Event archive - Orange County Jewish Genealogical Society

Phil Goldfarb: Living Jewish in the Pale of Settlement

5/17/2026

In this program, Phil discusses a wide range of topics about Jewish life in the Pale of Settlement:

Life in the Pale and Shtetls
Jewish health in the Pale
Jewish Laws in the Pale
The Yeshiva System
The Mussar Movement
Jews in The Russian Military
Jewish Schooling in the Pale
Russian census & Revision list
Czar Alexander II and III and the May Laws
Internal Passports
The Pale During WWI
The End of the Pale

Phil Goldfarb is a 4th generation pharmacist by profession and a retired Captain in the U.S. Army Medical Service Corps. He worked in the health care and medical communications industry for 40 years helping to grow and take a company public while retiring as Divisional Vice President of Operations for a Fortune 20 Company.

Phil is the founding President of the JGS of Tulsa in 2005 and has been doing genealogy for over 40 years. A genealogy contributor for web sites, he has lectured extensively having given over 2,000 presentations, published articles on genealogy sites and journals, written two books on passports and passport applications, and authors a monthly column in the Tulsa Jewish Review. He is the editor of The Weekly News Nosh…News about Jewish Genealogy, Jewish History and Jewish Culture which is published in Tracing the Tribe, The Jewish Genealogy Portal, and the Jewish Genealogy SIG on Facebook each Sunday, as well as on the L’Dor V’Dor Foundation website for those who do not use Facebook at www.ldvdf.org/newsnosh.

Phil co-produced a 2020 Emmy Award winning Historical Documentary titled: L’Dor V’Dor: Generation to Generation… the History of Tulsa’s Jewish Community, was Chairman of 2020 IAJGS Awards Committee, Member of the 2024 IAJGS Nominating Committee and assisted with the development and implementation of the LDVDF Worldwide Jewish Event Calendar which can be utilized 24/7/365 at www.ldvdf.org/Jdays

The recorded presentation

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Risa Daitzman Heywood: They Arrived Via Canada - Tracing Canadian manifests and U.S. border records

4/26/2026

Most immigrants, 75 to 80%, entered the United States via the port of New York. However, many destined for the Midwest or seeking a less expensive option chose to go through Canada. This presentation explores strategies for researching Canadian passenger manifests, related documents, and U.S. border entry records. Because the records went through many iterations, as the Canadian and U.S. governments worked together to close immigration loopholes, they can often be challenging to work with. The records you seek can differ depending on the time period, immigrant’s final destination, and amount of time spent in Canada. This presentation teases out the many record collections that recorded immigrants’ journeys to and through Canada.

Risa Daitzman Heywood, CG is a professional genealogist, writer, and presenter. She has over 25 years’ experience researching Jewish families, particularly from the Russian Empire. Risa is a director on the board of the International Association of Jewish Genealogical Societies (IAJGS) and a member of the Association for Professional Genealogists (APG). She is American and lives in Lisbon, Portugal. Risa holds the Certified Genealogist credential from the Board for Certification of Genealogists.

The handout

Canada Manifests handout
File Size:	404 kb
File Type:	pdf

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Steve Jaron: Exploring your Ashkenazi Heritage in the Netherlands

3/22/2026

Join Steve Jaron as he explores his Dutch roots within the Ashkenazi community of Amsterdam and across the Netherlands. Through stories of unexpected family connections and heartwarming reunions, Steve reveals how genealogy can uncover hidden histories and bring the past to life. Along the way, he’ll share practical research tips and tools to help you trace your own Dutch Jewish ancestry and make discoveries of your own.

Steve Jaron, a lifelong Pittsburgher, discovered his passion for genealogy through family stories, a college Spanish class, and uncovering his Dutch ancestry via a simple Google search. He currently serves as President of the Jewish Genealogy Society of Pittsburgh and holds additional roles within the International Association of Jewish Genealogical Societies (IAJGS). His personal research focuses on his Dutch, Galitzianer (western Ukrainian), German, non-Galician Ukrainian, and Belarusian roots, as well as the history of the Jewish community in Pittsburgh.

The handout

Ashkenazi Dutch Jewish Ancestry Handout
File Size:	119 kb
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Linda Ambrus Broenniman - The Politzer Saga: How to tell your family story, generation by generation, back to the 1700s

2/22/2026

A housefire in 2011. The contents of a box that survives become the catalyst for a quest whose seeds were planted in 1983 – the day Linda Ambrus Broenniman learned that her Catholic father was Jewish and what little family history she knew was a lie.

