland and was kindly donated by its editors - Marek Maciagowski and Yaacov Kotlicki.
Apart from these, a number of new projects were begun and if you would like to get involved in any one of the projects listed below or if there is a project that has been something you have been considering and you don't know how to begin, please contact me and I'll assist you, however I can.
Another new exciting beginning is the first Yizkor Book translation to come out as a hard copy through our Yizkor Books in Print Project which is being led by the untiring and resourceful Joel Alpert and the many volunteers working with him. The first book is the 'Destruction of Czenstochow' Yizkor book for Czestochowa, Poland and as soon as it's made available, we will let you know where it may be purchased.
In the meantime, if you are a coordinator who has a completely translated Yizkor book, we invite you to contact Joel whose contact information can be found at http://www.jewishgen.org/Yizkor/ybip.html Of course, if you would like to be involved in this project in any way, he would also like to hear from you and you can see what tasks are required on this same page.
The final new beginnings were the addition of the Halmeu, Romania Yizkor book to our list of Translation funds and in the near future it will be joined by the Serock, Poland and Sarny, Ukraine Yizkor Book Projects.
Note that a very positive way of helping to see translations placed online is by supporting this project or one of the many Translation Funds which have been set up to bring about the professional translation of the Yizkor books. If you feel able to support this effort, please go to the Yizkor Book JewishGen-erosity page:
to learn about the Translation Funds currently underway.
As far as the January figures go, we added 8 new projects, and updated 27 ongoing projects. All additions and updates have been flagged at http://www.jewishgen.org/Yizkor/translations.html to make it easy to find them.
Sunday, January 29, 2012
International Holocaust Memorial Day
Posted by: Jan Meisels Allen
In memory of the Holocaust, the United Nations (UN) remembers on January 27 each year, this day which is called International Holocaust Remembrance Day. An article, "Heroic Act of Resistance at Auschwitz-Birkenau" was published in commemoration http://ifounditinthearchives.tumblr.com/
The article has a link http://tinyurl.com/87dok66
original url:
http://www.scribd.com/fullscreen/78917641?access_key=key-p6qpxwab1cyf9b2k63i of a rarely viewed Army Intelligence report. The report was declassified in 2010 and the Associated Press found it at the US National Archives as part of their ongoing effort to mine the eight million secret records that have been declassified under the Nazi War Crimes Disclosure Act of 1998.
Thank you to Randy Herschaft of the Associated Press for bringing this to our attention.
Jan Meisels Allen
IAJGS Vice President
Chairperson, IAJGS Public Records Access Monitoring Committee
In memory of the Holocaust, the United Nations (UN) remembers on January 27 each year, this day which is called International Holocaust Remembrance Day. An article, "Heroic Act of Resistance at Auschwitz-Birkenau" was published in commemoration http://ifounditinthearchives.tumblr.com/
The article has a link http://tinyurl.com/87dok66
original url:
http://www.scribd.com/fullscreen/78917641?access_key=key-p6qpxwab1cyf9b2k63i of a rarely viewed Army Intelligence report. The report was declassified in 2010 and the Associated Press found it at the US National Archives as part of their ongoing effort to mine the eight million secret records that have been declassified under the Nazi War Crimes Disclosure Act of 1998.
Thank you to Randy Herschaft of the Associated Press for bringing this to our attention.
Jan Meisels Allen
IAJGS Vice President
Chairperson, IAJGS Public Records Access Monitoring Committee
(USA) Genealogists Not Invited To Testify on SSDI at House Ways and Means Subcommittee Hearing
Posted by: Jan Meisels Allen
IAJGS as one of the 3 voting members of the Records Preservation and Access Committee (RPAC) http://www.fgs.org/rpac/index.phphas has been coordinating with the other managing members, FGS and NGS and the RPAC chairman, David Rencher, chief genealogist of FamilySearch (see website for a listing of all the genealogical organizations that are participating on RPAC) in addressing the genealogical community's deep concerns over the recent actions to limit or prevent access to the Social Security Death Index (SSDI) [the commercial version of the Death Master File, produced by the Social Security Administration]. Four bills have been introduced in Congress (HR 3475, S1534, HR 3482, HR 3215) that if enacted would limit access or totally deny access to the SSDI due to concerns that access to the SSDI has lead to identity theft by identity thieves, obtaining Social Security Numbers of deceased children and applying for tax refunds for these non related children.
