Treasure Chest Thursday: An Envelope from Paris

This envelope is 5 1/8" x 3 1/2".  It's a yellowish, off-white color; it may originally have been white.  It has no return address but was mailed to Mr. Jean La Forêt, Vice Consul des Etats Unis, 30 bd Carnot, Alger.  The postmark is from Paris, XVI Arrondissement, Place Chopin, November 14, 1916.  The cost to mail it was 10 centimes.  In what appears to be Jean's handwriting, it has "Mason — Consular Reports, etc" at the top and "Answ'd 11/21-16" at the lower left.

The reverse of the envelope has "Mason" written in large letters sideways.  There is the barest hint of the postmark from when it was received in Algeria; "ALGER" can be made out (upside-down from this perspective), but nothing else.  The reddish-brown mark under the letter "a" in "Mason" feels and looks like a dried piece of rubber band that is stuck on the envelope.  I'm hesitant to try to pull it off in case it tears the paper.

And as with the four envelopes mailed to Jean from the "American Consular Service" earlier in 1916, this one is empty.

Looking at the writing on the address here, it is similar to that on the four previous envelopes.  Maybe they were sent by the same person.  And this envelope has what might be a name:  Mason.  Is that who mailed it?

Sometime between April 27 (the last of the four earlier envelopes) and November 14, Jean moved and/or the sender learned of Jean's new address.  And we've seen this address before.  Someone named Mason (I still can't read the first name) sent a postcard to Jean at boulevard Carnot.  I'm going to assume this is the same person.

So now I have five empty envelopes, from what I have to assume were letters mailed to Jean by Mr. Mason.  This time, however, Jean gave a clue as to why he might not have kept the contents.  If "Consular Reports, etc" referred to what was sent to him, those might have been filed and kept at the consulate.  If the previous envelopes held similar items, they also were probably kept at the consulate.  But then I have to wonder why Jean bothered to keep the empty envelopes!

I've discovered an interesting conflict about boulevard Carnot.  Google Maps told me it is the current avenue Taleb Messaoud, and that's what I posted earlier.  But French Wikipedia says it is now boulevard Zighoud Youcef in central Algiers.  On further investigation, avenue Taleb Messaoud is in the El Biar suburb of Algiers.  I'm leaning toward the location in central Algiers as being where Jean and Emma were living.

Wordless Wednesday

She Was the Informant for Her Own Death Certificate

It's October, the month of Hallowe'en and strange and scary things, so Elizabeth O'Neal of the Genealogy Blog Party asked people to write about the strangest things they had found during their research.  Besides my grandfather being registered as a girl on his birth record (which is strange in the sense of odd and confusing, but not particularly scary), the strangest thing I have found is the death certificate where the information was provided by the deceased herself.

I ordered this certificate while I was doing research for a friend.  As I worked my way down the page — past name (Taisia Swanson), birthplace (Russia), parents' names (Vladimir Gussakosky and Maria Akinfieva), occupation (self-employed vocal instructor), and usual residence (Ojai) — I reached the box labeled "Name and Address of Informant–Relationship", and found "Self Before Demise."

Say what?  This was the first time I had seen that on a death certificate.  Why in the world would she have given the information for her death ceratificate before she died?

My eyes had gone straight from the usual residence to the informant.  When I looked at the other information, I found that she had died in a convalescent hospital.  So she didn't really give the info specifically for the certificate; she likely provided it while she was filling in the intake forms that the hospital required, and the person at the hospital copied it from there.  But it certainly was startling to read, and I've never seen another like it!

Saturday Night Genealogy Fun: Childhood Interest in Family and Genealogy

Ah, a subject near and dear to my heart!  For Saturday Night Genealogy Fun, Randy Seaver (via Jacquie Schattner) is asking whether we showed interest in genealogy as children:

Here is your assignment if you choose to play along (cue the Mission:  Impossible music, please!):

(1) When you reflect back, as a child, do you now see things that you did then that show your interest in knowing extended family and/or your future interest in genealogy?

(2)  Share your response in a comment on this blog post, in your own blog post (and provide a link in a comment on this post), or on Facebook or Google+.

