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I thought it was Kopernik ("copper worker"), cognate to Cooper or Cooperman.
On websites devoted to reviving Old Prussian history, language, culture, it's been given as Kapernits. Maybe it went through a change later on, at some point...? Or maybe the "Kopernik" version was just someone's theory? Or possibly "Kopernik" is the Polish version of "Kapernits"?
According to the Polish/Prussian historian I mentioned earlier, the indigenous Prussians, those who even had any recollection of their roots, protested, saying they're not Germans, they're not Poles or other Slavs, they're the original inhabitants of eastern Prussia and should be allowed to remain in their homeland.
The Poles also gave nearly everybody in their zone the boot as well. Germans were automatically deproted. Small ethnic groups such as Mansurians (polish speaking, but protestant and thus Germanized to an extent) and anybody identifying as an ethnic Balt were allowed to stay- if they could find a recognized Pole willing to vouch for them personally. Needless to say, nearly all could not.
Though criticism of Soviet and Polish deportation policies are understandable, it is also important to remember to context in which they occurred.
Jon Stewart adopted his middle name as his stage name because he was estranged from his father.
I suspect that there might be a lot of this type of name changing...kids not wanting to be associated with a father. My gr-grandfather became "John Miller" around 1850 because he had escaped from his overbearing (presumably...by DNA) Russian or Ukrainian father who had money, people and resources to find him and bring him back home. His cover story for naturalization was that he was from Bavaria but I have a bunch of distant Russian and Ukrainian DNA cousins that popped up from somewhere.
Not sure anyone mentioned it in here but the Consumer Finance Protection Board (CFPB) was using a software program to estimate race for people getting auto loans and used the results to go after various aspects of the car sales marketplace for "disparate impact" aka minorities getting higher interest rates.
There are several articles on-line about this if your curiosity is piqued.
Basically, they didn't have race in the loan database so they used the persons name to estimate it.
On websites devoted to reviving Old Prussian history, language, culture, it's been given as Kapernits. Maybe it went through a change later on, at some point...? Or maybe the "Kopernik" version was just someone's theory? Or possibly "Kopernik" is the Polish version of "Kapernits"?
Since I don't speak Old Prussian and can just barely place it in the right language group (Baltic, I think), my guess is Kopernik is the Polish version of Old Prussian Kapernits. But it is just a guess.
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