Pickles: Evolution or revolution?

This is about a pickle evolution or, some might say, a revolution.

"A nickle for a pickel" - and you're back on New York's Lower East Side.

Nice olive-y green, delicious full-sour pickles, preferably from a big barrel, but more often today from a glass jar. None of those wimpy half-sours, thank you.

OK, I'm not quite sure why I'm posting this.

It doesn't have much to do with genealogy except gastronomically.

Pickles occupy an honored place in most Jewish ethnic cuisine, such as the classic Ashkenazi deli sour pickle, the Israeli garlic-y pickle, the Persian garlic pickle (actual cloves of garlic pickled, by tradition, for seven years called seer torshi; run, do not walk, to try these!), mixed pickled vegetables and fruits from around the world.

It was also a great way to preserve an abundance of vegetables and fruits for the winter before refrigerators were invented.

I'm not sure whether I am simply horrified or amazed by this particular creation of American ingenuity.

Those pickles were once mere dills. They were once green. Their exteriors remain pebbly, a reminder that long ago they began their lives on a farm, on the ground, as cucumbers.

But they now have an arresting color that combines green and garnet, and a bracing sour-sweet taste that they owe to a long marinade in cherry or tropical fruit or strawberry Kool-Aid.

Kool-Aid pickles violate tradition, maybe even propriety. Depending on your palate and perspective, they are either the worst thing to happen to pickles since plastic brining barrels or a brave new taste sensation to be celebrated.

Take a bite out of this New York Times story.

It's a family thing

From Nova Scotia, an article on getting future genealogists involved.

Some tips:

Simple three-generation pedigree chart using photos, color, stickers, whatever - instead of only hard facts. If they can write, have them add names and birthdates. Hang it where everyone can see it, take to "show and tell" at school.

Make a scrapbook page for each family member. Let the children decorate it (just keep a watch on spelling, dates and places).

A neat extension of this, says the author, is a series My Mother (or Father, Grandmother, Grandfather) and Me - A Memory Scrapbook for Kids (Kids Can Press), where kids enter data on a particular relative, compare lives, complete a three-generation chart and add photos. I haven't see this so can't judge, but I will look out for it.

Take the younger generations on vacations to the places important to you and your ancestors. Take pictures to use in scrapbooks. This brings family history alive.

The most important advice in the article: Keep "lessons" short and simple, so they'll come back for more!

Brussels: Godfrey the Crusader

Why should Jewish genealogists be interested in Godfrey of Bouillion's adventures during the First Crusade, or his statue in Brussels. It was so long ago.

For starters, the names of those murdered nine centuries ago were only sporadically recorded, and about one-third of European Jewry was lost forever. These were our ancestors, but we don't know their names.

The Crusades previewed tragic future events including expulsions and conversions. Some historians call the Crusades "the first Holocaust."

Michael Freund, in the Jerusalem Post, writes about Godfrey, who went off to the Holy Land at the start of the First Crusade.

Godfrey has long been revered by Europeans as the liberator of Jerusalem, the man who helped free the city from the hands of the Muslim "infidels" more than nine centuries ago. He has been the subject of epic poems and operas, as well as a topic of literary tribute, and was once even selected to appear on a list of the "greatest Belgians."

Pope Urban II's call to arms caught Godfrey's attention in 1096. He is reported to have told his army of thousands, "In this, our Holy War, we shall slay all the children of Israel wherever we shall find them. I shall not rest content until I have exterminated the Jews."

Several communities - such as Cologne and Mainz - paid the then-fortune of 500 silver marks each as protection money. Godfrey took the cash and attacked them.

May is the 911th anniversary of the Crusaders' jaunt across France and Germany, destroying entire communities: Speyer, Worms and Mainz. It is estimated that 25-30 percent, if not more, of European Jewry was lost forever.

It took three years to reach the Holy Land and, in July 1099, the Crusaders broke into Jerusalem, killing Jews and Moslems.

