Another Addition to the Brotman Family Tree: David Brotman and his wife Annie

Posted on February 7, 2014 by Amy

Family Tree drawn by Elaine Goldschlager Lehbraum

As you may recall, a couple of weeks ago my cousin Jody made a big discovery: handwritten notes that her mother had made of Joseph Brotman’s children. It included all the children we already knew about: Bessie’s children Hyman, Tillie, Gussie, Frieda (Florence in her notes) and Sam, as well as the two sons we knew of from Joseph’s first marriage, Abraham and Max. My brother had recalled that our aunt had said Joseph had had four children from his first marriage, but we did not know the names of the two remaining children, and I had traced every possible Brotman I could find to see if there was a link. I had hit many dead ends and found nothing that linked these other Brotmans to our family.

My aunt’s notes were a huge discovery because for the first time we had evidence of the names of those two missing children: David and Sophie. As I wrote when Jody first sent me the tree, I was able to locate a David Brotman from Austria who was a possible match for Joseph’s missing son, but I needed to check further and obtain some documentation in order to be sure.

Well, those documents arrived the other day, and I was so excited to see that on David’s marriage certificate in 1897, he listed his father’s name as Joseph Brotman and his mother’s as Chaye Fortgang.

David Brotman and Annie Salpeter marriage certificate

You may recall that Max had also listed his mother’s name as Chaye on his marriage certificate, so this confirmed that Joseph’s first wife was named Chaye, but now we know her surname as well.

Max Brotman marriage certificate

In addition, the marriage certificate gave David’s current address as 85 Ridge Street—the same address where Joseph and Bessie were living in 1895 when Gussie was born, according to her birth certificate.

Gussie birth certificate

This confirmed for me that David was Joseph’s son, Max and Abraham’s full brother, half-brother to Hyman, Tillie, Gussie, Frieda and Sam, and our great-uncle. I am still in a state of amazement that I was able to find him. Thank you, Aunt Elaine, for leaving behind this great clue to our family.

Once I had this information confirming the relationship, I located whatever census reports and other records I could find for David and his wife, Annie Salpeter. I found them on census reports for 1900, 1905, 1910, and 1920. David was a tailor according to the first three census reports, and he and Annie were living on the Lower East Side until at least 1910. At times Annie’s brother Morris lived with them as well as a cousin Meier, but there were no children listed on any of these census reports.

At the time of his World War I draft registration in 1917, David and Annie had left the Lower East Side and were living at 143 Manhattan Avenue in Brooklyn, which was also their address on the 1920 census report, when David’s occupation was given as a cloak dealer in a “cloak house.” Annie and David were now 44 years old and still had no children living with them, so I assume that they never had children. So there are no more second cousins to find and probably no pictures of David and Annie. (But I’ve learned never to say never.)

I’ve yet to find David and Annie on the 1930 or 1940 censuses, but I am still looking. It seems unlikely that they had left Brooklyn. I was able to locate a 1946 death certificate for a David Brotman married to Anna living at 10 Sumner Avenue in Brooklyn, and I believe this is the same David, despite the fact that the death certificate has his father’s name as Isaac. I’ve learned enough to know that death certificates are notoriously unreliable. I will continue to see if I can find anything about David and Annie after 1920.

I do have David’s petition for naturalization in 1920, and it indicates that he had arrived in NYC on October 14, 1889, on the “Updam” from Tarnof, Austria.

David Brotman petition for naturalization 1920

Tarnof could be Tarnow, a city about fifty miles north of Tarnobrzeg/Dzikow and even further from Czchow, the two areas that I have been focusing on as the Brotman hometown based on Hyman’s listing of “Jeekief” and “Giga” on his documents. But Tarnof could also be Tarnobrzeg, the larger town that is near Dzikow. So did this new information help our search for our hometown in Galicia or did it just make it more confusing?

That led me to search for the ship manifest for David, now that I knew when he arrived and on what ship. With some help from Renee, I located a September 4, 1889, German ship manifest for the Portia, sailing to Rotterdam, listing Dawid Brodmann as a passenger. I was excited to see that David was traveling with his older brother, Abe Brodmann. I had not previously been able to find Abraham on a ship manifest, so this was another exciting discovery.

David and Abe Brodmann on the Portia 1889

On the Portia ship manifest, Abe and David are listed as coming from “Grambow, Russland,” not Austria at all, let alone Tarnow, Tarnobrzeg, Dzikow or Czchow. I would have found this an indication that these were not the right boys, but there is a town right near Tarnobrzeg called Grebow, and according to a 1914 map, Tarnobrzeg was very close to the Russian border. So perhaps our family lived in Grebow? Or maybe that is where Joseph lived with Chaye and then moved to Dzikow when he married Bessie?

On the manifest for the Obdam, sailing from Rotterdam to New York arriving on September 19, 1889, David and Abe are listed as coming from Austria, not Russia, which appears to be correct.

David and Abe Brodman on the Obdam to New York 1889

There is obviously some confusion and conflict here, but it’s another clue and another place to look for the Brotman home in Galicia. I already have contacted several people researching this area to see if I can uncover more clues.

I have a few more leads to follow to fill in the gaps in David’s life story, and maybe they will even lead me to Sophie, the only remaining child of Joseph to locate. There is also some potential evidence that will link our family to the Brotmanville Brotmans, but again, I need to do more research before it is worth speculating about that connection.

