Friday, February 27, 2009
Bagaslaviskis death and marriages completed
Translations of the death and marriage records have been received as follows:
Deaths: 1854 - 1856, 1858 - 1870,
1872
Marriages: 1854 - 1861, 1863 - 1870, 1872
Additional records for Bagaslaviskis are contained in the "Vilna
County" vital records. Those wishing to continue with research in this town are encouraged to donate to the Vilna County
records which provides translations of vital rcords from many Vilna district towns.
11:28 am est
Saturday, February 14, 2009
Surpassing the 150,000 / 100,000 record marks
December 2008 marked two significant acheivements on the VRT project. Aaron Roetenberg completed the translation
of the 150,000th vital record for his Kovno gubernia towns. Congratulations are in order for Aarons efforts. If
your interest is in Kovno gubernia towns, contact Aaron and congratulate him for this acheivement. Better yet, Aaron
is in need of funding for several major translation efforts. Please consider giving a little extra to show your appreciation
for his efforts.
The Vilna / Suwalki gubernia translation effort reached the 100,000 record mark in December. Translations are now complete
for 12 towns. The largest achievement has been the Vilna city vital records. This project has completed over 80,000 translations
through the end of Dec. 2008. This is in large part due to the force of volunteers that came forth. These volunteers include
Bruce Zatz, Rabbi Nosson Vershubsky, Dmitry Shirochin, Yaacov Rakhmilevitch, Andre Molchanov, Diana Kriwicky and myself.
Olkeniki (Valkininkai) marriages and divorces sent for translation
The Olkeniki marriage and divorce records have been sent to a translator. These are expected to be completed in March
2009.
Bagaslaviskis Birth records translated
Translations have been received and distributed for the following birth records:
Births: 1854, 1855, 1857 - 1860, 1861, 1863, 1864 - 1867, 1869 - 1872
Death and marriage rcords have also been sent out for translation. The translations are scheduled to be received in late March
2009.
Mikailiskis vital records completed
The remaining translations for Mikailiskis have been distributed. They are as follows:
Deaths: 1879, 1885 - 1887, 1908
Additional records for this town are part of the Vilna County records. Rsearchers interested in these records are encouraged
to contribute towards their translation.
Podberezhe Russian only records
I mentioned last October there were many records for Podberezhe which were only in Russian. These have now been translated
and have been distributed.
Births: 1838 - 1853, 1861, 1869
Deaths: 1838 - 1853, 1862, 1869
Marriages: 1838 - 1853, 1885
The first translations provided by Diana Kriwicky will need to be sent out to a paid translator to answer
many outstanding questions as well as provide some corrections. we will need several more Podberezhe researchers to enable
this to occur this spring. Please contact me if you are interested in these records and can assist financially.
Merkine death records distribution
The following death records for Merkine have been distributed to qualified donors:
Deaths: 1855, 1860, 1861, 1864, 1865, 1867, 1870-1875
Additional death records for Merkine in hand cover the years 1877 - 1914. These records are already partially indexed.
Volunteers who are interested in Merkine may want to accelerate the distribution of these records by volunteering to produce
an Excel spreadsheet from the index. The index is in Latin characters, so language should not be a problem. Anyone interested
in performing this task should contact me.
Completion of Butrimonys birth records
The Butrimonys birth records have been completed with the distribution of the following records:
Births: 1881-1884, 1888-1890, 1899-1909
Gelvan Vital Records Distribution
It has been several months now since I've updated the blog, but there has been significant activity going on in the background.
The Gelvan vital records have been completed with the distribution of the following records:
Births: 1862
Marriages: 1854-1872
Additional records for Gelvan exisat as part of the Vilna County collection. Researchers interwsted in further records
for Gelvan are encouraged to donate to the Vilna County VRT records.
Sunday, October 19, 2008
Gelvan Vital Records distribution
Translations have been received for the following records:
Births: 1854 - 1872 ex. 1862
Deaths: 1854 - 1872 [contiguous]
The translations have been sent to qualified contributors.
An assessment will be made to see how much more we can translate with remaining funds.
Saturday, October 18, 2008
Podberezhe Vital Records
For the past two years or so, our Argentinean volunteer Diana Kriwicky has diligently been translating the vital records
for Podberezhe, working from dual language records. Many of these records are extremely difficult to read and accounts for
the time required to complete these records. Distribution of the Podberezhe translations must be held out of necessity, since
these must be proofed with special attention paid to names and places which were difficult to read.
There are some records Diana did not translate since they were only in Russian. These will be sent out for translation
in a few months time. Hopefully, the Podberezhe translations will be sent out by early spring.