This disaster, writes Freund, led to the Av Harachamim prayer still recited as part of the Shabbat service. A portion: "the pious, the upright and the blameless, the holy communities who laid down their lives for the sanctification of His name."

Is this really the kind of person who should be celebrated in the center of Europe ? Sure, you might be wondering, that may very well be correct. But who really cares? After all, it was a long time ago, so why bother dredging up the distant past?

Click here for the entire piece.

Atlanta: Gen sources in Georgia

The Jewish Genealogical Society of Georgia is contributing to a new book covering Jewish genealogical research in North America.

A working session - at 1.30 p.m. Sunday, May 20 - is planned to create the Georgia section for the future Jewish Resources for Genealogy and Family History in the United States and Canada, by Avotaynu, which publishes most reference works for Jewish genealogy.

Helpful Hint: Check out Avotaynu's Consolidated Name Index (CJSI), which contains nearly 700,000 surnames, mostly Jewish, that appear in 42 databases totalling 7.3 million records. The names are sequenced phonetically, using the Daitch-Mokotoff Soundex System, rather than alphabetically. Name variants that sound the same are grouped together. For example, there are 40 listings for TALALAY, of which 11 are those I have found in my research. It is a very useful tool and can provide new directions and possibilities in which to search.

The meeting is at the Cuba Genealogy Center at the Breman Jewish Heritage Museum in Atlanta.

Fee: JGSG/Breman Members, no charge; others, $5.

Click here or here for more information.

Washington: Holocaust archive coming

Millions of images of Holocaust-era prisoner documents will be transferred to the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum under embargo, a situation upsetting to Survivor organizations.

Paul Shapiro, called the "museum's point man on the Bad Arolsen files," is the opening keynote speaker at the 27th IAJGS International Conference on Jewish Genealogy, where he will present an up-to-the-minute review on Sunday, July 15, in Salt Lake City.

In this JTA story, read the latest about the Bad Arolsen archives.

A May 14 meeting of the 11-nation group overseeing the archive is expected to authorize the partial transfer - but only with an embargo - because Greece, Belgium and France must still sign the agreement.

The USHMM has agreed to keep everything secret until the committee authorizes its release.

JTA has learned, however, that the transfer will include 10 million digitized images of documents to be transported in several 500-gigabyte hard drives that plug into any computer via a simple USB connection. Small, lightweight, portable drives obviate the prospect of managing linear miles of archival documents.

The museum plans to assemble the raw images into a database with a search engine that can be accessed from one or more terminals in the museum's archive. The gargantuan collection will instantly double the size of the museum's holdings.

The USHMM has a small staff, few microfilm-reader machines and computer terminals, and is overwhelmed with requests in the summer. In addition to on-site use, "some 8,000 requests come to the museum each year via mail, phone and e-mail." The inquiry backlog at Bad Arolsen was more than 425,000 in 2006.

With documents on more than 19 million individuals, the USHMM says massive linguistic training will be required before it could begin to provide data, which will be only accessible via a few on-site terminals, with outside access strictly prohibited.

Critics wonder why the USHMMM will get the documents and there are arguments about Holocaust corporate involvement information, considered a taboo issue at USHMM, when the archives hold information on slave laborers who worked at those companies.

Survivor groups stress the age and health of their members and that most of them do not live in the DC area, stressing that accessibility is a major issue. They ask why copies won't be in New York (50,000 survivors) or Miami (10,000 survivors) for easier availability.

Paul Shapiro, the museum's point man for Bad Arolsen, told JTA that he has quietly assembled a list of companies he has seen in Bad Arolsen archives, but it remains secret. Museum officials refused to discuss "Shapiro's list."

Nonetheless, museum officials said they will not permit archival access via the open Internet or via terminals at libraries and universities around the country, the way other databases of documents are commonly accessed. Museum officials declined to explain their motives for restricting access.

Author of the JTA article is Edwin Black, The New York Times' best-selling author of the award-winning IBM and the Holocaust, His stories on the subject can be viewed here.

