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magidI've been doing some temp work typing in the information on yahrtzeit plaques, based on photos from a now-defunct shul. Each plaque has English and Hebrew names (Hebrew names for these purposes are generally $FirstNames son/daughter of $Father'sName), and English and Hebrew date of death. It's been interesting, more interesting than I'd thought beforehand. Some of it is just the copyediting finds; there's a surprising number of discrepancies between the English and Hebrew dates (found thanks to a Hebrew calendar site). Some of it is finding interesting names, mostly women's Yiddish ones, though occasionally men have unexpected monikers too. And I'm seeing how fashions in names have definitely changed over time (there's not nearly the number of Annies that there used to be, nor Yiddish-Elkas). Today I realized that I've been picturing almost everyone as having been at least middle-aged, if not older, with sufficient number of offspring, but there's no way to know without birth dates. Often there are a few relatives together, which is comforting, but I still wonder. One man had what I have to assume was a service star in front of his name; the date shows that he died during WWII, towards the end. Another man had "hachatan" before his name; did he die just before or just after his marriage, or did something else happen? No way to know. And there's the dates themselves: was she glad to have seen $technology popularized? Did he want to know how the war (whichever war) turned out? And so on. The one trend I didn't expect to find is that people in this not-diverse sample overwhelmingly died after midnight or before dark (the Jewish day changes at dusk/dark, while the English date changes at midnight). Yes, that's between 3 and 7 hours, an eighth to almost a third of a day, but fewer than an eighth died then. I'm not sure whether to assume that there's something about daylight, or medical convenience, or when families gather, or something else entirely.
Also, my Hebrew typing is getting better, though the keystrokes aren't related sounds, except for the few that are. I don't think I'll get actually fast, but my fingers are starting to know which key, rather than having to check the printed cheat sheet, or telling myself each English letter to type.
(I've heard that there's more than one scheme for Hebrew typing on an English keyboard; I'm not sure which one this is.)
eta 8/10 1550: Interestingly, some of the larger commemorative plaques included "ha-isha" for some of the dead women. I'm not sure what that's supposed to indicate, since even ungendered names in Hebrew (there are some, though not used so much during the time period) include son/daughter of, so are functionally gendered (not sure how this works for transpeople; I assume final gender for something like this). Perhaps it's a female honorific? Or the equivalent of Mrs.? It's intriguingly unclear.
Also, my Hebrew typing is getting better, though the keystrokes aren't related sounds, except for the few that are. I don't think I'll get actually fast, but my fingers are starting to know which key, rather than having to check the printed cheat sheet, or telling myself each English letter to type.
(I've heard that there's more than one scheme for Hebrew typing on an English keyboard; I'm not sure which one this is.)
eta 8/10 1550: Interestingly, some of the larger commemorative plaques included "ha-isha" for some of the dead women. I'm not sure what that's supposed to indicate, since even ungendered names in Hebrew (there are some, though not used so much during the time period) include son/daughter of, so are functionally gendered (not sure how this works for transpeople; I assume final gender for something like this). Perhaps it's a female honorific? Or the equivalent of Mrs.? It's intriguingly unclear.