The Illusion of Accuracy: Hyman Brotman’s Story

Maurice Goldschlager

Posted on February 6, 2014 by Amy

A number of the photographs I received from Robin were of her father, my uncle, Maurice (Mike) Goldschlager. I asked Robin to provide me with some information about her father’s life to fill in what I know so that I could write a short biography to go with her photos. Much of this was new information to me. What I knew of my uncle was that he was a man who had a wonderful sense of humor, a big tease who pinched our ears whenever we saw him, a man who loved his family, animals and the outdoors, a good businessman, a man who had served his country proudly, a man who was full of passion and loved life.

Isadore Gussie Maurice and Elaine about 1923

Maurice Lawrence (really Leon but he hated that name) was born June 10, 1919, the second child of Isadore and Gussie Goldschlager. He was named for Isadore’s father, Moritz. My mother has a book with some notes that her big brother wrote about his activities when he was a boy, and as I recall, he was keeping track of the number of animals he had captured. I don’t have access to the notebook right now, but that’s my vague recollection. Once I can get that notebook again, I will update this and scan some of his handwritten notes.

Maurice 1939

Here is a picture of Maurice in 1941 when he was twenty-two before he enrolled in the Army Air Corps to serve in World War II.

Maurice Labor Day 1941

He enrolled on September 25, 1942 and served until the end of the war. He was a staff sergeant and a tail gunner on a B 12 bomber. He was stationed in North Africa and flew missions over Italy and France. The day before he returned to the US, his tent caught fire, and he lost everything but what he was wearing. Although I never heard my uncle talk specifically about his war experiences, we all knew that he was very proud of his service and remained close to many of his army buddies. He had his wings made into an ID bracelet which his son Jim now wears in his memory.

Maurice at Aerial Gunnery School in Kingman, AZ

Maurice 1942

Tilly with nephew Maurice 1944

At the end of the war he was stationed in New Jersey where he met Lynn Brodsky. As Robin reported in my earlier post, it was love at first sight, and they were married on his birthday, June 10, 1945.

Maurice and Lynn 1946

They settled in New Jersey until Maurice had a run-in with his boss and lost his job. Lynn’s uncle, Kurt Leopold, owned a meat packing company, Union Meat, in Hartford, Connecticut, and offered Maurice a job and a place to live until he and Lynn could get settled in Connecticut. Maurice worked for Union Meat for several years and then started his own business with his partners Eric and Kurt Strauss called National Packing. Lynn had a sign made with the National Packing logo that hung in their family room in West Hartford; my cousin Beth now has it hanging in her kitchen.

National Packing sign on fireplace behind Maurice and Lynn

Maurice and Lynn 1967

Maurice and Lynn had three daughters, my cousins Beth, Suzie and Robin. Sadly, Lynn’s life was cut short on September 5, 1967 when she died of breast cancer at age 44.

Maurice was very fortunate to find love again with Diane Crone Schaler, who happened to be Lynn’s first cousin. He and Diane married and had a son, Jim (James Ian). In addition, Diane had two children from her first marriage, George and Leslie, and they all moved in together in Bloomfield, Connecticut, in a house that not only was filled with teenagers and one small boy, but also lots of animals—dogs, cats, horses, even chickens, ducks and geese, as I recall.

Beth, George, Sue, Leslie, Jim/Jamie, Robin

Diane and Maurice

The whole family in Bloomfield plus some visitors

But tragedy struck again on April 24, 1978, when Maurice was killed in a freak accident while riding a lawn mower down an incline on the property in Bloomfield. He was only 58 years old. It was hard to believe that a man who was so full of love and life was gone so suddenly. His name lives on through his many namesakes and in our memories and in these pictures.

Betty Goldschlager and Her Daughters Frieda and Estelle: FOUND!

Posted on February 4, 2014 by Amy

Betty Goldschlager

I have written about my grandfather’s younger sister, my great-aunt Betty, and her experiences arriving in New York City the day after her father had died of tuberculosis. But until now I knew very little about her life after those early days. I knew that she had married Isidor Feuerstein, had two daughters Frieda and Estelle, and had moved to Long Island, where Isidor had a dry goods business near Levittown. Most of that I knew from my mother, who has clear memories of her aunt, uncle and cousins visiting her in Brooklyn when she was growing up. My mother commented on what an astute businessman Isidor must have been to have opened a business near Levittown when it was a new community. She also remembered that her two cousins were beautiful young women, described by my grandfather as Romanian princesses.

But that was all I knew. My mother thought that Betty and her daughters had all moved out west at some point, and she had lost touch with them long ago. My search for them turned up a few details—a death certificate for Betty from Phoenix, AZ, census reports from 1930 and 1940, but little else. Then several months ago, I thought I had a hot lead. I located a great-nephew of Isidor Feuerstein on ancestry.com, and he knew that Frieda had married a man named Abe Albert and even had a wedding picture of her as well as one taken several years after the wedding. He believed that Frieda had a daughter named Gail, but was not sure. He knew that Estelle had married a man named Kenner with a first name that started with I, but did not know whether she had had any children. He did not know whether either Frieda or Estelle was alive or where they might be living.

Feuerstein Family (Betty at far left)

With that new information, I started searching again, and although I was able to locate an Estelle Kenner living in Pembroke Pines, FL, I had no way to be sure that this was the same Estelle. I could find no real evidence of Frieda. I searched as many different ways and as many different places as I could, but kept hitting that proverbial brick wall. So I moved on, focused on David, Isadore, the Strolowitz family, the Schwartz family, etc.

