Lecture To Look At Tracing

European Immigrant Ancestry

BRIDGEPORT — The New England Chapter of the Carpatho-Rusyn Society will present an audio/video lecture by professional genealogist Thomas A. Peters. The event will take place at 1:30 pm Saturday, October 6, at St John’s Church Auditorium, 346 Mill Hill Avenue.

The presentation is entitled “From No Man’s Land to the Promised Land — Our Journey to the Carpathian Homeland.” Mr Peters is a professional genealogist from Manville, N.J., with 25 years experience in tracing European immigrant ancestry. He focuses primarily on the Carpathian Mountain regions of Eastern Slovakia, the Ukraine, and the Lemko region of southern Poland.

A representative of the Church of the Latter Day Saints will also be on hand to demonstrate its ability to provide assistance in obtaining various eastern European church records of the 17th, 18th and 19th Centuries.

The Carpatho-Rusyn Society is a not-for-profit organization headquartered in Pittsburgh, Penn., devoted to the study and dissemination of information about Rusyn ethnicity, history, and culture and has chapters in other areas of the United States. The New England chapter is one of the largest and most active chapters.

The homelands of the Rusyn people are now found in eastern Slovakia, northern Hungary, Romania, southern Poland, and western Ukraine. They are often referred to as Rusins, Rusnaks, Carpatho-Russians, Ruthenians, or Little Russians. The Rusyns never had their own country. The society also maintains close ties with Rusyns in Europe and provides encouragement, humanitarian aid and relief to Rusyns living in the homelands.

Admission to Mr Peters’ lecture will be free, but donations are welcome. Food and refreshments will also be available. For further information e-mail nepresident@c-rs.com.