Tens of millions of descendants of Spanish and Portuguese Jewish communities, whose ancestors were forcibly converted from the 14th Century onwards, can now apply for and receive a Certificate of Sephardic Ancestry. Recent academic and genetic research has demonstrated that there are as many as 200 million people, largely in Latin and North America and Europe, who have “significant Jewish ancestry” dating back to the time of the Inquisition in Spain and Portugal.

The historic initiative is run by Jewish Unity Through Diversity Institute, Reconectar, an organization dedicated to helping the descendants of Spanish and Portuguese Jewish communities reconnect with the Jewish people, and Genie Milgrom, an award-winning author, researcher, documentarian, and genealogist who was able to fully document her unbroken maternal lineage 22 generations going back as far as 1405 to pre-Inquisition Spain and Portugal. Her recent film The Stone and the Flower is debuting at film festivals around the world tracing Genie’s personal story of connecting to her heritage.

To find out if you have Jewish Roots, visit: www.SephardicCertificate.com. 

Milgrom is also leading work to digitize Inquisition records that provide an unprecedented amount of genealogical information for those who seek to discover their possible Jewish roots. These and a vast array of other information on the certification website will help the descendants, otherwise known as Anousim, Marranos, Conversos or Crypto-Jews, discover their heritage.

“The Certificate of Sephardic Ancestry is historic for so many around the world and especially in Latin and North America who yearn to connect with their past and up to now have had no way to do accomplish this,” Milgrom said. “The Certification, in connection with my collection of genealogy tools specifically for those with Crypto -Jewish and Sephardic lineages that is on the website will allow them to also search for their own past and empower them in the process.”

You can read more in an article in the israel365news.com website at: https://bit.ly/3zwSMy3.

The following is an announcement written by Findmypast:

Explore new records from Peterborough to Pennsylvania.

If you have East Coast branches on your family tree, you may find a familiar name or two within over 36,000 Huguenot Society Application Papers, or within the 195,000 Roman Catholic baptism and marriage records from New York that we added this week.

Women’s Land Army Service Cards, 1939-1950

We added 36,438 Women's Land Army service cards this week. These images and transcriptions may reveal new information about your wartime ancestors.

Huguenot Society of Pennsylvania Application Papers

Was your relative a member of the Huguenot Society of Pennsylvania? Explore these 36,438 new records to find out.

New York Roman Catholic Parish Baptisms and Marriages

Researching your New York ancestors just got easier, as we've added 170,637 baptisms and 125,977 marriages from the city's Roman Catholic parishes.

Explore over 80 million pages from across the globe

We added two new English titles to our newspaper archive this week. We also updated a further existing 20 publications, taking our total page count to over 80 million. With so many fascinating titles to explore, what will you discover?

Boston Independent.

Here's everything that's been added this week. 

New titles:

Updated titles:

Episode 3 of Was Justice Served? out now

Episode 3 of our new podcast Was Justice Served? sees Jen and David dive into the mysterious death of Rose Harsent in 1902. Listen as they examine the evidence, hear testimonies from the trial, and ultimately determine whether the person responsible for this grizzly crime was brought to justice.

Listen now

Listen as they examine the evidence, hear testimonies from the trial, and ultimately determine whether the person responsible for this grizzly crime was brought to justice.

More on this topic:

English RecordsHistorical Newspapers

The National Library's collection of Finnish-American newspapers has been digitized up until the end of 1923. The collection had often received requests for digitization and is a significant source of material for the use of migration history, population history and genealogy. The papers tell the story of life in Finnish communities and are freely available everywhere through the digi.kansalliskirjasto.fi service.

Front page of Canadan uutiset from 1915. The motto of the magazine was “amity in mutual matters, freedom in private matters, and benevolence in all matters”. Source: digi.kansalliskirjasto.fi.

It is possible to make different searches in the material or, for example, browse it by title.  Some of the material can also be used on microfilmfiche at the National Library.The collection contains 174 newspaper and magazine items since 1876.

