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The Last of the Children of Marx and Sarah Seligmann: Mary Kornfeld and Her Descendants

Posted on August 12, 2015 by Amy

In this post I will complete the story (as far as I know it thus far) of the descendants of Marx and Sarah (Koppel) Seligmann. Marx, the younger brother of my three-times great-grandfather, came to the US with his second wife Sarah in 1849 and had four children: Sigmund, Jacob, Charlotte, and Mary. I have already written about the first three.

As I posted before, the youngest child of Marx and Sarah Seligmann, their daughter Mary, was the first to marry. She and her husband Oscar Kornfeld, a cigar maker, married in 1873 and by 1882 had four children: Marx (later Max) (1874), Rose (1877), Carrie (1879), and Lillian (1882). In 1900 Mary, Oscar, and their three daughters were living at 1883 Madison Avenue. Their son Max had already married Emma Pisko that year prior to the 1900 census.

Two of their daughters also married during 1900. On March 22, 1900, Carrie Kornfeld married Berthold Weiss. He was the son of Sigmund Weiss and Rose Hecht, who were Hungarian immigrants. Sigmund was a woodturner, according to the 1900 census, and Berthold was a hosiery salesman.

On December 23, 1900, Rose Kornfeld married Joseph Cohn. Joseph was the son of Philip and Adele Cohen, German immigrants. His father was a baker. Joseph was born in New York in 1876. In 1900, before marrying Rose, he had been living with his parents and brother and working as a printer.

New York, Marriages, 1686-1980,” , FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:F6HY-Z96 : accessed 8 August 2015), Joseph Cohn and Rose Cornfeld, 23 Dec 1900; citing reference ; FHL microfilm 1,570,443.

Thus, within one year, three of the four children of Mary and Oscar Kornfeld had married. Their youngest child, Lillian, married two years later. She married Emil Nardin on May 4, 1902.

“New York, Marriages, 1686-1980,” , FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:F6QW-TVL : accessed 8 August 2015), Emile Nardin and Lillian Kornfeld, 04 May 1902; citing reference ; FHL microfilm 1,570,816.

Emil was born in France, the son of Fredric and Susanne Nardin, and had arrived in the US in about 1886 when he was about twenty years old. He had been married previously to Lena Chavey, also French born, and they had had three children together: Ida, born in 1888, whom I cannot find on any subsequent record, Henri Arthur, who was born in 1892 and who died in 1895 from scarlet fever, and Helen Edith (known as Edith), born in 1896. On the 1900 census, Emil and Lena were living with just Edith. The census record reported that although Lena had had three children, only one was alive, so Ida must have died also. Emil was working as a cook. (A French chef in the family!) The family was living at 627 Amsterdam Avenue in New York. Sadly, Emil’s first wife Lena died from tuberculosis on December 4, 1900, leaving him with four year old Edith. Lena was 39 years old.

Thus, Emil had lost two young children and his wife before marrying Lillian Kornfeld in 1902. Lillian and Emil had a child of their own, a son named Arthur, born on June 26, 1903.

Mary and Oscar Kornfeld had two other grandchildren born in the early years of the 20^th century. Carrie and Berthold Weiss had a daughter, Edna Hazel, on February 27, 1903. Rose and Joseph Cohn had a son Harold, born on January 18, 1905. Arthur Nardin, Edith Weiss, and Harold Cohn were the only grandchildren Mary and Oscar would have.

Overall, these should have been happy years for the extended Kornfeld family. Unfortunately, Max Kornfeld soon ran into serious legal problems. In 1903, he was convicted on several counts of insurance fraud and sentenced to Sing Sing prison in Ossining, New York. As reported in the November 20, 1903, edition of The Standard, an insurance industry trade publication, Max Kornfeld was a public fire insurance adjuster and had been convicted of making a false insurance claim for $2000, claiming that his wife Emma’s wardrobe had been destroyed in a fire at the Hotel Richelieu. A later article dated December 10, 1903, in The Spectator, another trade publication, reported that Max was in fact part of a much larger insurance fraud scheme. It reported that Max had confessed to over 300 fraudulent fire insurance claims. He had testified that in these claims the adjuster received 40% of the proceeds, and he described some of the methods used to make these claims.



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Sing Sing Prison

Max was admitted to Sing Sing prison on July 17, 1904, and according to the admission record below, it looks like he was sentenced for three to nine years; he was still in prison at the time of the 1905 New York State census. One thing I found interesting on the Sing Sing admission record is the recording of his religion as Protestant and Hebrew. There is also a detailed physical description; Max had a number of scars on his head as well as on his hand.

New York State Archives; Albany, New York; Sing Sing Prison, 1852-1938; Box: 14; Volume: 36

As for the rest of the family in 1905, I could only find Mary and Oscar Kornfeld and their daughter Rose on the 1905 NY census. In 1905, Mary (nee Seligman) and Oscar Kornfeld were living as lodgers without any of their children in the household of a woman named Anna Bohl, residing at 274-276 West 19^th Street in Manhattan. Oscar was still working as a cigar maker. According to the 1905 NY census, their daughter Rose, her husband Joseph Cohn, and their son Harold were living at 10 West 118th Street, and Joseph was working as a printer.

Although I could not find Carrie Kornfeld Weiss or Lillian Kornfeld Nardin on the 1905 NY census, I had better luck locating all the Kornfelds but Mary and Oscar on the 1910 census. Max was out of prison, and he and Emma had moved to Philadelphia, where Max was working as a real estate broker. They did not have any children. Rose and Joseph Cohn were living on West 148^th Street with their six year old son Harold, and Joseph had his own printing business. Carrie and Berthold Weiss were living on Lenox Avenue with their seven year old daughter Edna, and Bert was still a hosiery salesman. Lillian and Emil Nardin were living on West 17^th Street with their six year old son Arthur and Emil’s daughter Edith, who was now fourteen; Emil was a chef in a hotel. Thus, it appeared that all four of the Kornfeld children were doing fairly well in 1910.

The next five years were harder. Their father Oscar died on November 27, 1911; he was 58 years old. He died from cirrhosis of the liver.

Then Lillian’s husband Emil died on March 28, 1914, also from cirrhosis of the liver as well as a uremic coma; he was only 48 years old and left not only Lillian, but his daughter Edith, who was only 18, and his son Arthur, who was only ten years old.

Poor Edith Nardin had lost her mother Lena in 1900 and now her father in 1911. By 1915 she was married to Arthur Downing Holmes, and the couple was living with Edith’s stepmother, Lillian Kornfeld Nardin, and Edith’s half-brother, Arthur Nardin, on West 92^nd Street. Arthur Holmes was 25 and working as a real estate agent. He had been born in New Haven, Connecticut, and was a graduate of Yale.

New York State Archives; Albany, New York; State Population Census Schedules, 1915; Election District: 10; Assembly District: 17; City: New York; County: New York; Page: 14

According to his World War I draft registration, Arthur D. Holmes was in the construction business. At the time of his registration and on the 1920 census, their address was on West 84^th Street. By 1920, Arthur and Edith had two sons, William and Lawrence. In 1922 they had a third son Robert. (Although Arthur and Edith were still together on the 1930 census, by 1940 Arthur was married to a much younger woman named Ann. I cannot find what happened to Edith after 1930 except for a 1974 Florida death record for an Edith H. Thomson with the same birth date.)

Meanwhile, eighteen months after Emil’s death, his wife Lillian Kornfeld Nardin remarried. On September 27, 1915, she married Arthur Rosenberg. He was born in England in 1885 and had immigrated to the US in 1898 with his parents. In 1910, he had been a chauffeur for a private family. According to his 1918 World War I draft registration, he and Lillian were living at 3440 Broadway, and he was now a rental agent for L.J. Phillips, a real estate company.

