Geographical Dictionary Project for Podolia Gubernia

Procedures, Sources, and Methods

By: Arthur H. Hoffman

I volunteered to coordinate this project for the Ukraine SIG about a year and a half ago. I thought it would become an interesting project because I recently retired and I wanted to acquire a new hobby to go with all the tennis and golf I’ve been enjoying. Having had some experience working with databases and my recently acquired interest in Jewish Genealogy of about a year previous, I thought it would be a good fit. Flo Elman, Ukraine SIG President, put me in touch with Warren Blatt of JewishGen to get the particulars. His memos describe the project and are found on the JewishGen WebPages at http://www.jewishgen.org/projects/desc/ShtetlMaster.html and http://www.jewishgen.org/projects/desc/ShtetlMasterRegions.html.

My skills are probably more managerial than researching. So, my original idea was to organize a team of people with a common interest, namely that they possessed an ancestor that came from a shtetl in Podolia. Each member of the team would be assigned one or more shtetls to research. Each team member would be provided with tools and instructions. I imagined that there would be an exchange of information among the team members so that we would all grow into first class researchers as the project progressed. The package of tools I intended to develop would contain a “Shtetl Information Template”, a set of Instructions for researchers to follow, a Bibliography of reference books, and a list of Internet Resources (URLs). The latter two would be expanded based on feedback from the team as it proceeded with the research.

After posting notices about the project in the Ukraine SIG mailing list and soc.genealogy.jewish, I got 17 volunteers willing to do the research on their respective shtetls. These were not professional researchers but individuals who said they just wanted to work on the project. Within two or three weeks, I had developed the aforementioned package of tools that I sent out to my team. They were asked to complete a Shtetl Information Template for each assigned shtetl and forward it to me for review and entry to the Podolia database that I designed to fit the objectives of the project.

Early on it became evident that it was unnecessary to have so many volunteers working on the project. The early work as Warren suggested should be to get as broad a list of shtetls rather than detailed information about each shtetl. For this only one or two researchers were needed, not a team of seventeen researchers. I came to this realization soon. Three or four weeks after sending out my package of tools, I had received only one feedback inquiry from members of the team. After two months I had received only one completed Shtetl Template. When I followed up after another month for a progress report, I got very few additional templates. It was at this point that I decided that Warren was right and that I should become the main researcher.

The objective of the project was to identify all shtetls in Podolia Gubernia that had at least 500 Jews sometime in the past. Each record in the database would contain the current (Ukrainian) name of the shtetl, other alternative names, the USBGN Feature Code number, latitude and longitude, Gubernia (if not Podolia), Uyzed, Oblast, Raion, and its Jewish population during different periods. The borders of Podolia have changed several times. To avoid trying to decide if and when a particular shtetl was in Podolia at one time but not another, the database uses the borders as they existed during the period 1882-1917 for calling a shtetl in Podolia. On the other hand, the database also includes other shtetls from nearby gubernias. Some of these shtetls were once in Podolia before the 1882-1917 borders were established but they are identified under the other gubernia. Others were included in the database if in the course of researching I came across their Jewish population.

The first part of populating the database was to enter all the shtetl names that I could find that were located in or near Podolia. I used a number of sources: “Encyclopedia Judaica”, Jerusalem, Israel, 1972; “Historical Guide – One Hundred Shtetls of Ukraine, Issue 1, Jewish Communities of Podoliya”, Lukin and Khaimovich, St. Petersburg-Jerusalem, 1997 (in Russian); Jewish Genealogy Yearbook 2000 (Changing Borders of Eastern Europe, article by Hal Bookbinder); “The Road from Letichev”, Vol. 1, Chapin and Weinstock, iUniverse, 2000; “Slownik Geograficzny”, 1880-1902; and several Internet URLs listed on my “Internet Resources” tool. Additionally, I received the names of many shtetls from subscribers of the newsgroup soc.genealogy.jewish who requested that they be included in the database. Altogether, these sources provided me with about 150 shtetls to begin populating the database.

