Update: The Family Tree Project



The new Family Tree - a work in progress



A Message from Jane Avner  

Dear Extended Family,



     Happy Spring Holidays to all, whatever you celebrate. I’m happy to give you an update about the Piza Family Tree project.

     As most know, the family has several lovely family trees, all created in the last century. This year, the decision was made to update one of them to include our youngest generations. Seventeen families responded to the first call to participate and our graphic artist is adding their names, their children and their grandchildren. Based on the family information we have today, three branches of Piza children will see additions: Benvanida, Esther, and Rachel.

     To enable more families to participate, our extended deadline for additions is now May 15th. Anyone interested in adding names and/or purchasing a printed or digital copy of the updated family tree, must let us know asap! Your email should be sent to our family genealogist, Sita (sita@likuski.org). If you're not sure what's already on the tree, you can contact Sita about that, too.
     The more people who purchase a copy, the cheaper each copy will be. I know people are anxious for a price, but until the graphic artist finishes the work I won’t have one. I can already be sure, however, that it will be very reasonable.

Love,
Jane (Joyce Brandon Adashko’s daughter, Isaac Brandon’s granddaughter)

   

 In tribute to Sita who does so much to keep the family records, a close-up of her family's branch…

Spotlight on Aruba

Most of us, when thinking of Aruba, imagine a tropical island paradise; even the name sounds delicious.  Indeed, the “Official Tourism Website of Aruba” displays a rather scantily clad gent on a lovely beach, while several hefty (but scantily clad) women advertise a carnival. There’s also a woman snorkeling who appears to have lost part of her bathing suit…. (If you really want to see those photos firsthand, click here).  Wikipedia (I know, they do make mistakes) describes Aruba as an arid, cactus-strewn landscape rather than a tropical paradise.  The only naked creatures they have photographs of are iguanas. So, ultimately, my impression of Aruba is of a mysterious desert surrounded by wonderful beaches. (Been there, seen that?  Give us your 2 cents in a comment!)

But what if you seek our family lore, rather than a suntan?  Roy Maduro, an Aruba native and proud family member, was happy to educate me on our family origins in Aruba; we’ve been on the island since 1754. At that time, Moses Maduro and his brother were the first white inhabitants of Aruba.  According to Roy, they had large families, most of which converted to Christianity; very few bothered to document their history so we don’t have many details. Roy’s father moved to Aruba from Curacao in 1937 to work.  Roy’s mother came from another Caribbean island called Saba.  In 1944 they married and started Roy’s Maduro line.

According to my research, Aruban citizens hold Dutch passports, which perhaps hints at the link between the Dutch Maduro lineage and the Aruban Maduro families. Certainly the Dutch Maduro line, descents of Jewish refugees from the Inquisition in Spain and Portugal, settled widely throughout the Caribbean.  

Rather than crediting the old-time Maduro families or today’s semi-naked Arubans with bringing culture to the island, Roy points a grateful finger at the Standard Oil Company, who set up a refinery on Aruba in 1924, setting the tone for a booming economy and cultural development. Having grown up in California, it’s hard for me to equate an oil company with culture but I think we’ll take Roy’s word about this. 

Have you been to Aruba?  Send me the photos you think best represent the island (WITH clothes, please!) and I’ll add them to this post.  Email for photos – cec235@hotmail.com

And thank you, Roy, for sharing your history and Aruba’s past with us!

Photgraph of Aruba, taken this year by Grace Maduro, and provided in response to my request.... Thank you Grace!

Maduro-Delvalle Genealogy

Examining Sita Likuski's charts
at the 2002 family reunion.

The stories of our family stretch around the world, sometimes tracing more than 15 generations.   Genealogy can be loosely defined as the pursuit of family kinship and history (thank you, Wikipedia).  I remember when Alex Haley’s book, “Roots,” burst onto the scene in 1976, making researching family histories very popular. But in our families - the Maduros, the Delvalles, the Fidanques, and such (there are too many family names to list here) - family lore has always been a popular subject, and we have several homegrown genealogists to prove it!  I’ll only mention the four cousins whom I know personally – but I know there are more of you out there.  If you’re into family genealogy, too, do leave a comment at the end of this article with a link to your website, and I’ll add it to our list!

Rene Van Wijngaarden, from the Delvalle roster, is an avid family genealogist from Holland, and has even written a book of our family history.  Lynn Lewis, originally from England and now living on Kibbutz Zora in Israel, follows our extended family with a website and huge database. He started studying family genealogy in 1986 and his records run back to the 15^th century.   Sita Likuski’s family moved from Panama to the United States when she was a toddler.  Her family charts include about 11,000 individuals.  If you think that number is impressive, let me introduce you to David Blank, born in Zurich, raised in Canada, and settled for many years in Jerusalem:  as of December 21^st, his database included 17,600 family members, and his genealogy website gets more than 1,000 unique visitors every day.   

While I love our family, I’ve never been tempted to pour over history books and old municipal records to increase my (feeble) knowledge.  I decided to ask Sita and David what, exactly, draws them into spending a good portion of their time studying our roots.

Sita generously explained that the challenge of playing detective and solving puzzles drew her to genealogy.  She grew up surrounded by her mother’s large extended family, and was intrigued by the mysteries of how they were all related.  She doesn’t play favorites; “whoever I’m researching at a given moment” is her man or woman of the day.  She strives for what she describes as an “aha! moment,” when she discovers something new or uncovers a family secret.  Perhaps it runs in her genes – in the photo to the right, Sita’s mother, Emita Fidanque Levy is presenting family history at the 1999 Maduro-Delvalle Family Reunion in Curacao.

David was more pragmatic, and presented me with numbers.  His 16^th generation grandfather, Eliezer Jaffe, was born in 1360, and his most distant relative is an 11^th cousin, three times removed.  His website notes family members, holocaust victims (600), tombstone notations (450), and has almost 3,000 photographs.  Individuals can’t be seen in his records until they’re dead, so no one should fear that their personal details can be lifted from his database.  He and his charming wife invited us to dinner, and since we couldn’t find the exact family connection, we decided to call ourselves simply “cousins.” Discover your cousins by reaching out to family members and visiting the suggested links below!

Some suggested links:

www.blankgenealogy.com

www.tzorafolk.com/genealogy

www.decastro.gen.nz/decgca.htm
www.madurofamilybranches.com

www.jewishgen.org

http://www.sephardicgen.com

www.ancestry.com

www.familysearch.org

Tracing the Tribe: The Jewish Genealogy Blog