Registration State: New York; Registration County: New York; Roll: 1786675; Draft Board: 141

Carrie (nee Kornfeld) and Bert Weiss and their daughter Edna were living at 2400 Seventh Avenue in 1915. The 1915 NY census reports that Bert was working in the wholesale dental supplies business, but according to his draft registration for World War I three years later, he was back in hosiery sales in what appears to be his own business, Weiss and Goldstein. The family was then living at 555 West 115^th Street.

Registration State: New York; Roll: 1786805; Draft Board: 146

In 1920 Rose and Joseph Cohn were living at 253 West 146th Street, and Joseph had his own printing business. Their son Harold was now 15.

According to his World War I draft registration, Max Kornfeld and his wife Emma were living at 1628 Diamond Street in Philadelphia in 1918, and Max was self-employed as a merchandise man and insurance adjuster. I was surprised to see that he was back in the insurance business, given his criminal record for insurance fraud. In 1920, however, Max reported his occupation as a real estate adjuster.

Registration State: Pennsylvania; Registration County: Philadelphia; Roll: 1907649; Draft Board: 29

Mary Seligman Kornfeld must have moved in with her son Max and daughter-in-law Emma sometime after the 1920 census because when she died on January 13, 1921, her address was 1628 Diamond Street in Philadelphia, where Max and Emma had been living in 1920. Mary was 64 years old and had died from cardiac dilatation and pulmonary edema. I thought it interesting that she had moved from New York where her three daughters and her grandchildren lived to live with her son in a city where she had never before lived. I also thought it odd that Max could not provide the name of his mother’s parents as the informant on her death certificate.

Ancestry.com. Pennsylvania, Death Certificates, 1906-1963 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2014.
Original data: Pennsylvania (State). Death certificates, 1906–1963. Series 11.90 (1,905 cartons). Records of the Pennsylvania Department of Health, Record Group 11. Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.

Two years later Mary’s youngest child, Lillian Kornfeld Nardin Rosenberg, died at age 41. (Her death certificate says she was 39, born in 1884, but that is not consistent with the birth records from the NYC birth index I have for her.) She died from chronic endocarditis and cerebral edema.

Lillian’s son Arthur Nardin was 20 years old when she died. On March 6, 1925, Arthur married Jane Burns; they were both 21 years old at the time. Their son Arthur Nardin, Jr., was born two years later. According to the 1930 census, Arthur, Sr., was a car salesman. The family was living on West 181^st Street at that time.

In 1930, Lillian’s sister Rose and her husband Joseph Cohn were living on West 90^th Street, and Joseph was no longer a printer, but now an investor in securities. Their son Harold had married Tillie or Teddi or Theodora Kremenko, a Russian immigrant, on October 6, 1928. Thus far, I cannot locate Harold or Tillie on the 1930 or 1940 census, but did find that Harold died on January 31, 1944. He was only 39 years old and died from coronary thrombosis. I am now following a lead to someone who might be Harold and Tillie’s son, so I hope to get more information and some photographs.

The third Kornfeld sister, Carrie, and her husband Bert Weiss were living on West 103^rd Street in 1930, and Bert was still a dry goods salesman. Their daughter Edna had married Harry Rosenberg on December 14, 1924. Harry was born in New York City, and in 1920 he and his father Edward were both selling dry goods. In 1925, Harry and Edna were living on West 176^th Street, and Harry was selling real estate. Unfortunately, as with Harold and Tillie, I cannot find them on the 1930 or 1940 census.

Finally, Max Kornfeld and his wife Emma had moved to Atlantic City by 1923, according to the directory for that year for that city. They were still there in 1926, and Max was working again as an insurance agent. I could not find Max and Emma on the 1930 census. (What is it with this family and the 1930 census? How did they elude the census takers?), but they were still living in Atlantic City when Max died on October 25, 1931. Max was 57 years old. He was buried at Rodeph Shalom cemetery in Philadelphia.

Historical Society of Pennsylvania; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; Collection Name: Historic Pennsylvania Church and Town Records; Reel: 1112

Thus, by 1931, two of the Kornfeld siblings had died, Max and Lillian. I cannot find Rose and her husband Joseph Cohn on the 1940 census, nor can I find their death records, and thus I do not know anything about them after 1930. The only Kornfeld sibling I located on the 1940 census was Carrie and her husband Bert Weiss. They were then living at 607 Broadway, and Bert was still selling hosiery. I do not have any information about them after 1940.

As for the three grandchildren of Mary Seligman and Oscar Kornfeld, as noted above, I cannot find Carrie’s daughter Edna and her husband Harry Rosenberg on either the 1930 or 1940 census, nor can I find Rose’s son Harold and his wife Tillie on any census after their marriage in 1928. I only know that Harold died in 1944. The only grandchild about whom I could find any real information after 1930 was Arthur Nardin, the son of Lillian and her husband Emil Nardin. In 1940, Arthur and his wife Jane and his two children, Arthur, Jr. and Edith, were still living on West 181^st Street, and Arthur was a car dealer. By 1958, Arthur and Jane had moved to Miami, where he died in 1983 at the age of 80.

That brings me to the end of the line started by Marx Seligmann and his wife Sarah Koppel, who immigrated to the United States in 1849 shortly after Marx’s divorce from his first wife. Marx and Sarah must have come to the US to begin their lives together as a married couple in a new country, far away from their home country of Germany. From that marriage came four children, eighteen grandchildren, and fifteen known great-grandchildren as well as many great-great-grandchildren, all my previously unknown American-born Seligman cousins, including my wonderful cousin Steve who supplied me with so many family stories and photos.

More Photographs of Gau-Algesheim

Posted on August 10, 2015 by Amy

My friends and former colleagues Barbara and Rene just returned from a trip to Germany. Rene’s family lives not too far from Gau-Algesheim, and he and Barbara were kind enough to travel to my ancestral town and take some photographs. Some of these have text that I need to get translated. As I’ve observed from other photographs of this town, it appears to be a charming, small town with lots of character. I think that Barbara and Rene have really captured that impression of the town. Thanks so much, Rene and Barbara!

[Ralph tells me that the sign lists the hours of the mayor of Gau-Algesheim.]

[According to Ralph, this is a list of local businesses in Gau-Algesheim.]

[Translation by Chip:

JACOB’S PILGRIMAGE

Pilgrim Hospitals

Pilgrim Hospitals, also called Hospices, were, in the Middle ages, the only place where destitute Pilgrims could find a bed for the night, a bowl of soup and care for their suffering. Often consisting of only a sleeping hall (large communal bedroom), the kitchen, a dining room, and a small chapel, as well as stalls and barn.

Many pilgrims often had to share the sleeping area, and follow very strict “Rules of the House.”

In cities, the hospices were often better equipped, or were part of a cloister. Here in Gau-Algesheim you have to imagine a rather meager hospital which, possibly, had to provide for the poor and sick of the place.

[

[According to Chip, “The sign over the “1726” (from the photos, the sign appears to be in the Town Hall), loosely translated, means that Lothar Francis, the elected Archbishop, built (financed the reconstruction of)) the building.”]

A Few New Tidbits about Moritz and Babetta, My Great-great-great-grandparents

Posted on August 8, 2015 by Amy

I am working on a blog post about the descendants of the last child of Marx and Sarah Seligmann, Mary Seligman Kornfeld, but am awaiting some documents before I can post it. So I am going to digress in this post from that line and return to my three-times great-grandfather, Moritz Seligmann (who was, of course, an older brother to Marx Seligmann). When my cousin Wolfgang sent me the handwritten family tree he and his mother found in their magic suitcase, he had originally not included the pages about Moritz, thinking I had all the information I needed about Moritz and his children. I asked him to send them to me anyway so that I would have the full document, even if there was no new information.

But in fact there was some new information or at least information that corroborated or clarified assumptions I had made based on inference, anecdotes, and other documents.

The first page names Moritz and his first wife, Eva Schoenfeld.

The next page lists the children of Moritz and Eva Schoenfeld. I had wondered what had caused Eva’s death and also what had happened to their son Benjamin. This page answered both questions. Benjamin died shortly after his birth as did his mother, so I assume it was related to childbirth.

