My grandpa was from Poland - Gresom Jopfa

What's wrong in saying Jews have big noses? Most of them have. Every ethnic group has some characteristic physical features. Try googling the pics of the people I mentioned in my previous posts, and you'll see characteristic features of Eastern European Jews.

In many cases, Jews have big noses, Africans have wide lips and Slavs have high cheeckbones. Get over it.


Of course you can have a Jewish name, just as you can have a Polish, English or Chinese name. Gershom, Sarah, Rachel, Abraham, Isaac etc. are Jewish names.


Many Jews in the diaspora have a kind of double national identity. I've heard a London rabbi saying "I'm an Englishman" and, of course, he was Jewish at the same time. A lot of Polish Jews consider themselves Polish as well as Jewish. There's really nothing unusual in a guy who is ethnically Jewish, atheist and identifies as a Pole. I'd rather say it was easier to find a Jewish atheist than an (ethnically) Polish one during the interwar period.

No, evidently you have a lot to learn. The kind of thinking that Jews are an ethnic group and not a religious group is the same kind of thinking that occurred on both sides leading to the Holocaust. Were you educated in the United States or in a country where myths and prejudices continue to be perpetuated to the detriment of all? Or have you bought into some contrived myth of oneness despite an education that would have taught you correctly?

Gersom may be a "Jewish name," but if it is a part of the Bible --which it is-- it's also a Christian name, like, for example, Noah, Benjamin, Samuel, David, Daniel, Elijah, Moses, Adam, Aaron, Elisha, Nathan, Solomon, Joseph, Joshua, Caleb, Jacob, Seth, Eve, Ruth, Rebecca, Rachel, Esther, Elizabeth, Susan, Sharon, et al.

Since there are no atheist names for historical reasons, they are also names of atheists.

If you're so keen on the discredited notion that Jews are an ethnic group, how can you possibly believe that the two quotes of yours above can both be correct? They can't be. Jewishness is passed through the mother in accordance with religious dogma. If, in fact, Judaism was an ethnicity (again, discredited), that wouldn't be true - the child of such a union would be half Jewish. If Judaism is a religion and not an ethnicity, then a person cannot be Jewish because he is a descendant of Jews.

You don't all live in Israel? No kidding, I live in New York City and there are many Jews here. Do you know what their ethnicity is? White Americans, black Americans, Middle Eastern Americans, and others. They all practice Judaism, but I can guarantee you that the black girl who lives next door whose parents came here from Ethiopia and my white Jewish friend whose ancestors have been in America longer than mine sure as heck aren't the same ethnicity.

As it happens, I have now found online my grandfather's immigration record. He came over to New York in 1937 from Poland. What's more is that I found him by his birthday on a baptism record for "Gersomus Jopfa, sw. Gregorius" researched in Poland by a relative I didn't even know about before I began to look on these websites.

My grandfather Harry Juva a.k.a. Gersom(us) Jopfa was the son of Marek Jopfa & Anna Kontnik, and their parents from the baptism record were Samuel Jopfa & Anna Spek "rustici" and Ioannes Kontnik & Anna Adamczyk "rustici." I am told "rustici" means villagers from the town of Stare Miasteczko, which according to my relative online was destroyed in WWII but is about 11 kilometers from the city of Szczecinek.

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That is a very respectable answer and it is not as offensive when there's a good explanation to go along with it. About there being a Jewish nationality, though, there isn't. But I take your point Switezianka. If you don't mind giving an answer, what is your background? Aside from my grandfather, I am a quarter French and half Cuban.

I'd like to think that some of the discussion here helped you to show one way or another the truth of your grandfather.

Check online for photos of the village. You might find something useful.

Thanks, Wroclaw, it did! I know, I have been looking all morning so far!
Does anyone here know that area? Szczecinek is in an area called West Pomeranian Voivodeship. I'm still not sure where the actual town (or the ruins of it) is in relation to Szczecinek but apparently nearby. Also, from the baptism record (Jews don't have baptisms, do they?) do you or does anybody else know what the "sw. Gregorius" part means? Is that like "nickname Gregorius" or something?

Go to: pilot polska

It's a map. Enter szczecinek in the box marked Miejscowosc. Then press Pokaz

It's north-west Poland, near Germany.

Rather than look for an old village. It might be better to locate the church. It might be still standing.

Also, look for some old maps... pre war. They might have something too.

sw = saint. (St. Gregory) I think it relates to the church.

Hmm... so "Gersomus Jopfa, saint Gregorius?" Is that then part of his name?

