Hart Cohen and family 1841-1851: Before the Move to America

Posted on May 13, 2014 by Amy

By 1851, the time of the second English census, my great-great grandfather Jacob Cohen had already moved with his family to Philadelphia. Much of the rest of his family of origin, however, was still in London. According to the 1851 census, Hart, my three-times great grandfather, was now a widower and 75 years old, living with two of his children, Elizabeth, now listed as 28 despite having been listed as 20 ten years earlier, and Jonas, who was 22. Jonas was not even listed as living with the family in 1841 when he would have been only 12 years old. All three were listed as general dealers and living at 55 Landers Buildings in Spitalfields parish in Tower Hamlets.

Hart, Elizabeth and Jonas Cohen 1851 England Census

Although I thought this might indicate a move to a new neighborhood, my research revealed that Landers Buildings were on Middlesex Street, which was just one blog from New Goulston Street where the family had been living in 1841. The English genealogy site Genuki indicates that Spitalfields was a district within the parish of Whitechapel for at least some point in London’s history.

I do not know when Rachel, my three-times great grandmother died. My search of the BMDIndex, the English index of births, marriages and deaths that began to be registered in 1837, revealed quite a few Rachel Cohens who died between 1841 and 1851. I have ordered one certificate on a hunch that it might be the right one, but I need to do more investigating before I know for certain when she died.

Hart’s son, Moses, now 30 years old, had married Clara Michaels in the fall of 1843, according to the BMDIndex. I need to obtain a copy of the actual record to be sure, but on the 1851 census, Moses Cohen was married to a woman named Clara and had three daughters, Judith (6), Hannah (2), and Sophia (six months). He was employed as a general dealer and living at 35 Cobbs Yard in the parish of Christchurch in Tower Hamlets.

UPDATE: I now know that Moses in fact had left England with Jacob in 1848. This is not the correct Moses.

Moses Cohen and family 1851 census

This neighborhood is about three miles west of where Moses had been living with his parents in 1841. Moses must have been fairly comfortable as they also had a servant living with them, although the Charles Booth Poverty Map depicted this area as poor in 1898.

The oldest son, Lewis, has been more difficult to track. He was not living with the family in 1841 nor was he living with his father and younger siblings in 1851. I would not even have known that he existed except for the fact that he appears on the 1860 US census reports living with his siblings Elizabeth and Jonas and his father Hart and on the 1880 census living with Elizabeth and Jonas. So where was he in 1841? 1851? According to those two US census reports, he was born in 1820, so would have been Hart and Rachel’s second child after Elizabeth. He might have been living independently in 1841, married, or perhaps just not home. The FamilySearch website indicates that the 1841 census had many holes; if someone was not staying at a home that night, they were not included in the census for that household. I found three Lewis Cohens on the 1841 Census, but none of them was a good fit. One was too old, one was living with different parents, and one was not born in England. But since the 1841 was the first true census taken in England, I assumed that perhaps Lewis was just not among those counted.

The 1851 English census did not provide any greater information on Lewis. There were several Lewis Cohens again, but only one who was a possible fit: he was born in Middlesex County in Spitalfields, Christchurch, around 1821 and was married to a woman named Sarah. They were living with Sarah’s mother, Ann Solomon.

Lewis Cohen 1851 census (not sure this is the correct Lewis)

I have found a marriage for this Lewis and Sarah in 1848 on the BMD Index and will write away for the record, but since Lewis was single in 1860 according to the US census, if this is the right Lewis, either Sarah had died or divorced him between 1851 and 1860. I searched for a death record for a Sarah Cohen who died between 1851 and 1860, and there were several on the BMD Index. I am not sure how to determine which ones might be relevant, but will order any that appear to be possibilities once I know that this was the correct Lewis.

UPDATE: I know now that Lewis had in fact emigrated from England to the US in 1846. This is not the correct Lewis.

The other possibility is that Lewis had immigrated to the US before the 1851 census or even the 1841 census. I cannot find him on either the 1840 or 1850 US census, but I did find some immigration records for a Lewis H. Cohen who was naturalized in Philadelphia in 1848.

Lewis H Cohen naturalization ED PA 1848

Since Lewis is listed on the 1860 US census as Lewis H. Cohen, I am inclined to think that this is the right person. If so, then I also may have found a passenger ship manifest for Lewis, arriving in the US in 1846, which would have made him the first Cohen to immigrate to the US, not my great-great grandfather Jacob. I need to check further into this, but it seems quite possible that the reason Lewis is not on the 1851 census in England is that he was already in the US. But then why can’t I find him on the 1850 US census either?

The other mystery child of Hart and Rachel Cohen is the son identified on the 1841 census as John, the youngest child on that census whose age was given as 14, giving him a birth year of 1827. In my initial research on the family, I thought that John had become Alfred J. Cohen, who was also born in 1827. Alfred married Mary A. Cohen and remained in England where eventually they had seven children.