This page also provided confirmation and new information about when the other children died.

On the third page, the writer identified Babetta Schoenfeld as the second wife of Moritz Seligmann and lists their children. There were several bits of important new information here. One is the date of Babetta’s death: January 15, 1899. It also states that she was 89 years old. This information helps to confirm that the photograph of the family group with the elderly woman was in fact a photograph of my three-times great-grandmother Babetta.

The other bit of interesting information on this page is in the list of children. The last child listed is Jacob, and it indicates that he was in England. This is further corroboration of the fact that Moritz’s brother James Seligman who immigrated to England was in fact named Jacob at birth and is most likely the Onkel Jakob in the family photograph with Babetta, below.

In addition, from this page I was able to learn when several of the other children of Moritz and Babetta had died.

The remaining pages cover some of the children of Moritz: Pauline, Hieronymous, August, and Mathilde. Although I did not find any really new information on these pages, they do provide additional confirmation of the information I already had as well as some dates I did not have. Unfortunately, some of the writing is not legible, and so I cannot determine what those additional words say. If anyone can read them, let me know. I’ve circled the words I cannot read.

UPDATE: My friend Dorothee in Germany tells me that the words after Joseph and Moritz indicate that they were both married and also both divorced. Thank you, Dorothee! My friend Ralph added to this, saying the words to the far right of Joseph say, “Son and daughter.” Unfortunately, I have no records for Joseph’s children. Ralph also said that to the right of Martha, it says in part “Floersheimer,” which was her married name. Thank you, Ralph!

UPDATE: Dorothee says that the symbol before Artur means “doctor” and the words after Artur say “in Baden-Baden, married.” Thank you again, Dorothee! Ralph added that the word next to Emil Ochs could be Mailand (Milan), which would make sense since Bettina entered Switzerland from Italy, as I wrote here. Thank you again, Ralph!

Brick Walls Everywhere

Posted on August 6, 2015 by Amy



Embed from Getty Images

I’ve run into some tough brick walls in my research, but never as many as I have with the descendants of Charlotte Seligman, the third child of Marx and Sarah Seligman. It’s been one frustration after another, searching for her children and grandchildren.

As noted in my earlier post, Charlotte (or Lottie) married Max Schlesinger in 1874, and they had four children: Harriet (1875), Arthur (1876), Lillie (1877), and Louis (1884). Max was in the tie manufacturing business. Lillie and Louis were still living at home in 1900.

By 1900, Harriet (or Hattie) had married George Cain and had had one child, originally named Edith, but then renamed Lucie in memory of George’s sister. The following year Harriet and George had a second daughter named Ethel.

I could not locate Arthur at all on the 1900 census, nor have I found him on any other record aside from the 1880 census and the NYC birth record index. There is one possible military enlistment record for him dated March 4, 1895, but I can’t even be sure it is the same Arthur Schlesinger from the record.

On December 14, 1904, Max and Charlotte’s third child Lillie married Solomon Sondheim. Solomon, or Sol, was born in New Hampshire in 1867, making him ten years older than Lillie. His father, a German immigrant, was in the dry goods business. After living in New Hampshire, Sol had lived in Buffalo, New York, and then Bradford, Pennsylvania. By 1900 when he was 33, Sol was working as a salesman and living in New York City as a boarder in what appears to be a large boarding house at 589 Second Avenue. After marrying, Lillie and Sol were living on East 116^th Street, and Sol listed his occupation on the 1905 NY census as a merchant.

In searching to learn more about Sol Sondheim, I found numerous articles about the suicide of his brother Philip. From these articles, I learned that Sol’s father had been a wealthy man, leaving quite a large estate to be divided among his four children (which apparently Philip squandered through gambling).

New_York_Times_December_9_1900_page_1 Philip Sondheim

Boston Herald December 13, 1900 p. 8

As for the rest of the family of Charlotte and Max Schlesinger, the 1905 NY census just presented me with problems. First, I cannot find Hattie and George Cain at all on the 1905 census (and Arthur still was missing). What’s even more confusing, Charlotte Schlesinger is listed twice on the 1905 census (both with the date June 1, 1905, preprinted on the page). On one page, Charlotte and Max were living at 231 West 116^th Street, and Max was still working in manufacturing (presumably ties).

Max and Charlotte Schlesinger 1905 NY census New York State Archives; Albany, New York; State Population Census Schedules, 1905; Election District: A.D. 21 E.D. 39; City: Manhattan; County: New York; Page: 24

On another page of the 1905 census, Charlotte is listed with her son Louis and his wife Alice, living at 1838 Seventh Avenue. Louis was only 21, and Alice was only 19.

Louis Schlesinger 1905 census
New York State Archives; Albany, New York; State Population Census Schedules, 1905; Election District: A.D. 21 E.D. 35; City: Manhattan; County: New York; Page: 38

I assume Max died sometime between the first census listing and the second, but I cannot find any record for Max’s death. There is no listing in the NYC death index, no obituary, nothing that explains what happened to him. Moreover, the NYC marriage index has Louis marrying Alice Stacke on April 26, 1906, a year after the 1905 census. Is it possible that this second census entry was filled in and filed a year late? Or perhaps it is more likely the marriage certificate was filed a year late. Or they weren’t legally married until April 1906?

According to the 1910 US census, Louis and Alice were still living with Charlotte, now listed as a widow (the NY 1905 census had not asked about marital status). They were living at 200 West 136^th Street, and Louis was working as a clothing salesman. Harriet and George Cain and their two daughters were living at 2308 Seventh Avenue, and George was the secretary of a bank. Lillie and Sol Sondheim were living on West 122^nd Street, and Sol was a traveling salesman. Arthur remained missing.

On June 4, 1914, Harriet’s husband George Cain died. I could not find a death record for him, but did find this death notice in the June 5, 1914, New York Times.

New York Times, June 5, 1914

Since there is no listing for George Cain in the NYC death index, I assume George died someplace outside of New York City. He left behind two young daughters, just 14 and 13, as well as his wife Harriet. On the 1915 NY census, Harriet was living with her two daughters Lucie and Ethel as well as her mother Charlotte at 2308 Seventh Avenue. No one in the household was employed outside the home.

Harriet Schlesinger Cain 1915 NY census
New York State Archives; Albany, New York; State Population Census Schedules, 1915; Election District: 23; Assembly District: 21; City: New York; County: New York; Page: 11

In 1920, Harriet was living with Lucie and Ethel, now 19 and 18, at 465 Central Park West. Harriet’s occupation was reported as “renting rooms” at home, and there was one lodger listed in the household, but her name was crossed out. Lucie was working in the bonding department of a security company, and Ethel was not employed.

I cannot find either Louis Schlesinger or Lillie Schlesinger Sondheim on the 1915 NY census. (These people are just incredibly elusive, no matter how I search.) But between 1910 and 1920, much had changed for both of them. First, on July 12, 1917, Louis married a second time, this time to Bertha Stein.

New York, New York City Marriage Records, 1829-1940,” database, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:24HM-6GL : accessed 4 August 2015), Louis Schlesinge and Bertha Stein, 12 Jul 1917; citing Marriage, Manhattan, New York, New York, United States, New York City Municipal Archives, New York; FHL microfilm .

I would have thought this was a different Louis, except that the marriage record reveals his parents’ names as Charlotte Seligman and Max Schlesinger. What had happened to Alice, his first wife? I don’t know. There is no death record for her, but neither was there one for George Cain or for Max Schlesinger. There are a number of later records for women named Alice Schlesinger, but none is obviously the right one. If she remarried, I haven’t found her.

At any rate, Louis and Bertha Schlesinger had a child on June 14, 1918, less than a year after marrying. They named him Arthur, which makes me believe that Louis’ older brother Arthur had died. According to his draft registration for World War I, Louis was the financial secretary for the Joe Morris Music Publishing Company, and he, Bertha, and their son Arthur were living at 301 St. Nicholas Avenue in New York City. Their residence remained the same on the 1920 census.

