An Annotated Guide to
Jewish Genealogy and Oral History Websites

A recent Lookjed discussion centered on what sources to use for family history projects. Below is an annotated list of websites on Jewish genealogy and oral history.

Many thanks to Larry Laufman for providing the initial list of websites. You can see his post here.

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JEWISH GENEALOGY RESOURCES

American Jewish Archives – Website includes several online exhibitions with downloadable images and documents, and an online catalog of their collection.

Avotaynu – Publisher of journals and books of interest to people researching Jewish genealogy, Jewish family trees or Jewish root. Includes a “5 Minute Guide to Jewish Genealogy Research”.

Cyndi's List of Genealogy Sites on the Internet: Jewish – A regularly updated website with hundreds of links to Jewish genealogy websites, including government documents, photographs, and maps. Note: this site has similar links for other religious groups.

Czestochowa-Radomsko Area Research Group - An impressive database including cemetary, synagogue, birth, marriage, emigration, and immigration records of Polish Jews. Includes a database of over 250,000 records of survivor lists and death lists from Holocaust-era Poland. Brings together over 100s of different projects.

Federation of East European Family History Societies: Jewish Genealogy Cross Index – Index of maps, listservs, researchers, and microfiche offered by member organizations.

International Association of Jewish Genealogical Societies [IAJGS] – Resources include maps, cemetary records, community books and family trees.

Jewish Genealogy Home Page – This website includes links to other organizations that deal with Sephardi and Ashkenazi Jewish genealogy, but also a helpful FAQ that describes how to get your research project started. Note: some of the links are out of date.

Jewish Genealogy Mine – A portal to Jewish genealogy websites. Organized by category.

Jewish Genealogy Society – Website includes resources for the New York area, including listings of New York naturalizations, cemetary and business records.

JewishGen: The Home of Jewish Genealogy – JewishGen is considered the primary web resource on Jewish genealogy. It includes many tools to help researchers including the JewishGen Discussion group, a database of surnames and towns, a Yitzkor book search.

JewishLink.net - Jewish Genealogy Links Page – This is an alphabetized collection of links about Jewish Geneaology.

Louis Kessler's Jewish Genealogy Links – Louis Kessler annotated this collection of links to Jewish genealogy sites. He links to internal pages so that you do not have to go searching for particular tools or resources. The annotations are written in easy-to-understand, perfect for younger students.

Sephardim.com: A Research Tool for Sephardic Genealogy / Jewish Genealogy – A very helpful collection of tools and resources for researching Sephardi Jewry. Includes a sephardic name search engine, a listing of sephardic names translated into English and a discussion group.

Tracing the Tribe: The Jewish Genealogy Blog – A blog about Jewish genealogy written by a professional genealogist.

The Ackman and Ziff Family Genealogy Institute at the Center for Jewish History –Website includes resources to help you start your family history research including a guide on how to interview relatives and dozens of guides on foreign research, each focusing on a different country or geographic region.

The Douglas E. Goldman Jewish Genealogy Center, The Museum of the Jewish Diaspora (Beit Hatefutsoth) - Website includes an online search, state records, and family trees.

JEWISH AND GENERAL ORAL HISTORY

Jewish Women’s Archive – The JWA’s overview on oral history. Includes twenty questions for interviewing purposes.  

42eXplore -  This is an eduScapes site for life-long learners of all ages, especially oriented to school based projects. It includes several scaffolding activities and links to introductory oral history sites.

Oral History & Interviews on Cyndi’s List - Comprehensive list of oral history websites.

Step-by-Step Guide to Oral History – This website includes short essays designed to help the beginning historian (or student) conduct and organize his own historical research.

University of Carolina at Chapel Hill - Oral History Handout – Explains how to conduct oral history interviews and integrate raw material into a larger research project.

Using Oral History: Lesson Overview – Lesson plan for middle and high school. Students study social history topics through interviews with ordinary Americans.

Wikipedia – Wikipedia’s oral history entry.

OTHER VALUABLE RESOURCES

Jewish Family History Foundation – site includes primary source doucumentation (maps, government records, etc) about Jewish communities in Eastern Europe

Centropa Student Website - includes over a dozen short films (5-10 min each) that are downloadable, links to transcripts of interviews with 1400 Central European Jews, a student website, etc.

Do you have a site to add? Send the link and a short description to chana@lookstein.org