April 2009
Dear Fellow
Kremenetsers,
You are long
overdue for an update about our activities. Although we have posted much new
material on our website in the past year, and Sheree has been active in sending
record extracts to many of you, I have been lax in providing you with a report
of what we have been doing. Let me try to bring you up-to-date with highlights
of our most important work since last Spring.
VITAL RECORDS. Since we began in
2000, our flagship project has been the Vital Records Translation Project. As
you know we obtained more than 15,000 Kremenets vital records covering the
period 1870-1907 (with some missing years) from the Mormons. Over the years we
have made steady progress in translating and making these records available to
you. Within the next few months this project will be complete. Our translator,
Judith Springer, has only two year sets to go, 1892 and 1893 death records.
CONCORDANCE. We have entered
all personal names from the translated records into our Indexed Concordance of
Personal Names and Town Names. The Concordance is freely available on our
website,
http://www.shtetlinks.jewishgen.org/Kremenets/web-pages/index.html. (Click
on the Research item on the menu that is on the left side of the web
page.) The Concordance currently contains 65,874 entries (57,337 from the
14,961 vital records, 250 from the Revision Lists, 4,308 from documents
obtained from the Central Archives for the History of the Jewish People, 3,461
from the Yizkor Books, Booklets and other sources, and 501 “see” and “see
also” references).
REVISION LIST
TRANSLATION PROJECT. When Judith finishes the vital records, she will shift
her attention to the Revision List (Revizskaya Skazka) Translation Project. In
addition, we have negotiated with Alex Dunai for a reasonable price for his
services translating the Revision Lists. These Russian Census records cover the
period from 1806 to the early 1860s (except for the 1834 Census ... for which
Jewish records seem to be missing from the LDS collection). We have about
40,000 records on more than 13,000 pages. They contain more than 150,000 names
and they cover almost all of the towns of former Kremenets Uyezd (District). We
have sufficient funds to begin the project, but we will have to raise about
$12,000 to keep the translation effort going to completion. More about this
later.
YIZKOR BOOK TRANSLATION
PROJECT. As you know, after WWII, the Kremenets Landsmanshaftn in Tel Aviv, New
York, and Buenos Aires produced two Yizkor Books and a series of 18 booklets.
In addition, there are Yizkor Books for Vishnevets, Pochayev, Shumskoye, and
Yampol.
·
"Pinkas Kremenets", edited by
A.S. Stein, and published in Tel Aviv in 1954, has 271 pages in Hebrew and 180
pages in Yiddish. All of the Hebrew and 4 Yiddish pages have been translated.
·
"Kremenets, Vyshgorodok, and
Pochayev: Yizkor Book", edited by P. Lerner and published in Buenos
Aires in 1965, has 431 pages in Yiddish, a 32 page Necrology in Yiddish
(complete with photos), and 5 pages in Spanish. The Necrology, the Spanish
section, and 65 pages of Yiddish text have been translated.
·
The 18 Booklets total 1,020 pages,
about half in Hebrew and half in Yiddish. They were published in Tel Aviv from
1967 through 1982. Translation of all the Hebrew and about 20% of the Yiddish
pages is complete.
·
"Sefer Vishnevets",
edited by Chayim Rabin and published in 1970 has 546 pages, 286 in Hebrew and
260 in Yiddish. Translation is complete for the Hebrew sections and 3 pages of
Yiddish.
·
"Jewish Partisans and Fighters
of Volyn: In their memory" is a 120 page book, published in 1997 by
the Council for the Commemoration of the Jewish Partisans and Fighters of Volyn
during the Second World War. The 96 pages in Hebrew, 8 page Necrology, and 14
pages in English include stories and names of many Jews from Kremenets District
towns and villages. Thanks to Sara Mages and Shalom Bronstein, translation is
complete and edited. Name and place indexes have been prepared and are being
formatted and proofread.
·
The Pochayev, Shumskoye, and Yampol
Yizkor Book translation projects are independent of ours. We have helped by
adding name indexes to these translations.
So, our volunteers
have translated about 1,300 pages of Yizkor Books! This is a remarkable
volunteer effort and I am bursting with pride at the accomplishments of our
volunteers. If we had to pay professional translators for this work, we would
have needed more than $26,000!!! All of the books contain many photos of
people, artifacts, and places. We have added name indexes to all translations,
and have added all personal names to our Concordance. All translations that
have been proofed and edited are online at the JewishGen Yizkor Book
Translations website. Now, we need volunteers skilled in Yiddish to complete
the Yiddish sections of our Yizkor Books.
CENTRAL ARCHIVES
FOR THE HISTORY OF THE JEWISH PEOPLE. During the past several years, Susan
Sobel and Rachel Karni, two of our Israeli members, visited the Central
Archives and obtained an assortment of documents relating to Kremenets District
towns. On my visit to Israel in August 2008, we returned to the Central
Archives and obtained even more documents. Now, we have a collection of 201
documents (or extracts of documents), which we have prioritized for
translation. Translation is complete for 16 of the 36 Priority 1 documents,
mostly documents from the Interwar period, immediately before the Shoah. They
are posted on our website. Names extracted from the translated documents are
included in the Concordance. To give you a better idea of what we have, here
are the short titles to the documents that have been translated.