Then the other night I mentioned to Renee (my friend and mentor) in an email that I was still searching for my mother’s two first cousins, Frieda and Estelle. I woke up the next morning, and there in my Inbox was an email from Renee providing me with Estelle’s wedding announcement, her husband’s obituary, and the names of their three children. So after months and months of finding nothing on my own, Renee in one evening had solved one of my most frustrating searches. How did she do it? She had access to yet another database that I was not aware of—something called ProQuest available at certain libraries.

So I was off and running, finding the three Kenner children on Facebook and sending each a message about my research. Within five minutes, Barry Kenner sent me back a message, and we then spent over an hour on the phone, exchanging information and getting to know each other. He also gave me contact information for Frieda’s daughter Gayle, and I have now had several email exchanges with her as well. There is still a lot to learn and more photos and documents to share, but I have answers to many of my unanswered questions. I have also had an email from Barry’s sister Robyn and hope to hear from his other sister Karyn. I have lots of new names to add to the Goldschlager family tree and am awaiting more photographs and information about my family.

Betty Goldschlager 1969

First, Frieda and Estelle are both still alive. Frieda lives in Arizona, and Estelle in Florida. Both of their husbands ended up in the same fabric importing business as Isidor Feuerstein. Irving Kenner had taken over the Long Island business, and Abe Albert started his own business in Arizona. Frieda and Estelle each had three children—two sons and a daughter for Frieda, two daughters and a son for Estelle. There are also many grandchildren and great-grandchildren descended from Betty and Isidor.

Frieda and Abe Albert at their wedding in 1943

I have already learned a few interesting facts that I did not know before. Gayle told me that her grandmother was very proud of her father Moritz, who she said was very dapper and a lamplighter for the theater. She said that there was even a story that before he married, he had run away to the circus! That gave me an entirely new perspective on Moritz and his life. Remember he is my great-grandfather who was an orphan by age six. I had wondered whether he had experienced any happiness in his life. I thought he lit street lamps This little snippet—a daughter’s memory of him as dapper and of being proud of his occupation, of a man who loved the circus and the theater—gave me a whole new insight into who my great-grandfather was. Even better, she later sent me a photograph of Moritz. Just the other day I wrote that I would never see a picture of him or know what he looked like. Never say never! Here he is:

Moritz Goldschlager

I assume this was taken in Iasi, not New York. I can see why Betty described her father as dapper. His clothing, his watch chain, the stance, the mustache, the furniture behind him—all this gives me a far different impression of the man who was my great-grandfather than I had imagined. Somehow I saw him as a peddler, a poor immigrant, because that was what he was in New York, but perhaps their life in Iasi was far more comfortable than I had assumed.

Gayle also said that her grandmother talked about having a tall brother whom she referred to as Uncle Gadalia. I told her that that must have been David, since Isadore was not tall at all. She also remembered that she had met David’s son Murray and his wife when they came to Phoenix from Tucson for her brother’s bar mitzvah, but that they lost touch after that.

Barry recalled visiting his grandmother on Long Island and her house with the grand entry staircase that they would slide down as children, using her silk pillows as seats. He described Betty as a sweet and petite woman whom he recalls making them mashed potatoes with chicken fat instead of butter. It’s amazing how little stories, little memories can bring alive someone whom I never knew. Barry shared this picture of the Feuerstein family at his parents’ wedding in 1951.

Betty, Irving’s mother, Irving’s sister-in law, Frieda, Estelle, Irving, Irving’s brother, Abe Albert, and Isidor Feuerstein at Estelle and Irving’s wedding

Estelle Feuerstein, Betty’s daughter

Estelle and Irving Kenner 1951

The photos on this page are a combination of the few photos I had of

Frieda and Abe Albert at their wedding in 1943

Betty, Isidor and their daughters and some pictures that Barry shared with me through his Facebook page and some that Gayle sent me. I am excited to see others and to learn more about these newly discovered cousins.

Frieda and Abe

Estelle

Estelle’s children Barry Robyn and Karyn 1963

Frieda and her children Robert, Gayle and Richard

Barry Kenner’s family

Where they lived: East Harlem in the Early 20th Century

Posted on January 30, 2014 by Amy

One of things that puzzled me when I started looking at the census reports for the Goldschlagers between 1905

English: Looking from 96th Street in the south, northward along Second Avenue towards Spanish Harlem. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

and 1915 was where they were living. I had always assumed that my grandfather, like my Brotman ancestors, had settled in the Lower East Side when he arrived in New York. I thought that was where all poor Jewish immigrants had settled in the late 19^th and early 20^th century. Yet at the time of the 1905 census, my grandfather was living at 2213 Second Avenue, near the intersection with 115^th Street, in the neighborhood we know as East Harlem or Spanish Harlem. He was living by himself (at age 17) in a building with some families with Jewish names but mostly families with Italian names. What was he doing there? Why was he living up there and not on the Lower East Side?

When Moritz arrived, they remained in East Harlem on 109^th Street, and after Moritz died, Betty and Isadore moved in with Tillie on 109^th Street. In 1915, all of the surviving Goldschlagers were still living on 109^th Street. Eventually, Isadore moved to Brooklyn, and David, Betty and their mother moved to the Bronx, until Betty and Gisella moved to Bayshore, Long Island in the 1930s. But why had they started and stayed in East Harlem?