For the past several months, IAJGS and others from RPAC, have been in discussions with the House Ways and Means Committee Social Security Subcommittee staff on the genealogical community's needs for access to SSDI including the Social Security Numbers [SSN], including providing them with suggested legislative language addressing the concerns of using deceased
children's SSN's while still permitting legitimate users --including genealogists--access to the SSDI . Several very prominent genealogists were lined up to testify on the hope that the genealogical community would be an invited testifier--even with only one representative. We were advised the upcoming hearing would not be specific to any of the current bills in
Congress but rather to address the issues and what legislation should include.
IAJGS was the coordinator and the lead spokesperson with the Subcommittee staff. As such IAJGS was advised by the Ways and Means Committee Social Security Subcommittee staff on January 26 that due to their very limited time and the issues growing more complex, they decided not to go with a genealogist witness. They commented that we may submit testimony for the record. The decision as to whom may be a presenter at a hearing is made by the Subcommittee chairperson, in coordination with the ranking subcommittee member and with subcommittee staff. The decision is not appealable. The hearing information is available on the House Ways and Means Committee website--February 2 at 9:00 AM.
http://tinyurl.com/7mp5op8
original url:
http://waysandmeans.house.gov/Calendar/EventSingle.aspx?EventID=276835
Please read the hearing advisory at: http://tinyurl.com/7xojjc3
original url:
http://waysandmeans.house.gov/News/DocumentSingle.aspx?DocumentID=276834
For information on submitting a statement see:
http://tinyurl.com/6lu7dw7
original url:
http://waysandmeans.house.gov/committeesubmissions/
Statements may be submitted through February 16- two weeks following the hearing. How and where are located in the link immediately above.
You will be able to watch the hearing live from the convenience of where ever your computer is-- go to: http://tinyurl.com/6uq9pd7 full url:
http://waysandmeans.house.gov/Calendar/?EventTypeID=149&CatagoryID=4772
and either click on the hearing or scroll down to the bottom right of the screen where it says committee videos (http://waysandmeans.granicus.com/ViewPublisher.php?view_id=2) and we should see it live. I have been told it will also be archived so one can watch it any time.
To learn who is on the Subcommittee: Go to the Committee website: http://waysandmeans.house.gov/About/Members.htm
The people who serve on the full Ways and Means Committee are listed first and scroll down to the Subcommittee on Social Security-- Each of the members own websites may be accessed by clicking on their names under the full committee.
This subcommittee hearing is to hear what should be in legislation. The IAJGS and RPAC have provided staff with legislative language and concepts, held several conference calls and had numerous e-mails and phone calls with the staff...they received our input-- if they do anything with it we will only know when the new bill is proposed. Therefore, when/if a new bill is introduced it will be heard in both the House and Senate- and an opportunity exists for more input at those times.
For those who are interested in ideas on this issue go to the Records Preservation and Access Committee (RPAC) website http://www.fgs.org/rpac/index.php where there is a talking points paper.
Needless to say IAJGS and RPAC are very disappointed that the genealogical community was not invited to be a presenter at the February 2 hearing. IAJGS is planning to submit a statement. As more information is made available it will be posted to this forum.
Jan Meisels Allen
IAJGS Vice President
Chairperson, IAJGS Public Records Access Monitoring Committee
IAJGS as one of the 3 voting members of the Records Preservation and Access Committee (RPAC) http://www.fgs.org/rpac/index.phphas has been coordinating with the other managing members, FGS and NGS and the RPAC chairman, David Rencher, chief genealogist of FamilySearch (see website for a listing of all the genealogical organizations that are participating on RPAC) in addressing the genealogical community's deep concerns over the recent actions to limit or prevent access to the Social Security Death Index (SSDI) [the commercial version of the Death Master File, produced by the Social Security Administration]. Four bills have been introduced in Congress (HR 3475, S1534, HR 3482, HR 3215) that if enacted would limit access or totally deny access to the SSDI due to concerns that access to the SSDI has lead to identity theft by identity thieves, obtaining Social Security Numbers of deceased children and applying for tax refunds for these non related children.
For the past several months, IAJGS and others from RPAC, have been in discussions with the House Ways and Means Committee Social Security Subcommittee staff on the genealogical community's needs for access to SSDI including the Social Security Numbers [SSN], including providing them with suggested legislative language addressing the concerns of using deceased
children's SSN's while still permitting legitimate users --including genealogists--access to the SSDI . Several very prominent genealogists were lined up to testify on the hope that the genealogical community would be an invited testifier--even with only one representative. We were advised the upcoming hearing would not be specific to any of the current bills in
Congress but rather to address the issues and what legislation should include.