Tunisia: Djerba pilgrimage

Legend has it that the sailors of the tribe of Zevulun in Solomon's fleet sailed to Djerba thousands of years ago. When the Babylonians destroyed the Temple, say other stories, some priests managed to save a door and took it away to safety. They discovered a Zevulunite colony in the southern part of Djerba called Hara Kabira; the newcomers founded the Hara Zerira settlement, built a beautiful synagogue and hid in it the Temple door.

The synagogue, called Al-Jeriba or Al-Ghriba, once had 60 ancient Torah scrolls.

The Djerba community worked in wool, fine metal, vineyards, precious stones and coral.

Genealogically speaking, there are interesting naming patterns. Male twins were always named Peretz and Zorach, female twins named Rebecca and Sarah, while twins of different sexes were called Isaac and Rebecca.

JTA had an interesting story on the Djerba pilgrimage.

Only about 2,000 of Tunisia's 10.8 million people are Jewish - half live in Djerba. Each year, they and many Tunisian Jews and their descendants who now live in other countries gather for the anniversary of the death of Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai

According to the article, "a huge candelabrum called the Grande Menara is paraded down the street as women reach out to touch the multicolored silk scarves adorning it," and the right to ride next to it is auctioned off to the highest bidders.

The procession winds through the small village of Hara Sghira, home to oldest North African synagogue, Al-Ghriba, and the article says it recalls the memory of a legendary woman named La Ghriba -- Arabic for "the foreigner" -- who lived centuries ago on the island and hailed as a saint.

There is no direct flight between Israel and Tunisia, so Israelis must fly to a European city to take a flight to Tunis and then drive six hours through the desert. In 2000, some 9,000 pilgrims attended, but in 2002 a fatal terror attack brought the numbers to zero. The number of participants is now growing - 5,000 came - and there is heavy security.

Nicaragua: 'Who's a Jew' splits community

Nicaragua's 50 Jews - with two Orthodox families - have the same problems as larger communities, reports this JTA story.

At an April 30 assembly to elect a new board of directors, relations between the 50 Jews in the country deteriorated after two people whom some consider non-Jews were elected to the board.

The assembly decided to allow anyone who "feels Jewish in their heart" to be a member of the community, even if they don't have maternal links to Judaism and haven't converted.

The move outraged some in the community, such as outgoing president Rafael Lipshitz, and left them weighing whether to form a splinter community.

In spite of the disagreements, the community is beginning to revitalize for the first time since the country's synagogue burned in 1978. When the Sandinistas took over in 1979, the entire community went into exile, only returning in 1990 after the Sandinistas were voted out.

The group, ranging from Orthodox to secular, organizes seders and Shabbat dinners, even though members are split among three main towns. They also maintain the Jewish section of the cemetery in the capital, Managua.

New York: learn about a 19th-century scandal

The Jewish Genealogical Society (New York) will host Pamela Weisberg, who will be speaking about "When Leopold Met Lena: Marriage, Divorce and Deception in 1892 New York."

The program starts at 2 p.m. Sunday, May 20, at the Center for Jewish History, 15 W. 16th St.,

First came love, then came marriage - but on the heels of the baby in the baby carriage came accusations of adultery and two trials in New York City's Court of Common Pleas.

The unexpected discovery of a divorce decree in the 1890s New York Times "News of the Courts" leads to scandal-ridden court transcripts held at the NYC Municipal Archives and revelations of a family secret.

Beginning in Czestochowa, Poland and Cracow, Austria and continuing to Manhattan's Lower East Side and Little Rock, Arkansas - the tumultuous, romantic and litigious world of our immigrant ancestors is brought to life in court records, graveyard inscriptions, newspaper articles, city directories, census and vital records.

Enjoy the ride as Besser v. Besser is deconstructed and learn how present-day genealogical research can be used to solve 19th-century mysteries.

Weisberger is the program chair for the Jewish Genealogical Society of Los Angeles, research coordinator for Gesher Galicia, and active in the Hungarian and Sub-Carpathian SIGs.

Admission: non-members, $5.

Click here for more information.