Rokiskis

The Rokiskis SIG (Special Interest Group), a group of Rokiskis descendants, has joined together to share our common interest in our ancestors' lives, stories, and our collective history. We are pooling our resources in order to collect as many documents and vital records as we can and we now own the 1897 All-Russian Census for Rokiskis, a number of candle tax records and box tax records, the 1891-1915 Postal Bank Records, the wonderful 1908 Family List, as well as an index to vital records (birth, death, and marriage)  from the Kaunas Archives. If you are interested in joining us, please contact the SIG chair, Linda Cantor

Tizenhof Museum Administration Building

(photo courtesy of Philip Shapiro)

(photo courtesy of  Yehudi Gaffen)

(photo courtesy of Howard Cuckle)

Rokiskis References and Research Sources

• View location via MapQuest  (Then click your browser's "Back" button to return here.)

• The Annihilation of Lithuanian Jewry by Rabbi Ephraim Oshry

• Business Owners List, 1939 

• Center for Studies of the Culture and History of East European Jews - For some interesting photos of Rokiskis follow the links to "Jewish Heritage in Regional Museums of Lithuania," then select Rokiskis from the pull-down menu under 'museum.'

• Chamber of the Holocaust - Mt Zion  

• Digital Map of Rokiskis at maps.lt - showing all the streets and building locations of modern Rokiskis.  Select "cities and villages," then type in Rokiskis and, finally, select 'map' for a street map or 'ortophoto' for a satellite view. 

• Encyclopedia Judaica

• Encyclopedia of Jewish Life Before and During the Holocaust

• The Holocaust in Rokiskis   

• Immigrants from Rokiskis, Boston HIAS Records 

• Links to on-line sites about modern Rokiskis 

• Lite - Description of Rokiskis from Lite by Dr. Mendel Sudarsky, Uriah Katzenelenbogen, J. Kissin, and Berl Kagan

• Lithuanian Jewish Communities by Nancy Schoenburg and Stuart Schoenburg (Aronson Press)

• Photos of Modern Rokiskis   

• 1930 Telephone Directory

• Rakishker Society - Johannesburg  

• Rokiskis Documents at YIVO - These documents have been translated for us by Mathilda Ginsburg Mendelow and Steven Weiss.

• Rokiskis Property Owners and Renters, 1921 - This is a list of property owners and renters listed on a 1921 street map.  

• Rakishok, the Biggest Shtetl - Read a first person account of life in Rokiskis, first printed in the South African journal, Jewish Affairs 

• Rokiskis Cemetery - See photos of the Rokiskis Cemetery  

• There Once Was a Home - Rakishok from  the Der Yiddisher

• Where Once We Walked by Gary Mokotoff and Sallyann Sack

• Yisker-bukh fun Rakishok un Umgegn     

People of Rokiskis

Click on photo to see a larger version

Meeting at the home of Yudel Meller, May 1940
(Photo courtesy of Jacob Rosen)

• Bunim-Idel Kril - Yiddish writer, poet and political activist  

• Famous Sons of Rokiskis

• Memoirs of Reuben Ruch

• Pandelys in the Holocaust - Read an interesting first-person description of events in Pandelys from In Sacred Memory: Recollections of the Holocaust by Survivors Living in Cape Town, edited by Gwynne Schrire, Cape Town Holocaust Memorial Council, 1995 . 

• Photograph Album - visit with our Rokiskis families  

•  Story of Simcha Segal   

"Relatively Rokiskis"   

We would like to know more about life in Rokiskis. Please share your family's stories and anecdotes with us. 
Send them to Rhonda Grosman.  

          Please click on the links below.

» Success Stories 

» Cohen Family by Neville Cohen 

» Finding Sorre Gitel by Jules Feldman   

» Frozen in Time by Arlene Weiss

» Rokishok and the Hollyhock by Rebecca Chodos (nee Cohen)

» Shapiro Visit to Rokiskis 

» The Kohnowitz Family of Rokiskis by Harvey Cohen

» The Story of Tevya Ruven Kress by Rhonda Kress Grosman

» Tracing my roots in Rakishok, Lithuania by Sorrel Kerbel   

» Visit to Rokiskis - Hadassah Magazine - by Ellen Cassedy 

Reuben Ruch, a Rokiskis native, describes the businesses that he remembers along Republic Street:

1st house: Leiba Vinokuras   - Photographer

1st house back side : Z  Klumelis  - Attorney; Haimas Reznikovicius  - Government Insurance Broker

2nd house : Tzadokas Boodnevas  -  Furniture and Leather Trade Store

3th house:  K Frenkelis -  Leather Store

4th house : Zalman Gafanavicius - Radio, Bicycles, Electrical Supply Shop

5th house: (white front): - Jewish National Bank

6th house:  Yankel Givovskis  - Iron Items Shop

7th house  Yankelis Krokas  - Leather Trade Shop

8th house  Yankel Kur - Taxi  Service, Workshop

9th house: Yankel Jacobson -  Kosher Meat Shop.

                 second floor  - Jewish Youth Club

(Photo courtesy of Amanda Jermyn)

Photos of Rokiskis

     Rokiskis Town Hall, c. 1940

(These photos are courtesy of the Rokiskis Land Museum. They were selected, scanned and sent to us by Chris Cummings, an American Peace Corps volunteer who worked in Rokiskis. Thanks also to Nijole Sniokiene, the director of the museum, for supplying and identifying the photos.)

Revised July 2, 2009