The Wedding Photo: Genealogy Comes Alive!

Contrary to dusty first impressions, genealogy can be an adventure. In Dan Oren’s book, The Wedding Photo, a visit to an abandoned Polish Jewish cemetery in 1993 launches a 20-year search to solve the mystery of “Who is Buried in Sarah’s Tomb?” A visit with a cousin unearths a breathtaking photo of a Berlin family wedding from 1926 and leads to discovering their unimaginable post-wedding history. An archivist in Prague discovers a secret uncle whose life takes the reader from the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York to the Vatican in Rome. A memoir by Philip Roth shocks a daughter into unlocking a father’s concealed past. In this talk, Dr. Oren will share his genealogical research strategies.

Born and raised in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Dan A. Oren, M.D. has worked for thirty years as a psychiatrist and faculty member at Yale Universtiy, the US National Institute of Mental Health, and the Univesity of Rzeszow, Poland. The author of Joining the Club: A History of Jews and Yale, he is the founder and president of the Friends of Jewish Heritage in Poland.

Ticket Info: $5 general at weddingphoto.bpt.me or 800-838-3006; free for CJH/JGS members (tickets not required)