About this talk

Trees will not grow without roots. Not a single person on earth could exist today without their ancestors - their personal roots. Usually, people have knowledge of only 2-3 generations and these stories are told to their children.

It is wonderful to have absolute documentary confirmation of your family's origins. This would be your family heritage and will give future generations this knowledge forever. Ancestors will be honored and revered.

It is so exciting to know how your great-great-grandfather was named, but are you ready to find out that in fact he was married twice, and he was also prosecuted? Or to find out that the real names of your great-grandmothers and great-grandfathers were nothing like the ones you knew? What a shock!

Our service helps clients not only to find the names of their ancestors but also how they lived in the old days. During the presentation of this project, Carl and Vasily will show how this all comes TOGETHER.

About Carl and Vasily

Carl Kaplan, who lives in Winchester, MA, is an amateur genealogist, and member of the Jewish Genealogical Society of Greater Boston. Carl has been researching his family history for the last 6 years, starting with a hand-typed family tree from his uncle to a tree of over 2500 relatives, finding dozens of "new" cousins all over the world, along with tracing his family back almost 3 centuries. During his research, Carl has employed various research tools. Most of all, Carl has learned some amazing stories from his family. Carl is a volunteer caseworker for The Together Plan, a non-profit organization conducting searches in Belarus's archives.

Vasily Zaitsau, who has spent a number of years working at an international banking group, managing financial projects, once understood that money and businesses that are so valued in our modern life, really don't matter. At the same time, he took part in a couple of local Red Cross fundraising projects for children's hospices. As a result, he concluded that the only real value in this world is people - around you and all over the globe. As a project manager, Vasily implements his skills in the Archive Service of The Together Plan, helping people to find their roots and identify ancestors.