PolishOrigins(TM) Forum

Re: Urgently needed clue is indecipherable!

jackiewisniewski — Thu Feb 10, 2011 3:39 pm

Author: jackiewisniewski

Posted: Thu Feb 10, 2011 3:39 pm

Ooo! Thanks Ute!!! I will definitely have to contact her. Thank you for the alternate spellings as well

Re: Urgently needed clue is indecipherable!

Ute — Thu Feb 10, 2011 2:46 am

Author: Ute

Posted: Thu Feb 10, 2011 2:46 am

Quote:

The best guesses for Anna's surname are Liszak or Lisrak, but those are not coming up in any kind of searches, and I'm not that familiar with names that are obviously Polish or not/quote]

Jack,
I'm pretty sure it is Anna Liszak at 1432 Kornelia St., Chicago. Perhaps you're lucky and find her at this address in the 1910 Census for Chicago. Try alternative spellings, such as Liszek, Liszczak or Lyczak, names were often misspelled in the Census records. There were also Lyszak families in Ohio.
I found a message at the Poland Genealogy Forum that might interest you:
http://genforum.genealogy.com/cgi-bin/print.cgi?poland::14802.html
Ute

Re: Urgently needed clue is indecipherable!

jackiewisniewski — Wed Feb 09, 2011 10:19 pm

Author: jackiewisniewski

Posted: Wed Feb 09, 2011 10:19 pm

The birth city for Julia is Dolega, which is the same as her sister Martha. Also, I read "stiepsist." as the relation and thought the extra "i" was a typo. And I believe the address is 1432 Cornela Str, but have not done much research on the address, but I will definitely take a look at a city directory now, hopefully footnote or ancestry has one for 1910

Re: Urgently needed clue is indecipherable!

PolishLibrarian — Wed Feb 09, 2011 10:03 pm

Author: PolishLibrarian

Posted: Wed Feb 09, 2011 10:03 pm

Well I would vote for Lisenk or Lizenk, but I'm not sure the first letter is an L. I was trying to compare that capitol letter to those on the city or town list under place of birth, but I don't recognize those names (because I don't know many place names in Poland) to know what the first letter is. What's the birth city for Julia Knapp on Line 1? I was thinking Anna's surname first letter looked similar to one for the name on line 5 which I think starts with T. Also I'm not convinced the relationship is stepsister b/c it looks like stilpsist, but I don't know what else it could be. Do you think the relationship for Line 5 is the stepson? Looks like stilpsohn to me. Certainly all the other relationships noted on this page are very obvious - cousin, fath, aunt, uncle, friend, broth, sist, br-i-l, sist-i-l.

Good luck. I'll be curious to see if anyone here can decipher it. Too bad you can't read the street name (the house number looks like 1432 to me). You might be able to go back to the 1910 Census and see who was living at this address in Chicago (assuming Anna was in Chicago in 1910).

Urgently needed clue is indecipherable!

jackiewisniewski — Wed Feb 09, 2011 9:25 pm

Author: jackiewisniewski

Posted: Wed Feb 09, 2011 9:25 pm

Hi all!
I'm wondering if there's someone out there that's especially skilled at deciphering handwriting. I usually have great luck when comparing lettering in a word to other legible words on a page, but on this one particular passenger list I am at my wits end!

Julia Knapp, the sister of my maternal great-grandmother Martha (Knapp) Jucha came to the US well before her sister. Not only did the family not know Martha had a sister - but lo and behold when I found Julia's passenger list did we all also discover they had a step sister! The problem is, the last name of the step sister is just not making sense. I've attached the image, the person in question is on line 1, Anna L....

Over the last two months I have asked every human I've come in contact with to look at this and see what they make of it lol The best guesses for Anna's surname are Liszak or Lisrak, but those are not coming up in any kind of searches, and I'm not that familiar with names that are obviously Polish or not.

These are the variations that everyone else "sees:"
Lisenk, Liserk, Liseak, Lisczk, Lisenh, Liserh, Lisank, Lizenk, and Lissak.

Two things I am sure of: The last letter is "k." I've seen it written the same all over the passenger list (mainly the first page not included here). Also, directly below the surname Chicago is listed, and the Ch appears to miselad some into thinking it's part of the surname.

Any help would be GREATLY appreciated!