Telsiai District Research Group

The Telsiai District Research Group (DRG) of LitvakSIG is chartered with obtaining records from all shtetls (towns) in the Telsiai Uyezd (district) of Kaunas Gubernia (region) of Lithuania. This includes the town of Telsiai itself as well as records that pertain to the entire Uyezd. Effective January 1, 2012, the Telsiai District Group will translate all available vital records as well as available revision/tax/family  and other district type lists.

We access the records, translate and create a database, and distribute the data to our contributors. We distribute the data to our contributors in Excel format via our contributors-only website http://donors.litvaksig.org/site/telsiai. As part of LitvakSIG’s overall mission, our group data is made publicly available in the LitvakSIG All Lithuania Database (ALD) 18 months from when members first receive access but only via the web interface and not in Excel format.

Since the Telsiai DRG was established in 1998 shortly after the founding of LitvakSIG, we have spent over $25,000 on acquiring and distributing data from over 250 different record sources for Telsiai Uyezd and the shtetls in Telsiai Uyezd – that’s over 50,000 individual record lines of people! Every shtetl for which there are extant records is represented in our collection. Our project is ongoing and progress is based on our available funds and the availability of records.

Our contributors are people who are researching ancestors from any shtetl in Telsiai Uyezd who have joined together to make the most of our shared resources. Since many of our ancestors lived in one place but worked, were officially registered, owned property or assets, or had relatives in another place nearby, it is only by researching on the broader geographic scale of the uyezd that one can be sure where a family was really "from" and that one has searched thoroughly.

Shtetls in Telsiai Uyezd are:

Aleksandravas, Alsedziai, Barstyciai, Darbenai, Gargzdai, Gruslauke, Jokubavas, Kalnalis, Kalvarija Zhamot, Kartena, Kretinga, Kuliai, Laukuva, Lieplaukis, Mosedis, Nevarenai, Palanga, Pavandene, Pikeliai, Plateliai, Plunge, Pozere, Salantai, Salociai, Saukliai, Seda, Skuodas, Telsiai, Tirksliai, Tverai, Vaiguva, Varniai, Ylakiai, Zarenai, Zemaiciu Kalvaria, Zemalenai, Zidikai.

We hope you will consider becoming a qualifying contributor at the $100 level or more to the Telsiai District Research Group. Effective January 1, 2012, a $100 contribution provides for early access for a 5 year cycle, based on calendar years. Instructions on how to contribute may be found here.If you have questions, you may contact the Group Coordinator Ann Brody.