Family Story Finder
The sweep of family history across the generations
Eilertsens by the lake
Ed was the rector at Saint Martin's By the Lake in Minnetonka Beach, Minn. The family was raised in towns around the lake region west of Minneapolis, including in the church rectory
Green Valley Drive—our exurban childhood
Our years in Pittsburgh were spent in a tract house in a natural wonderland—backed up against a family farm and an equestrian estate.
Our family during the Nazi years in Berlin
During the first five years of Hitler's reign of terror, Jewish families of Berlin faced one repression after another.
Rabbi Spektor's true genealogy
Most of what we discovered about Rabbi Spektor's genealogy was entirely true. All but the myth of our family's connection to it
Sputnik in the backyard
Watching Sputnik at night from our back yard in a suburb of Pittsburgh is one of my earliest memories.
Stan at Brant Lake
Stan summered at a Jewish summer camp in the Adirondacks.
The Clerc jewelry aryanization files
The Clerc jewelry assets were seized and resold to an Aryan buyer. The Nazis kept perfect records of the transactions.
Third Generation Rubys
First came Walter, then Danny and Joanne. They would carry on the Ruby-Ringel genes.
Twyla's childhood
Outlooks of a pre-millennial
Yichus and our relation to the famous rabbi
Walter thought he had proved the family legend of descent from the celebrated Kovno Rav, Rabbi Yitchak Elchanon Spektor. Later facts emerged that suggested a more tenuous connection.