This late XIX century photograph of the Sempinski family was sent to me in 2001 by my oncle, Jerzy Zimpel of Poznan. My grandmother Helena Rucinska is standing second from right, while her sister and mother of Jerzy, Zofia, is sitting on the lap of our Grandgradmother, Zofia Andrzejewska.
I took this photograph of the Rucinski family many years ago from an old portrait kept by the Graczynski’s in Grudziadz (this was one of the sisters of our Grandfather, the only female in the upper row, next to our Grandfather who is the shortest fellow in the upper row). Recently I scanned this small 4x6cm picture. It is of poor quality yet really charming (if not funny).
Since I am asked from time to time about genealogy, here are a few points about which I am absolutely sure: (1) The Rucinski family, as known to me, i.e. with the horizon in time at about 1850, came from the Northern Masovia region, around Ciechanow, Zuromin, Dzialdowo region, North of Warsaw. (2) They moved after 1864 from the Russian partition to the German partition, to a village Szwarcenowo, (3) After that the large family split into several branches (as one can appreciate from the number of the siblings of my grandfather in the photograph above) settling mainly in Pomerania and Great-Poland (Poznan) regions, (4) My grand-grandfather (the one on the photo, surrounded by his children) was a tailor, so I am personally rather skeptical about noble connections, although there was always a bit of talk about the coat-of-arms called Ogonczyk,(5) The name Rucinski is not that uncommon in Poland, especially in the Mazovia (Mazowsze) region: On the basis of the Warsaw phone book, I established the frequency of the name in Warsaw at 0.040% +/- 0.003% (230 entries in over ½ million); my wife’s maiden name, Brukalski is rarer (0.0006%). As I said, I suspect that the Warsaw region may have more Rucinski’s than other regions of Poland.
Update: Sep.28, 2004
