Thirteen Abraham Rosenzweigs or How I Almost Threw My Computer through the Window

Posted on March 4, 2014 by Amy

English: Bromo-Seltzer advertisement for headache medicine. Lottie Collins sings Ta-Ra-Ra Boom-de-ay! after being healed by the medicine and this effect makes her to dance and sing. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

A couple of weeks ago I started trying to trace Gustave Rosenzweig’s story and the story of his children by searching for census reports and other documents on ancestry.com and familysearch and other websites. Gustave and Gussie had ten children, and they all had names that were apparently very common back then: Lillian, Sarah, David, Abraham, Rebecca, Jacob, Joseph, Lizzie, Rachel and Harry (not necessarily in that order). When I came down with the flu around the same time that I started trying to sort all those children out, I decided that I needed to wait until I felt better. Names, numbers, census reports, and vital records were all floating before my fevered eyes, and I was unable to focus at all.

So yesterday and last night, finally back to full strength, I decided to try again. No fever, no chills, but nevertheless names, numbers, census reports, and vital records were still circling around and making me dizzy. I decided to take one child at a time and not get distracted by the other children. I had previously accumulated a fair amount of information about Abraham and thought I would start there. I thought I had found a census report for Abraham for almost every year that there was one: 1900, 1905, 1910, 1925, 1930 and 1940. I was only missing 1920. I also thought I had found Abraham’s wife and children and ordered his marriage certificate a few weeks back. But given that I had accumulated a lot of this without yet going through it very thoroughly, I knew I needed to go back and be more careful.

The 1900 and 1905 census reports were easy. Abraham was living with his parents and his siblings, making it easy to be sure I had the correct reports. Both indicated that he was born in 1890. So far so good. As I turned to the 1910 census, things became a little less clear as there was no census that had Abraham living with Gustave, Gussie and his siblings. There were two possibilities. One Abraham was living with his mother Gussie, who had been born in Romania, so that looked promising. But this Abraham had only two siblings, Joseph and Isaac, and this Abraham was born in 1894 and was younger than his two brothers. His mother owned a candy store in Brooklyn. It certainly could be that the census had errors; that happens all the time. But I wasn’t sure. The other Abraham on the 1910 census who was a possibility was the right age and also had Romanian parents, but he was in the Navy, so I had no way of knowing his parents’ names. I saved both census reports as possibilities.

I turned to 1915. There were THIRTEEN Abraham Rosenzweigs listed on this New York State census. I checked every single one of them, listing the facts, dates, occupations, places of birth, relatives’ names, and then narrowed it down to two real possibilities, the same two. The younger Abraham, born in 1894, was living alone with his mother Gussie and working as a grocery clerk; the older Abraham was living with his mother Gussie and all the correct siblings and was a sailor. It seemed obvious that the older Abraham, the sailor, was the correct one, meaning the correct Abraham in 1910 had been the one in the Navy, not the one living with Gussie. Although that was very time-consuming, I felt like I had confirmed that the data I had previously collected was correct.

I moved on to 1920. Now there were only (!) nine Abraham Rosenzweigs who fit within the appropriate age range and were born in New York City. Again, I sifted through each census report and started finding some repeating Abrahams—the one working as a naval clerk, married to Lena but of Russian background, the railway mail clerk married to Tessie, but of Austrian background, a few who were too young, one who was in prison but had American born parents, one who was a motion picture operator, and two who lived too far away and were too young. The one who seemed most likely was born in 1890, of Romanian parentage, and was married to a Rebecca and had two sons, Maxwell (3) and Irving (1). They lived in Brooklyn, where he worked as a bread salesman. But I had no way of linking him to Gustave and the right Gussie. I searched for a certificate for a marriage between an Abraham Rosenzweig and a Rebecca, but could not find one. I moved on to 1925.

Now there were eleven Abraham Rosenzweigs. I was starting to get a bit punchy, but labored on, wanting to do this before I lost track of my findings and my thoughts. Once again I saw some familiar faces—Lena and Abraham the naval clerk, Tessie and Abraham the railway mail clerk—and some new faces that did not fit. After another long stretch staring at each census report, I narrowed it down again to two: the Abraham living with his mother Gussie and the Abraham married to Rebecca, living in Brooklyn with their two children and employed as a driver. I then did the same thing with the six Abrahams listed in 1930 and in 1940.