Louis Schlesinger World War I draft registration Registration State: New York; Registration County: New York; Roll: 1786672; Draft Board: 139

As for Lillie, her life also changed dramatically between 1910 and 1920. Her husband Sol died on March 12, 1919, while he was in Chicago; I assume he was traveling there as part of his job as a salesman as he died at a hotel. He died from heart and kidney disease. He was 52 years old.

Six months later Lillie married William Lindsay on September 24, 1919. William was born in Philadelphia, the son of Joseph Lindsay and Mary Thomson, who were born in Scotland and Ireland, respectively. William grew up in Philadelphia, where his father was a shirt manufacturer. In 1920, William was working as an advertising solicitor for a trade magazine, and he and Lillie were living on 112^th Street.

Thus, between 1910 and 1920, three of the children of Charlotte Seligman and Max Schlesinger had had major marital status changes in their lives. Harriet had become a widow; Lillie also had become a widow and then remarried; and Louis had either become a widower or had his marriage end, and he had remarried. Meanwhile, their mother Charlotte was living on her own at 2040 Seventh Avenue. Charlotte died three years later on January 19, 1923, when she was 69 years old.

I cannot find Harriet on the 1925 NY census, but according to a directory listing, she was still living at 465 Central Park West in 1925. Her younger daughter Ethel had married Milton Robitchek on June 29, 1922, when she was 21, and had a daughter Georgia in 1928. By 1930, however, Ethel was divorced, and she and two year old Georgia were living with Harriet on West End Avenue. Ethel was a public school teacher. (I can’t seem to find Milton Robitchek at all after the 1922 marriage record. How could someone with such an unusual name just disappear?)

Harriet Schlesinger Cain 1930 US census
Year: 1930; Census Place: Manhattan, New York, New York; Roll: 1557; Page: 12B; Enumeration District: 0465; Image: 685.0; FHL microfilm: 2341292

Harriet’s older daughter Lucie was living on her own on Clinton Street in Brooklyn, according to the 1930 census, which reported that her occupation was “child placing” for an accountant. I have no clue what that means.

In 1940, Harriet was still living with her daughter Ethel, now on East 68^th Street, and with her granddaughter Georgia, now twelve. Ethel was still working as a teacher. Lucie was still living on her own in Brooklyn, and her occupation now clearly states that she was a public accountant. I have not found any later records for Harriet, Lucie, Ethel, or Georgia. I have searched as many ways as I can, but have found no documents, no news stories, no obituaries.

As for Harriet’s sister Lillie, she became a widow again on November 14, 1924, when her husband William Lindsay died at age 58. Like Harriet’s first husband Sol, William died of both heart and kidney disease.

I’ve had no luck finding Lillie on either the 1925 NY census or the 1930 US census, but did find her on the 1940 census. She was 62 years old, living at the Wyndham Hotel, and not employed. That is the last record I have for Lillie.

Finally, there is Charlotte and Max’s youngest child Louis Schlesinger. In 1925, he was still married to Bertha, and they were still living on St. Nicholas Avenue with their son Arthur, now six years old. Louis was still employed in music publishing. Although the family had moved to West 180^th Street by 1930, all else remained the same (though everyone was five years older, of course).

But then the big mystery for me surrounding Louis and his family surfaced in the 1940 census. Now Louis, Bertha, and Arthur are living on West 164^th Street, but there are two more children living with them: Henry, listed as their son, 17 years old, and Matilda, listed as their daughter, 12 years old. Where did these two children come from? If they were in fact Louis and Bertha’s children, they should have been listed with them on the 1930 census, but they were not. Had they been adopted after 1930? They both had the surname Schlesinger, at least on the census record. I don’t know, and what’s even more mystifying, I cannot find either of them on any later record or document. I would think Henry would have served in World War II, but I cannot find any record that would match him, if his name in fact was Henry Schlesinger.

Louis Schlesinger 1940 US census
Year: 1940; Census Place: New York, New York, New York; Roll: T627_2677; Page: 8B; Enumeration District: 31-2144

At any rate, in 1940 Louis was still in music sales, and his son Arthur, now 21, was a clerk in an advertising firm. On his draft registration for World War II, Louis reported that he was a music salesman and the president of Lewis Music Company.

Arthur Schlesinger, Louis and Bertha’s son, died on February 20, 1943. He was 24 years old. His death certificate does not report the cause of death, but it does indicate that he had been under a doctor’s care since October, 1942. He had been working as a clerk in federal court.

That, unfortunately, is the last record I have for Louis Schlesinger and his family. As with his siblings Harriet, Arthur, and Lillie, I do not know when he died. I don’t know when his wife Bertha died, what happened to his first wife Alice, or what happened to the two children who were living with him as his children in 1940, Henry and Matilda.

Since I cannot find out what happened to Ethel Cain Robitchek’s daughter Georgia either, I don’t know whether there are any living descendants of Charlotte Seligman and her husband Max Schlesinger. Harriet’s other daughter Lucie did not marry. Lillie had no children. Louis’s son Arthur died at a young age. But what I did learn about Charlotte and her family is that this was a family where many marriages ended early either due to divorce or death. Lillie was widowed twice. Harriet was left a widow at a young age with her two young daughters. Her daughter Ethel’s marriage was over by the time Ethel’s daughter Georgia was only two. And Louis married twice, though I don’t know if the first ended because his first wife died or because they divorced.

So many unanswered questions. I am hoping that with further digging, some answers will turn up, but for now I must say that searching for the family of Charlotte Seligman has made me feel like a very poor researcher and a very frustrated genealogist! If any of you out there reading have any suggestions on how I might find more about these people, please let me know.



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Four Generations 2015

Posted on August 3, 2015 by Amy

I’ve spent much time these last several years absorbed in past generations of my family, but frankly nothing is as rewarding as spending time with the four present generations of my family—from my parents to my grandsons. Having all four generations together for a week—eating, playing, laughing, and even arguing with each other—was wonderful. Here are a few photographs, almost all courtesy of my son-in-law Brian and my cousin Jody.

Four generations

Now I am energized to dive back once again into the past so that I can preserve the family’s history for the next four generations.

Stopping the Tide

Posted on July 24, 2015 by Amy

I will be taking a break from the blog for the next week or so as I will be spending time with my family. I have a number of projects on hold—more from the Seligmann handwritten family tree, more from my newly found cousin Lotte, more about the Schoenfelds. But right now other members of my family—especially my two grandsons—will be the focus of my attention.

For the past several days we have been taking care of our older grandson; we brought him to the beach where he swam and walked through the water until I was exhausted (he wasn’t), dug holes, and did other beach activities. But the activity that charmed me the most was when he tried to stop the tide from advancing. Oh, to be five and to think that you can stop the tides— and time—-from advancing.

Stopping the tide

From Cigars to Security, and Heartbreak and Heart Disease: The Family of Jacob Seligman

Posted on July 23, 2015 by Amy

The second child of Marx and Sarah Seligmann was Jacob. As I wrote in an earlier post, he married Mathilde Kerbs in 1881, and they had four sons and one daughter: Max (1882), Harry (1883), Louis (1885), Samuel (1888), and Beatrice (1902). Jacob was a cigar packer, and the family was living at 303 East 69^th Street in 1900. Max and Harry were both working as salesman, according to the 1900 census.



Embed from Getty Images

The family suffered a terrible loss when Max died on November 25, 1903. He was only 21 years old. He died from typhoid fever and pneumonia.

Maxwell Seligman death certificate 1903

In 1905, the remaining members of the family were living at 212 East 40^th Street. Harry was a police officer, Louis an errand boy, and Samuel a stock keeper (I assume in a store). Their father Jacob was still a cigar packer.

On July 17, 1907, Samuel, the youngest son, married Frances Hooton, the daughter of William Proctor Hooton and Hannah Newman.

