Happy times

Posted on January 31, 2014 by Amy

Dune on Cape Cod near Provincetown (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Over the last several days, my posts have been tinged with sadness: my great-grandfather’s Moritz’s life story, the death of Pete Seeger, and the tenth anniversary of the death of my cousin Jeff. So today, thanks to my first cousin Robin, I want to post pictures of some of the happy days shared by my family. Robin sent me many wonderful photos, and I will post them all sometime over the next several days or so.

But today I want to post the pictures Robin sent of a family vacation to Cape Cod during the summer of 1962, the first family vacation we shared with my Goldschlager cousins, Beth, Suzie and Robin. I found a few others from my collection from that summer and later summers on the Cape.

That 1962 vacation was special in many ways. It was the first time that our family went to Cape Cod, a place that has become a place we all love beyond words. It was, in fact, the first time my immediate family went on vacation for more than just a weekend away. And it was the first time that we shared a vacation with the Goldschlagers. My Goldschlager cousins lived in West Hartford, which back then seemed to be a million miles away from where we lived in Westchester. We would see them for holidays and occasional visits, either in New York or in Connecticut, but this was the first time we were able to spend so much time just being together.

It rained many of the days that we were there, but we did not care. We were just happy to be together. We drew, played cards and games, polished beach stones, collected shells, swam when it wasn’t raining, watched television, walked on the beach, and just enjoyed each other’s company.

Julie, Suzie, Ira, Beth, Amy and Robin 1962

Robin 1962

My immediate family was staying in a small cottage in Wellfleet in Paine’s Hollow, and my cousins were staying at a motel called Horizons in North Truro. We spent most of our days at Horizons because it was right on the beach and had an outdoor pool.

My parents at Horizons 1962

Amy and Beth at Horizons

cousins at our Wellfleet cottage

Although my family went on vacation alone in 1963 to a different part of the Cape, in 1964 all the cousins including Jody and Jeff, our Lehrbaum cousins, were together near Lake Sunapee. Somewhere I have some photos of that vacation. We all stayed in little cabins on the lake and spent another week together, collecting rocks, playing with frogs, swimming in the lake, even water-skiing for the bigger and more able cousins. It was another magical time for us, being all together.

In 1965 and 1966, we returned with the Goldschlagers and the Lehrbaums to Horizons and to Cape Cod. Here are some photos from those vacations. They are not great photographs (I was using a Brownie or Instamatic), but at least for me, they capture some happy memories:

Jeff 1965

Maurice 1966

My mother, I think?

Jeff

Jody

Maurice, Elaine, a cousin, and Lynn

Jeff at Horizons 1965 or 1966

For many years after 1966, Horizons was the place my immediate family would return to when staying on the Cape for vacations. In 1976, my cousin Beth and her husband Steven honeymooned there, and we, also newlyweds, met them there and sat around the pool, sharing our wedding stories and our childhood memories. We took our children there when they were little, and even my grandson stayed there when he was just two months old. One of the memories that never fails to make us laugh is of my Aunt Elaine coming into our motel room and standing on the bed to rearrange the drapes. I don’t remember why she was doing it, but the image can still make me laugh. Although we all have found other places to vacation and no longer stay at Horizons, I think for all of us Horizons Motel remains a place with special memories

Those were some of my happiest days—being with my cousins, finding our common bonds, getting to be together as not just cousins but as friends. Yes, those days were too few and too short, but they left an indelible mark that even now, some 50 years later, allows me to conjure up those days with a smile on my face.

Cape Cod National Seashore. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

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.

Comments and Replies

Posted on January 29, 2014 by Amy

Once again I am getting a report that my replies to comments are not being received despite subscribing to receive follow-up comments. Is this happening to anyone else? If you submitted a comment and did NOT get a reply from me, then something is wrong. I reply to every comment, even if just to say Thank you. PLEASE LET ME KNOW. Thanks!

Pete Seeger

Video

Pete Seeger, American folk singer (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I woke this morning to the very sad news that my lifelong hero, Pete Seeger, had died at age 94. Others will write more complete obituaries, but I wanted to write about my lifelong relationship with Pete.

It started with my very first album as a small child. It’s the one depicted below with Pete singing one of my favorite childhood songs.

So my relationship with Pete started before I could even read. His songs were the soundtrack to my early childhood.

When I was a little older, I found my parents’ copy of The Weavers album from their Carnegie Hall concert and listened to it over and over. Here’s one of my favorites from when I was probably eight or nine years old:

As an adolescent, Pete was there to be my conscience. First, during the Civil Rights movement, we all sang “We Shall Overcome” at camp in 1963.

And, of course, “If I Had a Hammer:”

And then in 1965 I got to see Pete in Concert at Carnegie Hall as part of an anti-war concert.