In my earlier search I had somehow assumed that the Abraham living with his mother Gussie in 1925, 1930 and 1940 was the right Abraham because I had not seen that there were two Gussie Rosenzweigs with sons named Abraham. Thus, I had added information to my tree for the wrong Abraham, including what I now believe were the wrong wife and children since this Abraham had married in 1932 a woman named Lee and had two daughters. I had been confused at the time also by the conflicting World War I draft registration forms I’d found. I had thought Abraham was still single in 1917 since I’d thought he hadn’t married until 1932, and so I had eliminated any draft registration for a married man. As a result I had selected an Abraham who also had had no prior military service. Although I knew that conflicted with the 1910 and 1915 census reports that showed that my Abraham had been in the Navy, I could not then figure out where I had gone wrong. Yesterday I realized my mistake, found what I think is the correct draft registration, and have to go back and correct my tree and look for records that will reveal if the Abraham who married Rebecca is in fact the right Abraham.

As usual, there remain more questions. If our Abraham was not living with his mother Gussie in 1925, 1930 and 1940, where was she? Had she died? Where was Gustave in 1915? The children were living only with Gussie, and I cannot find another census that includes Gustave. There also remains the question of why the 1920 census shows the other children living with Gustave, not Gussie, and yet there is another Gustave who is a painter from Romania listed elsewhere living as a boarder in 1920. I can’t find a marriage certificate for Gustave for his second marriage.

And I’ve only done one of the ten children. There are also multiple Josephs, Jacobs, Sarahs, Rachels, Lillians, and so on. It will take a while to resolve all this, but in the end, perhaps I will have a fuller picture of Gustave’s family and his life and even more cousins with whom to share the story of our family.

This is not Gustave’s family, but it gives a sense of what ten children in a family looks like.

A family of ten children

Vital Records—American versus Romanian

Posted on March 2, 2014 by Amy

Romanian flag (Photo credit: Tudor Girba)

American flag (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The other Romanian records I received last week from Marius Chelcu are the birth and marriage records of Gustave Rosenzweig, my great-great uncle, the man who stood up for and posted a bond of Jankel Srulovici, the man who met his nephew Isidor or Srul Srulovici at Ellis Island, and the man who signed as a witness for his niece Bertha at her wedding in 1915. Although I’ve not yet found any record linking him directly to my grandfather or his siblings, I have to believe that he also helped out my grandfather when he first arrived and probably also helped when my great-grandfather died in 1910 right before his wife and other children arrived.

So I have a great feeling of fondness for Uncle Gustave, and I was very happy that Marius was able to find these records. There were six pages of documents: a birth record, a record to prove that Gustave and his wife were not related under the Romanian Civil Code, and four pages of marriage records. Marius explained that these last four are essentially the same, as marriage laws required that there be three announcements of the marriage. (I am not sure what the fourth represents.) Marius only provided one translation of these four pages, however, so they need to be reviewed more carefully. I wish I knew Romanian, but looking over these documents I can pick out many words because of their similarity to English, French or Italian. But it is still hard to compare them, given the handwriting as well as the unfamiliar words.

The birth record is not like the records I posted about yesterday, which were actual birth records for David and Rebecca Srulovici, filed at the time of their birth. Gustave’s record was created at the time of his wedding in June, 1884, to substitute for a missing birth record. On this document, four witnesses, including his father David Rosenzweig and his father-in-law to be, Itzic Zacu, attest to the fact of Gustave’s birth as Ghidale on June 10, 1856. This document was important to me for several reasons: it provides not only information about Gustave’s birth date but also the birth year of my great-great grandfather David Rosenzweig. The record gives David’s age as 60 in 1884, meaning he was born around 1824. Also, it appears that Itzic Zacu knew Ghidale from birth or at least was willing to attest to that fact, perhaps indicating a close relationship between the Rosenzweig and Zacu families.

Gustave Rosenzweig birth record

translation of birth record

The second document is entitled “Testimony,” according to the translation provided by Marius. The translation simply reports that Ihiel Fisler, a witness to the wedding, attested to the fact that Ghidale and his bride Ghitla Zacu were not related under the Civil Code. The actual document, however, has four signatures, two written in Yiddish or Hebrew, two in the Latin alphabet. I have tried to decipher the ones written in the Hebrew alphabet, but would love some help if anyone knows Hebrew script better than I do.

testimony for Gustave and Gussie

translation of testimony

The remaining pages are the four pages of the marriage record itself, each one repeating what the other said, that is, that Ghidale Rosenzweig, 28 years old, son of David and Esther Rosenzweig, a painter by occupation, wanted to marry Ghitla Zacu, 20 years old, daughter of Itzic and Mirel Zacu, on June 1, 1884. Unfortunately, the translation Marius provided contains an error; it had the date as September 2, 1887, even though I could see the date was June (Iunie) 1, 1884 myself. I may ask him to provide a translation of each document separately, as it seems to me that there are some differences. Take a look and let me know what you think.

