Introducing the Curator Team

Welcome Peter

Welcome Marvin & Peter! We are grateful for the extra hands!

Welcome Marvin and Peter! Thank you for coming aboard.

Welcome Welcome..

I am a new curator with a background in technology, history, linguistics, and languages. I've been interested in genealogy for several years and Geni has been my site of choice for building out my family tree and that of my husband's family. Three features I particularly like are projects, computing relationships, and of course the beauty of the big tree, despite some of the drawbacks to collaboration. Curators are a wonderful addition to Geni and I am honored to join the curator team.

I have an undergraduate degree in history with an emphasis on Medieval and Renaissance history and History of Religion. I lived in Israel and in Egypt. I speak and/or read Hebrew, Spanish, and Arabic (rusty) and studied French, German, Amharic, Romanian, Berber, and Aramaic.

I spent 19 years in Islamic History. Arabic language and linguistics, formal linguistics, and Semitic languages. The next two decades I spend working in information technology. I was married to an Argentinian for 30 years, so have a strong background in Spanish and in South American and Hispanic culture.

My genealogy interests have been Eastern European Jewish families in Suwalki, Lithuania, and the Southern Ukraine; Southern Ukraine immigration to Argentina; various of the well-known rabbinical families that I am descended from, notably the Margolis branch related to the Katzenellenbogens and others; and my mother's Williams, Johnson, Stowe, Gallup, Wilbur, Bradford, and other Mayflower and Great Migration ancestors in Taunton, Roxbury, and Barnstable; and more recently the Anglo-Norman families that my Colonial American ancestors descended from.

I hope I can grow in my technical skills and branch out and help and interact with many of you. For now, I know what I know and where I need help, so go easy on me! I expect to be calling on Erica Howton, Pam Wilson, Tammy Swingle and others where needed.

Welcome Hatte

Nice to meet you, Hatte. Do you do genealogical work professionally? I am hampered doing my own research as I don't speak Romanian (paternal father/grandfather) or Lithuanian (maternal great-grandparents - I think!). Thanks!

Private User I still work more or less full time and genealogy is a recent "hobby". For Lithuanian ancestors there are transcribed databases for some towns for Jewish families that I could point you to, if they are relevant to you. Lots of good resources available. That's what I have have been using. I haven't done any Romanian research and don't know what the resources are.

@Hatte Blejer
Welcome to Geni's Curator team.
I read your introduction and got very excited, because my wife's mother comes from Southern Ukraine, the Tarnopol area, and she is a descendant of Margolis. She was the only survivor in her family after WWII, other than an uncle of whom she lost contact and never heard from again.
I started building my family tree only a few months ago, and managed to add, mostly from Yad Vashem, close to a 1000 people to the tree, and thru those Testimonies discovered living relatives on all sides and living in many different countries. We have located some of them, and even met some. It is a fantastic journey of discovery.
In this fashion I have managed to find information about Benzion Margolis (Margalit), who is deceased, but found out that he has three children living in Israel, one of whom, together with his wife and youngest daughter, we have recently met on their visit to the States.
But not much more information is available about that extended family, and my excitement reading your introduction came as a result of the combination Southern Ukraine and Margolis, except that I guess those are two different and unrelated projects you are working on.
If by chance you can have any input into this saga, your help would be highly appreciated.
Welcome again, and good luck!!!

@Daniel Levy

Private User It sounds like you are doing a great job! My Margolis family was in the Suwalki and Lithuania region in the late 18th, early-mid 19th centuries. Their ancestors moved from Spain into Western Europe, Italy, and Eastern Europe. Even a few generations back, sons were moving hundreds of miles across Lithuania to become rabbis in some distant town, so I assume that explains all the movement. So your wife's Margolis family could be related, although records are sparse and so these relationships are hard to prove. My Southern Ukraine family are Blecher (Blejer in Argentina) although I know a lot of the names of families from that region, if they then settled in Argentina and intermarried with my husband's family.

Hatte, I am so delighted that you joined our team. Welcome!

Could somebody make master profiles for some of the Peter and Thomas Montagues? I am not familiar enough to merge everything and it is a mess because it ties into George Washington's line. There are tons of merge issues since the names repeat in several generations. I would really appreciate it if somebody is really sure about their sources and could clean this up a little. I think there are 4or 5 Peters in different generations. If the birthdate is not there it is hard to merge.

Shari, can you please provide links to those profiles? Thanks.

Again, Hatte, welcome! I'm looking forward to continuing our work together!

Always a pleasure Tammy!

I’m a new curator from Johannesburg (the place you all came to hear the screech of the vuvuzelas in the morning, blowing for the World Cup!)

I’m part of a team of new curators who are hoping to provide support for the South African progenitor tree that stretches back through the Huguenots to the French nobility and the Vikings, as well as to England through the 1820 settlers, and to the Netherlands through the VOC Shipping Lines. In addition, we’d like to see the Zulu, Xhosa and Sotho family lines drawn into our tree.