I was interested in family history as a young child, because my mother and grandmother talked about family members all the time.  I knew names, birth dates, anniversary dates, relationships, and more.  My grandmother told me her father's original name (which made looking for him on a passenger list a lot easier).  My mother was close to her family, and I knew my grandparents, uncles, and cousins.  They all lived close enough that we saw them somewhat regularly.  I met more family members, including my grandmother's siblings and their children, on a visit to Florida for a wedding.  There was lots of communication back and forth with cards and letters.

My father was not close to his family, but I did know his parents and two of his sisters, along with many cousins.  I don't think I ever met his oldest sister.  In contrast to my mother's family, I didn't even know my grandfather had siblings until after the second one had died.

When I was 13, a junior-high-school assignment to do my family tree back four generations cemented my already existing interest in family history.  I still have the original purple mimeographed tree and the notes I took while interviewing family members.  (One of these days I need to dig that out to scan it and show it off!)

So I've been addicted to genealogy for 41 years, and counting.  As a habit, I could have made far worse choices.

Treasure Chest Thursday: Jean La Forêt Follows Developments in Nicaragua

This article, "How the United States Is Helping Nicaragua", was published in Dun's Review of April 1916.  Dun's Review was published by R. G. Dun & Company, prior to its merger with John M. Bradstreet's company, which created Dun & Bradstreet.  The article runs six pages, 39–44.  It appears to have been torn out of a magazine.  I can't find the article itself online, although this book includes it in the references.

The paper is 19.5 cm x 29.5 cm (approximately 7 11/16" x 11 5/8").  It's smaller than standard A4 paper and larger than A5; maybe this was a standard size in 1916.  All the pages are a little off-white, probably due to age.  When I received the article, it was folded into quarters.  The fold marks are obvious on the original, but they don't seem to show up that much on the scans.

The article was wrapped in a lined piece of paper with what appears to be Jean La Forêt's handwriting on it.

Jean wrote only a little on his cover sheet:

Nicaragua
Treaty, canal, Railroads.
etc. etc.
Voted February 18th 1916
55 to 18 (Senate)

The opening paragraph of the article mentions that Nicaragua was under consideration for the canal that eventually went through Panama.  Perhaps that is part of why Jean kept the article, as he seems to have been interested in the canal (or at least he kept an article about the final connection between the oceans being made).  Other than that, the article is an overview of U.S. history in Nicaragua, occasioned by the ratification in the U.S. Senate of the Nicaragua Canal Treaty.

The Nicaragua Canal Treaty is formally known as the Bryan-Chamorro Treaty, for its principal negotiators, William Jennings Bryan and Emiliano Chamorro Vargas.  The primary provision of the treaty gave the U.S. rights in perpetuity to build a canal through Nicaragua.  The treaty was abolished in 1970.

In 1916 Jean was still a U.S. Vice-Consul in Algeria.  Did this subject have anything to do with his job?  Or was this kept due to a strictly personal interest in the subject?  With only his short synopsis written on the cover sheet, I'm afraid I'll never know why this was considered important enough to keep.

Wordless Wednesday

The Frustrating Fate of the Record Books of the Jews from Egypt

This article originally appeared in the October 2016 edition of Kosher Koala, the journal of the Australian Jewish Genealogical Society.  It is reprinted with permission from the author to help spread word about the situation with these records.

Dani Haski, guest author

Community registers in Alexandria.
Photo credit:  Association
Internationale Nebi Daniel

In July 2016, the newspaper Egypt Independent reported the death of Lucy Saul.  Saul’s passing reduced the official Jewish population of Cairo to just six old and increasingly frail women.  In an interview with the BBC a couple of years ago, Magda Haroun, the nominal head of the Cairo Jewish community, voiced her anguish at what would happen to the cultural legacy of this once thriving community.  Unfortunately, Mrs. Haroun proved to be just as resistant as her predecessor, the late, formidable Carmen Weinstein, when it came to facilitating access to the large library of community registers housed in the various synagogues to those who have been fighting for decades to preserve this rich heritage, so her lamentations were somewhat disingenuous.

Then, in early April 2016, Mrs. Haroun gave the libraries of the Adly, Ben Ezra, and Abbasseya synagogues, in their entirety, to the National Archives of Egypt.  She did this without consulting any of the organizations which had been fighting to digitize and preserve these records.  Upon receiving these assets in Cairo, officials from the National Archives descended on the community in Alexandria, which had shown no such desire to surrender its heritage.  M. Ben Gaon, the community leader, was pressured to hand over its collections to the archives as well.  These included personal religious and civil identity registers dating back to 1830.  Placing these records with the Egyptian Archives has not so far improved access.  Those fighting to save them are concerned that the records will simply disappear into this vast collection, much like the Ark of the Covenant at the end of the Hollywood movie Raiders of the Lost Ark, never to be seen again.

