California: Peter Lande, June 29

Peter Landé, a volunteer at the US Holocaust Memorial Museum (Washington DC), will speak at the next meeting of the Jewish Genealogical Society of the Conejo Valley and Ventura County.

The meeting begins at 3pm Sunday, June 29, at Temple Adat Elohim, Thousand Oaks. There is no charge.

Landé is also speaking at the Southern California Genealogical Society Jamboree in Burbank over the weekend and will be at the JGSCV following his program at the conference.

His program, “Genealogical Records from the Holocaust – The Breakthrough??” will focus on the efforts to collect information on individuals persecuted during the Nazi regime, including in the Holocaust. These were centralized through an international agreement establishing the International Tracing Service (ITS) in 1955, in Bad Arolsen, Germany.

The international opening of the ITS archives, the largest collection of records on Holocaust victims and survivors, offers a new window for those seeking information on the fates of family members. While a tremendous step forward, researchers should not expect a panacea and there are still major holes in information on Eastern Europe.

He will cover what is (and isn’t) in the collection and how to access it given that it is not on the web. With 50 million name-cards, providing information on about 17 million people, there is much to do.

Landé has also been involved in a major project to identify and collect in a single computerized database the names of all Holocaust victims and survivors, whether Jewish or non-Jewish, as well as an inventory of thousands of sources of information on Holocaust victims and survivors. He was active in the ultimately successful international effort to open for public access the records of the ITS.

For more details and information on upcoming meetings, click here.

Zimbabwe: A shtetl in Africa

In 1894, 21 Jewish traders and former expeditionary force soldiers gathered in the tent of Messrs. Moss & Rosenblatt to form a congregation in Bulawayo, a sun-blistered town of tin and wooden shanties with roads that were little more than sand paths.

Dwindling from 7,500 Jews in the 1970s – about 80% Ashkenazim – today’s community numbers only about 200. A small number of them are residents of the Bulawayo retirement home, Savyon Lodge.

In a Jerusalem Post article by David E. Kaplan, a July 11 reunion for former Zimbabweans in Israel may exceed the number of their countrymen back home. Some 700 former Zimbabweans now live in Israel.

Dave Bloom describes his community as a “shtetl in Africa,” and believed it was time to “preserve the past before nothing was left or no one alive to tell the story.” He started collecting material which is available here.

Bloom visited archives, made copies of newspaper articles, meeting minutes and photos. He found recordings with early Jewish pioneers, unpublished manuscripts and much more. Of Polish ancestry, he was determined to document all the Jewish graves in Zimbabwe; so far more than 4,500 headstones have been published and former Zimbabweans have contributed more than 250 family biographies.

Englishman Daniel Montague Kisch was the first Jew to feature in the history of Rhodesia. By 1860, he had become a prospector. “and so joined the expedition of diggers, mainly Australian, on the wearisome trek to a golden will-o’-the-wisp on the Tati Fields.” Another English Jew was Moss Cohen.

Before its posting on Bloom’s Web site, very few had seen Rosenthal’s monumental work, commissioned by the Rhodesian Jewish Board of Deputies in 1949. Since its completion, it attracted little else than dust. “Very few even knew of its existence. Gems were coming out of the woodwork,” Bloom told Metro. People all over the world were dusting off the past to reveal a treasure trove of Jewish history in central Africa, much of which is now available on his site.

There were also Sephardic immigrants. From Morocco, Marvyn Hatchuel; Behor Benatar from Rhodesia via Rhodes, as was the Alhadeff family.

Wandering off, Hatchuel continued, his father found himself pounding the port area of Alexandria. A ship bound for east Africa grabbed his attention and on the spur of the moment he bought a ticket to Mozambique. Disembarking at Beira, Hatchuel had insufficient money to pay for any further passage. So the young Moroccan followed the railway track and walked the breadth of Mozambique until he crossed over into Rhodesia and completed the last stretch to Penhalonga. “I believe when Behor Benatar saw my father enter his store, he nearly collapsed. Anyway, he gave him a job. At night and under candlelight Dad would sit with a dictionary and a newspaper and in that way taught himself English,” Hatchuel related.

The reunion of former Rhodesians and Zimbabweans will be a brunch at 9.30am Friday, July 11, at the Ra’anana Lawn Bowls Club.

Read the complete article here and for contact information and reunion details.

Florida: Jewish heritage films, family ties

The Fort Lauderdale International Film Festival and Castle Hill Productions celebrate a century of leagcy with 10 films on Jewish heritage, to be screened June 18-23, at Cinema Paradiso, Fort Launderdale.

The films include:

Line King: The Al Hirshfeld Story – documentary takes a look at works by renowned artist Al Hirshfeld, whose caricatures of celebrities were featured on playbills and in The New York Times.

The Power of Good: Nicholas Winton – documentary about the courage and determination of a young English stockbroker who saved the lives of 669 children between March 13 and Aug. 2, 1939.

Hester Street – film about a young Jewish woman who comes to America in the 1890s, only to discover that her husband has found a new life and is dating another woman. In English and Yiddish.

Partisans of Vilna – film chronicles the endeavors of Jewish resistance fighters during World War II and the Holocaust.

