{"id":1261,"date":"2017-03-28T16:33:27","date_gmt":"2017-03-28T16:33:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cjhblog.cjh.org\/index.php\/2017\/03\/28\/breaking-through-our-female-ancestors-brick\/"},"modified":"2017-03-28T16:33:27","modified_gmt":"2017-03-28T16:33:27","slug":"breaking-through-our-female-ancestors-brick","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.cjh.org\/index.php\/2017\/03\/28\/breaking-through-our-female-ancestors-brick\/","title":{"rendered":"Breaking through our Female Ancestor’s Brick Walls: Genealogical Sources for Maiden Names\n\nby Moriah Amit"},"content":{"rendered":"

In honor of Women\u2019s History Month, I
\nwould like to offer some guidance to those who are seeking to discover and
\nshare the stories of their elusive female ancestors. One of the most common
\n\u201cbrick walls\u201d that genealogy researchers face when tracing the family history
\nof a female ancestor is that their family doesn\u2019t know her maiden name. For
\ncenturies in much of the Western world, the practice of women replacing their
\nsurname with their husband\u2019s surname upon marriage has effectively severed
\nthese individuals from their genealogical lineages.\u00a0 Learning a woman\u2019s maiden name is a crucial
\nfirst step for the modern researcher trying to find documents that shed light
\non a woman\u2019s early life (prior to her marriage) or that trace her ancestry back
\nto previous generations.<\/p>\n

\"image\"<\/figure>\n

Marriage contract of Yitzhak son of
\nMoshe(?) Benjamin and Palomba daughter of Shulami Halevy; artist: David Isaac
\nAmarillo; Salonika, 1897; Lithograph on paper with handwritten text.<\/i><\/p>\n

Collection of Yeshiva University
\nMuseum, New York<\/i><\/p>\n

Gift of Grace Grant<\/i><\/p>\n

Ironically,
\nthe very documents which mark the occasion on which women are typically stripped
\nof their maiden names are the ones that hold the greatest potential as the
\nsource of those names. Of course, I am referring to a woman\u2019s marriage records.
\nDepending on the place, time, and religious affiliation of the wedding, any
\nnumber of records may have been issued to show the couple\u2019s intent to marry,
\nsuch as marriage banns, intentions, bonds, newspaper announcements, licenses,
\nand applications, and to document the actual wedding, such as marriage
\ncontracts (the ketubah<\/i> in the Jewish
\ntradition, pictured above), registers, and certificates. With the exception of
\nthose that are passed down as family heirlooms, historical religious marriage
\nrecords have scarcely survived. On the other hand, civil marriage records, even
\ncenturies old, are much more likely to have been maintained by a local clerk,
\nregistrar, or archives to the present day. For more information on how to
\nlocate U.S. marriage records, please consult the Ackman & Ziff Family
\nGenealogy Institute\u2019s vital records research guide here.<\/a> For
\ninternational marriage records, please select our research guide<\/a> pertaining to
\nyour ancestor\u2019s country of marriage <\/p>\n

When
\na marriage record cannot be located or does not contain a maiden name, there
\nare a number of alternative sources to pursue, beginning with other types of
\nvital records. The birth records of a woman\u2019s children are the second best
\nsource for her maiden name, because most birth records solicit that information
\nand the informant (i.e. the person who supplied the information) is typically
\nthe woman herself. Records pertaining to a woman\u2019s death, such as death
\ncertificates and registers, cemetery ledgers, gravestones, obituaries, and
\nprobate records, should be used with caution. If the informant is identified on
\nthe document, think about whether that person is likely to have accurately
\nrecalled the deceased\u2019s maiden name. If the informant is not identified, think
\nabout whether the deceased\u2019s closest surviving relatives are likely to have
\nrecalled her maiden name. When in doubt, try to corroborate the name supplied
\nwith additional sources. Further guidance: U.S. birth records<\/a>,\u00a0 U.S. death records<\/a>, international records by country<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

There are several less commonly used U.S.
\nsources of maiden names that may help you when the aforementioned sources fail.
\nFirst, if your female ancestor was already married when she emigrated to the
\nU.S., check her and her husband\u2019s immigration records (also known as passenger
\narrival lists or manifests). They may have identified the woman\u2019s father or one
\nof her brothers (all of whom shared her maiden name) as their closest living
\nrelative in their native country or as the relative who they were joining in
\nthe U.S.\u00a0 Second, review your female
\nancestor\u2019s U.S. federal and state census records. Multi-generational extended
\nfamily households were much more common in the 19th<\/sup> and early 20th<\/sup>
\ncenturies than they are today. Well into your ancestor\u2019s married life, you may
\nfind one of her unmarried siblings or one of her widowed parents living in her
\nhousehold. Lastly, a couple of unexpected, but reliable sources for a woman\u2019s
\nmaiden name include her social security application and her husband\u2019s veteran
\npension file (if he served in the U.S. military and predeceased her). Further
\nguidance: immigration records ,<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0census records <\/a>,\u00a0social security applications <\/a>, veterans\u2019 pension files <\/a>. <\/p>\n

It is important to note
\nthat there are exceptions to this name change pattern. For example, in Spanish-speaking
\ncountries, Portuguese-speaking countries, Italy, France, the Netherlands, and
\nBelgium, among others, women have traditionally retained their maiden names
\nthroughout their lives, at least in official documents, and, in many cases,
\nalso colloquially. In the historical regions of Galicia (straddling modern
\nPoland and the Ukraine), and Bohemia and Moravia (modern Czech Republic), only
\nthe eldest son of a Jewish family was permitted to have a civil marriage and to
\npass on his surname to his children; these laws effectively forced many younger
\nsons to have only a religious marriage and to register their children under
\ntheir wife\u2019s maiden name. <\/p>\n

Women\u2019s lives are often
\nerased from the historical record. Women\u2019s History Month is, in part, a
\ncorrective measure to this regrettable trend. Through all of the variations
\ndiscussed above, the librarians at the Genealogy Center are dedicated to
\nhelping you discover more about your female ancestors and their families.
\nPlease visit us in person or online<\/a> to learn more. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In honor of Women\u2019s History Month, I would like to offer some guidance to those who are seeking to discover and share the stories of their elusive female ancestors. One of the most common \u201cbrick walls\u201d that genealogy researchers face when tracing the family history of a female ancestor is that their family doesn\u2019t know her maiden name. For centuries in much of the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[148,107,146,147,145,144],"class_list":["post-1261","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog-post","tag-discovery","tag-genealogy","tag-jewish-genealogy","tag-surnames","tag-womens-history","tag-womens-history-month"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.cjh.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1261","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.cjh.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.cjh.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.cjh.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.cjh.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1261"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.cjh.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1261\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.cjh.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1261"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.cjh.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1261"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.cjh.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1261"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}