Sixth Blogiversary

This is blog post number 215 in six years of blogging here at A Jewish Genealogy Journey.

I didn't blog as much as I wanted to during this past year, but I did share several Wordless Wednesday posts, as well as a few Tombstone Tuesday posts. And, of course, blog posts about DNA are always fun to share, though they take quite a bit of time to write!

I want to acknowledge that I will not be blogging much (if at all) during the next couple of months. I am two weeks into the fifteen-week Boston University Certificate in Genealogical Research program, which is taking up a lot of my time.

I look forward to taking what I am learning and applying it to my research and blogging. Thank you to my readers for staying with me; I do hope to return to regular blogging in the fall!

Tombstone Tuesday ~ Hersh Handler, d. 1863

In early 2016, Radovan Sremac, a researcher from Serbia contacted me through JewishGen's family finder and provided me with some images from the local archives showing the 1882 marriage record for Aron Handler and Szali Handler, my husband's great-grandparents, and the 1900 death record for Aron Handler.

He also let me know that there is a Jewish cemetery in Ilok, Croatia, and he shared several photographs of gravestones from that cemetery. Just about all of the text on the gravestones is in Hebrew, but with the assistance of resources like JewishGen's Reading Hebrew Tombstones, Steve Morse's Deciphering Hebrew Tombstone Dates and people on Facebook groups: Tracing the Tribe and Jewish Genealogy Portal, that isn't too much of a problem. I thank these kind volunteers for their translation assistance!

Tombstone Tuesday ~ Anna Gershman, d. 1909

Over two years ago, I connected with a DNA match of my husband's and we theorized that she and he were fourth cousins. See Connecting with a Segal Cousin.

A year before that, I shared a photograph of the gravestone of Simche Siegel (husband's 2x great grandfather) in Woodbine, New Jersey. See Tombstone Tuesday ~ Simche Seigal, 1919.

This fourth cousin recently obtained a photograph of her 2x great grandmother's gravestone in Har Nebo Cemetery, Philadelphia.

Hinde, daughter of Yehuda

Beloved Mother

Anna

Gershman

Apr 20, 1909

Age 60 Years

This is one more fact to help confirm that Anna / Hinde (Segal) Gershman is the sister of Simche Segal/Siegel - both gravestones list Yehuda as father.

Thank you Jill for sharing this photograph with me.

AncestryDNA Genetic Communities

I have already shared some information about AncestryDNA's newest feature: Genetic Communities at my other blog, From Maine to Kentucky.

Just for fun, I thought I would share my husband's Genetic Community. I'm sure you can guess what it is, based on the title and theme of this blog.

Yes, it's the Jews in Central Europe Genetic Community.

Jewish DNA and Endogamy ~ One Example

I have written about endogamy before:
DNA ~ Chromosome Browser and Endogamy
One Jewish Family's DNA Ethnicity Results (at FamilyTreeDNA)
and I usually mention it in my blog posts about DNA.

Due to endogamy, my husband's match list at FamilyTreeDNA has 9,902 matches. Yes, that's a lot. (I have 2,403 matches, and some of them appear as closer relatives than they really are due to endogamy, because of my many colonial New England ancestors.)

Recently I noticed a fellow blogger's name in the match list for my husband's DNA test results, at both FamilyTreeDNA and at GEDmatch. She shares more DNA with my husband than she does with either of his parents! This match is Emily Garber of (going) the Extra Yad, a blog to check out if you have Jewish ancestry.