The Greenhouse – film about a professor who makes up a story to his granddaughter about how his son was heroically killed in World War II. In French with English subtitles.

Alan and Naomi – film is set in the 1940s and is about a young Jewish boy who helps a young girl come out of her shell after she watched her father die at the hands of the Nazis.

The Life and Times of Hank Greenberg – film tells the story of baseball Hall-of-Famer Hank Greenberg, through archival footage and interviews with Jewish and nonJewish fans, former teammates, friends and his family.

The Boat is Full – film about refugees who sneak into Switzerland from Germany during World War II. They are allowed to stay at an inn if they pose as a family. In German with English subtitles.

The Tollbooth – film explores the life of a Jewish family in Brooklyn through the eyes of a struggling painter in her first year of art school.

Left Luggage – film about a rebellious student struggling with her relationship with her parents, who are concentration camp survivors. In English, Hebrew and Yiddish.

For the schedule and ticket prices, click here here.

California: Peter Lande, June 29

Peter Landé, a volunteer at the US Holocaust Memorial Museum (Washington DC), will speak at the next meeting of the Jewish Genealogical Society of the Conejo Valley and Ventura County.

The meeting begins at 3pm Sunday, June 29, at Temple Adat Elohim, Thousand Oaks. There is no charge.

Landé is also speaking at the Southern California Genealogical Society Jamboree in Burbank over the weekend and will be at the JGSCV following his program at the conference.

His program, “Genealogical Records from the Holocaust – The Breakthrough??” will focus on the efforts to collect information on individuals persecuted during the Nazi regime, including in the Holocaust. These were centralized through an international agreement establishing the International Tracing Service (ITS) in 1955, in Bad Arolsen, Germany.

The international opening of the ITS archives, the largest collection of records on Holocaust victims and survivors, offers a new window for those seeking information on the fates of family members. While a tremendous step forward, researchers should not expect a panacea and there are still major holes in information on Eastern Europe.

He will cover what is (and isn’t) in the collection and how to access it given that it is not on the web. With 50 million name-cards, providing information on about 17 million people, there is much to do.

Landé has also been involved in a major project to identify and collect in a single computerized database the names of all Holocaust victims and survivors, whether Jewish or non-Jewish, as well as an inventory of thousands of sources of information on Holocaust victims and survivors. He was active in the ultimately successful international effort to open for public access the records of the ITS.

For more details and information on upcoming meetings, click here.

Zimbabwe: A shtetl in Africa

In 1894, 21 Jewish traders and former expeditionary force soldiers gathered in the tent of Messrs. Moss & Rosenblatt to form a congregation in Bulawayo, a sun-blistered town of tin and wooden shanties with roads that were little more than sand paths.

Dwindling from 7,500 Jews in the 1970s – about 80% Ashkenazim – today’s community numbers only about 200. A small number of them are residents of the Bulawayo retirement home, Savyon Lodge.

In a Jerusalem Post article by David E. Kaplan, a July 11 reunion for former Zimbabweans in Israel may exceed the number of their countrymen back home. Some 700 former Zimbabweans now live in Israel.

Dave Bloom describes his community as a “shtetl in Africa,” and believed it was time to “preserve the past before nothing was left or no one alive to tell the story.” He started collecting material which is available here.

Bloom visited archives, made copies of newspaper articles, meeting minutes and photos. He found recordings with early Jewish pioneers, unpublished manuscripts and much more. Of Polish ancestry, he was determined to document all the Jewish graves in Zimbabwe; so far more than 4,500 headstones have been published and former Zimbabweans have contributed more than 250 family biographies.

Englishman Daniel Montague Kisch was the first Jew to feature in the history of Rhodesia. By 1860, he had become a prospector. “and so joined the expedition of diggers, mainly Australian, on the wearisome trek to a golden will-o’-the-wisp on the Tati Fields.” Another English Jew was Moss Cohen.

Before its posting on Bloom’s Web site, very few had seen Rosenthal’s monumental work, commissioned by the Rhodesian Jewish Board of Deputies in 1949. Since its completion, it attracted little else than dust. “Very few even knew of its existence. Gems were coming out of the woodwork,” Bloom told Metro. People all over the world were dusting off the past to reveal a treasure trove of Jewish history in central Africa, much of which is now available on his site.

There were also Sephardic immigrants. From Morocco, Marvyn Hatchuel; Behor Benatar from Rhodesia via Rhodes, as was the Alhadeff family.

Wandering off, Hatchuel continued, his father found himself pounding the port area of Alexandria. A ship bound for east Africa grabbed his attention and on the spur of the moment he bought a ticket to Mozambique. Disembarking at Beira, Hatchuel had insufficient money to pay for any further passage. So the young Moroccan followed the railway track and walked the breadth of Mozambique until he crossed over into Rhodesia and completed the last stretch to Penhalonga. “I believe when Behor Benatar saw my father enter his store, he nearly collapsed. Anyway, he gave him a job. At night and under candlelight Dad would sit with a dictionary and a newspaper and in that way taught himself English,” Hatchuel related.

The reunion of former Rhodesians and Zimbabweans will be a brunch at 9.30am Friday, July 11, at the Ra’anana Lawn Bowls Club.

Read the complete article here and for contact information and reunion details.