I have an undergrad degree in History, and postgrad degrees in English Literature, Psychology and Education. I was once an English teacher, and when I miss teenagers too much, I get to do guest-teaching at local schools in fun things that interest me, like ‘Introducing Philosophy Through Science Fiction.’ Now I practice as a child psychologist, specialising in cognitive neuropsychology, and Lacanian psychoanalysis.

I’m supposed to be working on a Phd entitled ‘The Name of the Father’ – in the process of which, tracking down the styles of partnership and inheritance in patriarchy and matriarchy, I have wandered into stories of the Medieval Troubadours and the Orkneyjarls; I have found myself researching the genealogical lines of Herod, Akhenaton and Macbeth, and, chasing an elusive Scots king’s line down a rabbit hole, stumbled upon Geni and found myself in… well Carolingia at the moment ;-)

Also, I heard there were T-shirts!...

How you managed to get "Lacan," "Akhenaton," " Carolingia" and "vuvuzelas" in the same post I'll never know.

Clearly genealogists are associational if nothing else.

In case it wasn't clear from the dizzying spectrum of our polymath / curatorial abilities and interests ... Sharon will focus initially on the project she already started to straighten out King Chuck AKA Charlemagne and his extra children; Hatte is trying hard to extract herself from Rev. Lathrop-land and join some medieval work.

But we want to do a Golden Age of Spain project most of all, waaaahhh.

Post deleted by Marvin Caulk, Volunteer Curator on Apr 15, 2011 at 8:24 AM

Welcome! I'm a former teacher, too (first grade) and find doing research for Geni is a great substitute for researching lessons. I loved pulling lessons together, and find working on projects especially enjoyable. Just one of the things I love about Geni! I'm sure you'll be a great asset to the team.

Hi Daniel: I think Ternopil (pre-1944 Tarnopol) is considered to be western Ukraine, though it is on the major railway between Lviv and Odesa. There is kind of a big cultural divide between western and southern Ukraine (occasionally you get alarmist reports of the country splitting in two, though I doubt anything so dire will ever happen), so it does seem to make a difference at least to the people still there.

Hi Hatte: Suwalki seemed kind of a nice area. Have wanted to spend more time in that area of the border zones between Lithuania, Poland, and Belarus, but sometimes life takes you in different directions (now, for me, Argentina is just across the mountains). Really liked Vilnius, that much I can say.

Erica: Golden Age of Spain? What are the parameters?

Sheesh! I knew we shouldn't have mentioned t-shirts!!

Sharon, you are so welcome as a member of our team. Now, when you are missing teenagers, you can join the various curator discussions and think you are right back among them!

Folks, Sharon has already been a valuable person to your curatorial team. The first two South African curators twisted our arms behind our backs until we brought Sharon aboard. You will all enjoy working with her.

Ben - I was planning to go to Prague, Sulwalki, Kalwarja, and Vilnius for my birthday this year and do a personal Jewish Heritage tour, but the kids insisted upon Italy instead. Although I did step foot in a Venetian synagogue my 13 great grandfather also stood in and led prayer in. Or at least so I pretend.

Hatte, how you planned on going to all of those 4 places in one day is above my understanding. It sounds like a stressfull day to me. :-)

Reminds me of some american third cousins of my father that sent me an email that they would like to meet me during their visit to Norway in 2008. They were going to do Denmark, Sweden and Norway in 20 days. Well, their visit to me lasted approx. 15 minutes. I would have liked to show them some of Kongsberg, Norway, the church from 1761 where some of their family were baptized, married and burried, but did they have time?, NO, the had to reach Bergen the next day. The result was that they really didn't have time to do anything or meet anyone they were related to. That is what I call a stressfull vacation. And I'm glad I'm not planning those kind of vacations. Please don't plan likewise.

Ben,

I don't know that we've gotten that far yet. All I can say is that bed boy of

http://www.geni.com/people/%D8%A7%D8%A8%D9%86-%D8%B9%D9%85%D8%A7%D8... of Abenabed (Muhammad ibn Abbad) al-Mutamid, hajib de Sevilla got me interested in learning more about the time and place.

Hate it when the links get so ugly!

Abenámar (Abu Bakr Muhammad ibn Ammar), Visir de Sevilla

And that Remi is why I didn't end up going to Eastern Europe and beyond. That needs a lot of time and careful planning. I'm a 3 day - 3 week kinda person. I prefer to get to know a town when I visit. I stayed 2 weeks in Beirut, 3 weeks in Buenos Aires, 3 weeks around Israel last time I was there and that was a whirlwind.

In fact 12 days for Italy for 3 cities was too little time.

Post deleted by Hatte Blejer on Jan 13, 2011 at 3:52 PM

Link got ugly for me too. I loved the "About Me" for Ibn Ammar. I'm pulling out my Spanish Portuguese North African books from that period now. And looking up Silves.

Welcome Hatte and Sharon. It's great to have you both on the curator team.