Gustave and Gussie Rosenzweig marriage record

translation of marriage record

When I reviewed these dates against the other records I have for the birthdates of Gustave and Gussie and their children, I was somewhat puzzled. According to the 1900 census, Lillie, their first born, was born in July, 1884, a month after the wedding. I realize that women did get pregnant before marriage even back then, but Gussie would have been eight months pregnant in June, 1884; why would they have waited so long? But then again the same census has Gustave’s birth year as 1861 and Gussie’s as 1862, not 1856 and 1864, as the Romanian records suggest. And it says Lillie arrived in the US in 1884, whereas Gustave’s naturalization papers clearly indicate that they arrived in 1887.

Does it seem likely that Lillie was born a month after her parents’ wedding? I went back to look at the 1905 census, and there Lillie or Lillian is listed as 21, giving her a birth year of 1884 as well. On the other hand, on the 1910 census, she is listed as 24 years old, making her birth year 1886, which makes more sense. Unfortunately, I’ve not yet found any other record for Lillie either after 1910 or before 1900, so I have no further evidence to corroborate either date. Perhaps Marius will find her Romanian birth record or perhaps I will find more American records. But which should I trust? What do you think?

UPDATE: This story on the blog Genealogy Tip of the Day relates to my question.

Romanian birth records

Posted on March 1, 2014 by Amy

I have received a number of different records from Marius Chelcu, the man who has been doing research for me in Iasi, Romania. Among those records are the birth records for five of the children of Jankel Srulovici and Tillie Rosenzweig, my great-great aunt. I now have birth records for Isidore, or Srul, their oldest child, for Bertha, or Bruha, their second child, for David, their third child, and one for Rebecca/Ray, their fourth child. I also have one for a son who died in infancy, Zissu. Unfortunately, Marius was unable to find a birth record for either Pincus or Leah.

First, the birth record for Isidore, or Srul, indicates that his birth date was June 9, 1883, and that his parents were Iancu Itzic Strulovici, age 38, and Bruha Thela Strulovici, age 36. This birth year is consistent with Isidore’s age on the 1910 US census, so it would be appear to be the right child and the right parents.

Isidore (Srul) Strolowitz Adler’s birth certificate

This record provides corroboration that Jankel Srulovici, here named Iacob Itzic Strulovici, was in fact Isidore’s father and that there was no first husband named Adler. The same is true on David, Bertha, and Rebecca’s birth records: Iacob Itzik Strulovici is their father. There is no indication on any of these birth records of anyone named Adler, and it thus does seem that the Adler name was chosen by the family sometime after arriving in NYC for reasons that are not yet clear.

If the ages of Jacob and Tillie are correct on Isidore’s birth record, they were born in 1845 and 1847, respectively, contrary to the 1851 and 1860 on their American death records.

The record for their next child, Bertha, has a date of birth of February 16, 1885, and her parents’ names as Iacob Itzic Strulovici, age 39, and Tilla Strulovic, age 36. Two things raise questions for me here as to whether this is the same mother named in Srul’s birth record. First, the mother is still 36 years old. That alone would not concern me, given how inaccurate the ages on these records appear to me. But her name is different. Certainly Bruha Tella could be the same person as Tilla, but the child’s name was also Bruha. Given Jewish naming patterns, it seems quite unlikely that Bruha would give her daughter her own name. It seems more likely that Bruha had died between 1883 and 1885 and that Iacob had then married Tilla, the mother of Bruha. But obviously I cannot be sure.

Bertha (Bruha) Strolowitz Adler birth record

The next record is for David, born on October 22, 1886, in Iasi, to Iacob Itzic Strulovici, 41, and Tela Strulovici, still 36. Perhaps Tillie just didn’t want to age and she was the mother of all three children?

David Strulovici birth record

translation of David Strulovici birth record

Next is the record for Zissu Strulovici, who was born April 1, 1891 and died six days later on April 7, 1891. At his birth Iacob is listed as 45 and Tillie as 40. Tillie had finally gotten older than 36.

Zissu Strulovici birth record

But when Rebecca was born on October 24, 1892, her father was 48 and her mother 39. So the best we can say about the accuracy of the Romanian records is that they are consistently inconsistent.

