Family Story Finder

The sweep of family history across the generations

Edith and Gina — the Ringel cousins in London
  • 1938 - 2007

Betty Ringel's two daughters were able to leave Germany before 1938. They were in the twenties and they settled in London.

Helga in the League of Women Voters
  • -

Helga expressed a commitment to liberal values in her lifelong work for the League of Women Voters.

If walls could talk—75 years in a Parisian villa
  • 1918 - 1992

Insider dealings in the French jewelry trade. Swank cocktail parties for the Nazi elite. A rough-cut Jewish jeweler and his ebullient new wife. Where Henry Kissinger met Le Duc Tho.

Kindergarten campaigner
  • -

In 1955, Helga led a committee of parents to open a preschool in Vestal.

Lisbon to New York—with a detour to Havana
  • August 1940 - May 1941

The Ringel family crossed from Lisbon on the SS Guine—but their entry to the U.S. was anything but routine

Mel Brenner
  • -

Mel accomplished many things in life, but his life’s greatest moments happened during the Battle of the Bulge

Motives for mercy—the consuls of Toulouse
  • October 24 1968 - December 8 1940

In July 1940, consular officials from three nations conspired to open an escape route for Jews out of occupied France. Why did they do it?

Rosa’s fateful choice
  • 1936 - 1940

Rosa Feidt was the only Lewi sibling who got out, to her everlasting remorse

The problem with anti-ballistic missiles
  • October 6 1968 - March 10 1969

Stanley Ruby entered the public debate over nuclear missile technology in 1968-69.