Marriage certificate of Samuel Seligman and Frances Hooton

William was born in England and was a shipping clerk; Hannah (usually referred to as Annie) was his second wife. His first wife Deborah Newman (perhaps Annie’s sister?) died in 1879, leaving him with four children. After having two children with Annie, including Frances in 1886, William lost his second wife Annie when she died on November 27, 1887. William himself died in 1901 when Frances was only fifteen, and she ended up living with one of her sisters, working as a dressmaker. [Thanks to the generosity of Chip Bennett, a relative of the Hootons, I am able to share some photographs of Frances Hooton Seligman and her children.] When Samuel and Frances married, he was only nineteen and she was 21.

Their first child Marion was born a year later in July, 1908.

Marion Seligman
photo courtesy of Chip Bennett

In February 1910, their second child Maxwell was born. According to the 1910 census, the family was living at 349 East 82^nd Street, and Samuel was working as a special officer for the Highway Department. A third child was born to Samuel and Frances in 1913; his name was William.

Frances Hooton Seligman with Max and Marion and her niece Ethel
Photo courtesy of Chip Bennett

Meanwhile, the other children of Jacob and Mathilde Seligman were still living with their parents in 1910. Jacob was still in the cigar business, and Harry was still working as a city police officer. Louis had no occupation listed, and Beatrice was only eight years old.

Harry married Rose Weis on March 24, 1912. Rose was the daughter of Joseph/Ignatz Weis and Henrietta Schoen, Hungarian immigrants. Her father was an upholsterer. As far as I can tell, Harry and Rose did not have any children. In 1915, Harry continued to work as a police officer. He and Rose were living at 349 East 84^th Street, according to the 1915 census.

Jacob Seligman died on December 16, 1915. He was 63 years old. His son Louis was married a year and a half later; he married Fannie Zinck on June 2, 1917. She was born in Alsace-Lorraine in about 1889 and immigrated to the US around 1902. Unfortunately, I have not been able to find any more about Fannie’s background. Louis and Fannie did not have any children.

According to his World War I draft registration, Louis was employed as a canvasser by his brother Samuel in 1918; according to Samuel’s registration, he was self-employed as a watchman. What would Louis have been doing as a canvasser for a watchman? They were living not far from each other, Louis and Fannie at 506 East 83^rd Street, Sam and Frances and their children at 242 East 85^th Street. Harry and Rose were also nearby—at 409 East 84^th Street; Harry (using the name Henry on his draft registration) was still a New York City patrolman. I found it interesting that all three brothers were in some aspect of the security business.

Their mother Mathilde Kerbs Seligman died on March 12, 1918; she was 54 years old. Beatrice, the youngest sibling, was only sixteen years old and orphaned. She moved in with her brother Louis and his wife Fannie, according to the 1920 census. They were then living at 307 East 78^th Street; Louis listed his occupation as special officer on night patrol, and Beatrice was a typist. In 1920, Harry and Rose continued to live at 409 East 84^th Street, and Harry continued to work as a police officer. Sam, Frances, and their three children were still living at 242 East 85^th Street, and Sam was still working as a night watchman.

Things remained pretty much the same in 1925. Louis, Fannie, and Beatrice were still living on 78^th Street. Louis was now working as a mechanic, according to the 1925 New York census; it looks like Beatrice’s occupation was a correspondent. I am not sure what that means. Samuel and his family were still on 85^th Street. Sam had his own business, and his two oldest children were working: Marion doing clerical work and Maxwell as a helper—perhaps in their father’s business? I have not been able to locate Harry and Rose on the 1925 New York census.

Marion Seligman as a young girl
photo courtesy of Chip Bennett

Samuel and Frances Seligman’s son Maxwell married Helene Sumner on August 25, 1927. Helene was the daughter of Edward Sumner and Priscilla nee McCarthy, who were English-born immigrants; her father was an engineer. Maxwell was only 17 years old when they married (although listed as 22 on the marriage record, all other records indicate he was born in 1910); Helene was listed as 17, but all her earlier records say she was born in 1912, making her only 15 in 1927. Given how young they were, I might have thought that Helene was pregnant (and maybe she was), but their first and only child, Joseph, was not born until 1929.

Maxwell Seligman as a young boy
Photo courtesy of Chip Bennett

The 1920s ended very sadly for the family. On March 9, 1929, Samuel Seligman died; he was only 40 years old and left behind his wife Frances and their three children. He died from angina pectoris and myocarditis—heart disease.

Samuel Seligman death certificate 1929

Marion was 21, Maxwell 19, and William only 16 years old when their father died. Frances remarried a man named Frank Mildrum on February 16, 1931, according to the records in the New York marriage index on Ancestry, although according to the 1930 census, she was already married to Frank, as she is listed as his wife and living with him and two of her children, Marion and William, in the Bronx. Frank also had a thirteen year old daughter Florence from his prior marriage. Frank was a private detective. Marion Seligman was working as an office clerk.

Louis Seligman did not live much longer than his brother Samuel. In 1930 he and Fannie as well as his sister Beatrice were still living at 308 East 78^th Street. Louis had his own business in protective alarms, and Beatrice was a clerk for an express company, according to the census. But on October 23, 1931, Louis died from luetic aortitis and chronic myocarditis at age 44. Heart disease had contributed to the death of yet another family member. Of the four sons born to Jacob and Mathilde Kerbs Seligman, only Harry was still alive.

Louis Seligman death certificate 1931

By 1930 Harry and his wife Rose had moved in with her parents and siblings in Brooklyn, and Harry was no longer working as a police officer, but instead as a clerk in a brokerage house. Harry was 49 years old; he had been working for the police force since at least 1905. Why would he and Rose have moved in with her family after all those years living on their own? Was Harry disabled? Had he reached eligibility for retirement? Did the police force even have a pension back then? According to this article from the official New York City website, there was some form of pension for police officers dating back to the 19th century.

I don’t know the answers to these questions, but I do know that Harry died just seven years later on March 6, 1937. He was fifty-six years old and died from “coronary thrombosis with cerebral and pulmonary emboli induced by generalized arteriosclerosis.” (The parents’ names on this certificate are clearly in error, but this is also clearly the correct Harry Seligman, son of Jacob and Mathilde.)

Harry (Henry) Seligman death certificate 1937

The New York Times March 7, 1937

Beatrice Seligman had been orphaned by the time she was sixteen, and now she had lost all of her siblings by time she was 35 years old. In 1940 she was living as a lodger on West 99^th Street and still working for the express company as a stenographer. She was single and 38 years old. After that, I cannot find her. I don’t know whether she ever married or what happened to her after 1940. I don’t know when she died.

Of the five children born to Jacob and Mathilde Seligman, only one, Samuel, had had any children. As noted above, Samuel and Frances Seligman’s son Maxwell married Helene Sumner as a teenager, and they had a son Joseph born in 1929. I saw on Ancestry that Joseph died when he was three years old in 1932. When I received the death certificate, I was shocked. Joseph had been hit by a car on 85th Street between Second and Third Avenue and had sustained a fractured skull. How could something like this happen to a three year old child?

It appears that the marriage between Maxwell and Helene did not survive the death of their son. In 1939, Maxwell traveled with his brother William to Key West, Florida. On the 1940 census Maxwell and William were both living with their mother Frances Hooton Seligman Mildrum, who had been widowed again when Frank Mildrum died in June, 1939. Frank’s daughter Florence was also living with them. Maxwell and William were both working as collectors for a detective agency; according to the 1940 census, both Maxwell and William had been living in the same house in 1935, suggesting that Maxwell’s marriage had ended by then.

William Seligman as a young boy
Photo courtesy of Chip Bennett

As for Marion, Samuel and Frances Seligman’s other child, she married Howard Fairweather on July 3, 1932. He was the son of Howard and Margaret (Duffy) Fairweather. This also appears to be a marriage that did not last. On the 1940 census, Howard and Marion were living on Undercliff Avenue in the Bronx. Although Marion was working as a secretary at Star Protection Company, Howard had no occupation listed.