Egypt and the Jewish people have a history going back to before Moses.  In more recent times, Egypt was home to a thriving and successful Jewish community, numbering more than 80,000 through the 19th and the first half of the 20th centuries.  In synagogues across the country, the day-to-day lives of the community—births, bris and bar mitzvahs, marriages, divorces, and deaths—were dutifully recorded by hand in hundreds of leather-bound registers.  No one foresaw the tumultuous turn the 20th century would take.  Sadly, after World War II and with the creation of the State of Israel in 1948, the fall of the monarchy, and the Suez crisis in the 1950’s, the community was forced into what many today call the Second Exodus.

For individuals with roots in Egypt, it has been an increasingly frustrating and difficult exercise to access those vital genealogical records, records which are more than historical curiosities and can actually be crucial in matters of religious identity—often being the only way some people can verify their Jewish status for religious purposes.

Yves Fedida (left) of Nebi Daniel with
M. Farouk Hosni, former Egyptian
Minister for Culture, in 2010.
Photo credit:  Association
Internationale Nebi Daniel

The Association Internationale Nebi Daniel, based in France, has been working tirelessly for years for the opportunity to access, digitize, and preserve these record books.  It was close to success in 2010, having secured a letter from the then Culture Minister, M. Farouk Hosni, acknowledging the legitimacy of its claim.

And then came Tahrir Square.  The Arab Spring in Egypt threw the whole project back to square one. Hopes were once again raised with the downfall of the Muslim Brotherhood administration, but after fruitless attempts to revive negotiations through official channels, Yves Fedida, from Nebi Daniel and the Heritage of Jews in Egypt Facebook page, initiated a Change.org petition addressed directly to President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi and the current Minister of Culture, M. Helmy Namnam, exhorting them to urgently authorize:

• scanning of all existing Jewish archives, particularly religious and civil identity records, and making the scans freely available;
• donation to various Jewish community synagogues across the world of some of the 150 Torah scrolls which fall outside the 100 years Egyptian Antiquities rule;
• restoration of the existing synagogues and cemeteries—in particular, the Bassatine cemetery in Cairo, one of the oldest Jewish cemeteries in the world—giving easy access both virtually and on the spot;
• development of a comprehensive inventory of the remaining communal assets and of a plan for their preservation; and
• creation, within one of the existing synagogues, of a museum of Egyptian Jewish heritage, which would encourage tourism.

A copy of the petition, which has, to date, gathered more than 1,500 signatures, was also sent to the Egyptian Ambassadors in France, Great Britain, Italy, Switzerland, Israel, Canada, the U.S.A., Brazil, and Australia.  Not a single diplomat has responded.  (I contacted the Egyptian Consul-General to Australia in Sydney for comment, but, at the time of publication, none has been forthcoming.)

The main concern of Egyptian authorities appears to be a perceived threat of reparations being demanded by descendants of Jews who were expelled and whose businesses and properties were confiscated.  The reality is that none of the registers in question has any connection to property ownership and cannot be used for this purpose.  Separate cases for reparations have already been prosecuted in the Egyptian courts and settled by individuals.  There is, in fact, no good reason to withhold permission for access to, and preservation of, these records, particularly when Nebi Daniel has committed to footing the bill for the whole exercise, ensuring positive PR and media coverage for the Egyptian government, and leaving the physical registers in Egypt.

The Egyptian government is not blind to the value of its Jewish cultural heritage.  In 2010, the government invested almost 8.5 million Egyptian pounds (US $950,000) in restoring the Maimonides Synagogue in Cairo and opening it to the public as a museum.

As recently as early September this year, a report in Al Monitor quoted the current head of the Islamic and Coptic Monuments Department at the Ministry of Antiquities (who is also responsible for Jewish antiquities), M. Saeed Helmy, as saying, “I know very well that the Egyptian monuments—including the Jewish antiquities—capture the attention of people all around the world. Therefore, I’d like to make it clear that Egypt pays considerable attention to its monuments, whether they are Islamic, Coptic or Christian .
. . . However, we need the support of the countries that are interested in cultural heritage in order to protect these great antiquities.”

