In trying to research and gather information about my grandparents on the Iwaniw side I came to a dead end. As I’ve posted before I have a copy of my grandfather’s church death record and I have copy of his church marriage record. Unfortunately, these result in more questions than in final answers. Both records show my grandfather, Michael, as the son of Basil Iwaniw. However, the dates don’t match. They are about 3 years difference. The marriage record state that Michael got married in 1902 at the age of 25. This would calculate his birth year as 1877. His death record states that he passed away in 1919 at the age of 36. This calculates his birth year as 1883. I haven’t been able to locate his birth record yet, but I’m working on it. It’s difficult because the records are actually limited or even non-existent for the period. I know that the name Iwaniw/Iwanow was a common surname for farmers in that region, but what are the odds of 2 different Michael Iwaniws with the father named Basil Iwaniw born 6 years apart?
It doesn’t help that a large portion of the church records have been either destroyed in the war or just simply lost.
So, I’m going to have to go back to the images of those records to determine if there are any other clues of information that I missed. One of the things you have to keep in mind is that there records were recorded by the parish priests and they not everyone would enter information that same way.
Archive for the ‘Update’ Category
I know that it’s been quite a while since I updated the status of my family research. I’ve been spending a lot of time on MyHeritage.com working on the current family information and trying to clean up/verify the data the best that I can. I’ve also spending time on my family data files that I maintain on my laptop with Legacy Family Tree software.
So I’ve had to re-evaluate my efforts and decide where and how I want to spend my time and effort in conduction my family research. I’m at the point right now where my effort need to be focused on the actual records that are found in Eastern Europe. There is very little that can be found on line. Additionally, in discussing my family research with numerous researchers from Eastern Europe I have found that:
- The Iwaniw surname was a fairly common name in Galicia region of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Therefore, just having the Iwaniw surname does NOT necessarily mean we are related. To determine that I would need documented lineage information.
- The other point is that official records from that region and time are extremely limited due to being destroyed during WWII or lost. I was lucky enough to find that my grandfathers death record survived as did his marriage record to my grandmother. I still have a lot to review to determine the best path to follow further.
I have decide to consolidate and focus my efforts to a couple of specific web sites. Currently, my family research/data is located/stored at:
- Tribal Pages – I will no longer be updating the information on this site. The data will remain but if you come across it exercise caution in utilizing the information found there. It probably isn’t up-to-date or current.
- Ancestry.com – even though I have found additional and new information on relatives and connections on here, I will no longer to updating the information found here. The information found here is more up-to-date than on Tribal Pages, it’s not going to be as accurate as the data on MyHeritage.com.
- Facebook Groups – I will probably be shutting down The Iwaniw Connection group and Iwaniw & Tyzbir Genealogy group. Neither group is generating any activity and no one is actually participating in any discussions or exchanging any information.
- Any Rootsweb web pages that I use to manage.
- I am divided on what I will do with The Iwaniw Project. This is an offline project where I am collecting publicly available information about people with the surname of Iwaniw.
If anyone wishing to contact me about my family research or wish to collaborate pertaining to family research can contact me through the form on this site.
In my last post I stated that I was going to search out information about my grandmother and great grandmother because I was running out of options/data regarding my grandfather but, at that time, I didn’t know where or how to start because I didn’t have much information about either of them.
However, thanks to the Polish Ancestry Researcher, Lucjan Cichocki, and the municipal clerk in Lutowiska, Poland I may have received the church record of my grandparents marriage.
There are a few inconsistencies that I need to resolve and explain. But if this is the true record of my grandparents marriage then it helps in explaining other data I received. One of those was about my grandmother’s maiden name. Some time ago when I was first starting my family research and while my father was still alive, I starting asking him the basic questions; i.e. what was your mother’s maiden name, what was your father’s name, etc. It was this time that my father told me that he never knew his father because he passed away when he was a baby. I acquired a copy of my grandfather’s death record confirming that he died when my father was just a baby, less than a year old. The death record listed my great grandparents as Basilius and Anna Iwaniw. Well, that didn’t help me with my great grandmother’s maiden name. I already knew that my great grandfather was named Wasyl (Basilius) and my great grandmother’s name was Anna from my father, but I didn’t know my great grandmother’s maiden name. According to the marriage record my great grandmother’s maiden name was Stefanow
Now, where did the Shubish come from? If you look at the record at the information regarding Matrona’s mother you’ll notice one of the surnames referenced is Skubycz. Could this be where my father got the surname from? Lucjan was kind enough to send me his translation of the information on the marriage record.
Here’s the translation:no. 15date 7/22/1902 (this is a Greek Catholic church record, there was no civil registration in the Austrian-controlled part of Poland back then)house no. 26the groom: Michael Iwanow, single, a son of Basilius Iwanow and Anna nee Stefanow, farmers in Lutowiska, a Greek Catholic aged 25the bride: Matrona Iwanow, single Greek Catholic woman aged 19, a daughter of Maria Smolij [who was] a daughter of Gregorius [and this Maria Smolij was] 1st married [to a man named] Skubycz [and then] 2nd married [to a man named] Iwanow, [Matrona and/or her mother was] from Michniowiec [I am not 100% positive about the place name]witnesses: Michael Iwanow, Joannes Iwanow, farmers of Lutowiska
- First married to Gregory Smolij
- Then married a man named Skubycz
- Finally married to a man named Iwanow.