Rifca Ruhla Strulovici birth record

translation of Rifca’s birth record

Assuming then that Jacob was really 48 in 1892, he would have been 63 when he arrived in NYC in December, 1907, eight years older than the 55 he claimed on the manifest and at Ellis Island for his immigration hearing. Given the typical lifespan back then and the fact that he was reported to be senile by the doctor who examined him at Ellis Island, it does make it seem even more likely that he died not long after being admitted to the US.

I was also interested to see on Isidore, Bertha and David’s birth records that Jacob signed his name in Hebrew or Yiddish. I can decipher the “Yaakov Itzic Srulov—“ . It also appears that his older brother Joseph was a witness and signed as “Strulov” on David’s record. On Rebecca’s birth record six years later, it seems that Jacob signed his name as “Strulov” and not in Hebrew letters, as did the other two witnesses. It also seems that Strulov could have been written by the same person, presumably Jacob, on both documents as the writing is very similar.

I find great comfort in seeing these documents. It’s wonderful to have a record of events that happened in the family so long ago, and it gives me hope that all the work I’ve done will survive as well. It is also very moving to imagine my grandfather’s cousins as babies, their births being recorded for all time by their parents. Given what I’ve learned about how the lives of these children unfolded and ended, it is particularly poignant to think of them as innocent babies, unaware of their struggles ahead.

Why Don’t They Trust Me?

Posted on February 28, 2014 by Amy

Almost every aspect of doing family history research is rewarding. Finding new family members, finding documents, looking at photographs, even puzzling through mysteries that you cannot solve—all are rewarding in different ways. Sometimes it is frustrating not to be able to find a key document, but there are always new documents to be found and hope for finding the ones that are missing.

But what I do find most frustrating is not being able to persuade a newly found relative that I am not a stalker or a scammer or some other type of crazy person. Whenever I have located a new relative, I always send a message explaining why I think we are related (in some detail) and a link both to my blog and to my work website. If they are on Facebook, I give them access to my Facebook page. I try to do whatever I can to reassure people that I am not after them or their money, that I am not interested in anything other than making the connection and possibly learning more about our shared family history.

I understand that not everyone is interested in this stuff, and that’s okay. There are lots of things I have no interest in that other people find fascinating—investments, cars, basketball, cooking. It makes life interesting—we are not all going to be interested in the same things. Variety is the spice of life, and all that. But what I don’t understand is people who won’t even respond, even if just to tell me that they are not interested. I assume they just don’t trust me, and that makes me sad.

Uncle Gustave to the Rescue Again

Posted on February 26, 2014 by Amy

A key lesson I’ve learned over the months I’ve been doing genealogy work is that it is important to go back and look at documents and information you received over and over again. Something that seemed unimportant or confusing when first viewed can take on a lot more meaning after you’ve learned more about a family or a person. So while I am waiting for new documents, I took the opportunity to review some old documents.

I went back to look at the information I had for Isidor Strolowitz Adler, Tillie and Jankel’s oldest child. I did this because I noticed (for the first time) that on the 1910 US census that Tillie said that she had been married for 27 years.

The Strolovitz Adler family with Isadore and Betty in 1910

Since she was a widow, the first time I looked at this it did not seem relevant. This time I thought there might be a clue here as to when Jankel had died. Assuming that Isidor was born within a year of marriage, as seemed to be the case in so many of the marriages of that era, if Tillie and Jankel were married the year before Isidore’s birth and were married for a total of 27 years, I might get a better estimate of when he died (or disappeared).

So I turned to Isidor’s information and saw that I had an estimated date of birth of 1883 based on the fact that Isidor was listed as 27 on the 1910 census. According to his death certificate, he was 31 years, two months at the time of his death on April 23, 1915, giving him a birth date of February, 1884.

Isidor Adler death certificate

Since Bertha, the second child, was born in February, 1885, it certainly is feasible that Isidor had been born twelve months earlier. Unfortunately, these were the only two documents I had for Isidor since he died so soon after arriving in the US. I am hoping my Iasi researcher will find his birth record (he has located birth records for two of Isidor’s siblings; more on that in a separate post), but I decided to see if I could find a ship manifest for Isidor.