·
Doc 152, 1835, Kremenets fire losses,
HM 2-8967.3
·
Doc 031, 1837-1841, Illegal Fundraising
Trial, Kremenets and Vishnevets
·
Doc 146, 1840-1841, Conscripted Jews
·
Doc 042, 1849 Beit Midrash Registers,
Dubno etc.
·
Doc 082, 1927-1934 Kremenets Jewish
Woman's Association
·
Doc 124, 1928, Orphans and Abandoned
Children
·
Doc 131, 1930-1939 Kremenets Jewish
Management Committees
·
Doc 091, 1934 Kremenets Tarbut School,
Students, Teachers, Parents
·
Doc 094, 1934 Zionist Revisionists,
Kremenets & Lanovets
·
Doc 096, 1934-1936, Religious Education
of Orphans and Poor Children, Kremenets
·
Doc 099, 1934-1936 Kremenets Tarbut
School
·
Doc 095, 1935, Kremenets Feepayers List
·
Doc 102, 1936, Kremenets Feepayers List
·
Doc 141, 1936, Shumsk Feepayers
·
Doc 174, 1936, Vishnevets Feepayers
List
·
Doc 110, 1938 Kremenets German-Jewish
Refugees
For a complete
list of our Central Archives documents point your web browser to:
http://www.shtetlinks.jewishgen.org/Kremenets/web-pages/central-archives-document-translation.html
We will post
additional translations as they are completed, formatted and proofread.
KREMENETS DISTRICT
CEMETERY PROJECT. As you know, we have been trying to obtain foundation
funding to restore the Kremenets and Vishnevets Jewish Cemeteries. We received
a grant from the Rothschild Foundation, Europe for Phase 1 of this project. We
used the grant and your contributions to document the cemeteries' visible
gravestones, produce formal surveys of all three cemeteries, and to develop
plans for restoring the Kremenets cemetery and conserving the stones. The
reports resulting from all of this work are on our website:
http://www.shtetlinks.jewishgen.org/Kremenets/web-pages/kjcp.htm
The website also
has complete copies of our key grant applications.
The database of
matzeva inscriptions still is being processed. It will be completed by the end
of this year and posted on the web. That database results from the initial
photography project. Unfortunately, we were unable to photograph the additional
stones (more than 4,000 of them) that were revealed after excess vegetation was
cleared in 2006. In 2007, Rothschild awarded us an additional grant of about
$20,000, but that amount was not sufficient to do meaningful work toward the
objectives detailed in our grant application. Through 2008, we tried, but
failed, to obtain supplementary grants. As a result, we had to decline the
Rothschild grant. The restoration project and additional photography currently
are on hold, pending a re-evaluation of our objectives and foundation recovery
from the current economic recession. I would like to hear your opinions about
how we should proceed with this project ... if at all.
CENTER FOR JEWISH
ART, HEBREW UNIVERSITY, JERUSALEM. In the 1990s, the Center for Jewish Art conducted
several expeditions to Ukraine to collect examples of Jewish art in synagogues
and cemeteries. Kremenets, Vishnevets, and Yampol were among the places they
visited. During my August 2008 visit, I met with Dr. Vladimir Levin and Dr.
Sergei Kravtsov, senior researchers at the Center. They provided me with much
material, including hundreds of photos of Kremenets gravestones from the
Center's various expeditions. Most of these stones date to the mid-1500s and
early 1600s. For the most part, these are stones that are not in our photo
collection, and so they are invaluable. The Center has transcribed the
inscriptions on these photos. These await processing. We need a volunteer or
two to translate the transcriptions and enter the data into an Excel
spreadsheet.
Sergei also gave
me a copy of a wonderful photo showing the Holy Ark of the Great Synagogue of
Kremenets in the early 19th Century. It is spectacular! The Ark and the
Synagogue were destroyed by the Nazis in WWII. The photo soon will be posted to
our website.
YAD VASHEM NAME
EXTRACTIONS. On my visit to Israel in August 2008, I met with Zvi Bernhardt at Yad
Vashem. Zvi very generously extracted 8,390 Kremenets District records, mostly
Pages of Testimony, from Yad Vashem's Shoah database. We have two versions of
the extract, one in a Hebrew Excel spreadsheet, the other in English. Later
this year we will process these records and add the names to our Concordance.
Since, on the eve of the Shoah, the Jewish population of just the town
of Kremenets was well over 8,000, the fact that Yad Vashem has only 8,390
records for all the towns of the Kremenets District means that a very
large number of Shoah victims from our area are not in the database. If you
have any ideas for identifying additional Shoah victims please let me know ...
or better yet, let's start a discussion of this on our Kremenets Discussion
Group. Just post your message to UKR‑KREMENETS@rootsweb.com.
