Collaboration can improve productivity by combining resources and wisdom to obtain a greater amount of data and construct better-reasoned conclusions. However, collaboration is also a potential source of much anxiety, disagreement, and bad feeling. Significant research has looked at collaborative […]
An Attempt to Map “Jewish Geography”
If you happen to be Jewish, and at least culturally so, then you are probably already familiar with the concept of “Jewish Geography.” For those who are puzzled by what this is, you can search the internet for various definitions […]
The Role of the Jewish Genealogist In Medical and Genetic Family History
Genealogists not only have been documenting their family histories, but have become the repository of vital medical and genetic history for their families. With the advent of widely available genetic testing, the giant leaps in disease identification, the dramatic growth […]
An Analytical Approach to Decoding Jewish Tombstones and Other Artifacts
Twenty years ago I accidentally discovered my own great-grandmother’s matzeva (tombstone) in a small cemetery in Kezmarok, Slovakia, a town by then devoid of living Jews. This astounding discovery spurred me to examine thousands of other abandoned, unvisited, ignored, […]
MyHeritage Launches Book Matching
Books have always been one of the best resources for family history: they are often very organized and well-researched, and many of them were written by contemporaries of our ancestors. But for those of us who have spent countless hours […]
Announcing the Avotaynu DNA Project!
DNA testing is an unparalleled genealogical resource, yet 15 years after the inception of genetic genealogy many genealogists and family historians remain unclear about its use. As a result, DNA testing is underutilized and potential knowledge goes unrealized. To remedy […]
Public Records Access: One Genealogist Can Make A Difference!
This past Thursday, September 3, 2015, a legal petition was filed at the Supreme Court of the State of New York, County of New York. Brooke Schreier Ganz and ReclaimTheRecords.org [Petitioner] vs. New York City Department of Records and Information […]
The Jewish Surname Process in the Russian Empire and its Effect on Jewish Genealogy
Did you ever wonder why your autosomal DNA and Y-DNA genetic match lists contain so many unfamiliar surnames? Did you ever question where the myriad number of bewildering and unexpected surnames, even among your close genetic matches, comes from? If […]
Privacy Issues with Online Trees
The right to privacy is a relatively recent legal construction, and one that is still evolving. As genealogists, people whose goal is to learn and write about personal details of other people, we often hear complaints about invasion of privacy. […]
Census: A Primary Genealogy Tool Under Challenge
The Future of Census Records for Genealogists: Will Privacy and Cost Eliminate Them? Concerns about privacy and cost are threatening the detailed census records that we and prior generations of genealogists have relied upon as an essential tool in our […]
Ethical Wills: A Most Unusual Genealogical Source!
Ethical Will “Found in the Briefcase of a Tsaddik”, Warsaw, 1845, described in this article. Courtesy of the National Library of Israel: Ethical wills are the culmination of a person’s spiritual heritage which he or she wishes to leave to […]
5 Steps To Finding and Interpreting Clues in a Family Photograph
In an ideal world, a genealogist inherits the perfect family photograph — one in which relatives are thoughtfully posed in a well-lighted photography studio. Family members have passed down the photograph in pristine condition with the photographer’s imprint and logo clearly […]
A Brief History and Detailed Listing of the Jews of Tàrrega, Spain, Before and After the Black Death and Pogrom of 1348
Maria Jose Surribas Camps The Jewish community or aljama of Tàrrega, on the Royal Road between Barcelona and Lleida, dates back to 1278 or earlier.[1] What follows is a description of that community from a genealogical perspective, from its earliest […]
Updated: Future Developments in Jewish Family History Research
As amply documented by Avotaynu over the last three decades, members of the Jewish genealogical community have made important contributions to the field of online genealogy with innovations such as the Jewish Genealogical Family Finder, the Daitch-Mokotoff Soundex, JewishGen, and […]
5 Steps to Publishing a Family History
So you want to publish your family history, but think you can’t do it yourself, and the costs are too high to produce the few copies needed? In reality, it may be easy enough to accomplish the task, and a […]
Opinion: “To Define The Terms Is to Win the Argument:” How Genealogical Jargon Hinders Our Research
How Research Happens “To define the terms is to win the argument.” I first heard that saying in my childhood, and it impressed me greatly; how could terms have such a large impact on success? As I have grown I have […]
Jewish Memoirs and Autobiography
People with good stories inside of them often find the drive and determination to get those stories out into the world. On the several occasions when I’ve enrolled in creative-writing or memoir-writing workshops, usually with the aim of finishing a particular […]
Using the Hebrew Calendar to Solve Date Discrepancies in Genealogical Records
Genealogists concern themselves with names, dates, and places, but they can be located and understood only in terms of the context in which they existed. Accurate dates are indispensible for many reasons—the scheduling of religious observances and the discovery of […]
Genealogical Methodology Used in a Biographical Research Project
Genealogical methodology, combined with knowledge of the historical context in which a subject lived, are valuable tools when constructing biographies—especially when we know little about the personal lives of our (even otherwise well-known) subjects. Several approaches are useful in […]
Using Facebook as a Genealogy Tool
Ever since I undertook genealogy research more than a decade ago, I have used the Internet extensively as an enormous repository of sources and resources, an important means of communication, and a major facilitator for connecting with relatives, colleagues, and […]
Surprising Revelations
I have been interested in genealogy since I was a little boy, when my father would tell stories about the Old Country that he had heard from his father. His family came from the Ukraine, and there were many versions, […]
Sometimes a Simple Letter Can Find a Cousin
Sometimes we find long-lost relatives through essentially simple, but at the same time, roundabout ways. A case in point is my discovery of a third cousin, the great-granddaughter of Henry Heiman. Henry was the brother of my great-grandmother, […]
Proving One’s Judaism Through the Matrilineal Line
When people ask how long I have been interested in genealogy and family history, I answer, “I was born this way.” I cannot remember ever not being interested in my ancestors. When I was in the fourth grade, I wrote […]
Jacobi Absolute Generations Scale
A major goal of the International Institute for Jewish Genealogy and Paul Jacobi Center is to develop research tools and technologies for the use of Jewish genealogists and social scientists generally. One such tool for which there has long […]
Contemporary Topics in Genealogy: A Conversation with Professor Thomas Jones
Professor Thomas W. Jones, CG, CGL, FASG, was a recent guest on Tracing Your Family Roots, a cable television show hosted by Arline Sachs and Sallyann Amdur Sack-Pikus (www.tracingroots.nova.edu). The discussion, largely reproduced here, focuses on some major issues in […]