More Vilna births and death records sent for translation
A significant set of Vilna vital records has just been sent to one of our translators. The decision was made to translate
additional early records with the funds in hand as we have a very short list of translators capable of working with these
particular records. The records sent out are the births for the years 1839 - 1854 and the deaths from 1837 - 1846.
A few volunteers are working other Vilna records including Bruce Zatz, who is working on the marriage records for the
late 19th Century. Solly Radowsky is working on the 1901 death records and Yaakov Rakhmilevich has just completed the
1874 births and is moving onto the 1875 births.
Balbieriskis Translations completed
The complete set of filmed vital records were recently translated and distributed:
Births: 1828, 1889, 1903
Deaths: 1828, 1889, 1903
Marriages: 1828, 1903
A listing received from the Vilna Archives shows there are far more unfilmed records waiting to be translated. Balbieriskis
researchers are therefore encouraged to contribute to see these records translated. The unfilmed records go all the way back
to the second decade of the 19th Century!
Olkeniki [Valkininkai] translations distributed
The following translations have recently been distributed:
Births: 1857, 1870 - 1872, 1874 - 1880
Deaths: 1871, 1872, 1875 - 1880
Butrimonys Translations Distributed
The following translations have been distributed to qualified members of the project:
Births: 1866 - 1875, 1878
Ziezmariai Translations Distributed
The following translations have been distributed to qualified members:
Births: 1878 - 1885, 1887 - 1893, 1896 - 1904, 1906 - 1915
Deaths: 1855, 1866, 1878 - 1891, 1893 - 1896, 1900 - 1906, 1909, 1910, 1912 - 1914
Thursday, August 7, 2008
Status of Vilna City vital records translations
Much has transpired in the last few months with the receipt of large numbers of translations from our volunteer extraordinaire
Bruce Zatz. Bruce has recently delivered translations of marriage records for the years 1847 - 1860 and 1866 - 1879. In addition, he
also donated translations of the 1915 death records.
The receipt of these latest translations brings the total number of completed Vilna records to just over 72,000.
Volunteers such as Bruce have produced 80% of these translations.
Paid translations
Due to the large financial resources required to translate the Vilna records, paid translators have been incorporated
only twice in four years. Based on where we are today with a large number of the Vilna records translated, I would like
to ask Vilna researchers to contribute now as we prepare to send out a large number of the early records to a paid translator.
If this effort is successful, I will actually employ two translators to speed up the work. This aggressive approach will require
everyone who has participated so far to reach in and assist and we will also need a significant number of new contributors.
In all, I am seeking to raise an additional $5000 [a goal of $10,000 is desired but probably not acheivable] at this
time which will go a long way to assist our work. History of the project to date have allowed a paid translator to be employed
only every two years. The message here is that in the absence of a good response at this time, we will spend down the current
balance and have to wait a rather long time before being able to engage a translator again. If you are on the fence, now is
the time to contribute to the Vilna vital records.
Distribution of Donated Translations
If we are able to raise a significant amount now, the distribution of the donated translations will be accelerated. Earlier
this summer, we distributed over 2300 birth and eath records for the year 1893. Preparations of the 1894 births
and deaths for distribution are underway.
Vilna researchers with questions about this project and our plans for the future are encouraged to contact me at Joelrat1@hotmail.com
.
Birth records for Ziezmariai sent for translation
Birth records for Ziezmariai were sent to a translator this week. The first of the translations should begin arriving
by the beginning of September. Funding for the translation of these records was facilitated by the transfer of excess funds
from another town. The major donor for that town authorized the transfer.
The birth records are all that can be translated at this time, since the account balance for Ziezmariai is insufficient
to cover the death, marriage and divorce records. The translation of these records will require an additional $1600 or so.
Ziezmariai researchers are therefore encouraged to contribute at this time to enable the continuation of the translation effort.
If sufficient funds are received by mid-September, I will seek to keep the Ziezmariai translations ongoing rather than break
up the work.
Translations received for Nemunaitis
Translations of the following vital records for Nemunaitis have been received:
Births: 1855, 1856, 1864, 1865, 1870 - 1895, 1897 - 1899
Deaths: 1863, 1866, 1867, 1870 - 1877, 1889 - 1892, 1894, 1896 - 1911, 1913
Marriages: 1857, 1861, 1865 - 1867, 1870 - 1877, 1883 - 1889, 1891 - 1894, 1896 - 1903, 1906, 1909, 1912, 1913
Divorces: 1871
Translations in process for Valkininkai
The first vital records for Valkininkai were sent for translation in June. The translations have begun to arrive and
these will continue through this month.
