I started a genealogy effort for my family nearly 10 years ago. I’ve since managed to navigate archives in many different countries and languages. However, I quickly hit a roadblock on one branch which was rooted in an
ancestral village was around Velykyi Bereznyi, Ukraine. This village was still in family lore, but my ancestors that immigrated shared very little beyond that about their life in the old country with their children. I very quickly learned about the Carpatho-Rusyn ethic group of which they belonged. As I scoured the internet for regional record sources, I came across several posts from Maxim. Maxim, who despite having good reviews, my initial impression from his directness and Internet footprints was that he was either very good or unnecessarily arrogant. So I wavered on pursuing anything at that moment, but I kept an eye on genealogical turnings in the region. Maxim kept coming up and my confidence grew.
Time passed, the last surviving progeny of my immigrant ancestors passed. Several of the 2nd generation of ~25 cousins passed during this time. Many of them I had met in starting the genealogy endeavor and mining their family stories. One of these cousins kept encouraging me over the years, asking if I found anything new, and in the back of my mind, I thought….
There is that “Maxim” guy..., but I never made the leap. It was really the debut of the Russian invasion that lit the fire because I also have Polish branches that I cannot explore the because the Russians had erased the history. With this sad situation unfolding several family members contacted me to ask if I had learned anything new about the family. So finally, I inquired.
What I found was exceptional quality, reasonable rates, and a reliable fellow who takes pride in his work. If you are looking for a genealogist in the Transcarpathia, Ukraine. You have found him. If you are hesitating don’t. Many of the people that would have enjoyed all the findings I have now obtained, have since parted. The culture, history and region are fascinating and you will enrich yourself writing the story.
So what did we find:
We basically started with some family lore, my great-grandparents and their ancestral village and some correspondences between my ancestors and their relatives in the old country. We started tracking down their records. This led to a surprising double surname, which explained a surname change in the family lore. With this alternate surname, for the first time I was able to track my great grandparents US entry papers because they entered using the first part of the name and settled with the second part.
We also discovered that my great-grandmother was originally born in Kucsin, Slovakia. With that information and what is available on the Familysearch website for Slovakia, I was able to take that branch back 3 branches to Nižný Hrušov, Slovakia and Stakcin, Slovakia and many new surnames were added to my tree. Here, I discovered that my great grandmother’s father was likely a Roman Catholic Slovak, however he died when she was a small child and likely barely knew much of him or his family. Maxim discoveries then suggested that after her father’s death, her mother moved in with her half sister in Roztots'ka Pastil’, which 1. explained why my great grandfather likely met my great grandmother, and 2. gave me more leads to track down family in Slovakia.
With the double surname, we also identified another relative that transiently came to the US. We were able to track him down and that search yielded several new family connections and multiple unexpected cousins and opened many new doors. The US descendants knew almost nothing of cousins, aunts and uncles as little was transmitted especially after the Iron Curtain fell. Questions about the family were always met with, “Kiss the ground you walk on and ask no more questions about the past” or “You shouldn’t look back, maybe you wouldn't like what you’d find."
We also tracked down people mentioned in the correspondences and were able to make all the connections, and yield other family members. I felt a personal satisfaction, by being able to directly attach a one-eyed, WV coal miner cousin that died with no next-of-kin and claim him on my tree.
As we narrowed down our search options, I found a route through another “genealogist" to access the 1869 census to fill a gap on my great grandfather’s side, which turned out to be overpriced, incomplete and low quality work. Maxim was able to salvage the information in this shoddy effort and thus we were able to take my great grandfather’s family back 4 generations.
We’ve tracked back the family as far as records exist. It is a family search that has had many twists and turns, unexpected surprises, mixed families, duplicated name confusion and has been a wonderful adventure. I cannot thank or praise Maxim enough. Since I’ve done a bit of my on archival research, I very easily understood and followed Maxim’s suggestions, and he interpreted my suggestions well, fairly and critically. He is direct and honest, with a healthy skepticism and solid grasp on reality surrounding his expertise. I think this is a good thing as my expectations were always achieved or exceeded.
Below I’ve attached a current working model tree to show the results. In grayed areas are the people that I knew existed before contacting Maxim. Many of those folks from Ukraine had their personal details were flushed out by Maxim and then, together his research allowed us to find all the other connections. The research is mainly done as far as it can go, although I still have a few Hail Mary ideas....
Tree-Maxim.pdf