Welcome 1. Introductions 2. Invited Guest Speaker Stephen Falk - PDF document

11/08/2016 Welcome 1. Introductions 2. Invited Guest Speaker – Stephen Falk 3. In Memory of Arthur Obermayer 4. Obermayer German Jewish History Awards Update – Karen Franklin 5. Discussion List & Moderation Update – John Lowens 6. Data Projects Update – Roger Lustig 7. A New Webmaster & A New Website 8. Volunteering to Help with New GerSIG projects – Jeanette Rosenberg 9. News, Updates & Announcements 10. Any Other Business 1

11/08/2016 Introductions • The GerSIG Directors: – John Lowens – Roger Lustig – Nancy Grayson Adelson – Jeanette Rosenberg OBE • GerSIG’s Invited Guest Speaker for 2016 – Stephen Falk • Former GerSIG Director, and Co-Founder – Karen Franklin GerSIG’s Invited Guest Speaker • Stephen Falk • 2 talks: • GerSIG Luncheon: The Three Cemeteries of the Breslau Jewish Community • Archival Resources on the Jewish Community of Breslau 1791-1941 (Breslau, Germany, now Wroclaw, Poland) 2

11/08/2016 Karen Spiegel Franklin • Former Director GerSIG • Director of Family Research at the Leo Baeck Institute in New York City • President of the Obermayer German Jewish History Awards • A past President of IAJGS • Past Co-chair - Board of Governors of JewishGen Dr. Arthur S. OBERMAYER (1931-2016) • GerSIG Director • GerSIG Webmaster • Founder of the Obermayer German Jewish History Awards • Tribute available at http://obermayer.us/aw ard/Tribute_Obermayer _020516.pdf 3

11/08/2016 http://obermayer.us/award/index.htm Deadline for 2017 Award is September 21, 2016! Awards Presented on January 25, 2016 The German Jewish Community History Council together with the GerSIG and the Berlin Parliament gave 5 awards to outstanding Germans who had carried out important work on Jewish history. They were: • Walter Demandt (Norden) and Almut Holler (Hage) • Peter Franz (Weimar) • Elmar Ittenbach (Thalfang) • Elisabeth Quirbach and Hans Schulz (Braunsbach) • Werner Schäfer (Frankenthal) Two Distinguished Service Awards were given to: • Nils Busch-Petersen (Berlin) • Reinhard Führer (Berlin) A Tribute to Dr. Arthur S. Obermayer and Obermayer German Jewish History Awardees 4

11/08/2016 How to Nominate • http://obermayer.us/award/nominate.htm • Deadline for 2017 Award Nominations is: September 21, 2016! • New this year – not just about individuals, you can also nominate organisations. GerSIG Discussion Group 5

11/08/2016 GerSIG Discussion List • Suggested improvements or complaints? • Need help putting a message into plain text? • Having technical issues with the website? • Non-English speaker needing help? • Please contact John Lowens the GerSIG list Moderator - GerSIGmod@gmail.com GerSIG Discussion List • Please send any thoughts or comments about our discussion list. • Not all comments and suggestions can be posted to the list but they are of interest to the Moderator and are much appreciated. • “As GerSIG’s customer service representative, I am always happy to try to help members solve GerSIG and JewishGen technical problems”. 6

11/08/2016 From the GerSIG Moderator • We strongly urge new subscribers to send "HELLO" or "INTRO" emails to introduce themselves & their research interests to the rest of the group. • Many excellent breakthroughs have resulted from new subscriber “INTRO" emails. • We are particularly keen for people to share by email lists of the names and places they are researching if they have not done so. • Please keep the last names in UPPER CASE and the places in lower case text, and if possible say when your family lived there. • We also appreciate SITE CITE and BOOK CITE and similar messages. • We especially appreciate "success stories" and "thank you" messages from those whom the Forum has helped. • A significant and growing number of list messages mention data from and member participation in other on-line sources - Ancestry, Geni, etc. • Many of the List messages are now View-mate translation requests. Please search the archived GerSIG messages before posting to the list 7

