History

Your hidden Jewish ancestry became hidden in some period of time in some place. One powerful tool to gain an understanding of your ancestry is to get acquainted with the history the place from whence they come, when they came from there. In each of the different Jewish ethnicities listed on the left of the website, you will find books that I have found particularly useful. Get one of them and read. Learn about the history of the Jews from the part of the world that your family came. 

As an example, if you know your family came from the Caribbean, and you suspect they lived as Jews in the Caribbean, get some books on the Jewish Caribbean. Better yet, if you know your family came from Jamaica, try to find some books on Jewish Jamaica. You may find your family story there. I mean, you might actually find some of the relatives on your family tree in these books. But, if not named specifically, you will discover a story that may overlap with your story. 

Here is a great example. Let's say you are Afro-Caribbean. And you were surprised to discover you have Sephardic Jewish ancestry. If you read about Sephardic Jews, living in the Caribbean, you will discover that they had slaves, they converted slaves, they freed slaves, they had children with slaves, and they married the mixed race children of Sephardic Jews and people of African descent. There is a ton of information on the mixing of Sephardic Jews and people of African descent in the colonial age, in books on the Jewish Caribbean,  

My family tree revealed I have an 11th great grandfather Lorent Massa. The name suggests we was a Spanish Jew or a Converso. He lived in Antwerp. Until the Duke of Alba came to Antwerp to drive all the Conversos and Protestants out of the Spanish Netherlands. Lorent Massa appears shortly after this date, in Germany, "converting" and becoming a French Protestant. Knowing a bit about history made a story that made no sense, make no sense. Why would a Spanish Jewish guy move to Germany and become a French Protestant? Because they were burning people like him in Antwerp and he went on the run. Learning about  history will make your family tree make sense. 

So, get some books on the history of the Jews from whence your family came, and more pieces of the picture will come into view.