DAVID, I CAN GIVE YOU INFORMATION ABOUT YOUR GREAT-GREAT-GREAT-GRANDFATHER DAVID, WHO WAS BORN ABOUT 1809
David Gurinsky named his son Cohen. I told David about his great-great-great-grandfather David who was married to Lillie Cohen.
Let’s take a step back. Imagine that there is someone out there in the world, married to a distant cousin of yours, whom you have never met. That same person started more than three decades worth of genealogical research before DNA testing became fashionable.
Her knowledge of the family trumps the details of any information people will find from such testing. This person was determined to record every ancestral connection so that her children, whom she longed for in twelve years of a childless marriage, would know their place in the world.
Three miscarriages intermingled with three live births later, she continued what one cousin called “her calling,” and neatly turned her children’s family trees, on all sides, into book format. Unwilling to take the most common route and research the family history of only one family tree branch, she, instead, devoted countless hours interviewing the older generation of relatives one by one.
She spoke with relatives from all sides of the family. Her endless research started in libraries before computers became household items. She often worked hurriedly between nap times and nursings for her babies.
An educated historian, she saved mounds of memorabilia with handwritten letters, as well as signed greeting cards from family members. She also accrued 125 letters she secured from her dying aunt’s keepsakes, dating back over 100 years.
The stack of letters mailed to her grandparents in America came from the old country. The priceless letters were all painstakingly translated into English by a cousin’s husband, who also had a burning interest in genealogy and his spouse’s family.
For years, when speaking about her genealogy research to anyone who would listen, the most popular response was, “You need to write a book.” When computers came into play, all attempts at plotting the family tree were simplified. She jumped on the opportunity to neatly chart the records and distribute an edition of each family tree, in book format, to relatives in each branch of the family.
Intent on keeping updated, precise records, she began writing a comprehensive yearly newsletter about family matters, in which she included lots of family memorabilia and pictures. She has a gargantuan amount of family information stored in file cabinets, as well as in her head. Some of the stories have begun to appear in her weekly Tuesday blog posts.
In case you haven’t figured it out, that’s me. For more on my relentless perseverance in completing the family tree puzzles and sharing my findings with all our relatives, visit my blog post, “Why Do You Do It?” I’m proud of my work and excited about bringing more family members together as the keeper of my children’s ancestry.
The story of Cohen’s name is just one of the many intangible rewards I continue to reap through my devotion to this endless endeavor. With permission, I included the story of his given name in the newsletters and copied an abbreviated version here:
David Gurinsky and his wife welcomed Cohen Harris Dakota Gurinsky, born 8-28-2019. Their story is so beautiful, David agreed that I could share his words. “My wife Patricia and I adopted our son Cohen last year. We adopted him at 2 days old. He was born on August 28th, 2019. We finalized the adoption on November 1st, 2019.
“His full name is Cohen Harris Dakota Gurinsky. His middle name Harris is in honor of my dad and grandfather Harris Richard Gurinsky and David Harris Gurinsky [see book cover below]. Dakota is from his birth family that we have met. They wanted to name him Dakota, so we thought we would honor them and have that as one of his middle names. We chose his first name from our family tree and decided to take the last name ‘Cohen’ and make it a first name. I thought you might think that was neat.”
We think that is very neat. These Cohen cousins are looking forward to the day we get to meet our baby cousin Cohen. With any luck, by that time, the family tree will be completely updated.
Adorable, happy Cohen, almost one - Summer 2020
A book co-edited by David Harris Gurinsky, my mother-in-law’s first cousin (their mothers were sisters)