Marian Smith, We Salute You!
March, 2008 - For many years, Marian L. Smith, Historian at the USCIS History Office and Library, USCIS (formerly INS and now part of the Department of Homeland Security) has served the Jewish genealogy community. She has given lectures about immigration, naturalization, and other related documents at many IAJGS conferences. Most recently, she toured the western part of the United States presenting her talk "Documenting Immigrants to America, 1882-1954" to seven local Jewish genealogical societies. She has also written an info file for JewishGen titled "A Guide to Interpreting Passenger List Annotations."
Marian has also written an excellent article, "Women and Naturalization 1802-1940" for the National Archives and Records Administration. Since the mid-nineteenth century a succession of laws worked to keep certain women out of naturalization records and, in many cases, barred their naturalization. Marian's paper helps the genealogist by taking them through the various laws and regulations effecting female naturalization over the years and showing how to research the elusive naturalization records for women.
Marian's articles appear in the National Archives journal Prologue, the FGS Forum, and other publications. Her research focus primarily involves official immigration agency records held by the National Archives.
For all of your efforts, Marian, the IAJGS Salutes you!
Ron Arons,Chair, IAJGS Salutes chairman
with Gary Mokotoff and Elsebeth Paikin
