Tracing your Roots
Sun, Jun 23
|Webinar
Tracing her family back 15 generations to the early 1500s in Spain & Portugal, Genie Milgrom was able to unravel the web of lies and deceit that her family had spun in order to survive. Here, she is joined by Georgina Garza and Dr. Drora Arussy to help you navigate the certificate process.


Time & Location
Jun 23, 2024, 12:00 PM – 4:00 PM
Webinar
About the event
Tracing her family back 15 generations to the early 1500s in Spain and Portugal, Genie Milgrom was able to unravel the web of lies and deceit that her family had spun around themselves in order to survive the Spanish Inquisition. This fascinating story brought her on a journey she could have never imagined. It also led her to partner with Jewish Unity Through Diversity Institute and Reconectar to create the Certificate of Sephardic Ancestry help others connect to their Sephardic heritage and gain a greater appreciation of their family legacy.
Here, she is joined by Georgina Garza and Dr. Drora Arussy to help you navigate the Certificate process and submit the research that you conduct.
It is recommended that you read Genie’s first book, "My 15 Grandmothers" (https://tinyurl.com/15Grandmothers) where she takes the reader through her journey – from growing up Catholic to finding her Crypto-Jewish lineage and embracing the religion of her ancestors. Her new film, "The Flower and the Stone," is now showing in film festivals around the world.
About Genie and Georgina:
Genie Milgrom has authored several books including "My 15 Grandmothers," "How I Found my 15 Grandmothers," "Pyre to Fire, De la Pira al Fuego." She was awarded the Latino Author Book Award as well as the Literary Titan Book Award for several of the Books. The Books have been translated to Yiddish and Farsi. Since 2010 she has been a global speaker on the topic of the Jews of the Inquisition that remained in Spain in hiding, including at AIPAC, the Knesset and the EU Parliament. Genie was a past president of Society for Crypto-Judaic Studies at Colorado State University and Jewish Genealogy Society of Greater Miami and is a currently a board member of Kulanu and Tarbut Sefarad in Barcelona. In 2015 she was hooded by Netanya Academic College in Israel for achievements in Study and research of Crypto Jewry and in 2018 she was awarded the Medal of the Four Synagogues from Jerusalem, the highest accolade available on this research. For the past nearly decade, she has spearheaded a global initiative to digitize Inquisition documents. In 2020, organized a full curriculum of learning for the Anusim of Latin America.
Originally from Monterrey, Nuevo Leon, Georgina Garza De Leon comes from the original Crypto-Jewish families arriving at Nuevo Reino De León. Descendant of Luis De Carvajal de la Cueva, Diego De Montemayor, Marcos Alonso de La Garza Y Falcón, and many other Crypto-Jews fleeing the inquisition. Her tree's prominent names are Leon, Garza, Gonzalez, Trevino, Cantu, Cano, Benavidez, and many more Sephardic last names.
She has a podcast and a group where she documents her return to Judaism. Loves reading the Torah and learning about Jewish law.
Georgina graduated from the University of North Texas with a master's in Spanish language and culture from Salamanca, Spain. She has a certificate as a genealogist and has helped many with the Spanish law of return. She hopes to return to Israel.
She works as a School Educational Diagnostician and helps many students with learning disabilities.