In reviewing my earlier work from last year, however, I am now doubtful that this was in fact the child of Hart and Rachel. Although I will order a marriage record for Alfred to be sure, I now think that the John in the 1841 census was actually Jonas, the youngest son of Hart and Rachel and the son who was living with Hart in 1851 in London and in 1860 in Philadelphia. My reasoning is that Jonas was not listed on the 1841 census when he would have been only twelve years old. Where else would he have been if not living with his parents? Also, since Jacob’s age was off by a few years on the 1841 census, it seems quite possible that there was an error in “John’s” age and also his name. Jonas is close enough to John, at least the first syllable, so a census taker might have just recorded it or heard it incorrectly. On the US census reports, Jonas’ age jumps around, making it difficult to pinpoint a correct year of birth. Although I am going to order whatever vital records I can for Alfred and for Jonas, right now my hunch is that Jonas and John were the same person, the youngest son of Hart and Rachel Cohen, born sometime between 1825 and 1830.

UPDATE: It seems quite clear to me now that “John” was Jonas.

So I have a lot of unanswered questions about my Cohen ancestors between 1841 and 1851. When did Rachel, my three-times great grandmother die? Where was Lewis in 1841? Did he marry in England? Did he in fact immigrate to the US in 1846? If so, why isn’t he on the 1850 US census? Are John and Jonas the same person, or were there in fact two sons younger than Jacob?

It will take some time to get the records that may help to answer these questions, so while I am waiting for those documents, I will move on to the next decade and the story of my Cohen ancestors in the United States.

Hart Cohen and Family Between 1841 and 1851: My Great-Great Grandfather Jacob Cohen

My Ancestor was a Chut: More on Dutch and English Jews

Posted on May 8, 2014 by Amy

The Chuts” Synagogue Sandy’s Row London

After I wrote my last post saying I was going to put aside for now any attempt to find my four times great-grandfather’s family in Holland, I decided to look more generally into the question of why a Dutch Jew would have emigrated from Holland to England in the late 18^th century. After all, life seemed to be pretty good for the Jews in Amsterdam at that point. They had acquired full legal rights as citizens, many were comfortable both socially and economically, and England was in fact still forty years away from giving Jews the same legal rights as Christian residents. Why would someone have left Amsterdam to move to London?

Su Leslie of Shaking the Tree mentioned in a comment that she had seen some episodes of the British version of Who Do You Think You Are involving famous British Jews and recalled that there had been discussion of an immigration of Jews from Holland to England in the late 18^th century. I decided to search on line for more information and learned that there was in fact a whole community of Dutch Jews who settled in London during that time. My research led me to several websites discussing this community, including the Bishopsgate Institute website describing a recent oral history project about this community being sponsored by the Institute and created under the direction of Rachel Lichtenstein, a well-known writer and artist. According to this site:

The oldest Ashkenazi synagogue in London, Sandys Row in Spitalfields, was established by Dutch Jewish immigrants in 1854, who began arriving in the city from the 1840s onwards. They came in search of a better life, rather than fleeing persecution like the thousands of Ashkenazi Jews who came after them in the 1880s from the Pale of Settlements. Mostly from Amsterdam, many settled in a small quarter of narrow streets in Spitalfields known as the Tenterground. Here they continued to practise the trades they had bought with them from Holland, which were predominately cigar making, diamond cutting and polishing, and slipper and cap making. Many small workshops were established in the area and businesses were passed on within generations of families.

With their own practises and customs, many of which were different from other Ashkenazi Jewish groups, they became a distinctive, tight knit community of about a thousand people. To the frustration of the more established Anglo-Jewish population living in the area at the time, ‘the Chuts’ (as they were known locally) refused to join any of the existing synagogues…

Sandys Row Synagogue (Photo credit: FarzanaL)

So my four times great grandfather Hart Levy Cohen was a Chut—a term I’d never heard before and a community I’d never known about before. Other sites confirmed this information and also provided some other details. Wikipedia provided this explanation for the name “Chuts.”

The origin of the name Chuts is uncertain. A popular assumption is that it derives from the Dutch word goed (meaning “good”) and is imitative of the foreign-language chatter that others heard. It is also Hebrew חוץ for “outside” or “in the street” and may have been applied to the Dutch Jews of London either because they were socially isolated or because many were street vendors. Another possibility is that the Hebrew word would have appeared increasingly in Amsterdam synagogue records as more and more emigrated to London, and others who followed would have “gone chuts” (i.e., emigrated).

Sandys Row Synagogue, London (Photo credit: nicksarebi)

The About Jewishness website revealed where in London the Chuts lived:

They settled mostly in a small system of streets in Spitalfields known as the Tenterground, formerly an enclosed area where Flemish weavers stretched and dried cloth on machines called tenters (hence the expression “on tenterhooks”). By the 19th century, the site had been built upon with housing, but remained an enclave where the Dutch immigrants lived as a close-knit and generally separate community. