Recently my family and I watched a stage production of the musical Fiddler on the Roof. In it, the milkman Tevye describes some of their traditions in their Jewish village (shtetl), which the residents try to maintain in the face of changing times. Most reviews will mention the changing social norms, but the larger context includes the political pressures the village faced within the larger Russian Empire. Although the name Anatevka is fictional, it represents hundreds of small Jewish villages across the western rim of the then Russian Empire, known as the “Pale of Settlement.” This was a region to which Jews under the rule of the Russian Empire were confined during most of the 19th century.

The musical Fiddler on the Roof is set about 1905, with an uprising and demonstration when Perchek gets arrested in Kiev, and the play ends with the expulsion of all the Jews from Anatevka, presumably as part of the pogroms in 1906 which occurred as a reaction to the 1905 uprising.

Thousands of Jewish families left the Pale for the United States, either seeking a better life or fleeing pogroms, from the start of the pogroms in 1881 to the start of World War 1. To a historian, 1905 does not seem that long ago; after all, it was part of the 20th century, which many of us still remember. However, without genuine effort, knowledge of family history dies quickly.

With my extensive academic background in Russian language, Russian history (and contemporary Russian society), I have helped several clients look for their ancestors who once lived in the Russian Empire. This includes Jewish families who can trace their heritage to this Pale of Settlement. Countless families in the United States today remember only that their families had lived in Russia (or Poland, Ukraine, Belorus, etc).

Although many small shtetl like “Anatevka” ceased to exist, civil records which were created (census records or birth, marriage and death records) typically remain in the archives of the regions where the shtetl once was. Therefore, finding the name of the small town that was their ancestors’ birthplace is essential to move the genealogy back to previous generations.

The birthplace was sometimes recorded on passenger manifests. Check the “Arrival Records Collection” on the Ellis Island website. Hometowns were also often included on the naturalization applications, but only after 1906. (Prior to 1906, counties usually only asked for country of origin). Birthplaces of immigrants are sometimes listed on death certificates, but only if someone is still alive who remembers.

So, if your family has any paper which might include a hometown, keep it. That knowledge is priceless. If the family has a tradition that includes a village name, preserve it. If Jewish immigrants who came to the U.S. belonged to a Landsmannschaften, or benevolent aid society, knowing the name of this society can be a big help to genealogy research, since these societies were organized on the basis of birthplace.

Imagine Tevye going to New York and joining a network of other people who had left Anatevka. His grandchildren (in the play, Zeitel’s child), might be told stories of Anatevka, or might remember that Tevye belonged to an association from Anatevka. But Teyve’s grandchildren might not hear the stories, and certainly by the fourth generation, memory of the name of the shtetl is often gone.

If a family did not preserve the name of their great-grandparents’ hometown, it takes a great deal of effort to find it. Ask your older relatives. 1905, although recent, is too long ago for any of those immigrants to still be alive, but their children or grandchildren might be, and they might have heard a story which did not get passed on. Ask. Learn. Find your Anatevka.