11/08/2016 Forthcoming GerSIG Projects • New indexing projects to be announced soon – Candidates: Baden surname lists, Württemberg family registers – More as new records come on line • Work in progress: index of vital records and other sources – Filmed items – Originals in archives – On-line materials The Hessen Gatermann Index Phase 1:vital records from all Kreise in the former Kassel administrative region of Hessen-Nassau, plus Waldeck. Mainly 1825-1938 (73,000 records) complete • Frankfurt now being digitized • Gatermann films for other parts of Hessen are a small portion of available records • Darmstadt archive has some records on line 8

11/08/2016 Die Geschichte der Juden in Jebenhausen & Göppingen by Aron Tänzer • Published in Frankfurt in 1927 • In German • Images available online • 1988 Addendum – what happened to the community after 1927 • 1988 version in English translation • Project to supplement 1988 version bringing the trees right up to date • Steve Weil - Stephenjw@aol.com www.jewishgen.org/gersig 9

11/08/2016 GerSIG Website • We need both a new webmaster and a new website • Your GerSIG Directors wish to unanimously propose Alex Calzareth now becomes our new Webmaster and a Director of GerSIG. • We’ve been working with Alex • Want to welcome him by acclaim • Mazal Tov! New GerSIG Website - 2016 In Honor of/In Memory of Dr. Arthur S Obermayer GerSIG Webmaster 1998-2016 10

11/08/2016 JewishGen • All Germany Database Leo DigiBaeck • Locality Pages Baeck Communi • Kehila Links Institute ty • Data NY Histories • Web traffic to Yizkor Books Funding stream Database Old GerSIG New for new ? Website * Data data & & records Recor ds Obermayer Awards & New GerSIG Website to be Awardees hosted by JewishGen & located at www.jewishgen.org/gersig Alemannia Judaica Stronger Linkages * Old website online until replacement is ready Further ideas – from Alex (Feb 2016) • • Header image with logo? 1939 Minority census • • GerSIG projects - Naldex Current Jewish communities? • • In memoriam? Ad hoc translations – Arthur Obermayer • Germans (Obermayer awardees – Martha Lev Zion and others) interested in certain – Michael Bernet towns - directory? • • Membership survey? Connect descendants to their • hometowns German societies • Map of Jewish communities ? • GerSIG event Calendar? • Standard town page? • Historical conference speakers • Stolpersteine and materials? • Holocaust research • GerSIG speakers bureau ? 11

11/08/2016 A different page for each town 12

11/08/2016 First Towns • Steve Jaron – Duisburg & Randerath • Stephen Falk – Breslau, Germany, now Wroclaw, Poland • Kehilalinks • Your Towns? Peter Landé’s Databases Collection • 1933 German Jews Database • Kindertransport Database • German Jews: Death Certificates • They will all find their way on • to our new website! 13

11/08/2016 NRW Jewish records Online • Reg.bez. Detmold: http://tinyurl.com/gpvg fbh • Reg.bez. Arnsberg: http://tinyurl.com/zk7y 5qm NRW – Westfalen & Lippe • About 900 Jewish & Dissident Registers • Digitised Images of Original Records • Covering: 1808-1874 • RB Arnsberg - P5 • RB Detmold - P2 14

11/08/2016 Other Future Projects…. • Rolf Hoffman Files • Other projects with LBI, NY • Collaboration with CAHJP • Arising from ITS Collection • In cooperation with the Wiener Library in London • GerSIG Directors are interested in your views about what records you want us to work on Can You Help GerSIG? • What can you do to help us help GerSIG Researchers: – Sign up today, or contact Jeanette – Please send your name, Email, Volunteer Interests & Skills • Scanning • Data Entry • Translation • Donating Materials • Organizing Projects • Which town will you manage? • We will contact you! 15

11/08/2016 Thank you to our Donors • Fundraising for GerSIG – The General Fund – The Speaker Bureau German Jewish GerSIG DNA Project http://jewsoffrankfurt.com www.facebook.com/jewsoffrankfurt WIRTH Group 16

11/08/2016 JGSGB German SIG • Quarterly meetings – with presentations • Workshops to explore our research brick walls • Supporting mutual genealogy research • Answering research questions • Using the genealogy & history research library • Keeping in touch with GerSIG activities • Handouts with links to new resources – ask me for more info about this. International Germanic Genealogy Conference • July 28-29, 2017 in Minneapolis, Minnesota • Deutsche Arbeitsgemeinschaft genealogischer Verbände e. V. • www.dagv.org 17