Political and spiritual associations of Finnish immigrants, as well as various local communities, published their own papers in the United States and Canada. The places of publication tell the history of Finnish settlement: Duluth, Astoria, Hancock, New York, Fitchburg, etc. Periodicals were printed in Finnish, Swedish and English. In part, the languages were mixed into Finglish, a special form of Finnish used by American Finns.  

Some publications have a link to the present day. For example, Canadan uutiset was in print until 2000 and has since merged with The Finnish Update: Pohjois-Amerikan uutiset, a politically independent newspaper.

The National Library's digitized collection of Finnish-American newspapers accumulated during the North American mass migration. The largest number of immigrants that moved to America went between the 1870s and the 1920s. The papers provide a varied picture of the everyday life of migrants and the New World, but also provide information on how Finnish and European issues were reported across the ocean.

The digital collection will be supplemented during 2024 with additional material, also digitized in the United States, copies of which have been donated to the National Library by the Library of Congress. This material comprises approximately 5,000 pages of Toveritar, Auttaja and Uusi kotimaa issues, which have been missing from the physical collection of the National Library.

In addition, Finnish-American material that was released after 1924 has been digitized to some extent. For copyright reasons, it is only available on the workstations of legal deposit libraries.

Further information

Finnish-American serial publications in digi.kansalliskirjasto.fi(opens a new tab)
Finnish-American serial publications in the National Library's search service(opens a new tab)

The. following is an announcement from the (U.S.) National Archives and Records Administration:

On March 24, 1958, Elvis Presley was inducted into the Army, and the document below is from his Official Military Personnel File (OMPF). Presley’s (OMPF) is considered a Persons of Exceptional Prominence (PEP) file. Persons of Exceptional Prominence (PEP) records consist of military heroes, political leaders, cultural figures, celebrities, and entertainers which are now open to the public.

Elvis Presley was a well known rock and roll music performer and actor whose career began in 1954 and continued until his death in 1977. He is known as one of the 20th century's most significant cultural figures.

Enlarge

A page from Elvis Presley's Official Military Personnel File. National Archives Identifier: 57304571.

View in National Archives Catalog

You can view and download this record from the National Archives Catalog.

An innovative digital repository on the website of the Army Women's Museum is providing valuable insights into well-preserved artifacts, archives, and exhibits related to the contributions of women in the U.S. Army.

Tracy Bradford, the curator of the Army Women's Museum, stated that the objective of this initiative is to establish an internet-based collection that will safeguard and provide access to the archive materials held at the museum for the entire nation.

The AWM's inaugural digital archive, known as "Digital Collections," will provide access to individuals unable to physically visit the museum, enabling them to virtually explore and appreciate the archives, displays, and collections.

"We aim to provide individuals who are unable to physically visit our museum with the opportunity to fully engage with all the offerings it provides," stated Alexandra J. Kolleda, education specialist at the Army Women's Museum.

In order to make this history accessible to the public, the museum undertakes the task of processing and digitizing all of their holdings, making them available online.

In order to initiate the process, it is necessary to digitally scan and upload each unique piece within a collection. Subsequently, data entries are generated for each piece, containing essential information such as the date, title, and subjects.

These items consist of photographs, certificates, postcards, and even more varied things such as an audiovisual file.

"Incorporating informative data into all the components enhances the comprehensiveness and preparedness of each collection for public accessibility," stated Kolleda.

Certain pieces may also be incorporated into the museum's virtual tours.

To access these online archives, visitors can navigate to the AWM's website homepage and scroll down until they locate a historical image depicting a gathering of women in the Army. The image will be labeled "The U.S. Army Women's Museum Digital Collections." By clicking on this photo, visitors will be directed to the digital collections section of the website.

The U.S. Army Women's Museum has developed an online archive of historical significance that is accessible to the public. Visitors to the digital collections can access special exhibits, collections, historic photos, documentations, certificates, and perform advanced searches to locate specific items.