IAJGS was the coordinator and the lead spokesperson with the Subcommittee staff. As such IAJGS was advised by the Ways and Means Committee Social Security Subcommittee staff on January 26 that due to their very limited time and the issues growing more complex, they decided not to go with a genealogist witness. They commented that we may submit testimony for the record. The decision as to whom may be a presenter at a hearing is made by the Subcommittee chairperson, in coordination with the ranking subcommittee member and with subcommittee staff. The decision is not appealable. The hearing information is available on the House Ways and Means Committee website--February 2 at 9:00 AM.
http://tinyurl.com/7mp5op8
original url:
http://waysandmeans.house.gov/Calendar/EventSingle.aspx?EventID=276835
Please read the hearing advisory at: http://tinyurl.com/7xojjc3
original url:
http://waysandmeans.house.gov/News/DocumentSingle.aspx?DocumentID=276834
For information on submitting a statement see:
http://tinyurl.com/6lu7dw7
original url:
http://waysandmeans.house.gov/committeesubmissions/
Statements may be submitted through February 16- two weeks following the hearing. How and where are located in the link immediately above.
You will be able to watch the hearing live from the convenience of where ever your computer is-- go to: http://tinyurl.com/6uq9pd7 full url:
http://waysandmeans.house.gov/Calendar/?EventTypeID=149&CatagoryID=4772
and either click on the hearing or scroll down to the bottom right of the screen where it says committee videos (http://waysandmeans.granicus.com/ViewPublisher.php?view_id=2) and we should see it live. I have been told it will also be archived so one can watch it any time.
To learn who is on the Subcommittee: Go to the Committee website: http://waysandmeans.house.gov/About/Members.htm
The people who serve on the full Ways and Means Committee are listed first and scroll down to the Subcommittee on Social Security-- Each of the members own websites may be accessed by clicking on their names under the full committee.
This subcommittee hearing is to hear what should be in legislation. The IAJGS and RPAC have provided staff with legislative language and concepts, held several conference calls and had numerous e-mails and phone calls with the staff...they received our input-- if they do anything with it we will only know when the new bill is proposed. Therefore, when/if a new bill is introduced it will be heard in both the House and Senate- and an opportunity exists for more input at those times.
For those who are interested in ideas on this issue go to the Records Preservation and Access Committee (RPAC) website http://www.fgs.org/rpac/index.php where there is a talking points paper.
Needless to say IAJGS and RPAC are very disappointed that the genealogical community was not invited to be a presenter at the February 2 hearing. IAJGS is planning to submit a statement. As more information is made available it will be posted to this forum.
Jan Meisels Allen
IAJGS Vice President
Chairperson, IAJGS Public Records Access Monitoring Committee
Sunday, January 22, 2012
(USA) National Archives Attempting To Restore the 1973 Fire-Damaged Military Records
Posted by: Jan Meisels Allen
In 1973 a devastating fire burned millions of US military records located in the St. Louis, Missouri facility--we all thought the records were lost forever. A recent article in the St. Louis Beacon, http://tinyurl.com/7ya32sy
original url:
http://www.stlbeacon.org/arts-life/neighborhoods/out-and-about/114919-profile-of-national-archives-at-st-louis
relates the story of the restoration efforts being undertaken by the National Archives, in St. Louis. We will not see all of the millions of documents restored in our lifetimes, but they have already treated 15,000-20,000 records out of the 6.5 million burned.
Jan Meisels Allen
IAJGS Vice President
Chairperson, IAJGS Public Records Access Monitoring Committee
In 1973 a devastating fire burned millions of US military records located in the St. Louis, Missouri facility--we all thought the records were lost forever. A recent article in the St. Louis Beacon, http://tinyurl.com/7ya32sy
original url:
http://www.stlbeacon.org/arts-life/neighborhoods/out-and-about/114919-profile-of-national-archives-at-st-louis
relates the story of the restoration efforts being undertaken by the National Archives, in St. Louis. We will not see all of the millions of documents restored in our lifetimes, but they have already treated 15,000-20,000 records out of the 6.5 million burned.
Jan Meisels Allen
IAJGS Vice President
Chairperson, IAJGS Public Records Access Monitoring Committee
Virginia Vital Records Access Bills Reported Out of Committee
Posted by: Jan Meisels Allen
On January 19, the Senate Education and Health Committee unanimously reported out (approved) SB 309 on marriage, divorce records http://tinyurl.com/79jfq8x original URL:
(http://lis.virginia.gov/cgi-bin/legp604.exe?121+ful+SB309+pdf) and SB 310 on death records http://tinyurl.com/7f5wu6l original URL (http://lis.virginia.gov/cgi-bin/legp604.exe?121+ful+SB310+pdf ) by Senator Blevins reducing the "closed" periods for marriage and death records from the current 50 years to 25 years. The companion legislation HB 272 http://tinyurl.com/7p2n88b original
URL:(http://lis.virginia.gov/cgi-bin/legp604.exe?121+ful+HB272+pdf) also passed out of committee.