330 East 109th Street today

Some quick research revealed that East Harlem was a huge Jewish community in the early years of the 20th century, but that that community had disappeared and was for the most part forgotten. As David W. Dunlap wrote in The New York Times in 2002, “On the map of the Jewish diaspora, Harlem is Atlantis. That it was once the third largest Jewish settlement in the world after the Lower East Side and Warsaw — a vibrant hub of industry, artistry and wealth — is all but forgotten. It is as if Jewish Harlem sank 70 years ago beneath the waves of memory, beyond recall.” Dunlap then described the many signs that Jews once lived in East Harlem in the churches that were once synagogues.

Former Temple Israel Jewish synagogue, now Mt. Olivet Baptist Church. Detail: Star of David.

Mount Olivet Baptist Church in East Harlem, originally Temple Israel

The neighborhood had been rural until the subway and elevated trains arrived around 1880. Soon after tenement buildings were constructed, and immigrants moved in, first German and Irish immigrants, then Jewish and Italian immigrants. According to Wikipedia, there were 90,000 Jews living in East Harlem in 1917; however, the neighborhood was predominantly Italian and came to be known as Italian Harlem or Little Italy. That is consistent with my study of the names in the 1905 census.

Photograph shows 105th Street between Madison and Park avenues in 1929, with traces of Jewish Harlem, including the Hebrew Home for the Aged in Harlem <i>(left)</i> and the synagogue called Beth Hamridash Hagadol of Harlem.

My mother remembers that her father spoke several languages and was quite fluent in Italian. He must have learned Italian living in East Harlem in his first ten years in New York. He was not a religious person and had left Romania at least in part to escape the anti-Semitism there. Perhaps living in a mixed neighborhood made him feel more American, although obviously there was a well-established Jewish community there as well with many synagogues and other institutions. Maybe it was cheaper than the Lower East Side, maybe the Lower East Side was already filled beyond overcrowding, or maybe East Harlem was a better neighborhood, not a cheaper neighborhood. I don’t know what drew my grandfather there or why he stayed.

It’s always good to learn something new. Now I know not only something new about my family, but also something new about the history of New York City and the Jewish immigrants who settled there.

2287 1st Avenue, East Harlem, New York. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

My Great-Grandfather Moritz (Moses ben Ira) Goldschlager

Posted on January 29, 2014 by Amy

It’s remarkable to me that before I started doing any of this research, I did not even know my grandfather’s father’s name (or his mother’s name). I still know very little about his life and nothing about his personality, but I know enough to make me sad that I don’t, and likely never will, know more.

From records that my researcher in Iasi was able to find last summer, I know that my great-grandfather was born Moses Lieb in Iasi, Romania in 1855. His parents were Ira and Beila Goldschlager. From the birth record created for his marriage, I know that witnesses testified to his birth and to the fact that his father Ira died in 1859 and that his mother Beila died in 1861.

Moses Leib Goldschlager birth record

Moses birth record transcribed and translated page 1

page 2

In other words, my great-grandfather was an orphan by age six. I have no idea who took care of him after that. Perhaps it was one of the several witnesses on this record, men who were old enough to have been a guardian to him. I have no idea what his childhood was like or how or why his parents both died when he was so young.

The next event for which I have any record is Moses’ marriage record dated September 2, 1887, when he was 32 years old. Was this his first marriage? Thirty-two seems old for that generation to be married for the first time, but so far no earlier record has shown up. Perhaps he was married before; perhaps he even had children in that first marriage. I don’t know. I don’t know what he was doing between 1855 and 1887, how he survived, where he lived, how he made a living. But in 1887 he married my great-grandmother, Ghitla Rosentzweig, eighteen years old according to the marriage record, daughter of David and Esther Rosentzweig. Her father also had died by the time she was married, but her mother was still alive and living in Iasi. On the marriage record Moses’ occupation is reported as “freely profession,” as translated by my researcher. I asked him what this means, and he said he believed it meant self-employed. Since my great-grandmother is listed as “without occupation,” I assume that Moses had some occupation, but it is not identified.

Moses Leib Goldschlager and Ghitla Rosentzvaig marriage record

Transcription and translation of marraige record

Their first child, my grandfather Isadore, was born in August, 1888, almost a year after Moses and Ghitla were married. On his birth record, it says that Moses, now 33, was a lamplighter. I assume this meant that he lit the gas lamps on the public streets.

UPDATE February 2, 2014: I just learned today that he lit the lamps in the theater!! And that he was a very dapper dresser. Thank you, Gayle, Betty’s granddaughter, who reported this information to me.

Interestingly, Ghitla is now reported to be 22, not 19. (I guess Romanian record keepers faced the same inconsistent age reports as American census takers.) My grandfather’s name is spelled Ire here, obviously named for Moses’ father Ira Goldschlager.

Ira aka Isidor Goldschlager birth record

transcription and translation

Moses and Ghitla’s second child David was born the following year on November 4, 1889. David was presumably named for Ghitla’s father, David. Moses’ occupation is once again described as “freely profession,” and he is now 34, Ghitla 23. The Goldschlager family was residing at the same house as the year before at 26 St. Andrew Street in Iasi, depicted below.

David Goldschlager birth record

transcription and translation

The Goldschlager home at 26 St Andrew Street, Iasi

The next record I have for Moses is the ship manifest for when he left Romania and came to the United States. He sailed from Le Havre on July 31, 1909, to New York. On the manifest his name is given as Moritz Goldschlager with his occupation listed as a tailor. It says he was 46 years old, which is about eight years younger than it should be. It gives his nationality as Roumanian and his “race or people” as Roumanian, but then written over it is “Hebrew.” Moses/Moritz named his wife Gisella Goldschlager of Jassy as the nearest relative from the country he was leaving and named his son Isidor, my grandfather, of 440 East 147^th Street, New York, as the person he was joining at his destination. The manifest also reveals that Moses was only 5’3” tall and had auburn hair and blue eyes. That is probably the closest I will ever get to a picture of him.