Collection of the Jewish community registers might have been an unwritten part of this response, as on June 11, the Ministry announced the formation of a special committee, with Helmy as its chair, to take stock of Jewish antiquities and register them in the ministry’s records—an activity undertaken several times already by previous Antiquities ministers.  But he admitted that, with the drastic fall in tourism revenue, the country had scarce funds to achieve its goals.

Community registers in Alexandria.
Photo credit:  Association
Internationale Nebi Daniel

But should the community registers be classified as antiquities or as artifacts?  Their importance lies more in the information they contain than in the physical books themselves.  Unfortunately, the Ministry has consistently ignored repeated offers of financial assistance from Association Internationale Nebi Daniel specifically to preserve these books and to help raise money for other preservation activities.  It appears that this very public show of attention to part of Egypt’s recent history might simply, once again, be mere lip service, as it coincided with Helmy’s meeting with the U.S. cultural attaché in August 2016.

So what is to be done?

Egypt claims it wants to preserve these artifacts and records but cannot afford to.  Members of the diaspora have repeatedly offered to help raise money and to pay for the preservation, digitizing, and indexing of important community registers, on the proviso that these records are available to the international community.

Are the Egyptian authorities deaf?  Have the messages been lost in translation?

Or is the Egyptian government simply telling the international community what it wants to hear while continuing to do absolutely nothing?

Disclaimer:  My father was a refugee from Egypt. I have a personal stake in wanting to access his records, along with those of his parents and grandparents, so that I can understand more of my family’s history.

©2016 Dani Haski. All rights reserved.

Will the Real Mrs. Sellers Please Stand Up?

Mary Lou in 1964

My family was "blended" decades before that became a common term.  In 1968, and maybe a little before and/or a little after (I don't know the exact dates), not only was my father on his second marriage, but his first wife and his daughter from that marriage (whom I always have called simply my sister) were living with my family in Southern California.  For a while my sister and I attended the same elementary school.

Mary Lou, the aforementioned first wife, told me a story about a contest at the elementary school.  It was for the "best mother" in the school.  One day she was at the house when the phone rang.

"May I please speak to Mrs. Sellers?"

Mary Lou answered, "Which one?"

This threw off the woman from the school a bit, but she recovered enough to say, "The one with a daughter at Rorimer Elementary School."

And again Mary Lou answered, "Which one?"

The woman on the other end of the phone became a little more disconcerted.  "The one who submitted an entry for the best mother contest?"

You guessed it:  "Which one?"

By that point the woman from the school was totally confused.  Yes, my sister and I had both submitted our mothers for the contest.  After a few more details, Mary Lou discovered that she had won the contest.  (I guess my sister, being five years older, could write a better essay.)

Funny, but now that I think about it, it's interesting that Mary Lou told me that story, but my mother didn't.

I'm posting this story in honor of Mary Lou's birthday, which was yesterday, October 16.  If she were still with us she would be 78 years old.

Saturday Night Genealogy Fun: What Were You Doing in 1995?

This week's Saturday Night Genealogy Fun assignment from Randy Seaver is an update from one he did last year about this time, when he asked everyone what they were doing in 1985:

Here is your assignment if you choose to play along (cue the Mission:  Impossible music, please!):

(1) Do you recall what you were doing in 1995?  Family, school, work, hobbies, technology, genealogy, vacations, etc?

(2)  Tell us in a blog post of your own, in a comment on this blog, or in a Facebook or Google+ post.

At least we know why Randy can remember so much about what he did — he sent out a Christmas letter (which he obviously has a copy of)!  I don't think I'm going to do as well.

• In January of 1995 my mother, my grandfather, and an uncle passed away.  That pretty much shot the rest of the year for me.

• In April 1995 I turned 33.  I don't remember anything exciting happening for my birthday or any holidays that year.

• I was working for Chaosium, a small press publisher in Oakland, California.  I was an editor, I think on two fiction lines, along with being the company "convention schnook", which meant I handled the paperwork for our convention appearances and convention support.  I may have gone to one or two conventions myself for the company that year, but I had just started working there in October 1994, so that's the most I would have attended.  I think I went to GenCon on my own that summer, but I'm not sure.  I also did a lot of freelance editing for R. Talsorian Games.