On my entries for Isidor I had two different arrival dates: 1901 and 1903. His death certificate in 1915 said he’d been in the US for twelve years, giving me 1903. The 1910 census said that he had arrived in 1901. Although the 1910 census indicated that Isidor had petitioned for citizenship, I’ve yet to locate that petition. And I had no ship manifest. Although I had found ship manifests for all of his siblings and for his parents, I’d not been able to locate one for Isidor. I’d searched for Isidor, Isaac, Ira, and Israel and all the variations of his last name, but had not found anything.

But this time I vaguely remembered something: in the records for his father’s hearing at Ellis Island, Isidor had been referred to by another name. I went back to look at those records and found that Isidor had been identified as Srul.

transcript listing Srulovici children

I had learned from one of my JewishGen contacts that Srul was a Yiddish version of Israel—that Srulowitz means son of Israel. So Srul had become Israel and then Isidor in the US. The transcript also said that Srul was 26 in January, 1908, making his birth year 1883.

So I went back to the Ellis Island search engine created by Steve Morse and searched again, using Srul, and lo and behold—there it was. Strul Strulovici, age 19, had arrived on January 12, 1902, from Jassy, Romania, via Hague on the ship La Gascogne. That would make his birth year either 1883 or 1882. So I am no more certain of his birth year and thus no more certain of when his parents had married. But assuming they were married sometime between 1881 and 1883, that would mean that Tillie became a widow between 1908 and 1910, which is what I already assumed.

Strul Strulovici ship manifest

But I did learn something new from the manifest. Under the column asking who was meeting Strul/Isidor in America was the entry “Uncle.” I have to believe that this was his mother’s brother, Gustave Rosenzweig, my great-great uncle, the same uncle who stood up for Jankel in 1908 and posted a bond, the same Gustave who acted as a witness at his niece’s wedding. I can only imagine all the other things that this man did that were not documented for eternity. This new finding gave me the incentive to go back and learn more about Gustave and his children.

Gustave Rosenzweig

So keep reviewing those documents. You never know what you will learn a second time or third time or even a fourth time through.

Brotman Research: Where I am

Posted on February 25, 2014 by Amy

Having reached the conclusion last week that I was not going to be able to get any further specific information about where in Galicia my Brotman relatives lived and then realizing that even if Tarnobrzeg was the ancestral home that the records there are very limited and too recent to be of much help, yesterday I went back to look over what I have learned and what is left to be learned about my Brotman relatives.

I have learned an incredible amount. I know much more about my great-grandparents Joseph and Bessie Brotman and about the life they lived in the Lower East Side. I have found all five of their children—Hyman, Tillie, Gussie, Frieda and Sam– and know what happened to them: who they married, who their children were, where and when, and in most cases, why they died. I know what they did for a living and where they lived. I even have been able to trace what happened to their grandchildren and who they married and the names of their children. I have seen pictures of almost all these people, except Joseph, Abraham, David, and Frieda. It’s been an incredible experience, so much more rewarding than I ever expected less than a year ago when I first starting dipping my toe into the waters of genealogy.

I’ve also been able to locate three of Joseph’s four children from his first marriage to a woman likely named Chaye Fortgang. I have found Abraham, Max and David, but not Sophie. I have also been able to learn a great deal about their lives, occupations, families, and homes and have located their living descendants. Although there are a few missing holes in David’s life story and a number of years for which I can find no records, I know that he married a woman named Annie Salpeter and that they did not have children. I know that he came to America with his older brother Abraham and that he died in 1946 of hypertension. Only Sophie is missing from the picture, but given that I do not know either what her Yiddish name was in Galicia or her married name in the United States, I am not sure what else I can do to locate her.

There are many unanswered questions, but most of them relate to their life in Galicia—where did they live, what did Joseph do for a living, what happened to his first wife? These questions I cannot answer, and that makes me sad. Also, when did Joseph arrive in the US? I cannot find him on a ship manifest, but will keep looking. I will also try and fill the holes in David’s story and look for Sophie, but overall, I think I have to say that I have reached the end of my search for the Brotman family.[1]

So what does that mean? Obviously, I hope to continue to develop my ties to my new cousins (and my old cousins, of course), and I also hope that they will help to fill out the personal side of the stories of their parents and grandparents. It will make the family story so much more meaningful and interesting if people contribute stories or profiles or letters or pictures that bring to life their relatives. I cannot do that on my own. I didn’t know Abraham, Max, Hyman, or Tillie—but those of you who are their grandchildren certainly did. I also didn’t know any of Joseph’s grandchildren aside from my mother and her siblings, but my second cousins—their children—must have memories and stories that they want to survive. Let me know, and I will be happy to interview you or help you write something you’d like to share.