Through the advanced search feature, users have the ability to input precise details in order to improve the effectiveness of their search. The required information includes a title, a specified period of time, an individual's name, and potential descriptions to facilitate the identification of the precise search criteria.

The overwhelming majority of artworks, which cannot be exhibited at the gallery owing to spatial constraints, will now be accessible for viewing through the online exhibition in the digital collections section of the website.

"The upload process for these collections is solely determined by the size of the collection," stated Kolleda. "A smaller collection could be processed within a day, whereas a larger collection may require two weeks or even longer."

The U.S. Army Women's Museum has developed an online archive of historical significance that is accessible to the public. The AWM aims to employ its new digital collections to educate a wide audience, including students from Virginia and other states who rely on the museum for their academic studies and school assignments.

"We believe it is our duty to make these historical documents available to the public, so that researchers, students, families, and others can easily access these exceptional primary source materials," stated Bradford.

To access the official website of the Army Women's Museum, please click on the following link: https://awm.army.mil/.

To access the digital collections of the Army Women's Museum, please click on the following link: https://awm.historyit.com/public-sites/home/digitalcollections?hsxezn=kezfcv

Two North Carolina-based genealogists, David McCorkle and Diane L. Richard, recently started GenWebinars. They sought a better chance to offer their lectures with more time, less restrictions, and at times that would most help the audience. So born GenWebinars, located at genwebinars.com.

Reviewing their Frequently Asked inquiries (FAQ) section on the website will help you find responses to your inquiries on how things will go.

They talk about the expenses of attending—usually $25—without a subscription. Zoom buys one of the lectures at a time; they also include how to engage with the speaker and so on. Every webinar runs ninety minutes, including time for questions.

The page's subtitle is "live, in-depth, and interactive genealogy webinars." Among their earlier presentations were "Tracing Landownership Over Time," "Using Artificial Intelligence Tools in Genealogy," and "Using Timelines." You can find on the website how, when, and whether past webinars are viewable.

Currently president of the North Carolina Genealogical Society, McCorkle is well renowned as the land grants specialist from North Carolina and maintains a webpage for that. Richard editor of the North Carolina Genealogical Society Journal and well-known genealogical speaker.

These GenWebinars by two seasoned professionals are absolutely worth looking at.

Proton, the privacy-focused technology company, has launched Proton Docs, a new document editing tool that bears a striking resemblance to Google Docs. The service, launched as part of Proton Drive, offers features such as rich text editing, real-time collaboration, and multimedia support.

Since this is a Proton product, security is everything: the company says every document, keystroke, and even cursor movement is end-to-end encrypted in real time. Proton has long promised to never sell or otherwise use your user data, which may appeal to more people than ever now that there are so many questions about how your documents and information are used to train AI models. (For what it’s worth, Google says it also doesn’t use your content to train its models.)

There's a saying that "the internet never forgets" but that's just wishful thinking. Storing data on servers takes money, time, and effort. Eventually, something you care about will be wiped from the web forever. The good news is that you can do something about it now. 

Web Content Is Always Under Threat 

Just a day before I sat down to write this, Paramount removed almost everything from the Comedy Central and MTV websites. The Internet Archive, arguably one of the most important websites on the internet, has been forced to remove around 500,000 books from its site. While archival sites do their best to preserve what they can, legal and financial pressures will inevitably lead to losses of content and our easy access to it. Even peer-to-peer hosting of rare content, such as implemented by the Internet Archive, doesn't guarantee that eventually some torrents will have no seeds. Streaming services and digital content such as ebooks and digital-only games can likewise disappear in the blink of an eye. 

We ourselves, as collective users of the web, can individually preserve content. So don't let time and entropy rob you of the content you think should be saved somewhere. Here's how you can keep a small piece of our culture safe from digital death.

