Family Story Finder
The sweep of family history across the generations
Abe Ratner in the seltzer business
The Ratner family became established in the Fifth Ward of Albany, N.Y. Abe bottled soda water and Rose nurtured a brood of children.
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
Shtetl life in Russian Rezhitsa
Today it is Rezekne in Latvia. In the 19th century, it was the village in Vitebsk Province where our Tulbowitz clan lived in the old Yiddish way
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 Kauflers of Krakow
Our best documented family line is Feige Kaufler's ancestry among the Jewish families of Krakow.
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
Young man on the make in the Roaring Twenties
Walter Ruby hustled his way as a traveling silver salesman, with some career side trips into boxing promotion and medicinal alcohol.