Thank you to all the Brotman cousins who helped me get this far—for answering my emails and my questions, for sending me pictures and telling me stories, for providing me with names and contact information, for sharing whatever you were comfortable sharing. It’s been an amazing experience to share with you all, my Brotman family.

The rest of my personal journey to find my family will continue with the Goldschlager and Rosenzweig lines and eventually my paternal lines: the Cohens, Schoenthals, Seligmans, Katzensteins, Nusbaums, and so on!

[1] There remains, of course, a possibility of a tie to the Brotmanville Brotmans, but my research has hit a brick wall there as well. Without being able to trace back to Joseph’s parents and grandparents and Moses Brotman’s parents and grandparents, I will never know whether Joseph and Moses were siblings, cousins, or not related at all. Brotman is and was a much more common name than I had anticipated, and we could be related distantly to all of them or none of them. Without better European records, there is just no way of knowing.

Questions raised by Headstones

Posted on February 23, 2014 by Amy

I was reminded of the power of headstones when I received a set of photos from Tillie Strolowitz/Adler’s great-granddaughter Jean. Jean has been doing genealogy research for many, many years, and it has been wonderful to have a family member who shares this passion. Jean started in the pre-internet era, and she has been helpful in reminding me to be patient as I wait for documents. I want immediate gratification, typical of those of us working with modern technology; Jean reminds me that back in the pre-internet era there were no documents that you could view from the comfort of your home just by clicking on a computer. You had to travel to libraries, government offices, cemeteries, synagogues, and other record-holding institutions—or at best mail away (snail mail) and wait for documents to be returned by snail mail.

Anyway, Jean wrote to me about her visit to Mt Zion Cemetery back in 1999 to search for her great-grandmother’s headstone. Her experience was very much like mine when I searched for my great-grandfather Joseph Brotman’s headstone last fall. The stones are so overcrowded in the old cemetery that it is impossible to walk around without stepping on the gravesites of other people. It is also very difficult to find a particular headstone. There are no straight lines, no easy paths, as in other cemeteries. Here are some photos Jean took back then to capture the feeling.

Mt Zion cemetery

But when you do find the headstone, it is a powerful experience. You suddenly understand that your long-lost relative is in fact buried there and that someone stood there in mourning to bury them many years ago. Jean pointed out that Tillie’s headstone only refers to her as a loving mother, not a wife, and that the Strolowitz name is nowhere included on the stone, just the name the family adopted in America, Adler, despite the fact that Tillie’s death certificate is under the Strolowitz name.

Tillie Strolowitz Adler headstone Mt Sinai

Tillie Strolowitz Adler headstone Mt Zion

When Tillie died, two of her sons had already passed away, Isidor and Pincus, and were also buried at Mt Zion under the Adler name. Had the family erased Jankel from their memory by dropping his name and not including any reference to Tillie as a wife on her headstone? Does that provide any clues as to what happened to him? One would assume that he, too, was buried at Mt Zion, if he had died shortly after arriving in NYC, but I cannot find anyone with a name similar to his buried there.

I am still waiting for some records that may relate to Jankel and his fate. I am not optimistic that these will in fact relate to Jankel, but I will be patient, count the days, and hope that these records will help to answer the mystery of Jankel Srulovici.

Is there a Yelp for Genealogy Resources?

Posted on February 21, 2014 by Amy

The always helpful and amazing Renee did it again. I asked her for help finding Nathan and Gertrude Mintz and their daughter Susanne, and within hours she had located an obituary for Gertrude, naming her daughter Susan and granddaughters and great-grandchild. A second obituary for Susan’s husband revealed another great-grandchild. So now I have some living descendants to track down and contact. I’ve already reached out to one, but have not yet heard back. Perhaps we will be able to learn what happened to Harry, Zusi and Nathan after Hyman died and the family seems to have split apart or disappeared.

I would like to be able to find this kind of information myself. I asked Renee how she had found these materials, and once again it was two resources to which I do not subscribe or have access: Geni.com and PeopleFinders. It’s all quite overwhelming. There are so many different sources and websites. There are an amazing number of free resources: Familysearch.org, FindAGrave.com, fultonhistory.com, JRI-Poland, stevemorse.org, italiangen.org, Google, Facebook, the White Pages, for example. JewishGen.org and Gesher Galicia are free, but if you want full access, you need to pay or make a contribution. All of these sites are tremendously helpful, especially for finding people before 1940, but to find people after that date requires access to other resources since the census reports and vital records dated after 1940 are not publicly available. To find someone after 1940 or so requires access to obituaries, phone books, newspaper articles, marriage announcements, and other more modern databases.