Alternate shtetl names, the USBGN Feature Code number, and latitude/longitude came from ShtetlSeeker (http://www.jewishgen.org/shtetlseeker/loctownexp3.htm). By entering #JG# following the shtetl name in the search window (e.g., Litin#JG#), you get the USBGN # as well as alternate names and latitude/longitude. The trick is to move this information from ShtetlSeeker to the database easily without having to write anything down. With both windows open (ShtetlSeeker and database), judicious use of the copy and paste commands allows transfer from one to the other window. You start by copying the shtetl name from the database to the clipboard. Then, toggle to ShtetlSeeker and paste the name to the search window leaving the #JG# in place. Limit the search to Ukraine and D-M Soundex. When the list of shtetls comes up, select the right one if there is more than one shtetl with the same spelling. (I was able to limit the possibilities because all shtetls are shown with distances and direction from Kiev. Podolia was about 100 to 270 miles in a south-westerly direction (actually south to west) from Kiev. Even so, sometimes there were multiple shtetls that could be the right one I was trying to locate. I selected the most probable one with the idea that I would verify it later from maps of the area. See below.)

The next step is to copy the USBGN # from ShtetlSeeker and paste it to the database. Do the same for alternate names and latitude/longitude. Then copy the next shtetl name in the database and paste it to ShtetlSeeker (after clicking the back button twice to get to the search window). Moving data around this way is easy once you get the hang of it.

The next phase was to find Jewish population of the shtetls. There is some population information in “100 Shtetls of Ukraine” and the pages of the Wiesenthal Center website <http://www.wiesenthal.com/>. More came from “Encyclopedia Judaica” and “Slownik Geograficzny”. The microfilm of the 1897 All-Russian Census (in Russian) has lots of population data but only on the major shtetls of each gubernia. (The microfilm can be ordered from the Church of the Latter Day Saints’ (LDS) Family History Library (FHL) through a local Family History Center (FHC). There is a nominal cost per film good for one month of viewing at the FHC. There are 19 films on the Census with 4-6 Gubernias on each film. You need to consult the library catalogue that is on CD at each FHC to order the correct film. It takes from 2-6 weeks for the FHC to get the film. The films are in Russian Cyrillic. To get an idea of what’s in the films, I’ve attached an English translation of the Table of Contents for Podolia Gubernia.) More came from “Jewish Roots in Ukraine and Moldova”, Miriam Weiner, Avotaynu, 1999. Finally, most population data came from “Evrieskaya Entosiklopedia”, 1906-1913. It contains a table from the 1897 Census of 88 communities in Podolia with more than 500 Jews.

Podolia (Gubernia) has been around for a long time. It was first heard of in 1500 and it was passed back and forth between Poland and the Russian Empire. However, it ceased to exist following the Russian Revolution in the early 1920’s. It was carved up and replaced by oblast(s) which is the Soviet term for province. Similarly, the term uyzed or uzed for district in the Russian Empire became raion during the Soviet era. There are several URLs (e.g., http://www.lemko.org/lih/indexuke.html) that specify the oblast and raion for the shtetl. Additionally, “Jewish Roots in Ukraine and Moldova” contained oblast and raion information.

By this time, the database had records for about 270 shtetls. Now came the verification phase. I went back to all the multiple shtetls with identical names where I wasn’t quite sure whether I had selected the right one. There are several map programs on the Internet. In fact, ShtetlSeeker links to three: Expedia, Mapquest, and Multimap. I found the target shtetl on one of these maps and compared its location both with an oblast map and a map of Podolia that contained boundaries of uyzeds that I’d traced from “Atlas of Russian History” by Martin Gilbert. At that point, a judgement was made as to which of the shtetls was the right one and in which uyzed the shtetl was located.

I found the project to be most rewarding. For example, I learned how to transliterate Russian Cyrillic to English. But, I’m glad it is over. At least I’m planning that it is although Warren has just given me some leads on more researching. Drat!