Jewish Genealogy Research

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Did you know?

 * Columbus took Jews with him in hopes they could translate Oriental languages.
 * Jewish births are sometimes listed in local church records.
 * Emma Lazarus, daughter of Sephardic Jews, wrote the famous poem inscribed on the Statue of Liberty, "give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses..."
 * Jews are the oldest group with their national identity and cultural heritage intact.

Ethnic Divisions of Judiasm

 * Ashkenazi Communities of Jews that settled in Central and Eastern Europe. They speak a unique language called Yiddish, which is a mixture of Hebrew and German that originated in the 9th century.
 * Sephardic Jews who descend from those who were expelled from Spain in 1492 and Portugal in 1496 and from Italy 1490 - 1510. Most of these Jews spoke a version of Spanish called Ladino and settled in the Ottoman Empire, Netherlands and the Holy Land. Sepharad means Spain in Ladino.
 * Romaniote Community with distinctive cultural features and who have lived in the territory of Greece, Italy and neighboring areas for more than 2,000 years. They trace their roots from the destruction of Jerusalem. Their languages were Yevanic, a Greek dialect, and modern Greek.
 * Mizrahi Jews descended from local Jewish communities of the Middle East. The term Mizrahi is most commonly used in Israel to refer to Jews who trace their roots back to Muslim-majority countries. Mizrahi and Sepharadic are often inter mingled.
 * Marrano Jews from Spain who converted or were forced to convert to Christianity, some of whom may have continued to practice Judaism in secret. Sometimes called Crypto-Jews
 * Crypto-Jews A term used to describe descendants of Jews who maintain some Jewish traditions of their ancestors while publicly adhering to other faiths.
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Key Internet Links

 * American Jewish Archive The Jacob Rader Marcus Center of the American Jewish Archive has a large and growing genealogy collection, with over 1,000 family genealogy files. In addition, we have extensive resources in the following areas: Jewish communities and immigration during the Colonial Period, early Jewish communities in the Caribbean Islands, along with congregational records from early Jewish settlement to modern times
 * American Jewish Historical Society books, photos, art and artifacts
 * Ancestry.com Jewish Family History Collection
 * Archives: Jewish Family History Resources
 * Arolsen Archives - 13 million Holocaust records online.
 * Avotaynu Not the same as the website below. Avotaynu publishes books, newsletters and weekly emails for researches
 * Consolidated Jewish Surname Index
 * Avotaynu Online intends to stimulate collaboration among genealogists. They are also the main sponsor behind the Jewish DNA collection effort.
 * B&F Compendium of Jewish Genealogy Over 25,000 Jewish genealogy resources for over 200 countries, 80 provinces, and over 1400 towns in Poland.
 * Cemetery Scribes recording tombstone inscriptions in the UK
 * Center for Jewish History databases, collections, guides, and event
 * Cyndi's List/Jewish
 * Federation of East European Family History Societies fosters research
 * Gesher Galicia Promotes and conducts Jewish genealogical and historical research for Galicia a province of the former Austro-Hungarian Empire.


 * International Association of Jewish Genealogical Societies over 75 societies around the world.
 * Israel Genealogy Research Association (IGRA) the largest genealogy organization in Israel with over a 1,000,000 records in its online database.
 * JewishGen databases and tools to help find family members
 * Joint Distribution Committee Archives houses significant collections for the study of modern Jewish history. Comprising the organizational records of JDC, the overseas rescue, relief, and rehabilitation arm of the American Jewish community, the archives includes over 3 miles of text documents, 100,000 photographs, a research library of more than 6,000 books, 1,100 audio recordings including oral histories, and a collection of 2,500 videos.
 * Jewish Genealogy in Italy
 * JRI - Poland Largest fully searchable database of indexes of Jewish vital records online
 * Museum of the Jewish People Housed within the Museum of the Jewish People in Tel Aviv.

The Douglas E. Goldman Jewish Genealogy Center and is the only center of its kind in the world. At the Center, visitors can search a computerized database containing thousands of genealogies of Jewish families from all over the world and can also register their own family trees. There is also a way to order genealogy help even when you aren't at the museum


 * National Library of Israel JPRESS. New titles on JPRESS This site contains a collection of Jewish newspapers published in various countries, languages, and time periods. Ongoing project.
 * National Jewish Welfare Board Records The collection documents the National Jewish Welfare Board's (JWB) evolution from an organization founded in 1917 to provide support for soldiers in times of war to an agency involved in all aspects of Jewish life both in the United States and abroad. In 1990 JWB recreated itself as the Jewish Community Centers Association of North America.


 * Routes to Roots Jewish and civil records of Eastern Europe
 * Sephardim.com for Sephardic genealogy / Jewish genealogy research
 * Sephardic Gen multiple databases and links for Sephardic research
 * Synagogue Scribes London Ashkenazi Synagogue records database]
 * The South African Jewish database. The primary aim of the project is to research the estimated 15,000 core families who migrated to Southern Africa between 1850-1950 from England, Germany, Lithuania, Latvia and Belarus.
 * Utah Jewish Genealogical Society. The Utah genealogy society focused on Jewish research.
 * U.S. Commission for the Preservation of America's Heritage Abroad - contains lists of Jewish cemeteries and other historically significant sites. Information organized by country.
 * Yad Vashem - Israeli Holocaust Museum and database (contains the Holocaust Victims' Database)
 * Yivo Institute for Jewish Research A 7-year initiative to digitally reunite prewar archival and library collections separated by the Holocaust.


 * EllisIsland.org NY passenger lists of 20 million immigrants. See also:


 * Searching $ New York (all: 1820-1957) Passenger Lists in One Step
 * Searching $ Hamburg Outbound Passenger Lists in One Step

Helpful Guides

 * How to Start Your Family History Simple steps to begin your family history.
 * State Research Guides Individual guides to finding records and indexes in each U.S. state.
 * Research Outline Jewish Genealogy
 * Victims of National Socialism
 * Shoah-Holocaust Free Research Help