Sing In For Peace 1965

It was my first Carnegie Hall concert, my first anti-war concert (I was 13), and an unforgettable experience seeing not only Pete Seeger but all the other great folk singers of the day. I am so grateful that my parents took me with them to experience this. I will never forget it. I saw Pete in concert a number of times after that, usually with Arlo Guthrie, but that first time was so magical.

Pete wrote and sang many anti-war songs, but my favorite will always and forever be this one:

I sang this all through my teenage years and after. I sang it to my children when they were little, trying to instill in them Pete’s message—that war is cruel and pointless and that only love and peace will sustain and save us.

I could post many more, but these are the ones that resonate for me today and every day.

Thank you, Pete Seeger, for always doing the right thing and for being the conscience for all of us.

Pete Seeger, Pamela Means, Magpie; Clearwater Festival 2008; Croton on Hudson NY; June 22, 2008 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Memories

Posted on January 28, 2014 by Amy

As I wrote earlier, my cousin Jody sent me some new pictures yesterday—pictures I had never seen before. These are pictures taken in the 1940s, except for one that was taken in 1953. Here are the first three.

First, a picture of my grandparents, my uncle Maurice and my aunt Lynn, and my aunt Elaine. My Uncle Phil probably took this picture because he is not in the picture, plus he was always the one taking family pictures, thank goodness. Jody, his daughter, has taken over that role in our generation.

Next is a picture of my grandparents, apparently taken the same day. You can tell how short he is, since my grandmother was only about 5’2 herself.

: Isadore and Gussie

Here’s a picture of my grandmother Gussie alone—notice those remarkable Brotman cheekbones.

The next two are very special to me. First, this is my grandmother Gussie with my cousin Jeff, Jody’s brother. She is obviously proud of her first grandchild. She was never much of a smiler, but you can tell (well, I can tell) that she is happy in this picture. This picture was probably taken in 1946 or 1947, as Jeff was born in April, 1946.

: Jeff and Gussie c. 1946

Finally, my favorite, a picture of my grandfather holding me on his lap with Jeff lying in the kiddy pool at his feet. This is my favorite for two reasons. First, it shows how much I loved my grandpa and vice versa. As I’ve said before, he died before I was five, and I only have vague, non-specific memories. Pictures like this one reinforce my emotional sense memory that my grandfather and I loved each other.

: Jeff, Amy and Grandpa 1953

Also, these last two pictures are special because they bring back memories of my cousin Jeff. It’s ten years ago yesterday that we lost Jeffrey, and it still seems unbelievable that he is gone. He was my first crush (after my father, of course), my role model, the one who teased us, the one who helped at every birthday party because he was the oldest cousin, the one who tolerated having seven younger cousins and a sister all chasing him around. He taught many of us to swim, to ski, to dive. He was always making us laugh; he was always fun. We all adored him, and despite the fact that we probably drove him crazy, we all knew he loved us. We miss you, Jeff.

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….

Pessel bat Yosef

Posted on January 25, 2014 by Amy

We decided to go to synagogue for Shabbat services this morning, and for the first time in a very long time, I had an aliyah. When the gabbai asked me for my Hebrew name to insert in the blessing, I said “Pessel bat Yosef.” I had not used my Hebrew name in any public way since I started doing all the genealogy research, and beforehand it had not meant anything too layered for me. It was just my Hebrew name.

The “Pessel” I knew was for my great-grandmother Bessie, but I knew almost nothing about her.

Bessie

The “Yosef” was manufactured by the rabbi who married us back in 1976. He had asked me for my father’s Hebrew name for the ketubah, and I didn’t know what it was. When I asked my father (whose English name is John), he said he had never had one. He’d not had a bar mitzvah, but had been confirmed in a Reform congregation which did not use Hebrew names. So the rabbi picked Yosef, figuring it was at least a name that started with a similar letter to John. That was fine with me. For a while I thought I’d switch to Yohanatan, figuring it was closer to John, but then I thought I should stick with what was on the ketubah (and easier to say).

So when I told the gabbai this morning that my name was Pessel bat Yosef, I felt a real connection to Bessie Brot Brotman, my great-grandmother, and I had a revelation. I didn’t know it in 1976 when I was married; I hadn’t even known it when I last had an aliyah several years ago. But now I know that Pessel bat Yosef was Bessie’s Hebrew name as well. Her father’s name was Joseph. So that rabbi in 1976 did not realize it, but he had in fact given me the same Hebrew name as my great-grandmother. When I realized that for the first time this morning, it gave me the chills.

Now that I know so much more about Bessie and her life, I feel particularly honored and moved to share her name. I am proud to be called Pessel bat Yosef, carrying her name and her memory into the present day and into the future.

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

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

My Great-Grandfather Moritz (Moses ben Ira) Goldschlager

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