Yes, the other parts I am still working on, but apparently Samuel Jopfa and Anna Spek were from a different place called Manenburg and Anna Adamczyk was from a place called Zetichowo, but its all written pretty small so I could have a letter wrong from the scanned copy. She also scanned another baptism from about two years after my grandfather's of another person with the same grandparents, different parents: Ioannes Kontnik with parents Simonus Kontnik & Anna Jopfa and grandparents Ioannes Kontnik & Anna Adamczyk and Samuel Jopfa & Anna Spek, so a double first cousin of my grandfather it looks like. Then there is a third one for Samuel Drobnik who is the son of Stephanus Drobnik & Judith Jopfa whose parents are R. Drobnik & M. Rybacki and S. Jopfa & A. Spek, which, assuming this last pair is Samuel Jopfa and Anna Spek again, makes him another first cousin.

"MIE.A. RZYM-KATOL.SKA PARAF. DUBLIKAT" is stamped on all three of them like five times. Does that mean anything other than that it's a duplicate copy?

Anyway, I can't find Manenburg on a map and there are several places called Zetichowo, but I think it probably is the Zelichowo (and not Zetichowo) which is really close by. Any thoughts on Manenburg though?

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I wish it would just let me post a new message. But it's Marienburg not Manenburg, just like it was Zelichowo and not Zetichowo. But there were a lot of Marienburgs according to Wikipedia. Any ideas?

The problem that you have now is that some of the place names are in German.

This is because of German occupation. The place names changed again after the war.

You need a map from about 1850... for German place names. And a modern map to compare what you find.

There are websites which have lists of Polish - German place names. You just have to find the list for the area you are researching.

As I understand the baptism: Gersom Jopfa was baptised at St. Gregory's church.

I'll get back to you in a while about the other places and names.

This stuff was all scanned by Agnes Miller, the daughter of Samuel Drobnik who is the subject of the third baptismal record I mentioned above. Her dad came here too but apparently he didn't know my grandfather was living here until my grandfather died back in 1995. He died in 2003.

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According to this, Marienberg is now called Malbork.

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Everybody on all the certificates is a rustici!

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Apparently the Jopfa, Spek, Rybacki (originally Ryback), and Adamczyk (originally just Adam) families were driven into Poland by the Germans, although it says the Kontnik and Drobnik families were both from Poland originally. There are also related related Klas, Kubik, and Sienko (originally Stenk) families. I don't get all the name changes...

This is all pretty confusing...

Well, I'm glad you found your roots, but it beats me why you get so hot under the collar about Jews being an ethnic group. Of course we have a few branches and there are cosmetic differences between Jews from india, for example, and Jews from Poland, but that's because of some intermarriage shaking up the gene pool. It's nothing to do with prejudice or holocausts. It's no insult to be a Jew. I've been one for years.

No problem. As far as I know, pure Polish. And I don't think it's racist, when someone attributes my fair skin, greyish blonde hair and face features to my Slavic origin ]:-)


mmm...
I have read a lot of bullsh*t about Jews in my life, but I haven't heard anything like that. What the hell is the source of that? Looks like some kind of political correctness...

That "myth" is the basic belief of judaism and factor that held Jews together for centuries, not letting them give up their culture.


First of all "Americans" is not ethnicity but nationality. If there is anything like "American" ethnicity, it's not white, black or middle eastern, but Native American.

Anyway, this will be good for a start: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_ethnic_groups


Does anyone here deny he came from Poland?


If you had any idea about Jewish history, you'd know why Ethiopian Jews are different from Ashkenazis.


Neither do atheists.

Have mercy, yehudi is a Jew, so he knows what he is talking about.


So then that was inside of the 3rd Reich.

I agree that there's nothing wrong with having a big nose, so there's nothing wrong with saying Jews have them. But looking around at my friends and neighbors I must say that I don't see many with big noses. But they are shaped a bit differently than the noses I saw in Poland. Poles seemed to have pointy noses going a bit upward. Ours are either straight or curved downward. The main difference between the visual appearance of Poles and Jews is coloring - hair color, skin color and eyes. These of course are generalizations and the main thing is not to take it too seriously. (Unfortunately, there were periods of recent history when the shape of a nose or the color of ones eyes were the difference between life and death).

paulajuvaw:


I have a great grandmother, Kataryna (whom I was named after) Barowitz. She was a devout Catholic, but definitely has a Jewish last name. Her children and husband were devout Catholics. She lived in a heavily populated Jewish area, Rohatyn, southeast of L'viv. I don't know how it happens either, but we are all Catholics....with a Jewish name thrown into the pot.....

yes, does not look but jewish, dark, turkish jewish look, only to look at picture knowing he is not a typical polish