Caroline Gries had waited a long time for her trip to ancestral Germany. During the actual trip, what she looked forward to most of all was her visit to Waldgirmes, where she and her brother had already established contact with a local authority who is very knowledgeable about Jewish ancestry there. We arrived at exactly […]
Tag Archives: jewish
Wallerstein’s Jewish Past
The hamlet of Wallerstein near the larger town of Noerdlingen has an interesting past, having once had a very large castle and many Jewish inhabitants. In fact, the synagogue once stood on the main road passing through town, which was unusual as synagogues were usually tucked away in a distinctly Jewish neighborhood. Unfortunately, the 1970s […]
Tracing Jewish Ancestors in Bechhofen, Bavaria
One of the more than dozen ancestral villages visited by lifelong genealogist Caroline Gries was tiny Bechhofen, located in Middle Franconia, Germany. We were lucky to have a local historian, Hans-Rainer Preiss, standing by to help us understand more about the Jewish history of this place. This included a visit to the location of the […]
Jewish Genealogy Trip Success Story in Niedernberg, Bavaria
Caroline Gries from Denver, Colorado has long wanted to visit her ancestral villages in Germany, where her Jewish forefathers lived before emigrating to the United States in the 1840s. That trip was made possible in April, 2017 by European Focus. Caroline visited more than a dozen villages connected with her extensive family tree. The first […]
The Holocaust Memorial of Berlin
July 17 The Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe, also known as the Holocaust Memorial, is a memorial in Berlin to the Jewish victims of the Holocaust, designed by American architect Peter Eisenman and engineer Buro Happold.
Jewish History in Pittigliano, Tuscany
May 10 There was once a flourishing Jewish community in this fortified Tuscan village. Kicked out of the Papal States (those areas immediately surrounding Rome) by Popes in the 16th century, a large settlement developed in Pittigliano where they were given protection by the local ruling family. In ‘Little Jerusalem’ there can be seen many […]
Berlin, Germany and an Inexpensive place to sleep in central Berlin
April 18 In the heart of Berlin in the vibrant neighborhood of Kreuzberg my friends Georg and Martina Siegmann have opened “The Five Lofts” apartments in a former store house that Georg bought in 1986. Moving from Rothenburg ob der Tauber where they owned and operated the successful “Passage 12” gift store, the Siegmanns have […]
Regensburg Cathedral and the Judensau
Some who visit Germany for the first time assume that the persecution of the Jews in Europe began with Adolf Hitler and the Third Reich. Not so. The Jews have been chased out of Europe, murdered and punished with huge taxation rates for more than 1,000 years in Europe. In Regensburg there is a visible […]