• I was still working with a game convention in Southern California, so I must have traveled to Los Angeles over Presidents' Day weekend and Labor Day weekend for the four-day events.  I believe I also went to the Memorial Day weekend convention.

That's about all I remember.  I don't think I took any regular vacations, just my "working vacations."  It was not a great year.

Treasure Chest Thursday: Captain P. Rychner

This is a business card (or possibly a calling card) for Le Capitaine (Captain) P. Rychner.  It is 3 7/8" x 2 3/8" and is yellowed with age but might have been white or off-white originally.  It has a large brown spot in the upper left corner, along with two dark holes, one near the bottom of the brown spot and one about 3/4" below the first.  This business card is one of four items that were held together with a straight pin which rusted over time.  I removed the straight pin but have kept the four items together.  Captain Rychner's card also includes his position, Commandant la Compagnie sanitaire I/1, which means Commander of the Health (Medical?) Company I/1.  I don't know how to interpret the I/1.

The postcard is 5 7/8" x 3 7/8".  It was written in Tunis, Tunisia on March 23, 1916 and mailed on March 25 to Mr. and Mrs. Jean La Forêt in Algeria.  I believe the signature of the person who sent it is D. P. Rychner, which would appear to be the captain whose card is shown above.

The note is on a torn piece of paper that is 8" x 3 7/8".  It might be the bottom part of a regular sheet of paper.  The date is April 9 (my birthday!), but no year is included.  The note does say Dimanche, which is Sunday, and April 9, 1916 was a Sunday, so I'm guessing that's when it was written.

The second business card is the same size as the first, 3 7/8" x 2 3/8".  It is for G. Ramboud, whose address was 12, Rue Broussais, Algiers.  There are notes in French on the front and back.

All three of the above items have two holes from the straight pin that held everything together.

And next are the transcriptions and translations of the French texts.

-- >< -- >< -- >< -- >< --

Postcard:

(I really wish there wasn't a postmark right over the message.  It made it much more difficult to read!)

Carte Postale

Tunis 23 III. 16. Midi.

Correspondance.

Désolé.  Je croyais, j'étais sûr que je rentrerais pour Alger.  Et voilà que nous devons nous embarquer à Tunis ou plutôt à Bizerte pour aller encore en Corse.

Je vous écrirai à mon retour en Suisse.

Bons souvenirs

D. P. Rychner


Addresse.

Monsieur et Madame
Jean La Forêt
Vice Consul des Etats-Unis
6 Rue Henricet
St Eugène
Alger


Front:

6413  PAYSAGE DU SUD.  —  Dans l'Oasis.  —  LI.


Note:

Front:

Dimanche 9 Avril - Reçu visite du Col. de Gendarmerie Boineau {Inspécteur des prisonniers de guerre {ou 9 9. chance de ce guerre[?].  M'a dit vous a rencontré en Tunisie où vous avez eu la chance d'aider à le tirer de son trou dans les sables.


Back:

Mad


Business card:

Front:

Boineau  –  Colonel
Inspecteur des prisoniers [sic] de guerre
G. Ramboud
guerre
206 Cour St André
Villa des Peupliers
Grenoble (Isère)
12, Rue Broussais    Alger


Back:

Visité Dimanche 9 Avril

-- >< -- >< -- >< -- >< --

Postcard:

Postal Card

Tunis, March 23, 1916.  Noon.

Sorry.  I beleived, I was sure that I would be returning to Algiers.  And now we have to board in Tunis or rather Bizerte to go again to Corsica.

I will write to you on my return to Switzerland.

Good memories

D. P. Rychner


Addresse.

Mr. and Mrs. Jean La Forêt
U.S. Vice Consul
6 Rue Henricet
St. Eugene
Algiers


Front:

6413  Southern landscape  — At the oasis  — LI.


Note:

Front:

Sunday, April 9 — Received visit from Police Colonel Boineau (POW Inspector).  He told me that you met in Tunisia, where you had the chance to help him pull[?] [something] from the sand.

Back:

Mad [an unfinished note?]