You can read more in an article by Sydney Butler published in the howtogeek.com web site at: https://bit.ly/4ctnHd3

MTV News was closed down last year due to staff reductions at its parent firm, Paramount. Last week, Patrick Hosken, a former editor of MTV News (and a contributor to Stereogum), observed that the website of the music publication had been deactivated, resulting in the loss of numerous years of esteemed music journalism. The Internet Archive has provided a searchable database of MTV News, offering a solution to the problem.

The database contains a total of 460,575 web pages that were formerly published on mtv.com/news, starting from the website's establishment in 1996. Paramount also removed content from its CMT, Comedy Central, and TV Land websites. "In order to enhance our website, Paramount has implemented more efficient versions of our sites, directing fans to Paramount+ to enjoy their preferred shows," stated a representative from Paramount Global. The MTV News database can be accessed here.

Shari Redstone's National Amusements Inc., which has control over Paramount Global, recently ended discussions of a merger with David Ellison's Skydance Media, known for producing popular movie franchises such as Mission: Impossible and Star Trek. Currently, National Amusements Inc. is seeking to reduce its yearly expenses by $500 million and is considering selling off certain parts of its media empire. Paramount's intentions regarding the sale of MTV and its other cable networks, such as Nickelodeon, remain uncertain. However, recent information suggests that the corporation is considering selling BET to the network's CEO and CC Capital's Chinh Chu for $1.6 billion. Following yesterday's revelation that IAC, led by Barry Diller, may be considering purchasing Paramount, it appears that the merger with Skydance is indeed taking place.

Paramount Global's long-term debt amounted to $14.6 billion last year, and recently its shares reached its lowest point ever. Notwithstanding the decline of its cable business, Paramount also possesses valuable assets in the form of CBS and Paramount Pictures. Additionally, it aims to consolidate its Paramount+ platform with another streaming service, such as Warner Bros. Discovery's Max.

MTV was established in 1981 by Warner-Amex Satellite Entertainment and later acquired by a consortium that included Paramount, which was then known as Viacom, in 1983. In 1987, Sumner Redstone's father, Sumner, gained ownership of Viacom through his company, National Amusements. In 2010, MTV removed "Music Television" from its branding, but it maintained its production of music journalism until the closure of MTV News. The MTV Video Music Awards will commemorate its 40th anniversary on September 10th, although the MTV Movie & TV Awards will not take place this year.

The following is an extract from the MyHeritage Blog:

As we celebrate July 4th, it’s the perfect time to dive into your family history and discover your American roots. The United States is a melting pot of cultures and backgrounds, and people all around the world have American relatives. For a limited time, from July 3–7, 2024, we’re offering free access to our extensive U.S. City Directories collection. 

Search the U.S. City Directories for free! 

MyHeritage’s U.S. City Directories collection was produced from 26,000 directories published between 1860 and 1960, and consists of 1.3 billion individual records, which we consolidated into 561 million records. 

These directories are invaluable for several reasons:

• Alternative to Census Records: City directories serve as an important resource, especially for periods where census records are incomplete or missing, such as the 1890 census, which was largely destroyed in a fire.
• Consolidated Records: Multiple records about the same individual are consolidated, making it easier to track your ancestors’ movements and activities over time.
• Rich Details: City Directories often include names, addresses, occupations, and sometimes even additional information like business advertisements, offering a vivid picture of your ancestors’ lives.

If you want to take a deep dive into the city directories, watch this in-depth webinar on Legacy Family Webinars: A Deep Dive into U.S. City Directories at MyHeritage. This comprehensive session will guide you through using MyHeritage’s U.S. City Directories collection to find not only residential information about your ancestors but much more. Learn about the unique features and search capabilities that can help you uncover detailed insights into your family history.

Usually, a Complete, Data, or Omni plan is required to view these records, but for a limited time only, you can search and view them for free. Note that you’ll be asked to create a free MyHeritage account to access these free records.

Take advantage of this limited-time offer to explore your American roots. Dive into the records to uncover addresses, occupations, and other valuable information that paints a picture of your family’s past.