Marion may have been more than a secretary; she may have been THE secretary of the company. According to an article from the New York Times dated January 27, 1940 about a labor strike at the company (Star Electric Protective Company, a burglar alarm company), Marion Fairweather was at that time the treasurer of the company.

Marion Fairweather burglar alarm strike

Marion and Howard had no children. In 1942 Howard was serving in the armed forces as a private and still listed his status as married. He reported that his occupation was as a non-public police officer, so I assume a private detective. After that I have no records for them together. Marion traveled alone several times in the 1950s. Perhaps they were still married, but I have no documentation for either of them until their deaths. Howard Fairweather died in Atlantic City in 1976; Marion Seligman Fairweather died July 27, 1988. Her last residence had been in New York City.

William had enlisted in the military on 1942. In July, 1953, he traveled to Bermuda. It appears that William never married. William P. Seligman is listed in the New York City telephone directory in 1959 and 1960, and there is a Max Seligman as well, but I don’t know if it is the correct Max since even within the family there were several Max Seligmans. William died on June 2, 1964. His death notice in the New York Times mentioned only his sister Marion Fairweather as a survivor so Max must have predeceased him. Unfortunately I cannot locate a death record or obituary for Max.

The New York Times, June 4, 1964

None of the children of Samuel Seligman had children, and Samuel was the only child of Jacob Seligman to have children, and thus the line of Jacob Seligman, son of Marx and Sarah Seligmann, ended when Marion Seligman Fairweather died in 1988. Looking back at their story, this seemed to be a family that was succeeding in America—three sons who were all involved in personal and property security in some form or another. But they were also three sons who died far too young in addition to the fourth son who died as a very young man. There was the tragedy of a three year old child killed by a car and the marriage between his two young parents that failed not long after that death. It is also a family that has no living descendants to carry on the names or the stories of these people.

Descendants of Jacob Seligman and Mathilde Kerbs

Gifts from My Cousin Steve

Posted on July 19, 2015 by Amy

How very lucky I have been in finding my Seligman cousins. Starting with my cousin Pete from Santa Fe, then my cousin Wolfgang in Germany, then my cousin Suzanne from Scranton, and now two more cousins: Lotte, a descendant of Hieronymous Seligmann, brother of my great-great-grandfather Bernard, and Steve, a descendant of Marx Seligman, brother of my three-times-great-grandfather Moritz. I will talk about Lotte in subsequent posts, but for now I will continue the story of Marx Seligman and his descendants.

Steve is a grandson of Sigmund Seligman, the oldest child of Marx and Sarah Seligman, and as I mentioned last time, he has generously shared with me many photographs of his family as well as personal anecdotes about them. All the photographs in this post are courtesy of Steve. I am filled with gratitude to him for bringing to life his father Leo, his aunt Mary, and his uncles Max and Albert.

In my earlier post about Marx and his descendants, I wrote that “Sigmund and Charlotte had five children between 1883 and 1896: Mary (1883), Max (1884), Leo (1891), Theresa (1894), and Albert (1896). Sigmund was employed in the insurance industry. In 1900, they were living at 304 East 117th Street.” As posted last time, here is a family photograph of Sigmund and Charlotte and their children from about that time, estimated to be taken in 1901.

Sigmund Seligman and family about 1901. Standing rear: Mary, Max. Sitting middle row: Sigmund, Albert, Leo, and Charlotte. In front: Theresa
Photo courtesy of Steve Seligman

Tragedy struck this happy family on September 27, 1902, when eight year old Theresa, the little girl seated in front, died from tubercular meningitis.

Theresa Seligman death certificate

In 1905, the remaining children were all still living with their parents at 89 East 121^st Street; Sigmund was a supervisor in an insurance company, Max was working as a bookkeeper, and the other boys were in school. Mary was home.

As noted last time, Mary married Joseph Brandenburg (later Brandt) in 1907. By 1910, her parents and brothers had moved to 275 East 123^rd Street. Sigmund was still working as a supervisor in the insurance company, now identified as Metropolitan Life. Both Max and Leo were working as clerks for American Pencil Company, and Albert was only fourteen and presumably in school.

In 1915, the family had relocated again to 60 West 129^th Street; Sigmund was still in the insurance business. The census does not report what businesses they were working in, but Max was working as an assistant manager, Leo as a salesman, and Albert as a stock clerk.

Sigmund Seligman and family 1915 NY census New York State Archives; Albany, New York; State Population Census Schedules, 1915; Election District: 09; Assembly District: 21; City: New York; County: New York; Page: 35

Sigmund and Charlotte’s first grandchild, Jerrold Thurston Brandt, son of Joseph and Mary (Seligman) Brandt, was born on June 15, 1913.

On October 12, 1915, Max married Pauline Hirsch. Pauline’s father Samuel was a German immigrant working as a watchman; her mother had died in 1901. Pauline had been working as a bookkeeper for a clothing company in 1910. Pauline and Max had a daughter Theresa born August 15, 1916, presumably named for Max’s little sister Theresa, who had died in 1902.

Both Leo and Albert served in World War I. Leo served stateside near Jacksonville, Florida; Albert was sent overseas where he was gassed on the battlefields of France. According to his nephew Steve, Albert never fully regained his health, suffering from heart problems and pneumonia all his life.

Leo Seligman World War I courtesy of Steve Seligman

Albert Seligman World War I photo courtesy of Steve Seligman

By 1920 Sigmund had retired. He and Charlotte were still living with two of their sons, Leo and Albert, as well as a boarder. Home from the war, Leo was a salesman for a cloak company, and Albert was a merchant in ladies’ clothing.

On April 18, 1920, Leo married Jeanette Freundlich, the daughter of Morris and Martha Freundlich. Morris was an immigrant from the Austria-Hungary Empire, and according to his passport application, he was born in Krakow. Morris was a furrier and had his own business. According to the 1920 census, Jeanette and her brothers Julian and Edwin were all helping their father in his business. Jeanette and Leo had three children in the 1920s, Joan, my newly-found cousin Steven, and Edward.

Leo Seligman and his family

Joan Seligman

Edward, Joan and Steven Seligman

Edward and Steven Seligman about 1938

Joan Seligman, age 13

In 1920 Max was working as the assistant manager in the pencil company, and he and his family were living at 424 East 51^st Street.

Albert Seligman married Bella Heftler on November 20, 1921. Bella was the youngest of ten children of Max and Sarah Heftler, who were Hungarian immigrants. Max Heflter was supporting that large family as a tailor, with his two oldest daughters working in a shirt factory in 1900. By 1920, Max had died, and Bella was working as a bookkeeper, still living with her mother and five of her siblings. In 1923, Bella and Albert Seligman had a son Maxwell, named presumably for Bella’s father.

Albert Seligman courtesy of Steve Seligman

Bella Heftler Seligman courtesy of Steve Seligman

Maxwell Seligman courtesy of Steve Seligman

Sigmund Seligman died on June 15, 1924. He was 74 years old. His wife Charlotte survived him by ten years, dying on July 18, 1934. She was 75 years old.

Sigmund Seligman and Charlotte Koppel Seligman

As for their children, in 1930 Max was working as the manager of a movie theater and living with his family on West 97^th Street. Leo was living with his family on Cathedral Parkway (110^th Street) and working in coat manufacturing. Albert and his family were living on Jesup Avenue in the Bronx, and Albert was a salesman in the film industry. Mary and Joe Brandt were living with their son Jerrold at 23 West 73^rd Street, and Joe was one of the owners of what was now called Columbia Pictures.