In addition to
Pages of Testimony, Zvi provided us with an Excel spreadsheet listing 113 other
records for Kremenets District towns. These include:
·
Records of the Russian Extraordinary
State Commission to Investigate German-Fascist Crimes Committed on Soviet
Territory
·
Personal Testimonies from the
Department of the Yad Vashem Archives
·
Documents from the Central Historical
Commission (CHC) of the Central Committee of Liberated Jews in the US Zone,
Munich
·
Documents from the Collection of
Various Testimonies, Diaries and Memoirs
·
Documents from the Jewish Historical
Institute, Warsaw
·
Documents from the War Criminals
Department, Legal Division of the Central Committee of Liberated Jews
·
Documents from the Nuremberg Military
Tribunals
·
Testimonies from the Gathering of
Holocaust Survivors held in 1981
·
Documents from the The Bialystok Ghetto
Underground Archives (Mersik‑Tennenbaum Archives)
·
Documents from the Ilya Ehrenburg
Collection
·
Documentation from the Central Archives
for Public Organizations in the Ukraine, Kiev
·
Documentation of the Central Government
Archive of the Ukraine
·
Documentation from Regional Archives in
the Ukraine
·
Documents from Archives in Belorus
·
Personal Files of SS Members from the
Berlin Document Center
·
Nazi documentation
·
Register of Holocaust Victims
·
Documents from the Collection about the
Soviet Union
·
Documents from the Institute for the
Documentation of Austrian Resistance
·
Documents from the Yad Vashem
Collection of Miscellaneous Documents
As you can see,
this is an extraordinary collection of Shoah-era documents. To
process this properly, we need volunteers to obtain the individual documents
from Yad Vashem. Some are available online, but in most cases, a visit to
Yad Vashem will be required to examine long documents and to copy pages that
are relevant to Kremenets-District towns. Please let me know if you can
volunteer for this project.
INCORPORATION OF
KREMENETS DISTRICT RESEARCH GROUP. As you know, we began our activities in 2000 as the
Kremenets Shtetl CO-OP, an affiliate of Jewish Records Indexing-Poland
(JRI-Poland). Through this affiliation, we have come under JRI-Poland's
non-profit, 501(c)(3) status so that donations to our group are tax-deductible
in the US and Canada. This affiliation has served us well. JRI-Poland has been,
and still is, very tolerant of our idiosyncrasies and independent spirit. We
owe them a deep debt of gratitude. Over the years, as our emphasis has shifted
to activities other than vital records translation, we sometimes found
ourselves in an ambiguous situation, especially in terms of applying for and
administering grants for our work. In addition, as I get older, I get more and
more concerned about continuity of our group and its activities.
In 2007, these
twin concerns led us to incorporate in the state of Oregon as the Kremenets
District Research Group (KDRG). The Kremenets Shtetl CO-OP now is an
activity of the KDRG, as well as being affiliated with JRI-Poland. Tax
deductible donations still can be made to JRI-Poland for our account. Our next
step is for KDRG to apply to the US Internal Revenue Service for independent
501(c)(3), non-profit status, so that we can receive grants and donations
directly as a charitable organization. This requires By-Laws, elected officers,
and a more formal designation of "membership" than we have had in the
past. In the interim, I have drafted a set of By-Laws and three of us (the
minimum required by Oregon law) have agreed to serve as members of a
provisional Board, pending elections:
·
Ronald D. Doctor, Interim President
·
Sheree Roth, Interim Vice President
·
Ellen Garshick, Interim Member of the
Board
If we proceed, we
face a process that is complex and costly. It is one on which we need your
feedback, especially with regard to how we designate "membership". I
will discuss our options in a follow-up message within the next few days. In
the meantime, please take a look at the draft By-Laws attached to this message.
I welcome your comments and suggestions. [Note: The By-Laws were approved
unanimously in August 2009. They are on our website. … RDD]
As I mentioned
earlier, we have to raise about $12,000 to ensure completion of the Revision
List translations. I know the current state of the economy has made life
difficult. However, if you can contribute, will you please take a moment and
make a donation?
Contributions to
"Jewish Records Indexing - Poland" may be made by check, bank draft,
money order, or credit card. Be sure to specify that your contribution is for
the Kremenets Shtetl CO-OP. Send your donation or credit card information to:
Jewish Records
Indexing - Poland, Inc.
c/o Sheila Salo,
Treasurer
5607 Greenleaf
Road
Cheverly, MD 20785
USA
Telephone:
(301) 341-1261
Fax:
1-810-592-1768 (24 hours)
E-Mail: ssalo@capaccess.org
Be sure to specify
that your donation is for the Kremenets Revision List Project, or that it is
for the Kremenets General Fund. And, if you send a donation, please send me an e-mail
message to let me know the amount you donate, and the date of mailing so that
we can be sure the donation gets applied properly.
The Kremenets
Shtetl CO-OP is affiliated with Jewish Records Indexing - Poland, Inc.
(JRI-Poland), which is a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization. Your contributions
are tax-deductible in the U.S. and Canada to the extent permitted by law.
If your employer
has a matching gift program, please think about matching your donation through
that program.
Thank you in
advance for your support.
Ron Doctor
Co-Coordinator,
Kremenets Shtetl CO-OP/Jewish Records Indexing-Poland
An activity of the
Kremenets District Research Group