Ship Manifest of Moritz Goldschlager

page 2

UPDATE: I just realized that the 440 East 147th Street must be 110 East 117th Street, as that was the address that my grandfather have given for his aunt Zusia Mintz as the person meeting him when he came to NYC. Plus 440 East 147th Street is in the Bronx, not Manhattan.

I wonder when he became Moritz, just as I wonder when my grandfather became Isidor (or Isadore; it seemed to change back and forth). Were these names they used in Romania, or were they adopted to come to America? I assume the former—that Moses and Ira were Hebrew names, Moritz and Isidor secular names, but I don’t know for sure.

Moritz arrived in the United States in August, 1909, and then sadly, the next and last record I have for him is his death certificate, which I just received the other day. As I’ve written earlier, Moritz died on April 3, 1910, just eight months after he arrived in New York, a day before his daughter Betty arrived, and seven months before his wife and his son David arrived from Romania. They all arrived apparently without knowing Moritz had died, as they all listed him as the person meeting them at arrival.

I had wondered about his cause of death, and although I know that there is some question about the reliability of death certificates before the professionalization of the medical examiner’s office in the late 1920s, my great-grandfather died in a hospital according to his death certificate, and his death certificate is signed by a medical doctor, not a coroner. According to the certificate, my great-grandfather died from tuberculosis after being admitted to Harlem Hospital on April 2, 1910. I wonder how long he had been sick before coming to the hospital.

Moritz Goldschlager death certificate

The certificate also provides some other information and, as often is the case, some misinformation. It says that Moritz was a peddler, that he was married, and that he was 53 years old, which is closer to the truth than the age listed on the ship manifest. It says his father’s name was Isidor Goldschlager, which, if true, means that my great-great-grandfather also used Isidor as his secular name and his Hebrew name was Ira. But the certificate also says that Moritz’s mother’s name was Ghisela and then something that is not legible. I assume that my grandfather was the informant and that he was confused and gave his mother’s name instead of his father’s mother’s name.

Finally, the death certificate indicates where Moritz and Isadore had been living—173-175 East 109^th Street. According to the 1910 census, this is the same street where Tillie Strolovitz and her seven children were living in 1910, just a few blocks away. That census is dated April 24, 1910, just 21 days after Moritz had died, 20 days after Betty had arrived. Isadore and Betty had moved in and were living with their aunt and cousins by that time, obviously taken in by their aunt Tillie shortly after their father’s death.

And that is all I know about Moses ben Ira, Moritz Goldschlager. He lost his both his parents by the time he was six years old; he married at age 32, had three children, and worked for at least a while as a lamplighter and perhaps as a tailor in Iasi before emigrating in 1909. He lived for less than a year in New York as a peddler before succumbing to tuberculosis at Harlem Hospital before he ever saw his wife, his younger son, or his daughter again.

Sometimes when I put together these missing links to people I never knew and who no one alive today ever knew, it makes me feel incredibly rewarded and happy. Sometimes, as with Moritz, it leaves me feeling sad. What kind of life did he have with so much misery at the beginning and then at the end? I can only hope that in between he found happiness and some comfort with his wife and three children.

Moritz Goldschlager headstone

These lost ancestors are part of what motivates me to do this research. Someone should know that they lived, they suffered, they loved and were loved, and they died. Moritz had at least two namesakes: Isadore’s son, my uncle Maurice, also named Moses Lieb, and David’s son Murray, also Moses Lieb. If we count the children who were then named for my uncle Maurice as namesakes of Moritz’s namesake, then there are several more, including my daughter Madeline. I’d like to think that that adds more meaning to his life—knowing that his name does live on and that his life is now remembered and documented.

Big Brotman Family Update!

Posted on January 27, 2014 by Amy

I’ve been focused on the Goldschlagers these last few weeks, but I have not at all forgotten my Brotman cousins. I have just not had anything new to report as I am still awaiting a few documents and also hoping to break the brick wall that prevents me from finding out about our Galician home and our earlier ancestors.

But today I actually have some news about the Brotman family. My first cousin Jody sent me the document depicted below:

Family Tree drawn by Elaine Goldschlager Lehbraum

It’s a family tree written by her mother, my aunt Elaine Goldschlager Lehrbaum, my mother’s sister. At first I didn’t realize there was anything new about it until I read it over a second, third and now fourth time. My aunt provided the names of all the other children of Joseph Brotman, including Max and Abraham, confirming what we already knew, that is, that they were Joseph’s sons from his first marriage. But now we have the names of the other two children from that first marriage: David and Sophie! This is huge news for me and gives me a new start to researching the other Brotman cousins.

Also, note that my aunt said that Joseph and Bessie were first cousins. (No wonder our gene pool carries so many repeating traits—like those distinctive cheekbones.) That may help me locate them in Europe since we now know that they had the same grandparents.

Finally, I never knew that my aunt’s Hebrew name was Esther. That was Gisella’s mother’s name—Esther, married to David Rosensweig. So my aunt was named for her great-grandmother. I wonder if she knew that.

Another one of those days when a small document can just bring tears and smiles to my eyes.

Jody also sent some wonderful pictures which I will post later. Thanks, Jo!