The other chamber will start to consider bills in mid-February.
Further information will be posted when available.
Jan Meisels Allen
IAJGS Vice President
Chairperson, IAJGS Public Records Access Monitoring Committee
On January 19, the Senate Education and Health Committee unanimously reported out (approved) SB 309 on marriage, divorce records http://tinyurl.com/79jfq8x original URL:
(http://lis.virginia.gov/cgi-bin/legp604.exe?121+ful+SB309+pdf) and SB 310 on death records http://tinyurl.com/7f5wu6l original URL (http://lis.virginia.gov/cgi-bin/legp604.exe?121+ful+SB310+pdf ) by Senator Blevins reducing the "closed" periods for marriage and death records from the current 50 years to 25 years. The companion legislation HB 272 http://tinyurl.com/7p2n88b original
URL:(http://lis.virginia.gov/cgi-bin/legp604.exe?121+ful+HB272+pdf) also passed out of committee.
The other chamber will start to consider bills in mid-February.
Further information will be posted when available.
Jan Meisels Allen
IAJGS Vice President
Chairperson, IAJGS Public Records Access Monitoring Committee
Thursday, January 19, 2012
Announcement: JGS of Greater Miami
JGS of Greater Miami will be meeting Sunday, January 29, 2012, 10:00am Greater Miami Jewish Federation, 4200 Biscayne Boulevard, Miami, FL
Free Secure Parking on site. Press #001on the box and the gate will open.
Have ID. Special complimentary refreshments.
If you're in the Miami area, don't miss this exciting and unique presentation with the fabulous Steve Morse, (http://stevemorse.org) creator of the "One Step" genealogy search engine as we celebrate our 23rd Anniversary. Steve has been presenting his 1940 census lectures nationwide, but we are the only JGS to have this special bonus that Steve agreed to do for our members. Five lucky members will be selected (more if time permits) after his presentation and Steve Morse will run your search for you.
This time we must charge $5.00 admission for non-members. Any guest who joins the fee will be waived and that person will be eligible for the drawing. Remember, for the extra bonus only members and those joining at the door, will be eligible for a chance to have Steve Morse do their search for the 1940 ED. Don't miss this exciting and unique opportunity.
Contact Frances Waxman, VP/Membership (fjw6@comcast.net) if you plan to attend so we can provide for sufficient refreshments, or call her cell at 786-210-7966.
Guests and their friends are always welcome. $5 admission this time only. As always no admission fee for members. Come and enjoy the morning of genealogy with your fellow researchers. This should be a very informative session. We look forward to seeing you there to share this and for us to share with you.
Joan Parker,
Immediate Past President
JGS of Greater Miami, Inc.
New Project: Jewish Cemetery of Miskolc, Hungary
Project Description
The objective is to secure sufficient funding to photograph 18th and 19th century headstones and photograph 20th century cemetery books for the Jewish cemetery in Miskolc, Hungary. The 18th and 19th century written records were lost in the Holocaust and such information is currently only available by visiting and searching the overgrown part of the cemetery. A list of names of 20th century deaths were recently made available at the Miskolc synagogue. Another list of 20th century burials is available at the Miskolc cemetery. We estimate that there are approximately 16,000 18th and 19th century headstones, which will be documented by taking 10,000-12,000 photographs in addition to 600 photographs of pages of the 20th century cemetery records.
Miskolc is the third largest city in Hungary. In the 1940s it was reported to have a Jewish population of about 14,000. The city's total population was at that time about 100,000. The cemetery was started about 1792 and its size is reported to be 6 1/2 hectares or 65,000 m2. A picture of the cemetery's surface and geographic location in Miskolc can be accessed at http://binged.it/qZXHa8.
The project involves removing vegetation from the overgrown part of the cemetery, cleaning headstones, and highlighting inscriptions as necessary using a medium that will not contribute to deterioration of the stones. Workers will then photograph each stone and map its location. Volunteers will be recruited from among JewishGen researchers to transcribe the inscriptions and burial locations using the JOWBR template to be integrated into the JOWBR database at http://www.jewishgen.org/databases/cemetery/.
These records will be indexed and transcribed by JewishGen volunteers.
Estimated Cost
The total cost is estimated at $11,000-$13,000 based on a unit cost of $1.00 for each photographic image.
The projects has been divided into three phases to allow work to proceed while funding is being raised through donations to the Hungarian SIG The project will require funding from Jewish Gen accounts such as H-SIG account and JewishGen-erosity.
