Free Access Terms and Conditions
To commemorate VE Day, we will be providing free access to the following collections from Monday 4th May – Friday 8th May. To access these collections please click on the links below. Note – you can only access the free access to Newspapers and Fold3 by clicking on these links.
- All Canada Military Records on Ancestry
- Newspapers.com: https://nwspprs.com/wwii**
- All Commonwealth records on Fold3 – click here. ***
- Holocaust Collection on Ancestry (Note – the majority of records in this collection are free to access at all times)
Free access from 4 May 2020 at 8 a.m. EDT to 8 May at 11:59 p.m. EDT. Registration required. After the free access period ends, you will only be able to view the records in the featured collections using an Ancestry.ca paid membership. To see a full list of records in the featured collections please click here.
**Free access to Newspapers.com will be from 4 May 2020 at 8 a.m. EDT to 8 May at 11:59pm EDT. Registration required. After the free access period ends, you will only be able to view the papers using a Nespapers.com paid subscription. Terms and conditions apply.
***Free access to all Commonwealth records on Fold3.com will be free from 4 May 2020 at 8 a.m. EDT to 8 May at 11:59 p.m. EDT. Registration required. After the free access period ends, you will only be able to view the records using a Fold3 paid subscription. Terms and conditions apply.
Key collections and records on Ancestry mentioned in Janette’s session that are free to access:
- https://www.ancestry.com/search/categories/jewishholocaust/
- Ancestry® and Arolsen Archives collaboration https://www.ancestry.com/cs/alwaysremember
Five top tips for researching your Jewish ancestors before and after WWII
- Don’t assume you know the names of your ancestors in Europe. Use wildcards in your search, be creative in your spelling.
- Just because you think you know where your ancestors came from doesn’t mean you do. Many towns in Europe, even within the same country have the same or similar names. Use a gazetteer to locate the place.
- European records may have Julian dates, depending on where people lived, as late as WWI. Use conversion tools to change Julian into Gregorian. When using Jewish records, use a tool to convert to and from Hebrew calendar dates.
- European borders changed not just right after WWI, but during the interwar period, after WWII and recently. You may need to consult data from many different countries and local jurisdictions.
- Don’t discount your family’s stories and also don’t accept them as gospel – dig to find the kernel of truth around which the story was built and then search for documentation.
Other key resources:
- Arolsen Archives https://arolsen-archives.org
- JewishGen https://www.jewishgen.org
- Mémorial de la Shoah, Paris, France http://www.memorialdelashoah.org
- Montreal Holocaust Museum https://museeholocauste.ca/en/
- National Holocaust Centre and Museum, Nottinghamshire, U.K. https://www.holocaust.org.uk/
- New York Public Library: https://libguides.nypl.org/yizkorbooks
- USHMM, Washington, D.C. https://www.ushmm.org/
- Yad Vashem, Jerusalem https://www.yadvashem.org/
- Yiddish Book Center: https://www.yiddishbookcenter.org/collections/yizkor-books
Janette is an Ancestry ProGenealogist and began her family history journey more than 35 years ago as a hobby with her father. This hobby quickly became more as she immersed herself in Jewish history, both as a student and a teacher. Janette serves as a Board member of the International Association of Jewish Genealogy Societies (IAJGS). She has been president of a Jewish Genealogy Society; was lead co-chair of the 2016 IAJGS conference and for over 6 years was the Coordinator of the JewishGen Ukraine SIG. She has worked with private clients since 2004. Janette holds master’s and doctorate degrees in Jewish studies from Spertus Institute in Chicago. Her areas of research expertise include Eastern European Jews, the Holocaust, the United States and immigration. She has travelled widely in Eastern Europe doing onsite archival research and accompanying clients on ancestral home visits.