By 1940, all three brothers were somehow connected to the film industry. Joe Brandt had left Columbia Pictures in 1932 and had died in 1939, but he somehow must have connected his three brothers-in-law to the movie industry. According to the 1940 census, Max Seligman was working as a purchasing agent for Columbia Pictures. His draft registration for World War II says that Columbia Pictures was his employer. Leo reported that he had his own office as a film distributor on the 1940 census, and on his World War II draft registration he said his employer was Max Seligman. According to Steve, his father distributed foreign films as well as children’s cartoons for a local movie theater. As for Albert, the 1940 census reports his occupation as a movie theater manager, but on his World War II draft registration he listed his employer as Columbia Pictures. Steve said that Albert was in the publicity department. Thus, by 1942 all three brothers appear to have been working in the film business.

Max (front left), Leo (rear on right), and Mary (front right) and two friends playing cards
Courtesy of Steve Seligman

Mary had also moved back from Hollywood to New York at some point after Joe died, and her nephew Steve remembers that she would often take him and his siblings to the movies. Steve wrote, “Aunt Mary would march up to the box office and demand to see the manager. When he came out she would come up with the same pitch. ‘My husband was President and co-founder of Columbia Pictures and this child and I would like to see this picture.’ I never remember being turned away.”

Mary Seligman Brandt
Photo courtesy of Steve Seligman

About his Uncle Max, Steve wrote, “Uncle Max had a habit of saying almost everything twice. When I would go and visit him and my Aunt Pauline, Uncle Max would invariably open the door and say, ‘Hello my boy, hello my boy, how are you, how are you.’ Even during conversations it would happen. I don’t know whether he thought we were hard of hearing or if he just wanted to emphasize what he said. Not everything was repeated, of course, but enough times for my brother Eddie and my cousin Maxwell to refer to him as Uncle Max, Uncle Max.”

Steve also wrote this loving tribute to his father, Leo Seligman, the middle brother:

One thing you could say about my father was that he was a lousy ballplayer. He couldn’t throw, he couldn’t catch, he didn’t even follow the baseball teams. When my brother Eddie and I would be in our room listening to a replay of the day’s games, my father would be in the living room reading the paper and surely not the sports page. But in other ways he managed to spend quality time with us. In the summer almost every Sunday we would go up to the roof of our apartment building with bridge chairs and hang out for a couple of hours. He would have contests between Eddie and me testing our spelling, math and memory skills. Eddie would always win the math contest but I managed to hold my own in the other games. I think whoever won would get a nickel, nothing to get crazy over but enough to tide us over in the candy store. In my early teens on Sundays in the spring he and I would rent bikes and go bike riding in Central Park. It’s amazing but I still remember the store. The owners name was Aug, it was on 81st St. and he charged a quarter an hour. That was fun. What my father lacked in ball playing he made up on a bike. One other thing; he never spanked us. When I misbehaved he would “flick” my ear, hard. It’s hard to describe what “flicking” an ear is but if you put your forefinger against your thumb and release it strongly, that’s flicking. It really didn’t hurt much but it didn’t matter, we knew we were being punished.

Leo Seligman

Leo and Jeanette (Freundlich) Seligman

All three brothers died within five years of each other. Albert, the youngest, died first on October 6, 1948. He was only 52 years old and had been plagued with poor health since his service during World War I. Leo died on January 1, 1952; he was just sixty years old. Max, the oldest of the three, died the following year on March 9, 1953; he was 68.

Mary Seligman Brandt, the oldest of the children of Sigmund and Charlotte Koppel Seligman, lived the longest. She died in February, 1977, at the age of 94.

Thank you once again to my cousin Steve Seligman for sharing his photographs and his stories with me. I am so pleased that we have found each other. These new contacts and the pleasure they bring me continue to be the most meaningful benefits I get from doing genealogy and writing this blog. Here are some additional photographs of Steve’s family:

Steve’s brother Eddie Seligman

Steve’s wife Arline

Joan Seligman’s husband Bennett Pollard

Steve and Arline Seligman

Nancy (nee Seligman) and Barry Buzzuro

Steve and Arline Seligman and daughter Nancy

Jane Brenwasser Jacobs, great-granddaughter of Sigmund Seligman

I Could Have Been A Contender*

Posted on July 16, 2015 by Amy

The original CBC Film Sales logo used from 1919 through 1924 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

As I continued to research the descendants of my four-times-great-uncle Marx Seligman, one thing kept bothering me. I had not yet confirmed one of the facts asserted in the second handwritten tree discovered by my cousin Wolfgang. That second handwritten tree, which had led me to Marx and his family, claimed (1) that Marx had remarried and moved to New York. That was true about the Marx I was following—he had married Sara Koppel and moved to New York City.

The creator of that second tree also claimed that (2) Marx and Sara had had a son who (also) married a woman whose surname was Koppel (or Coppel). That also proved to be true of the Marx I was following: his son Sigmund had married a woman named Charlotte Koppel, born in Germany (and likely related to Sigmund’s mother).

But there was one more specific fact that the tree had mentioned that I had not yet confirmed: (3) that the son had had a daughter who married a film agent. As I researched up to 1900, I had not yet uncovered anyone involved in the film industry who was related to Marx. Being a big movie fan, I was disappointed not to find a connection to Hollywood.

But then I entered the 20^th century in my research. While researching the children of Sigmund Seligman as they entered adulthood, I found the answer. According to another family tree I found on Ancestry owned by Sharon Bolton, Sigmund and Charlotte’s first child, Mary, married a man named Joseph Brandt, who was born on July 20, 1882, in Troy, New York. I am always very reluctant to rely on anyone else’s tree, having seen so many that are unsourced and clearly carelessly done, but this one seemed very thorough and included many photographs as well as personal stories by Sigmund’s grandson, Steve. (I am now in touch with both Sharon and Steve, and they generously shared wonderful photographs and stories about Sigmund’s family. I will post more photographs in a subsequent post.)

Sigmund Seligman and family about 1901. Standing rear: Mary, Max. Sitting middle row: Sigmund, Albert, Leo, and Charlotte. In front: Theresa
Photo courtesy of Steve Seligman

According to Joseph Brandt’s record on the 1920 census, his father was born in Russia and spoke Yiddish; his mother was born in Germany.

Joseph Brandt and family 1920 census
Source Citation
Year: 1920; Census Place: Manhattan Assembly District 23, New York, New York; Roll: T625_1227; Page: 38B; Enumeration District: 1506; Image: 543

I could not find Joseph on any census before or after 1920, and I could not find anything else about his parents or family. (Sharon also had nothing about his background on her tree.) Based on his birth date and birth place as recorded on Sharon’s family tree, the only other official records I could find for him were his 1913 passport application, his 1918 World War I draft registration card, and several ship manifests for his travels with Mary.

But his draft registration corroborated that third missing fact from the handwritten family tree. According to his 1918 draft registration card, Joseph was then employed as an attorney and assistant treasurer for Universal Film Manufacturing Company. Now I had evidence that the Marx Seligman I had been following was the same man discussed in the handwritten family tree: Marx’s son Sigmund had married a woman named Koppel; they had had a daughter (Mary) who married a “film agent.”

Registration State: New York; Registration County: New York; Roll: 1787086; Draft Board: 170

Of course, Joe Brandt was more than a film agent. In fact, he was much, much more. Once I saw that he was in fact involved in the film industry, I googled his name and learned more. From Wikipedia and his obituary in the New York Times on February 23, 1939, p.28, I learned that Joe Brandt was one of the founders and the first president of Columbia Pictures. Joe had graduated from NYU Law School in 1906 and had worked in the advertising industry for several years before being hired in 1912 by Carl Laemmle, the founder of Universal Film Manufacturing, today known as Universal Studios. In 1919 he and two brothers he had known at Universal,, Harry and Jack Cohn, formed their own film production company, known first as C.B.C. Film Sales (for Cohn Brandt Cohn) and later known as Columbia Pictures.

Christmas ad in The Film Daily December 1920 p 1484

Joe sold his interest in Columbia Pictures in 1932 and then became president of two other film companies before retiring due to poor health in 1935. Joe died at the age of 56 on February 22, 1939. Joe and Mary had had one child, a son named Jerrold Thurston Brandt, who would also enter the movie industry.