Business card:

Front:

Boineau  — Colonel
POW Inspector
G. Ramboud
war
206 Cour St. André
Villa des Peupliers
Grenoble (Isere)
12, Rue Broussais   Algiers

Back:

Visited Sunday, April 9

-- >< -- >< -- >< -- >< --

So this is an interesting collection of items.  Rychner's business card is logically connected with the postcard, as it appears to be Rychner who sent the latter.  The only thing that connects those two items with the note and Ramboud's business card is the fact that I received them pinned together.  The note does mention Tunisia, however, and Rychner was in Tunisia when he wrote the postcard in March.

One important question here is who wrote the note on the torn paper and the note on Ramboud's business card.  If it was Rychner, then Jean was in Tunisia at some point and met Colonel Boineau there.  It makes sense that Rychner wrote these notes, because he would have sent them to Jean, and that's why they were kept together.  If Jean wrote them, then logically he would have sent them to Rychner (or whomever), and then he shouldn't have had them anymore.

Another question is just who G. Ramboud is, other than someone in Algiers.  The only part he appears to play here is to have his card be a piece of scrap paper on which to write a note.  None of the information here connects him with Rychner, Boineau, or Jean.

Was Boineau the person whose address was in Grenoble?  Or was it Rychner, who wrote on the postcard that he would write again on his return to Switzerland?  Did he send the note and Ramboud's card from Switzerland?

The note on the front of Ramboud's business card was written originally in pencil and then copied over in ink.  I noticed that the lines doesn't all match up well.  It might be that the pencil was written by Rychner and copied in ink by Jean.  Whoever wrote over the pencil in ink missed the word "guerre" to the right and below the name Ramboud on the card.

One final question:  What does the "P" stand for?

Wordless Wednesday

Saturday Night Genealogy Fun: Which Relative Gave You Family Information?

Jacquie Shattner is again the inspiration for the challenge in this week's Saturday Night Genealogy Fun from Randy Seaver.

Here is your assignment if you choose to play along (cue the Mission:  Impossible music, please!):

1) Was there a relative that was a big help in giving you family information?  Who and how was he/she helpful?

2)  Share your response in a comment on this blog post, in your own blog post (and provide a link in a comment on this post), or on Facebook or Google+.

This is one of those times when I knew immediately what my answer was to the week's challenge.  I had different helpful people for different sides of my family, however.

On my mother's side, she and my grandmother were the people who gave me the most help with family information.  I have written previously about hearing all kinds of family stories from them while I was growing up.  My mother was close to her family, and keeping up with how everyone was doing was normal.  She was also helpful with information for my father's family, often remembering more than he did.  As a little girl I already knew many names, dates, and places associated with my family.  When I was asked to create a family tree tracing my family back four generations as a junior high school assignment, I was well prepared.

In addition to my mother, the other person who helped a lot with information for my father's family was my grandfather's youngest sister, Betty.  I first spoke with her in 2000, which is when I learned she was still living.  She broke through my brick wall concerning my great-great-grandmother "Kate Moore" by letting me know that Moore was her second husband, not her maiden name, which was how it had been presented to me all those years ago when I had started my research.  Once I knew that, I was able to find records on Kate (born Catherine Fox Owen) and figure out who her parents were.  Aunt Betty also told me about my great-grandfather Elmer's half-brother from that second husband, and I did a lot of research on him.  (It isn't Aunt Betty's fault that I discovered my grandfather wasn't Elmer's biological son, so all that research was on my adoptive family.)  Without Aunt Betty I might still be stuck looking for a Kate Moore who married a Sellers.

Treasure Chest Thursday: Four Envelopes

I have put these four envelopes together because they're very similar.  They all measure 5 9/16" x 3 5/8".  They are all a yellowish off-white, possibly white originally.  They all have "American Consular Service" printed in the upper left, in the return address area.  They're all hand addressed to Jean La Forêt — one to "Mr. Jean La Foret", two to "Mr. Jean La Forêt", and one to "M. J. La Forêt."  They all were postmarked Algiers and were sent to Jean at 6 rue Henricet (the address on Jean's business card), St Eugène (which we already know was a neighborhood within Algiers), at a cost of 10 centimes each.

And they're all empty.

The first envelope was mailed January 26, 1916 in Algiers and arrived in St. Eugène on January 27.  The second was mailed March 15, 1916 and postmarked "Alger R. P."; it arrived in St. Eugène on March 16.  The third was mailed April 3, 1916 in Algiers and arrived in St. Eugène the same day.  The fourth and final envelope was mailed April 27, 1916 in Algiers and arrived in St. Eugène the same day.

