Around 1,000 Jews from across the world will gather in Philadelphia from Aug. 18-22 for the 44th International Association of Jewish Genealogical Societies.
Attendees from Israel to Argentina with all levels of genealogic experience will receive and share guidance on the tools, pitfalls and meaning of Jewish genealogy research.
The conference will feature 175 presentations, meetings, workshops and activities relating to Jewish genealogy. Attendees looking for resources and tips will have access to advanced research tools and the foremost experts in Jewish genealogical research.
Weitzman National Museum of American Jewish History keynote speaker and renowned cookbook author Joan Nathan will be interviewed by Jewish genealogist Randy Schoenberg during the opening session on Aug. 18.
Nathan is known for her extensive research, storytelling and, of course, her recipes.
“I hope people will bring their recipes with them and, if they want to find out more about their family, we can do it from there,” Nathan said.
For Nathan, food tells a story and connects people to tradition. Her books are filled with the stories of people, the ingredients and methods in a recipe that tell a story about the people behind it, how they lived and what ingredients were available.
Her latest book, “My Life in Recipes,” uses recipes to reflect on her life, family history and her quest to discover worldwide Jewish cuisine.
“It gives people more strength to know that not just the language … but a recipe also has been carried down from generation to generation,” Nathan said.
Most of the conference will take place at the Sheraton Downtown, but attendees will also visit Jewish historic sites around Philadelphia and the Weitzman.
While many genealogy services offer documents and DNA analysis, there are some unique challenges to researching genealogy as a Jew, according to Jennifer Mendelsohn, a genealogist specializing in helping Eastern European Jewish families reclaim their history.
According to Mendelsohn, one of the unique challenges is tied to DNA. Because Ashkenazi Jews were largely endogamous, meaning they only married others within their community for a long time, having the same common ancestor may not yield as much information.
“The first DNA test results made no sense. I just got incredibly frustrated,” Mendelson said.
Mendelsohn now uses her platform and a Facebook group with more than 13,000 members to help others decipher DNA results and highlight meaningful matches. She also co-founded the DNA reunion project, now called the Holocaust Reunion Project.
Like many of the speakers, Mendelsohn is a veteran of a genealogy research journey. In 2013, she united her husband’s grandmother, a then-95-year-old Polish Holocaust survivor with three living first cousins she had never known.
Mendelsohn will speak at the IAJGS conference about reconnecting families separated by the Holocaust and finding your Eastern European town of origin.
“Most Jewish genealogists today encounter the memory of the Holocaust and feel compelled to discover what happened to their families during those dark years,” Arthur Kurzweil said.
Kurzweil, an author and genealogist, will also speak at the IAJGS conference. He will host “The Mitzvot We Do as Genealogists” during the gala banquet.
“By doing genealogy, we are honoring our parents and all of our ancestors,” Kurzweil said. “We believe in remembering our ancestors and, by doing this, we honor them.”
The last day to register is Aug. 11.
Mark Halpern, presenter and program chair of the conference, said he hopes that more students will register because the time to connect with distant relatives is finite.
To eliminate some of the barriers young people face in beginning their genealogy journey, the conference offers reduced ticket pricing for students.
Halpern began his genealogy journey in 1996 while on a business trip to Poland. There he visited Bialystok — his mother’s birthplace.
“I found I have family in Israel, which I didn’t know about. I also found out I had family that perished in the Holocaust; I didn’t know about that,” Halpern said.
While Halpern discovered a lot about his roots, he wishes he had started researching earlier.
“I would have found out a lot more,” Halpern said. “If I had been able to talk to my mother’s brothers or my father’s brothers, and they all passed away.”
Halpern, 77, is retired but spends 5-6 hours daily volunteering and helping others research their genealogy.
“When you’re working and you’re bringing up a family and you have kids at home, it’s hard to focus on something that is like genealogy, so a lot of people start that once they retire or when their kids are grown,” Halpern said.
The schedule for the conference can be viewed at iajgs.org/conference.