Searching for truth, Linda pieces together the astonishing story of her Jewish ancestors -- the Politzer family--their remarkable lives lost to her father’s secrets. From the Austro-Hungarian Empire in the 1700s to modern day Hungary and America, she finds her family: doctors and lawyers, entrepreneurs and industrialists, writers and musicians, artists and art collectors. She learns of their resilience in surviving religious persecution, wars, epidemics, and economic upheavals. Finding her roots brings Linda a new sense of who she is and a peace that now she can honor the memories of her family.

In helping Linda find her family, András Gyekiczki wrote, “I hardly know any non-fiction sagas to better exemplify Hungarian Jewish fate of the past 300 years as this Politzer story.”

Illuminating the destructive power of hatred, dehumanization, and injustice, this powerful story encompasses issues that still echo today. The Politzer Saga is the subject of an Exhibition at the Rumbach Synagogue, Budapest, Hungary.

Linda Ambrus Broenniman grew up in Buffalo, New York. She is the middle child of seven born to Catholic Hungarian physicians who survived World War II and started their new life in the US in 1949.

Linda graduated from Swarthmore College with a BA in psychology. Several years after getting her MBA from Carnegie Mellon, she left mainstream corporate America to follow her path as an entrepreneur, building companies in technology and biotech. She let her passion for uncovering hidden potential in unexpected places guide her.

And she allowed this passion to fuel her search for her hidden family. Searching for truth, Linda pieced together the astonishing story of her Jewish ancestors -- the Politzer family--their remarkable lives lost to her father’s secrets. Her journey culminated in The Politzer Saga, the book she wrote to connect to her family’s lives and make them real. The stories told in the book form the basis of The Politzer Saga Exhibit, a permanent exhibition in the newly renovated Rumbach Synagogue, Budapest, Hungary.

Linda lives in Great Falls, Virginia with her husband, Ed, of 30 years.

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Susan Rosin: The JewishGen Yizkor Book project

12/28/2025

The Yizkor Book Project and JewishGen Press are integral parts of JewishGen, featuring translations of original Yizkor books and other research documents, as well as digitizing books for online searches. Susan Rosin, Publications Manager for JewishGen Press, shared what Yizkor books are and how they’re made accessible to researchers in English. If you’ve ever read an English Yizkor book about your ancestors’ town or an essay about a family member in one, you know just how valuable these works are for genealogical research.

Born in Poland to two Holocaust survivors from the former Galicia (now part of the Ukraine), Susan Rosin grew up in Israel. She received a B.S. degree in Chemistry from the Technion in Haifa, Israel, and an M.S. degree in Biochemistry from the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa. After moving to the US with her spouse and children, she became a software developer, retiring as a software development manager from a major financial company. Inspired to start the genealogical research of her family by a (non-Jewish) coworker and hitting the proverbial “brick wall” she decided to give back to JewishGen. She translated the entire 700+ pages Yizkor book of her mother’s town (published in 2018) and then started on the book of her father’s town. She proceeded to lead the indexing project of Yizkor books and in 2021 became JewishGen Press Publications Manager.

The handout

Useful links
File Size:	13 kb
File Type:	docx

The recorded presentation

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Ellie Vance: Navigating Metrical Books for the Non-Russian Speaker

11/23/2025

Records were often recorded in Russian and can be tricky to navigate, especially for the non-Russian speakers, however, with the proper tools you can learn to identify ancestral surnames and common vocabulary, and record format. An extensive handout, complete with column heading translations, examples of handwritten key vocabulary, common given names, and resources to help you determine the handwritten forms of your surname are included with the presentation.

Ellie Vance graduated from Brigham Young University with degrees in Russian and Family History and Genealogy. She worked as the Slavic research specialist for the FamilySearch Library and currently works as a technical historical records expert at FamilySearch. Ellie enjoys helping others trace their roots in the former Russian Empire.

The handout

Navigating Russian records for the non-Russian speaker
File Size:	8554 kb
File Type:	pdf

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Jerry Rishe: US immigration law as it affected Jewish immigration

10/26/2025

The 1924 Johnson-Reed Immigration Act marked the beginning of a dark chapter in our nation’s immigration history. The N.Y. Times headline declared: AMERICA OF THE MELTING POT COMES TO END.

The story of how we reached that point is littered with xenophobia, fear of the Other, the Ku Klux Klan, the so-called science of eugenics and the need, as stated by President Coolidge, that America must remain American. After Johnson-Reed passed it ended a historic migration of Jews to the United States & created restrictions that would keep out many Jewish refugees when the Nazis rose to power a decade later.