The "R. P." designation on a postmark appears to exist even today, but I can't figure out what it stands for.  My guess is that it was a name for a neighborhood.

The handwriting looks similar on all four envelopes, so I think it's a reasonable hypothesis that they were all sent by the same person.

So someone who was living or working in a different part of Algiers than St. Eugène, and who apparently worked for the American Consular Service, mailed four letters to Jean during the first few months of 1916.  It's possible they were all work-related.  If they were for work, the letters may have been filed.  But then why would he keep the envelopes?  And if the correspondence was personal, why did it disappear over the years but the envelopes remained?  I wish I knew the complete chain of who had all this material before it reached me!

Wordless Wednesday

The Economics of Family Photographs

My grandfather with friends c. 1934

A chance conversation with someone gave me some unexpected insight into my own family.

A genealogy friend, "L", was very excited, because a distant cousin had recently sent her a photograph of her grandmother when she was a babe in arms, being held by her own mother, L's great-grandmother.  L had never seen the photo before and didn't believe anyone in her direct branch of the family had a copy.  The photo was sent by a descendant of the great-grandmother's brother, who apparently took the photo himself.  The photo was a one-off snapshot, as opposed to a cabinet card or another type that was done in a studio by a professional photographer.  It is probably the only copy of the photo that exists.  While talking about the photo, L commented that her family hadn't passed down many photos, because they were poor and hadn't been able to afford photographs.

Suddenly a light bulb went on over my head, and I think I now understand the great disparity in the number of photographs between my grandmother's and my grandfather's sides of the family.  When my grandmother, Bubbie, had a stroke and it was clear she would not be able to live by herself again, I was the first person who was able to spend time at her apartment and begin to pack everything up in preparation for moving everything out.  Among the items were four large boxes of photographs, which I had looked at with Bubbie the year before, when she had finally(!) allowed me to label everything.  I remembered noticing at that time that the vast majority of the photos were from Bubbie's family; only about a dozen or so were from my grandfather's, Zadie's, side.

I asked Bubbie at the time why there were so few photographs of Zadie's family, and she said she had no idea.  Thinking over it now, though, Bubbie's family was assimilated and comfortably middle class, while Zadie's family was very Orthodox, very traditional, and much poorer.  It makes sense that they would not have had as much discretionary money to spend on things such as photographs.  That reason had never occurred to me before my conversation with L.  I guess I had my blinders on.  Now that I have thought of it, those few photographs from Zadie's family have become much more precious.

While you are researching your own family, listen to stories about other people's families.  Maybe something they say will help you understand your own family better.

Saturday Night Genealogy Fun: What Was the First Genealogical Society You Joined?

Jacquie Schattner has been coming up with several suggestions lately for Saturday Night Genealogy Fun topics for Randy Seaver.  This week we were treated to another of her ideas:

Here is your assignment if you choose to play along (cue the Mission:  Impossible music, please!):

(1) What was the first genealogical society you joined?  Why did you join that one?

(2)  Share your response in a comment on this blog post, in your own blog post (and provide a link in a comment on this post), or on Facebook or Google+.

I started my genealogy research before Randy, in 1975.  This of course was before the ubiquity of personal computers, so my initial research was also on paper, most of which I have kept.  I had several family lines fairly well detailed by 1979, when I moved back to California from Florida, where I had graduated high school.

I spoke to many relatives and added to my information for the next ten years.  Soon after I moved to the San Francisco area in 1989, I started to visit the Oakland Family History Center on a regular basis.  I think it was there that I read something about a meeting of the San Francisco Bay Area Jewish Genealogical Society.   The first meeting I went to was probably in Berkeley, since that was close to where I lived, but I don't actually remember.  The meetings were (and are) free to attend, and many interesting and useful topics were covered.  I joined not long after the first one I went to, because it was inexpensive and it was a way to support a group from which I was benefiting.  A few years after I joined, the president announced the society needed someone to help with publicity, and I was foolish . . . er, generous enough to volunteer.  And I've been doing that since then, along with adding the responsibilities of vice president, journal editor, and programming.

And like Randy, I didn't stop with SFBAJGS but joined additional societies:  African American Genealogical Society of Northern California, California Genealogical Society, California State Genealogical Alliance, and Gesher Galicia.  And then I went and volunteered with them also!