The Sisters Rosensweig[1]

Posted on January 26, 2014 by Amy

One of the things that confused me about the ship manifest for David Goldschlager, before I knew that it was really my grandfather Isadore on the ship using his brother’s name, was that David did not list his brother Isadore as the person meeting him in New York. Instead, he listed an uncle whose name appeared to be Morishe (?) Mintz. I had no idea who this was, and I could not turn up anyone on any document who might have been this mysterious uncle. Also, if Isadore had arrived first, why wasn’t he meeting his brother David?

Isadore Goldschlager ship manifest (under David’s name)

Once I established that in fact Isadore was the one who had arrived on the Patricia in October, 1904, I went back to look more closely at the manifest and to search again for Uncle M. Mintz, with no luck. I did, however, find a separate document that I had not seen before relating to Isadore’s (“David’s”) arrival at Ellis Island, a Record of Detained Aliens, shown below.

Record of Detained Aliens
Isadore listed as David Goldschlager

I am familiar with this type of document now because I had seen the one issued for Gisella Goldschlager, who had listed her husband Moritz as the person meeting her. Because her husband had died, she was apparently detained and released to her son Isadore instead. It appears that the same type of occurrence detained my grandfather. On the document it says the cause of detention was “to uncle,” and then in the next column for “Disposition,” it says “Aunt Zusie (?) Mintz, 177 East 111^th Street, New York City.” From this I surmised that something prevented Uncle Mintz from meeting Isadore and that instead his wife Zusie had picked him up instead.

That led to a search for the aunt and uncle. I could not find any M Mintz on the 1900 census from Romania who could fit. I searched the NYC marriage index and also had no luck—until I searched for all men named Mintz who had married between 1880 and 1904. I checked every one of them to see what their bride’s names were and was excited when I found a bride named Zusia ROSENSWEIG married to a Harry Minz in 1896. Could this be a third Rosensweig sister?

If so, she would have been the youngest sister, about 14 years younger than Tillie, ten years younger than Ghitla/Gisella. Why would she have left Romania first and not her older sisters? Her sisters did not arrive until 1907 and 1910, respectively, when they were already married and had children. But Zusia was still single, and thus more able to pick up and leave earlier, as did her nephew Isadore at age sixteen.

Harry and Zusia were married in 1896, so I looked again on the 1900 census using the name Harry with a wife with a name that could be Zusia. No luck. I decided to look just for an S or Z Mintz and found a Sonsa Mintz, a widow, living with Jason and Rachel Reitman and their one year old daughter Clara. Sonsa was identified as a cousin of the head of household and as a widow. Assuming that this is the same woman who had married Harry Mintz, it means that her husband died less than four years after they were married. It obviously would explain why he was unable to meet Isadore/David at the boat in 1904. I have not located a death certificate for Harry, however, nor do I know for sure yet that Sonsa is the same person as Zusia or really the sister of Tillie and Gisella.

Unfortunately, I cannot find a Sonsa, Zusia, Susan, or Susie Mintz in any later census. I did find a reference for a Susie Mintz who died in the Bronx in 1931 and is buried in New Jersey, but I do not know if this is the same person. I will order the death certificate to see, but at the moment I have no other records for Sonsa Mintz after 1900. I assume she may have remarried, but I did not find a marriage record either.

The only other possible record relating to the third Rosensweig sister is a ship manifest listing an eighteen year old girl named Sural Rosensweig from Romania, arriving in New York on September 30, 1890. The age and name are close enough that it could be the same person, but I cannot know for sure. (On the 1900 census, Sonsa Rosensweig’s birthdate is April, 1874, and her arrival date is 1891, whereas on the manifest her birth year would have been 1872 and arrival year 1890.)

Although I’ve hit a wall so far with Sonsa and with Harry, her husband, I did look to see if I could figure out how Sonsa was a cousin to the Reitmans. Was it through Harry? Through Jacob or through his wife Rachel? Although I was able to find a number of records for the Reitmans, up through their great-grandchildren, I have not yet figured out the relationship. They, like Sonsa, were from Romania, but beyond that, I have no clues. I have sent an email to one of the great-grandchildren, but it seems quite unlikely that they would know anything about a woman named Sonsa Mintz who lived with their great-grandparents in 1900.

I will have to hope that the 1896 marriage certificate for Harry Mintz and the 1931 death certificate for Susie Mintz have some clues.

[1] With apologies to Wendy Wasserstein. No connection to her play is intended….

The Schwartz Family: Updates, Documents and Pictures

Posted on January 24, 2014 by Amy

First, a few comments about my last post about the Schwartz family. My mother pointed out to me that David Goldschlager’s wife Rebecca was always called Becky, not Rebecca. Richard, her grandson, confirmed this, so from now on I will refer to her as Becky. Also, both my mother and Richard described Becky as a warm, outgoing person with a wonderful laugh (and a great apple strudel, according to Richard.) Looking at the wonderful pictures below, I can see that Becky came from a large, but close family, and that despite losing two brothers and overcoming the adjustments to living in America, there must have been happy times in their childhood here.

Thanks to Jon Schwartz, Becky’s nephew, I have some wonderful documents and photographs to share of the Schwartz family. First, Jon has shared the marriage certificate of his grandparents Solomon Schwartz and Louise Schwartz, or Solomon Svarti to Luisa Svarti in Romanian. Here is the English translation:

Marriage record for Solomon and Louise Schwartz 1888

Two things are interesting here. First, Jon wonders whether his grandparents were cousins since both had the surname Sfarti before they married, just as we believe that Joseph and Bessie Brotman were related, both sharing the same surname before marriage. It was apparently not uncommon for families to arrange marriages between cousins. Also, note that Solomon was from Jassy (Iasi), and Luisa from Berlad. According to Google Maps, the two cities are about 80 miles apart and would take even today two hours to travel between. It seems unlikely that Solomon met Luisa without some prior arrangement so a family connection makes sense.

