GenAmi - The Association for Jewish Genealogy   

There was a crowd in the school yard in Rue des Hospitalieres-Saint-Gervais, initially the exhibitors, the associations and organisations connected to the AUJF, especially the Union and the Federation of Jewish Societies in France, various other associations like OSE, publishers …etc

We arrived early enough to obtain a good position, with two tables placed perpendicular to the entrance of the inside area, in the open, under the shade of buildings and of a tree.. a genealogical one, no doubt! This joke was made by our friend and administrator Benoit Gherchanoc, who kindly stepped in as a replacement.

We had brought with all the material necessary, rolls of paper to cover the tables, Avotaynu’s book ‘Where once we walked’ an essential starting point, attached to the table by a wire fixed by Philippe Gutmann.

'From Pinsk to Paris' Poster

The brochures created last summer had a great deal of success. A poster ‘From Pinsk to Paris’ created with the assistance of our artistic advisor Caroline Guillot, and enlarged by Benoit, contained photos and documents showing that it can be possible to get back a long way, in this case to about 1780. This astonished the visitors who thought that all the documents had been destroyed.

No, the Jewish communities were massacred, many of the cemeteries destroyed, the headstones used to repair roads and pavements but many of the documents still exist, in unbelievably large numbers… so we can, more or less, revive the names of our ancestors.

Here are some photos taken by Benoit Gherchanoc and by Francois van Deth who joined us for a while.

Micheline Gutmann and Benoît Gherchanoc	General view on the schoolyard
Micheline Gutmann with two visitors

Thank you to our members who also visited us and to Frederic Viey the organiser who thought to invite us to participate in such an enjoyable day.