But what was Maria Iwanow’s maiden name? The record doesn’t say. I could leave things as is because Matrona’s family line is not a surname that I am trying to research. Its purpose is to help me connect to others that are researching their family history that may be connected to mine. I’ve written to Lucjan for further clarification and explanation of the information in the record.
From November 13, 2019
In my last post I detailed some of the different documents that I received pertaining to my father’s time in Germany. So, my best guesstimate is that while he was in Sulmingen he was a farm laborer and while he was in Ulm he was a shoemaker/cobbler. While in Sulmingen his occupation as a farm laborer listed his employer as Theresia Ackermann. But I haven’t been able to find anything more about Theresia Ackermann. In Ulm, was my father an owner of a shoemaking shop or an employee of one? I have no details on either.
As I progress with my research my questions result in more questions and not answers. According to a record that I received from Arolsen Archives my father was taken from his home in Lutowiska to Germany in 1942. I can only presume that he was taken to a labor camp in Sulmingen Germany. But which labor camp? I cannot find any information on a labor camp in the region of Sulmingen.
I wrote to someone in the municipal office of the City of Sulmingen requesting any information about the marriage of my parent in 1945. I did receive a reply that they had found no information but had forward my request to the registry office in that city. I then received a response from the registry office stating that they had no record of the marriage there. However, they felt that the request was sent to the incorrect location. They believed that the request should have been sent to the Town of Sulmingen, which is now part of the Municipality of Maselheim. That person has forwarded my inquiry forward to there.
So, that’s where my research stands right now. I’m just waiting for information, I’m waiting to hear from whoever was forwarded my inquiry in Maselheim, I’m waiting to hear back from the Red Cross Tracing Service about their inquiry in the 1960’s regarding my father, and I’m waiting to find out additional information on church records from my father’s village of Lutowiska.
My next post I will update the status of the inquiry to the Red Cross Tracing Service.
While conducting my family research I have been provided much information pertaining to both of my lineage surnames, Iwaniw and Tyzbir. I have been able to identify at least 2 other families in America with the last name of Tyzbir and I have been told of another one.
The 2 families I came upon were Tyzbirs of Vermont and the other were the Tyzbirs of Nevada. The other that I have been told about was Tyzbirs of Connecticut/Rhode Island. Neither of which are connected to my family line that I can find. In discussing this with my cousins in Ukraine, they inform me that there were three other Tyzbir families in the city they lived in and they were not related.
As for the Iwaniw lineage, that’s another story. If you’re on Facebook you just need to search on the surname of Iwaniw and you’ll be surprised on the number of Iwaniws that are found just on Facebook. Are we all related? Not that I can document. Although there are a few duplicate on the list and a few that I am fairly sure are related via other documented means, I don’t know where in the collective tree is the common ancestor is located. But then how can there be so many just on Facebook? A few years back when I was starting my family research I received an email from a researcher/historian named Maciej Augustyn (vbroda@poczta.onet.pl). I have misplaced the actual email but I had the foresight to print out a hardcopy of that email.
In that email, they were responding to a collaboration request I had posted regarding the Iwaniw Family in Lutowiska. I am going to transcribe what was in the email exactly as they wrote it:
“Mister Iwaniw!
My name is Maciej Augustyn. I’m historian!
Iwaniw was typical farmer family in Lutowiska.
In my archiv is list of voter from 1870. In Austriatime in Galicia voter was only head of family.
In this list write
Stefan Iwanow number of home 28
Fedio Iwanow number of home 17 (name Fedio = Fedor = Teodor)
Mikolaj Iwanow nr of home 111
Stefan Iwanow nr of home 16
In this time write another version You name Iwanov = Iwaniw.
Maciej Augustyn
Ustrzyki Dolne”
What I make of this is that the Iwaniw (Iwanow) surname was a fairly common name in the area. Similar to Smoth, Jones, or Brown in America.
So, without proper, legible documentation it is difficult to determine the relationship between different Iwaniw families that lived in Lutowiska, Lisko district in Poland. I had previously posted an update about my grandfather, Michael Iwaniw. But there was another Michael Iwaniw from Lutowiska. It was estimated that they were both born around 1880’s. The difference was that my Michael Iwaniw was married to Matrona Smolii and the other Michael Iwaniw was married to Kasia Iwaniw. My Michael Iwaniw had a son in 1918 but passed away in 1919 in Lutowiska. The other Michael Iwaniw had a son that was born in 1924 who then subsequently emigrated to Australia. Both of our families were resettled in 1951 from Lutowiska to Dudchaney Ukraine. That is where the other Michael Iwaniw died and was buried.
In conclusion, there are a few Iwaniw families in the world but I have no idea if we are related or not. I would love nothing more than to be able to document the relationships. These families are:
- >Iwaniws that emigrated to Australia – 2 different Michael Iwaniws born around the 1880’s and from the same village.
- >Iwaniws that emigrated to the State of Michigan, USA.
- >Iwaniws that emigrated to Wilkes-Barre, PA, USA – there is a strong indication that there is a family connection but nothing that can be documented with any certainty.
- >Iwaniws that emigrated to Argentina.
- >Iwaniws that emigrated to Great Britain. I use to communicate with the one family member that was their family historian/researcher but he passed away many years ago. We were never able to make a genealogical connection.
So, if you believe that we’re related we should communicate and compare notes. To contact me click on the Contact link above.