Jewish Ancestory?

Question:Where can I go to trace my Jewish ancestors? My mothers side was Jewish (but not my mother). Where do I trace them? Thank you

Best Answer - Chosen by Asker: Where can I go to trace my Jewish ancestors? My mothers side was Jewish (but not my mother). Where do I trace them? Thank you

First thing for anybody to do is to get as much information from living family as possible, particularly your senior members. Tape them if they will let you, It might turn out they are confused on some things but what might seem to be insignificant story telling might be very significant. We old folks just love to tell the young'uns about old timey, and people of the past. People who have done this state they go back a few years after doing research and listen to the tape again and hear things they didn't hear the first time around.

See if they have any birth, marriage and death certificates. Birth and death will have parent information. The death certificate and at least the 2 applications for a social security number I have seen had the name of both parents including mother's maiden name AND their places of birth.

You should edit your question to indicate from what country they immigrated. We have some regulars on this board that are Jewish and some knowledgeable in Eastern Europe that can help you.

If a person was drawing social security at time of death and on their own social security number, they should be on the Social Security Death Index. Rootsweb and FamilySearch.org are 2 free sites that has the SSDI. All you need is the name of the person as they were listed on SS or their SS number. You don't need both even though there is place asking for both. Once you locate a person on the Rootsweb SSDI, there is a link to the left you can probe and it will give you a letter you can print on to the Social Security Administration.

Your public library might have a subscription to Ancestry.Com which has lots of records. They have all the U. S. censuses through 1930. They have transcribed them but you can also view the original images. Sometimes their transcriptions aren't too good but once you look at the original image, you can have sympathy for the transcribers.

See the links below:

http://www.avotaynu.com/jewish_genealogy...

http://www.jewishgen.org/

If your mother isn't Jewish you aren't either. The line traces maternally not paternally so best of luck on it.

If you are in the USA, you trace it just like the Catholics and Baptists do. The resolved questions are full of links and tips. There are a couple of sites devoted to Jewish ancestry specifically, just like there are sites for Huguenots, African-Americans, Native Americans and Poles. You fond those by Googling "Jewish genealogy".