Mathilde A. Tagger (1933-2014), was born in Tangiers, Morocco. She had an MA degree in Library and Information Sciences from Hebrew University in Jerusalem; was Chief Librarian of the Atmospheric Sciences Department, Hebrew University and then the Scientific Advisor for Special Information Projects at the Ministry of Science and Development. She went on to become a specialist in Sephardic research, especially names (onomastics) in the Sephardic world. She single-handedly created many of the databases on SephardicGen.com. She was a founding member of IIJG and served for many years on the Institute’s Executive Committee and was a founding member of IGRA.
Mathilde was honored twice by the IAJGS – In 2007 she received the Lifetime Achievement Award and in 2014 the Montefiore Census Digitization project received the IAJGS Program Award. Mathilde, together with Billie Stein and Rose Feldman and their volunteer staff transcribed, translated and created the database for all five of the 19th century censuses.
Mathilde published numerous articles in various Jewish genealogical journals, including Sharsheret HaDorot (Israel); Revue du Cercle de Genealogie Juive (France); Etsi – Sephardi Genealogical and Historical Review (France); IGRA and AVOTAYNU. She was coauthor of Guidebook for Sephardic and Oriental Genealogical Sources in Israel, published by Avotaynu in 2006; and authored Dictionary of Bulgarian Jewish Surnames (2015, Avotaynu), and A Dictionary of Sephardic Given Names (2015, Avotaynu). They are additional examples of how prolific her writings were and her interest in sharing her knowledge with the genealogical world. She gave generously of her time and knowledge.