The project will be organized in phases as follows:
To contribute to this project, please click here.
The objective is to secure sufficient funding to photograph 18th and 19th century headstones and photograph 20th century cemetery books for the Jewish cemetery in Miskolc, Hungary. The 18th and 19th century written records were lost in the Holocaust and such information is currently only available by visiting and searching the overgrown part of the cemetery. A list of names of 20th century deaths were recently made available at the Miskolc synagogue. Another list of 20th century burials is available at the Miskolc cemetery. We estimate that there are approximately 16,000 18th and 19th century headstones, which will be documented by taking 10,000-12,000 photographs in addition to 600 photographs of pages of the 20th century cemetery records.
Miskolc is the third largest city in Hungary. In the 1940s it was reported to have a Jewish population of about 14,000. The city's total population was at that time about 100,000. The cemetery was started about 1792 and its size is reported to be 6 1/2 hectares or 65,000 m2. A picture of the cemetery's surface and geographic location in Miskolc can be accessed at http://binged.it/qZXHa8.
The project involves removing vegetation from the overgrown part of the cemetery, cleaning headstones, and highlighting inscriptions as necessary using a medium that will not contribute to deterioration of the stones. Workers will then photograph each stone and map its location. Volunteers will be recruited from among JewishGen researchers to transcribe the inscriptions and burial locations using the JOWBR template to be integrated into the JOWBR database at http://www.jewishgen.org/databases/cemetery/.
These records will be indexed and transcribed by JewishGen volunteers.
Estimated Cost
The total cost is estimated at $11,000-$13,000 based on a unit cost of $1.00 for each photographic image.
The projects has been divided into three phases to allow work to proceed while funding is being raised through donations to the Hungarian SIG The project will require funding from Jewish Gen accounts such as H-SIG account and JewishGen-erosity.
The project will be organized in phases as follows:
- Photograph the approximately 600 pages of two cemetery books. Estimated cost $600.00
- Clean as necessary and photograph approximately 600 gravestones from the town of Hejocsaba that have been transferred to the Miskolc cemetery. Estimated cost $600.00
- Clean as necessary and photograph the remaining 18th and 19th century gravestones in phases of approximately 1,000 graves at a time as sufficient funds are raised. Estimated cost $11,000-$12,000
- Peter Szlukovinyi, acting rabbi of the Miskolc synagogue, has approved and is participating in the project. He provided his written authorization allowing JewishGen to photograph available burial records and headstones and to create and publish an index to the burials
To contribute to this project, please click here.
New JewishGen Course: Create Family History Pages
Posted by Phyllis Kramer
Do you have a lot of genealogical family material to share and want to organize it into a set of images, but don't know how? Marlis Humphrey will explain and demonstrate how to create image rich family history pages for your family.
Students will learn how to layout, design, and edit a quality family history page set for two ancestors,that can be broadened at a later time. You will learn to include documents like census, naturalization and photographs of your family, heirlooms and memorabilia.
Students will discover sources of digital resources (templates, fonts, etc.) for formatting, and will walk through a project using Photoshop Elements 10 for editing; students will learn how to format the pages for printing using Shutterfly.
Class will feature multimedia including a series of short screencasts with voice narration, powerpoint instructions and text notes for reference. We will use the FORUM for questions and answers and we will encourage students to post their digital pages (.jpg files) for review and comment.
*Please* read the full course description and the software requirements at www.jewishgen.org/education; there are no set times for this course as our students are from around the world; enroll via our secure online enrollment system.
Please address all questions to JewishGen-Education@lyris.jewishgen.org
Phyllis Kramer
VP, Education
Do you have a lot of genealogical family material to share and want to organize it into a set of images, but don't know how? Marlis Humphrey will explain and demonstrate how to create image rich family history pages for your family.
Students will learn how to layout, design, and edit a quality family history page set for two ancestors,that can be broadened at a later time. You will learn to include documents like census, naturalization and photographs of your family, heirlooms and memorabilia.
Students will discover sources of digital resources (templates, fonts, etc.) for formatting, and will walk through a project using Photoshop Elements 10 for editing; students will learn how to format the pages for printing using Shutterfly.
Class will feature multimedia including a series of short screencasts with voice narration, powerpoint instructions and text notes for reference. We will use the FORUM for questions and answers and we will encourage students to post their digital pages (.jpg files) for review and comment.
*Please* read the full course description and the software requirements at www.jewishgen.org/education; there are no set times for this course as our students are from around the world; enroll via our secure online enrollment system.
Please address all questions to JewishGen-Education@lyris.jewishgen.org
Phyllis Kramer
VP, Education
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