This is a Message Board Post that is gatewayed to this mailing list. Classification: Query Message Board URL: http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec/msg/an/RdC.2ACI/354.1.1.1.1 Message Board Post: The one thing we all need to remember. If they married in the bride's parish, there may be on marriage record, if the moved to his parish. Try surrounding parishes. Most people marry in the bride's church. Her parents pay for the wedding. In the year 2001, this is where eveyrone with the name of Czekala lived. BsmBs is the city of Bialystok. BsmSu is the city of Suwalki. BsmBs: M. 5, F. 1, BsmSu: M. 4, F. 1 I have a telephone book for the powiat of Suwalski. There is one person in the city of Suwalki with the last name, who has a listed telephone number. Do you speak Polish? Nowogrod is not far from the city of Lomza. Many men married outside of their parish. They had social functions, and people attended them from in parishes. This is how they met, or their parents arranged the marriages knowing people from other parishes. Check the LDS catalog at this site: http://www.familysearch.org/Eng/Library/FHC/frameset_fhc.asp Check the names of the parishes and a map to see how close they are to Nowogrod. I would than see if there is microfilm for the right year of birth for you ancestor. There are many more people in Podlaskie province with the Bednarczyk surname: BsAu: M. 4, F. 6 - powiat. Augustowski - gmina Augustow BsBs: M. 4, F. 4 - Bialostocki - Bialystok BsBl: M. 3, F. 1 - Bielski - Bielsk Podlaski BsGr: M. 9, F. 9 - Grajewski - Grajewo BsHa: M. 2, F. 1 - Hajnowski - Hajnowka BsKo: M. 39, F. 36 - Kolnenski - Kolno BsŁo: M. 31, F. 33 - Lomzynski - Lomza BsSi: M. 3, F. 6 - Siemiatycki - Siemiatycze BsSo: M. 3, F. 4 - Sokolski - Sokolka BsSu: F. 2 - Suwalski - Suwalki BsWy: M. 1 - Wysokomazowiecki - Wysokie Mazowieckie BsZa: M. 12, F. 3 - Zambrowski - Zambrow BsmBs: M. 12, F. 11 - city of Bialystok - Bialystok BsmŁo: M. 19, F. 22 - city of Lomza - Lomza BsmSu: M. 7, F. 11 - city of Suwalki - Suwalki A powiat in essence is equivalent to a county in the US. The administrative district is call a gmina. If you check the LDS catalog, you will find that most of the gminas have a parish. As you can see most of the people with this surname are in the city of Lomza and the powiats of Lomzynski and Kolnenski. You may want to check those parishes. Maybe something like this will help. With the Czekala name, I would try contacting all the people with that name. I'm sorry I do not have a telephone book for Bialystok. I hope to get one next year, when I visit cousins there next year. Last year I was in the Suwalki area, and my cousin gave his old book from 2002. Maybe if you find a cousin, you may learn in what parish the Czekala family lived. Tina