Family Story Finder
The sweep of family history across the generations
Abraham Blokh came from Minsk
Before he became Abe Ratner, he was Abraham Blokh from Minsk.
Benjamin Hopper settles in California
Fleeing English coal country, he founded the family base in California's Central Valley
Dan's 2018 research trip to Berlin and Gdansk
Dan supplemented his attendance at a Warsaw genealogy conference with a tour of family locations. Read his blog postings and view the post-trip video coverage.
Demise of the cultured Lewi family
Five siblings who stayed true to German ideals until the bitter end
Eilertsens at sea
Members of a farming family took to the sea both as an occupational calling and a means of emigration
Family roots in the Plymouth colony
Isetta Stetson descended from early Massachusetts colonists, going all the way back to the Mayflower on one side. Nine generations later, her midwestern parents still upheld Yankee values
From Rezitsa to Rostov
Sholom and Sophie Tulbowitz left their ancestral town in the 1870s to settle for 20 years in Russia near Rostov-on-Don.
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.
Janis Brenner—a Ratner in motion
An innovator in modern dance and choreography since breaking in with the Murray Lewis Dance Company in the 1980s. The Ratners moved geographically. Janis moves artistically.
Just so—how the Rubys got their name
When and why did Walter Rabinowitz take on our abbreviated last name? He may have gotten the idea during intermission at a Bronx nickelodeon
Lisbon to New York—with a detour to Havana
The Ringel family crossed from Lisbon on the SS Guine—but their entry to the U.S. was anything but routine
Louis Katz of Kolberg
Betty’s father was a prosperous merchant who came to Pomerania from East Prussia.
On Hill Avenue
The Ruby family comes of age in a bedroom suburb west of Chicago
Ratner family passage to America
Abe Blokh became Abe Ratner to avoid conscription and get out of Russia. With his young wife and her mother, they voyaged from Bremen to Leeds to New York
The Eilertsens in Brooklyn
From Red Hook to Gerritsen Beach to Bay Ridge, Jack and Camilla Eilertsen lived the Norwegian immigrant experience in Brooklyn
The family secret behind grandfather's desk calendar
A surprising artifact discovered after a parent's death leads to a series of discoveries and a new pastime in genealogy
The Klein family in the 1940s
Leon Klein continued to work for American Spirits as its upstate New York sales representative
The Rabinowitz family in Jewish Harlem
Joseph and Lena Rabinowitz were Russian immigrants who ran a corner grocery in Jewish Harlem. Their nine children were native Americans
The Ringel family roots in old Rzeszów
Moses Ringel and Rose Lea Reichman raised a large family in Rzeszów in the Galizianer tradition
The Ringels in Berlin—time of prosperity
From 1880s to the 1930s, the Ringel family prospered in the garment trade in the German capital. Herman made men's outerwear.
The Stetson family’s manifest destiny
From stalwart Yankee roots, Herbert and Hattie Stetson went west with the country
The Wohlgemuths in Danzig
Before moving his family to Berlin in 1912, Isaak Wohlgemuth prospered as a mover in Danzig. His family roots were in nearby West Prussia.
Tulbowitz in the USSR—an alternative history
If Sholom Tulbowitz had gone to Dvinsk instead of Rostov, as his cousin did, his Ratner descendants might have grown up in Perm instead of Albany.