There are also a very large number of paid sites. Each time I’ve asked Renee how she found a source, usually a wedding announcement or an obituary, I’ve checked out that database or website and subscribed to a few. For example, newspapers.com and genealogybank.com are two sites to which I have subscribed but that have been almost useless to me. I don’t know whether I am using them incorrectly or just unlucky, but I’ve found almost nothing of value on those sites. So I’ve become a little reluctant to plop down my credit card for more sites without figuring out whether they are worth the investment.

Some of the sites are not that expensive—$25 a year; others are far more expensive. For example, Geni.com, the site Renee used this time, costs $125 a year. They do offer a free 14-day trial, however, so I might at least try that. There are also so many other sites—Intelius, PeopleFinders—the list goes on and on. I am confused and overwhelmed. Do I really need any of these? Do I need all of them? Where do I draw the line?

Maybe somewhere there is a source that rates these sources for genealogy research value. Maybe some of the genealogists who are reading this post can point me to that source or provide me with some guidance. What are the best sources for locating obituaries, wedding announcements and other information relating to people living after 1940? Why have both newspapers.com and genealogybank.com proven to be so useless to me? Is Geni.com worth the price?

Let me know what you think. Thanks!

Zusi Rosenzweig: Some answers, more questions

Posted on February 20, 2014 by Amy

About ten days ago I wrote about the documentation that confirmed that Zusi Rosenzweig—also known as Sonsa, Ceci, Cecile, Celie, Susie and Susan Mintz—was my great-grandmother’s sister and the aunt who met my grandfather Isadore at Ellis Island in 1904. I also knew that she had married a man named Harry Mintz in December 1896, but it appeared that Harry had died by the time of 1900 census since Zusi, as Sonsa Mintz, was listed as a widow on the 1900 census, living with Jake and Rachel Reitman.

I also believed that I had found evidence that Zusi had had a son Nathan, born in December, 1897, but had not further evidence of him until he was living with Zusi at the time of the 1915 census. I believed Nathan had married a woman named Gertrude in 1930 and had had a daughter named Susanne in 1932, one year after his mother Zusi/Susie had died.

Although I was able to research fairly deeply into Jake and Rachel Reitman from the public records, I could not find any familial link between Zusi and either Jake and Rachel. On Jake and Rachel’s marriage certificate, their parents’ names are all revealed, and no one has a surname that I can link to the Rosenzweig/Goldschlager/Strolowitz family. I still don’t know if Sonsa Mintz is in fact Zusi, and if it was, I have no idea why she was living with the Reitmans.

Jake and Rachel Reitman marriage certificate

I had ordered three more documents: a birth certificate for Nathan Mintz, a marriage certificate for Nathan and Gertrude Mintz, and a death certificate for a Harry Mintz who died in 1924, thinking that perhaps Harry had just “disappeared” and had not died between 1897 and 1900. Today I received those documents, plus one more. For the most part, these documents did in fact confirm my hunches. The Nathan Mintz born in December, 1897, was the child of “Zussie” Rosenzweig, born in Romania, and her husband “Herman” Mintz.

Nathan Mintz birth certificate

The Nathan Mintz who married Gertrude in 1930 was the same: son of Susan “Rosenberg” and Harry Mintz.

Nathan and Gertrude marriage certificate

Thus, Susanne is Zusi’s granddaughter and her namesake. The death certificate for Harry Mintz dated 1924 neither confirmed nor contradicted what information I had because it is not the same Harry; this one had only been in the US for four years, was older, from Poland, and married to a woman named Ida.

Harry Mintz death

But there were some surprises in the documents; first, I received a second birth certificate for a baby Mintz born in December, 1897, Nathan’s twin, Hyman: same parents, same birth date, same doctor.

Hyman Mintz birth certificate

I immediately wondered why I had not seen any future references to Hyman and suspected the worst. I checked the death index, and Hyman Mintz died in January, 1898, a month old infant.

Moreover, the New York City birth certificate form asked how many children were born to this mother before this delivery and how many of those children were still living. On both Nathan and Hyman’s birth certificates, it says that Zusi had had one prior child and that three were still living. So who was this first child, and where was she or he living? Zusi and Harry had only been married twelve months when the twins were born, so they could not have had a prior child (well, at least one conceived since they had married). Zusi had been a 24 year old widow when she married Harry; she must have had a child with her first husband, perhaps in Romania before immigrating to the US. She was only a teenager when she emigrated. I have what I think could be the ship manifest listing Zusi as a passenger on the Ethopia, arriving in New York City on September 30, 1890; there is no child with her.