Joe Brandt obit NYTimes February 23, 1939

But why couldn’t I find out anything about Joe’s background before entering the film industry other than his birth in Troy, New York, in 1882? From a link in the Wikipedia entry, I found this little snippet about him from a journal called Moving Picture World dated April 6, 1912:

Joe had changed his name from Brandenburg to Brandt. There is also a reference to his name change in this article from the February 1, 1913 edition of Motography:

Once I knew his original name, I had no trouble locating his parents and his siblings. Joseph Brandenburg was the son of Daniel and Rosa Brandenburg. Daniel was born in 1846 in Russia, and according to the 1900 census, had arrived in the United States in 1870. His wife Rosa was born in Prussia in 1847 and had immigrated to the US in 1865, according to the 1900 census. Daniel and Rosa had married in 1871, and by 1880 they were living in Troy, New York, where Daniel was working as a tailor. They had three children by that time: Albert, Lilly, and Anna. Joseph was their youngest child, born in 1882. At some point the family must have moved to New York City because the article reprinted above from Motography states that Joe was educated in the NYC public schools. On the 1900 census, Daniel and Rosa were living in New York City with all of their children, including Joe, who was already a lawyer, according to the census report. Daniel was still working as a tailor. Joe was still living with his parents as of the 1905 New York census and was still listed as a lawyer on that census record.

On October 20, 1907, Joseph Brandenburg married Mary Seligman in New York City.

New York, New York City Marriage Records, 1829-1940,” database, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:24HY-X9K : accessed 15 July 2015), Joseph Brandenburg and Mary Seligman, 20 Oct 1907; citing Marriage, Manhattan, New York, New York, United States, New York City Municipal Archives, New York; FHL microfilm .

He was still using the Brandenburg surname as of 1910, when according to the census, he was working in advertising for Billboard magazine. He and Mary were living at 3161 Broadway in NYC. Sometime between 1910 and 1913 when he applied for a passport, Joe changed his surname to Brandt, as that is how he appears on every document thereafter.

Joseph Brandt passport application 1913 National Archives and Records Administration (NARA); Washington D.C.; NARA Series: Passport Applications, January 2, 1906 - March 31, 1925; Roll #: 194; Volume #: Roll 0194 - Certificates: 14182-15185, 07 Aug 1913-30 Aug 1913

Joe Brandt passport application 1913
National Archives and Records Administration (NARA); Washington D.C.; NARA Series: Passport Applications, January 2, 1906 – March 31, 1925; Roll #: 194; Volume #: Roll 0194 – Certificates: 14182-15185, 07 Aug 1913-30 Aug 1913

Joe Brandt’s story is another one of those remarkable American dreams come true. The son of a Russian Jewish immigrant who worked as a tailor, Joe not only went to college and law school. He became a major figure in the burgeoning American film industry of the early 20th century and an extremely wealthy man, according to his nephew Steve. In fact, if I hadn’t found the facts myself, I’d say it was just a Hollywood story made to perpetuate the myth of the American dream. But it is in fact a real story.

Mary Seligman Brandt, my second cousin, three times removed
Photo courtesy of Steve Seligman

Moving Picture World July-September 1913, p. 728 http://archive.org/stream/movingpicturewor17newy#page/727/mode/1up

————-

* From On the Waterfront, a Columbia Pictures film

The Case of the Disappearing Twin: Edith and Lucie Cain

Posted on July 14, 2015 by Amy

In my last post, I wrote about the family of Marx and Sarah Seligman. One of their daughters, Charlotte, had married Max Schlesinger, who worked in the tie industry, and they had had four children, including a daughter Harriet, born 1875. Harriet had married George Cain in 1897, and on the 1900 census, George and Harriet had one daughter, Edith, born in May, 1900, just a month before the census was taken in June. George’s sister Lucie was also living with them.

Cain family 1900 census Year: 1900; Census Place: Manhattan, New York, New York; Roll: 1119; Page: 16A; Enumeration District: 0852; FHL microfilm: 1241119

When I found Harriet and George on the 1910 census, I was bewildered. There were now two daughters, Lucy [sic], aged nine, and Ethel, age eight.

Cain Family 1910 US census
Year: 1910; Census Place: Manhattan Ward 12, New York, New York; Roll: T624_1022; Page: 1B; Enumeration District: 0533; FHL microfilm: 1375035

What had happened to Edith? At first I thought the census taker had just listed Edith by the wrong name. But then the ages didn’t make sense. Then I thought Lucie was born in 1901, a year after Edith, and then Ethel in 1902. But where was Edith? Had Edith died? Plus on the 1900 census Harriet reported that she had had one child and one alive, and on the 1910 census she reported that she’d had two children, and two were alive.

I searched on both Ancestry and on FamilySearch, and I didn’t find any death certificates for a child named Edith Cain between 1900 and 1910. But I did turn up something strange. FamilySearch had two New York City birth records for daughters born to Harriet Schlesinger and George Cain on the same day, May 28, 1900, one named Edith, one named Lucie.

So where was Lucie in 1900? Maybe she had been sick and in a hospital when the census was taken? But then where was Edith in 1910? Had there been twins? Had Edith died? What really puzzled me was that both records had the same certificate number. Usually if there were twins, there would be two separate certificates each with its own unique number.

But all FamilySearch had were these summaries of the certificates, not images of the actual certificates. I turned to the New York City Genealogy group on Facebook for some insights. People there were just as mystified, but one group member, Jim Murray, offered to help. He was going to the NYC archives two days later and offered to look up and transcribe the two certificates.

What Jim found was that the two certificates were the same as described on FamilySearch, and in addition they had different home addresses for the family. The one for Edith had 166 W. 122nd St. as the father’s address; the one for Lucie had 202 W. 123rd St. as the father’s address. I went back to the 1900 census and found that the family was living at 166 W. 122^nd Street on June 9, 1900, when the census was taken, just twelve days after the baby or babies were born.

I asked Jim if he had noticed the dates that each certificate was filed, and he said he would go back and check. In the meantime, I had a brainstorm. What had happened to Lucie, George’s sister, between 1900 and 1910? Had she married? She was no longer living with George and Harriet. A few more clicks on Ancestry, and I found out why. Lucie had died on June 26, 1900, just a few weeks after the 1900 census and less than a month after Harriet and George’s baby or babies were born. Had Harriet and George changed their baby’s name in memory of her aunt Lucie?

I waited for Jim’s answer and also waited to receive electronic copies of the actual birth certificates for Edith and Lucie and of the death certificate for George’s sister Lucie. What I then learned seemed to confirm my theory—that the baby was named Edith at first, but then renamed Lucie after George’s sister died. The first certificate for Edith was filed by the doctor on June 9, 1900; the second certificate with the name Lucie was filed by her mother Harriet on July 6, 1900. I also noticed that the second certificate had both the old address and new address on it with the old address as the place of birth. I was convinced that the baby born Edith was renamed Lucie after her aunt died.

Somehow the city allowed Harriet to file the second certificate without rescinding the first one so two birth certificates are still on file 115 years later for one baby, born Edith, but then renamed Lucie.

Her aunt Lucie, for whom she’d been renamed, had died at age 38 of chronic nephritis. (Notice that the doctor who signed the death certificate is the same one who filled out the first birth certificate for Edith-Lucie.)

Death certificate for Lucie Cain, George Cain’s sister

It must have been a time of such emotional turmoil for George and his family—the joy (and strain) of having a newborn baby mixed with the heartbreak of losing his sister at such a young age. Perhaps the bureaucrat at City Hall had acted out of sympathy, not carelessness, in allowing this second certificate to be filed. And by allowing the first to stay on file, the story of how George honored his sister was there to be discovered 115 years later.

Brotmanblog: A Family Journey

Adventures in Genealogy

Author Archives: Amy

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The Case of the Disappearing Twin: Edith and Lucie Cain

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