How did the change in immigration law impact the ability of Jews to enter the U.S.? How did the U.S. State Department acquire an outsized role in denying immigrants generally, and Jews in particular, legal entry into the United States? Please join us as we explore these historically fascinating and significant questions.

Jerry Rishe earned a B.A. degree in Political Science from CSUN where he was an award-winning speaker in intercollegiate forensic competition and later received a J.D. from Whittier Law School. He worked as in-house counsel at First Charter Financial Corporation (holding company for American Savings), the J.G. Boswell Company (the largest privately owned cotton grower in the world), and Saint John’s Hospital and Health Center in Santa Monica.

In the public sector and for the last 16 years of his legal career he was a trial attorney with the Immigration and Naturalization Service (later the Department of Homeland Security) where he prosecuted those charged with violations of the Immigration and Nationality Act in Immigration Court, defended his Service and Department against charges in employment matters and was honored by being named Employee of the Year in an Agency of over 16,000 employees whose offices are located around the country and across the globe.

Jerry is now enjoying retirement as a docent at the Autry Museum of the American West in Griffith Park, participating in SAGE, a life-long learning organization for retirees, traveling, and his family.

The handout

US Immigration History
File Size:	126 kb
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Zachary Mazur: Rabbis, Innkeepers, and Tricksters. Jewish Life in Poland-Lithuania.

9/21/2025

Approximately eighty percent of the world’s Jews have a connection to Eastern Europe, and all of them once lived in a unique country called the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth.

We joined Zachary Mazur, Senior Historian at the POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews, who discussed the key question of why Jews settled in Eastern Europe and what their lives looked like there. While discussing the larger historical narrative, he focused on the stories of those living in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth to paint a picture of Jewish life before the Great Migration that began in the 1880s.

This virtual seminar incorporated POLIN’s Core Exhibition, a journey through 1000 years of the history of Jews in Poland from the Middle Ages to the present day.

Zachary Mazur earned his PhD at Yale University and is currently a Senior Historian at the POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews in Warsaw and a lecturer at the Polish Academy of Sciences. His research interests include modern Eastern and Central Europe, national identity, law, and economics. You can find his list of publications here.

The handout

Jewish life in Poland-Lithuania
File Size:	108 kb
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Daniel Horowitz: What's new at MyHeritage

8/24/2025

Daniel Horowitz is the Genealogy Expert at MyHeritage, providing key contributions in the areas of product development, customer support, and public affairs, liaising with genealogy societies, bloggers and media, lecturing, and attending conferences around the world. Daniel headed the company's translation department for 8 years, where he was instrumental in increasing MyHeritage global support to 42 languages.

Dedicated to genealogy since 1986, Daniel was the teacher and the study guide editor of the family history project "Searching for My Roots" in Venezuela for 15 years, where he helped found the Jewish Genealogy Society of Venezuela. He has a BS.c. in computer engineering, a Specialization in education, and a degree in Management of Educational Institutions.

Daniel has lived in Israel since 2005, coordinated multiple crowdsourcing transcription projects, and holds board level positions at the Israel Genealogy Research Association (IGRA) and the International Association of Jewish Genealogical Societies (IAJGS), among others.

The handout

MyHeritage - Latest updates
File Size:	594 kb
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Marlis Humphrey: JCat, AI, and the new era of Jewish genealogy

7/27/2025

Hidden in plain sight lie millions of Jewish records—military lists, synagogue ledgers, school rolls—waiting to smash your brick walls. Join LDVDF CEO Marlis Humphrey for a fast‑paced tour of JCat’s growth, AI handwriting breakthroughs, and new researcher tools. You’ll leave knowing exactly how to: search smarter, mine NewsNosh and JDays for leads, volunteer from your laptop, and fund the next wave of discovery. Come learn how you can help unlock the missing 85 %—before it vanishes.

Marlis Humphrey is an internationally recognized genealogist and tech innovator committed to safeguarding Jewish history. As CEO of the L’Dor V’Dor Foundation (LDVDF) and LDVDF Canada, she oversees JCat, NewsNosh, JDays, and the LDVDF AI Lab—initiatives that have already surfaced tens of thousands of once‑hidden records. A professional genealogist, former President of the International Association of Jewish Genealogical Societies, and Director of the National Genealogical Society, she pioneers AI‑driven tools that rescue and reveal our Jewish documentary heritage.

The handout

Unlocking the Other 85 percent handout
File Size:	322 kb
File Type:	pdf

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