To the family: Since early 1999, Donna Tartasky of St. Louis and Gary Mokotoff of Bergenfield, New Jersey have been contacting Tartaskys and Taratotskys throughout the world to demonstrate that we are all related. The common thread is that we all have ancestors that came from Bialystok and environs and invariably these ancestors were in the building trades; primarily bricklayers. Below are our results to date; there are more than 1,000 people on the tree. The simplest way to find yourself is to Search for your name using the Search facility (Ctl-F). If you have additions, or corrections mail them to Donna Tartasky. If you have comments about this Web page, you can contact Gary Mokotoff. This Family Web Page is just the tip of the iceberg. Once we have the basic information, we will ask you for old family pictures, anecdotes, and additional information about your families to share with all the Tartaskys. There is still much to be done because we have not yet linked the main branches of the family together. Our next major project is to acquire the birth, marriage and death records of the family from Bialystok for the period 1868-1899. Remarkably these records have survived World War II and the Holocaust. We hope to have results by the end of 1999. It is worth noting that we have determined there are no people with our surname born, married or died in Bialystok prior to 1868. This means our origins are in another town and the evidence is leaning toward Sokolka, Poland, a city northeast of Bialystok.. Origin of the Tartasky Name Prior to about 1800, the Jews of Eastern Europe did not have surnames. About that time, the three great powers of Europe, Russia, Prussia and Austro-Hungary, forced their Jewish citizens to take herditary surnames. The origin of the name Tartasky has two possibililities. It could be derived from the Polish word "tartak" which means "sawmill" or it may be derived from the town named Tartak (the -ski ending usually refers to a town name). There is a town of Tartak just 60 miles north of Bialystok. One family of Tartaskys living in Israel claims their ancestors were in the sawmill business. The correct Polish spelling of the name is Tartacki (Tartacka, if a woman). Americanized versions of the name include Taratatski, Taratatzky, Taratazki, Taratoszky, Taratotzki, Taratozki, Taratzki, Taritazki, Tarotazki, Tartacka, Tartacki, Tartacky, Tartatzki, Tartatzky, Tartazki, Tartazky, Tartotsky, Tatarsky. [Source: Ellis Island passenger records] The Family Tree The listing below is called a Descendancy Report, listing all persons in descendant order, indenting each generation. The family is divided into four branches. Branch 1 (1.1.) are the descendants of Menachem Benjamin Tartasky. He had three sons: Yechaskel, Meer and Leizer. Yechazkel Tartasky (1.1.1), is Donna's branch of the family. Yechazkel had seven children: Chaim Bines, Meir, Zelig, Joseph, Menachem, Leah and Fruma. Most persons named Tarr and Tartasky are descended from these people. The Tarres are descended from the second son, Meer and Frieda Tartasky (1.1.2). The least known branch of the family are the descendants of Leizer Tartasky (1.1.3). How Gary Mokotoff's ancestors are related to Branch 1 is not known. He is descended from a Bezalel Taratotsky (1.1.4) of Volkovysk, Belarus, a town about 50 miles east of Bialystok. Gary's grandfather Abraham Judel Taratotsky was apprenticed as a bricklayer in Bialystok when he was eight years old and family legend is that his cousins were in the construction business. The best guess is that Bezalel's father was a brother on Menachem Benjamin Tartasky. Branch 2 (1.2) is an Israeli branch. We hope to prove that their ancestor, Pesha Tartasky, is also a brother of Yechazkel. Branch 3 (1.3) was found by looking in the Israeli phone book. They are people named Tartasky. We do not know their relationship to the rest of the family. Branch 4 (1.6) are a group of people you can help us identify. Genealogical research often consists of going through lists of people creating pieces of a puzzle. The effort then is to connect the pieces. This list consists of unlinked Tartaskys. They were found in a number of sources including: New York (Ellis Island) passenger arrival records U.S. Social Security Death Index (SSDI) a database of some 60 million Americans who have died since 1960 for whom there was a Social Security Death Benefit Claim. The 1910 U.S. census for the Lower East Side of New York City The 1920 U.S. census for New York State and Illinois. 1900-1910 birth records for New York City. The 1912 Voter Registration list for Bialystok. Click here to view the family tree Click here to view documents of our ancestors.