Ship Manifest as Susel Rosenzweig

Did she leave her child behind in Iasi for her family to raise? Why did she return to her maiden name if she’d been married? Perhaps there never was a marriage? I can guess, speculate, but not know for certain.

So what do we know and what don’t we know about this woman who met my grandfather at Ellis Island? We know she married Harry Mintz, had twin sons Nathan and Hyman, but only Nathan survived. Nathan grew up, married Gertrude, and had a daughter in 1932 named Susanne. Zusi died in 1931. What we don’t know is what happened to Harry or what happened to her first child. We don’t know where Zusi and Nathan were between 1898 and 1915. And we don’t know whether Nathan and Gertrude had additional children, whether Susanne had children, whether there are any living descendants of the elusive Zusi Rosenzweig.

Brotman Ancestral Home: Tarnobrzeg (probably)

Posted on February 19, 2014 by Amy

While researching my Goldschlager/Rosenzweig relatives, I have also been continuing to work towards an answer to the question

Photograph of Tarnobrzeg Main Square. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

of where in Galicia my ancestors Joseph and Bessie Brotman lived. The discovery of David Brotman, Joseph’s son from his first marriage, provided a new jumpstart to that research because David had listed two different home towns on his documentation: Tarnof on the ship manifest and Grambow on his naturalization papers. Unfortunately, that information seemed to conflict with what I had from Hyman’s papers—Jeekief and Giga.

After consulting with a few people in the field, my best guess is that the family came from Tarnobrzeg, then called Dzikow. A town called Grebow or Grybow is close by, and I am wondering whether David was born in Grebow, near Tarnobrzeg, when Joseph was married to Chaye Fortgang, and that Joseph moved to Dzikow/Tarnobrzeg when he married Bessie and when Chaim/Hyman was born. It’s a guess, but it’s the best I think I will be able to do, given the unreliability of the US records and our ancestors’ memories.

Having decided to make the assumption that Tarnobrzeg was the Brotman ancestral home, I then again researched the available resources online such as JRI–Poland, Gesher Galicia, and JewishGen, to see if there were any records that might be relevant, adding the surname Fortgang to my search since that is what David’s death certificate said had been his mother Chaye’s maiden name. I could not find any, and then I checked to see what records were even available in general for Tarnobrzeg.

I wrote to Stanley Diamond, the creator of JRI-Poland, and this is what he informed me: “Among all the towns listed [on JRI-Poland], Tarnobrzeg is the one with the fewest surviving records. They are the 1889-1911 births that are in the Polish State Archive branch in Sandomierz (for which we now have digital images) and the 1912-1937 birth records in the town hall in Tarnobrzeg.” Obviously, all of those records are too late for our family as the last child born in Galicia was Tillie in 1884. Just our luck—our relatives had to come from the place with the fewest surviving records.

Stanley told me not to give up all hope—that new records are sometimes discovered over time. And I will certainly keep renewing my search periodically, hoping that something does turn up. But for now, I think I have to accept the limitations of our ability to learn everything about our past.

So am I content with this? No, of course not. It’s particularly frustrating because it means I cannot go back any earlier than Joseph, Bessie and Chaye to find our earlier ancestors. I think that I can learn to be comfortable saying that my great-grandparents Joseph and Bessie Brotman probably came from the Tarnobrzeg region of Galicia. That’s much better than what I could say last summer when I really started digging for answers. But being even 99% sure is not the same as knowing for certain, and I am not even close to 99% sure.

For those who are interested, here are two websites about Tarnobrzeg, the town where my great-grandparents Joseph and Bessie Brotman probably lived.

Poland, Tarnobrzeg – Museum of City History, placed in old granary (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

ShtetlLinks page

Gesher Galicia page

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

Brotmanblog: A Family Journey

Adventures in Genealogy

Thirteen Abraham Rosenzweigs or How I Almost Threw My Computer through the Window

Vital Records—American versus Romanian

Romanian birth records

Why Don’t They Trust Me?

Uncle Gustave to the Rescue Again

Brotman Research: Where I am

Questions raised by Headstones

Is there a Yelp for Genealogy Resources?

Zusi Rosenzweig: Some answers, more questions

Brotman Ancestral Home: Tarnobrzeg (probably)

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