It’s also interesting that Solomon came from Iasi. Perhaps he knew the Goldschlager family growing up, which might explain how David Goldschlager ended up marrying Solomon’s daughter Becky. What makes this seem a bit more possible is the fact that Solomon was a hatter even in Romania. Although David was born after Solomon had married and left Iasi, it is interesting that David, a hatter from Iasi, ended up marrying the daughter of Solomon, a hatter from Iasi.

Jon also sent me the birth certificate, both in Romanian and in English, for Rebecca (Becky), Solomon and Luisa’s first child, born in April, 1889, ten months after their wedding. Here is the English version below:

Rebecca Schwartz birth certificate translated

Jon also has some wonderful photographs of his father’s parents and siblings. My favorite is this one, depicting the Schwartz family probably a year or so after they arrived in Newark.

The Schwartz family c. 1905

From left to right, they are Sophie, Annette, Louise (sitting), Becky, Abram, Solomon, Meyer, Etta and Rose.

Jon thought that the baby was Jennie, the Schwartz’s youngest child born in 1907, but since the picture does not include the other child born in the US, Meyer, who was born in 1904, I think the baby is Meyer. Also, the ship manifest said Abram was two at the time they left Romania(1903), and in this picture Abram (the little boy leaning on his mother’s knee) looks too young for him to be six or seven, which he would have been when Jennie was a baby in 1907. I would date this picture between 1904 and 1905, and I believe that the baby is Meyer, the poor little boy who died of a burst appendix when he was nine years old.

The other Schwartz children all grew to adulthood, Abram becoming Arnold, the only brother among six sisters. He had a painting business for some time, but when it failed during the Depression, he became a route salesman. He had two sons, Stephen and Jonathan. The sisters all married except for Sophie, and all but Jeanette had children. Here are two pictures of the Schwartz sisters, courtesy of their nephew Jon.

Rose Schwartz

Schwartz sisters 1956

Sophie (aka Sherry), Jeannette, Rebecca, Etta, Rose, Annette

The Schwartz Family

Update: The Strolowitz/Adler Family, My Grandfather’s Cousins

Posted on January 23, 2014 by Amy

As I have written, in 1910, after my great-grandfather died the day before his daughter Betty arrived and before my great-grandmother and her son David arrived, Betty and her brother Isadore lived with their aunt Tillie Rosensweig Strolovitz and her seven children on East 109^th Street in New York City. Tillie had arrived with her husband Itic Yankel Srulovici and their three youngest children, Beckie, Pincus and Leah, in late December, 1907. Their four oldest children had left Iasi, Romania, before them: Isidor in 1901, Bertha and Bella in 1906, and David in January, 1907.

Leah Adler c. 1920

Although I have not yet found a ship manifest for Isidor, the oldest child, I do now have manifests for all the other members of the family, having just located David’s last night. Among the many documents I received this week were David’s naturalization papers, which provided his date of arrival and the name of the ship. Although his first name was partially torn off the paper, with a little trick of the trade I learned from Renee, I was able to obtain a copy of the ship manifest as well. David is listed as “…vid Stubowicz” on the manifest, yet another variation on the family name. He named his brother, Israel (presumably Isidor) Stubowicz, as the person paying for his ticket and meeting him in New York. Interestingly, although David’s certificate of arrival has his name as Strubewicz, his petition for naturalization was made under the name David Adler.

David Adler petition for naturalization

I had already found the manifests for Bertha and Bella and for Tillie, Jacob and the other children, and interestingly, every member of the family used some variation of Srulovici/Strubowicz/Strolovitz on the manifests, not Adler. It appears that the Adler name was not used officially by the family until after they came to the United States. Whether Isidor had already adopted it and then the others eventually followed I do not know. In 1910, we know that only David and Isidor were using Adler, but as already discussed, eventually every member of the family was using it at least part of the time.

David Adler and his wife Bertha

In addition to David’s naturalization papers, I received several other documents related to the Adler family. (For simplicity sake, I will refer to them as the Adlers, except where the Strolowitz name is relevant for a particular reason.) I had hoped to find something that would help me learn what had happened to Jacob. To recap what I already knew and did not know, I had not found any record of Itic Yankel after the ship manifest of 1907, and family lore said that he had never left Ellis Island. The ship manifest, however, indicated that he was admitted, after being briefly detained for a doctor’s examination of his eyes. There is no record of deportation. I thought perhaps that he had died shortly thereafter, and I ordered the death certificate of the only Jacob Adler I could find who might fit in terms of age and year of death. I now have that certificate, but unfortunately it was not for the correct Jacob Adler. The certificate is for a Jacob Adler from Germany who had been in the US since 1880 at the time of his death in 1910. So I still have no answers to the question of what happened to Jacob, Tillie’s husband. I am awaiting his immigration papers from the National Archives and hope that they will provide some clues.

I had requested several other documents in order to confirm what I assumed was true: that Tillie was the sister of my great-grandmother Gisella Rosensweig and that Itic Yankel Srulovici and Jacob Adler were the same person and the father of all of the seven children. Not surprisingly, they all do confirm one or both of those facts. First, Tillie’s death certificate lists her parents as David and Esther Rosenzweig (no maiden name for Esther, unfortunately), my great-great grandparents, confirming that Tillie was my great-grandmother Gisella’s sister. Her death certificate was witnessed by her son David, signing as Strulowitz, confirming that Yankel Srulovici was his father and not some other husband named Adler. (Tillie is also a Strulowitz on the certificate.)

