Los Angeles: Bring your shtetl to life on April 23

My former congregation, Valley Beth Shalom in Encino, is the venue for the upcoming meeting of the Jewish Genealogical Society of Los Angeles about "Recovering Memories: Bringing your shtetl to life."

The meeting begins at 7.30 p.m. April 23, and will focus on the work of the Ariogala (Lithuania) Research Group.

The ARG has brought to life their ancestral shtetl. Members have shared information and resources to obtain complete records for the town. They have reconstructed the lives of their families and learned about the shtetl's 250-year Jewish history. The time line runs from the 18th century's Grand Duchy period through the Russian Empire period and Lithuanian independence and ends with the Holocaust.

Lists of residents helped to uncover relationships between families. Correspondence files show how Jewish community leaders interacted with the government. Newspaper articles, personal memoirs and family photographs provide a picture of pre-Holocaust Jewish life.

Personal visits by ARG members provided a sense of place and led to new information. Group members photographed the town, determined which buildings were pre-war and cataloged the Jewish cemetery's remnants.

Sources of archival records include archives and museums, YIVO, Yad Vashem, the U.S. National Archives, the Library of Congress, and survivors, descendants and current town residents.

Speakers at the upcoming event include:

ARG organizer David B. Hoffman, president of the Jewish Family History Foundation, a nonprofit genealogical organization preserving 17th-18th century Eastern European archival documents;

JGSLA past president Sonia Hoffman, coordinator of the Grand Duchy Project of the JFHF; and

JGSLA CFO Nancy Biederman, who served as co-president in 2006, and is an active JFHF board member.

For more information on the program and speakers, click here.