Jewish Genealogical Society of Great Britain

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List your family names of interest on the one of the forms downloadable here or in a table with five columns:
(1) family name, (2) town, (3) country and (4) approximate dates resident in that town.

For members updating their existing Family Finder entry, mark each line with the letter code N, A, D
for New (N), Amend (A) or Delete (D) in the extra column.

Then simply add your name, JGSGB membership number and the date. When complete, please print and mail the form to the Family Finder Editor, JGSGB, PO Box 2508, Maidenhead SL6 8WS or email to familyfinder@jgsgb.org.uk

It is much preferred that members submit their entries by computer file/email for lists of 12 lines and over. Please refer to foot of the guidelines for more details. The data submission facility is for members only

Guidance notes for completion of the Family Finder data form:
Please note: enter one country only per line using the modern nation state name.

1] Family Name: list the family name with its primary spelling first; a minor variant of a single letter or suffix can be handled on one line. For the very common names ~ Levy, Cohen, Isaacs etc. a qualification with a single given name may assist. For example:
    Abra(ha)movitch
    Gold(en)berg
    Abraham(s) / Abrams
    Lovat(t)
    Flatau / Flatto
    Kopitko / Kopytko
    Levy, Joseph
    Cohen, Lazarus

Variants which are more distant alphabetically should go on a second line. For example:
    Vladinmersky
    Wladermersky
    Gelenovsky
    Gilmovsky

2] Town: place the main town name first using the modern name only. Add a district after a comma if desired. (maximum 32 characters).
If only a region or sub-region is known use that instead; also add a region to avoid ambiguity for identical town names. For example:
    London, Aldgate
    New York, Brooklyn
    Kaunas guberniya
    Schleswig-Holstein
    Ashford, Kent
    Ashford, Middlesex

For alternative towns or districts, use a slash with spaces either side. For example:
    N.Y. State / Miami
    London, Whitechapel / Mile End
    Grimsby / Hull / Sheffield

For help in finding modern town names, use the shtetlinks pages at the Jewishgen website.

3] Country:

Only one country/nation state per line with a few exceptions e.g. Latvia / Lithuania; Russian Poland and one or two other small nation pairs.
Use the modern name and the current sovereign nation for your town. Please don't omit it, the Family Finder Editor is not expert on the towns of all nations.
Enter 'worldwide' for a global search or 'South America' for a whole continent.
England, Scotland, Ireland, Wales are used for the UK nations and 'UK' for all of them. Other usage examples are: Netherlands and Belarus.

4] Dates of residence: include some idea of date if possible, even a wide range helps other readers. Note the use of spaces in the following examples of date coding:

Date	To be entered as (maximum 15 characters)
From/after 1912	1912 >
Pre 1890	< 1890
mid 19th century	mid 19th C
18th century	18th C
date range	1880 - 1914
1924 to present	1924 – 2002

* Generally query signs (?) are not necessary. Simply provide your best information, as finer points of certainty are not very important for making contacts. Only use a '?' if you are uncertain of spelling/transliteration.
* Copies of the Family Finder Form are downloadable from the top of this page.

Computer submission:
If you wish to use your own Excel/Works spreadsheet or a database/Word table to submit your data (and this is preferable for lists of 12 lines and over), please conform to the five column table layout described above, and use Arial 10pt type font. The data submission facility is for members only
Any version of Excel/Works/Word up to Office/2000 can be used; alternatively a plain text file (.txt) with a single tab only between each column is equally acceptable from all PCs and Macs.

The Family Finder ~ background notes

* The Family Finder service links together JGSGB members who share a common research interest, whether family name, town or country. All members may submit a list of their research interests in accordance with the Guidance Notes above.
* The list shows the membership number (not the name) of each submitter to maintain privacy and confidentiality. The number look-up list for decoding this is provided on paper only and not electronically in order to maintain security. Members will find this bound with each update of the membership list.
* The main list of research interests is now distributed electronically in a variety of formats. For details, please see the Family Finder Download Page
If you have difficulty downloading the formats on the website, an Excel or PDF file can be emailed to you on request.
* Members are asked to review regularly their own entries on the Family Finder. Updates can be submitted by email to familyfinder@jgsgb.org.uk
* For entries of 12 lines and over, there is a Word or Excel data form downloadable from the top of this page; this can be used as a template.

Family Finder Data Form