Tillie Strulowitz death certificate

Second, Isidor’s death certificate confirms that he died young—in 1915 of liver cancer at age 31. Although he is identified as Isidor Adler, his parents’ names are given as Tillie Rosenzweig and Jacob Strulowitz. Bertha’s marriage certificate gives her parents’ names also that way, with Bertha also now using Strulowitz. On the other hand, Leah’s marriage certificate uses Adler and lists her father’s name as simply Jacob (and her mother as Tillie Rosensweig). Finally, David’s death certificate gives his father’s name as Jacob Adler (and David’s name as David Adler), and his mother’s as Tillie Rosensweig. Certainly this is enough documentation to prove that Jacob Adler and Yankel Srulovici were the same person and the father of the seven children.

Isidor Adler death certificate

Thus, many open questions were answered by these latest documents, but there remains still the question of what happened to Jacob Srulovici/Strolovitz/Strulowitz/Adler after he arrived at Ellis Island.

In addition, the marriage certificate of Bertha contains the signature of a Gustav Rosenzweig as a witness to the marriage. Could this be Tillie and Gisella’s brother? Or a nephew? Cousin? And thus begins yet another search for a possible member of the extended Goldschlager-Rosensweig family.

Bertha Strulowitz marriage certificate witnessed by Gustav Rosensweig

Update: My Grandfather’s Arrival

Posted on January 22, 2014 by Amy

Statue of Liberty National Monument, Ellis Island and Liberty Island, Manhattan, in New York County (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Yesterday I received eight new documents, and I will report on them all over the next couple of days. But for me, the most exciting document is my grandfather’s naturalization application. It is always touching to see a document written in the handwriting of someone who means a lot to you, so that alone would have made it exciting. It’s also exciting to see the names of my grandmother and aunt and uncle on his petition. It’s exciting to see his distinctive signature.

But what made these pages particularly exciting is that they resolved a question that has been unanswered for a long time. A number of years ago my brother tried to find the ship manifest for our grandfather Isadore at Ellis Island. He was able to locate the manifests for David, Betty, Moritz and Gisella, but not Isadore. When I started my own research almost two years ago, I also tried to find something that documented when Isadore arrived in New York, but found only the same information that Ira had found. I had given up and moved on to other things.

When I returned to researching the Goldschlagers a few weeks ago, I once again looked, figuring that with my improved research skills and newer research tools, maybe I would finally find a ship manifest for my grandfather, but once again, nothing turned up. I resigned myself to the idea that I would never find a record for his arrival.

Then the other day, as I wrote in my post entitled “Isadore and David Goldschlager: More than Brothers,” I realized that there were two ship manifests for David Goldschlager: one dated October 27, 1904, and the other dated November 4, 1910. I also realized that it was the later one that was accurate. Every other document said David had arrived in 1910: his naturalization papers, several census reports, and his wife’s naturalization papers. It also made sense that David had waited with his mother and sailed with her to America.

That left me thinking that the David Goldschlager on the 1904 manifest was not David, but Isadore, my grandfather. That manifest was for a ship called the Patricia, sailing from Hamburg, and arriving in the United States on October 27, 1904. I was hoping that Isadore’s naturalization papers would reveal what ship brought my grandfather to America. I hoped that I had finally found the evidence of how and when Isadore traveled to his new home.

Well, I opened the naturalization papers today, holding my breath, scanning quickly to see if the answer was revealed. And there it was: Isadore wrote that he arrived on October 28, 1904, on the Patricia, sailing from Hamburg. Isadore had in fact used his younger brother’s name to escape from Romania.

Isadore Goldschlager naturalization papers
page 1

page 2

page 3

I was always told that he left Romania to avoid the draft. He turned sixteen in August, 1904, and was presumably then draft age. David, on the other hand, was a year younger and would not turn sixteen until 1905. Perhaps Isadore took David’s passport to get out of Romania. Or maybe he just used his name. (That leaves me wondering how David managed to stay safe until he left in 1910, but I am afraid we will never know the answer to that question.)

When I told my mother what I had found, she said that she was not surprised that her father figured out a way to get out of the country. He was a very clever and resourceful man who knew how to get what he wanted. He used his wits to survive. As one of his namesakes who never knew him likes to say, “If at all possible, lie.” It seems that that approach may have saved our grandfather’s life and enabled his three children, his nine grandchildren, his fourteen great-grandchildren, and the ever-increasing number of great-great grandchildren to come into this world.

Thank you, Grandpa, for being so clever and for escaping Romania, and thank you, David, for letting him borrow your name.

SS Patricia, the ship that brought my grandfather to America

Brotmanblog: A Family Journey

Adventures in Genealogy

Category Archives: Family Names

Another Addition to the Brotman Family Tree: David Brotman and his wife Annie

Maurice Goldschlager

Betty Goldschlager and Her Daughters Frieda and Estelle: FOUND!

Where they lived: East Harlem in the Early 20th Century

My Great-Grandfather Moritz (Moses ben Ira) Goldschlager

Big Brotman Family Update!

The Sisters Rosensweig[1]

The Schwartz Family: Updates, Documents and Pictures

Update: The Strolowitz/Adler Family, My Grandfather’s Cousins

Update: My Grandfather’s Arrival

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