One of the resources for genealogical discovery not often thought about, I don't think, are old pre-war photographs or films, e.g. where names of Jewish businesses are displayed on various signs, or where there are photographs of pre-war matzevot (gravestones) from Europe are displayed. The latter, of course, is intriguing as many of these matzevot that we can see now online no longer exist, having been destroyed at sometime from then until now.
For instance, in my latest display of Lodz Ghetto Cemetery data I have displayed at least two photos of the cemetery grounds where one can distinguish the names inscribed on at least two matzevot, one for a Sura Goldkrantz and the other for a Rivka Leah Borenstein (Borenstejn perhaps in Polish). The first photo can be found at
www.museumoffamilyhistory.com/ce/ghetto/lodz-ghetto-cemetery-R-S.htm; the Borenstein gravestone photo can be found above or at
www.museumoffamilyhistory.com/ce/ghetto/lodz-ghetto-cemetery-A-D.htm. There are photos like these that are found on a number of sites, e.g. the US Holocaust Memorial Museum (
http://www.ushmm.org/), not to mention others. It might be a good project--that shouldn't take that long at all--for someone to do a limited search on such sites and find such matzevot photos, and where there are names inscribed that are legible, to make a list of them, i.e. at least the name of the deceased and the town in which the cemetery is located. Then you can post them for all of us to see. Of course, you're welcome to send this list to me and I will make the list available to all online.
Of course there are many matzevot still extant within the many cemeteries of Europe, and many photos have been taken of them and put online. Many, however, are broken, missing or otherwise eroded to the point of being indistiguishable. Surely, though, there are photos online or elsewhere of matzevot that are no longer extant, that can be of genealogical value to those who are researchers of particular surnames or towns.
Just an idea for a project that sounds interesting to me. What do you think?
You can now view a number of photographs of the Jewish New Synagogue of Harbin, China. It used to be the largest synagogue in Northeast China, but it hasn't be used as such since the Jews left Harbin in the 1950s. Built in 1921, it served as both a synagogue and library and has within the past number of years been renovated. Harbin used to have the largest Jewish population in the Far East.
More names have been added to the list of those buried in the Jewish Ghetto Cemetery of Lodz, Poland, now totaling more than 3,400 burials. More will be added, but not until 2011. Not only does this list contain the names of the deceased and date and age of death, but also grave location, Hebrew name of the deceased and father and more.
Many more photographs of the synagogues of Europe (now close to six hundred in all), both from sometime before World War II and of the recent past, can now be found within the Museum's exhibition. "Synagogues of Europe..." which arguably has the largest number of synagogue photos from Europe online.
One of the resources for genealogical discovery not often thought about, I don't think, are old pre-war photographs or films, e.g. where names of Jewish businesses are displayed on various signs, or where there are photographs of pre-war matzevot (gravestones) from Europe are displayed. The latter, of course, is intriguing as many of these matzevot that we can see now online no longer exist, having been destroyed at sometime from then until now.
For those of you who are interested in learning about those who are interred within the Lodz Ghetto Cemetery, you can now view the current master list online within the Museum of Family History.
Posts
