Re: UPDATE - HELP - ZUK, ZUKOW, ZUKOWSKY
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In reply to:
Re: UPDATE - HELP - ZUK, ZUKOW, ZUKOWSKY
Cheryl Wankmueller 4/22/14
Hi Cheryl,
Thank you for the very nice summary of what you have so far.I have read all of your posts (on various Genforum forums) but it is good to have all the facts in one place.
Regarding the SSN application, go for it! I have my grandfather's, although it did not give his place of birth, only the country.Maybe yours will have the town of origin, I do not know.
Regarding East Ridgelawn Cemetery, to the best of my knowledge, the sections of that cemetery correspond to specific churches and organizations.For example, there are areas on their map called "O St. P&P" "St. P&P" and simply "P&P" which all refer to St. Peter and Paul's PNC Church in Passaic.My understanding is that the church bought up a group of cemetery plots and then sold them, as needed, to parishioners.When they ran out, they bought a second area and then a third. This gives me some hope that the Virgin Mary section in which your Anthony is buried will also lead you to a specific church.Perhaps you have already talked to the people in the cemetery office.I took a quick look online to see if there are churches in the surrounding towns that have "Virgin Mary" in their names.I found one Russian Orthodox church but it appears to have been founded in 1972.
Given the info you have from marriage and census records, I am going to go with the assumption that Anthony was Polish, and born in what was then the Russian Partition.The correct Polish spelling of his name would be Antoni Zukowski (with a dot over the Z). At the time he was born, however, all official documents (including church records) had to be in Russian.So, if you are able to trace back to a town of origin, the records will be in Russian which uses the Cyrillic alphabet.When he emigrated, he would have had a document showing his identity, and it would have been in Cyrillic.So, all the spellings Zukowski Zukowsky Zukovsky etc. are all "correct" in the sense that they are just transliterations from Cyrillic.Since your family went with the spelling Zukowsky, I consider that your correct spelling.The dot over the Z, by the way, changes the pronunciation of the letter. According to a pronunciation guide that I have, the plain Z sounds like the Z in zone while the Z with a dot over it gives "a sound somewhat approaching that of the English S in pleasure or measure".So if you see spellings like Zhukovsky, that is again a way of trying capture the sound of the name.As for how he came to be Zukowsky rather than Zuk or Zukow, I am curious to know.I'm sure you are, too!
You have excellent documentation that he arrived through Canada.A big score for you would be to find his arrival into Canada, any time before June 1914.The Canadian arrival manifest will give his town of origin, and it will also give his religion.I think you need to look under Zuk and Zukow as well as Zukowsky.
You had also written that you think he may have been from Grodno.That would fit with the idea of being in the Russian Partition.I am doubtful that the records would be in Belarus, though. Why don't you post a very simple question on the Poland forum asking where records from Grodno would be held today.
Best of luck,
Sophia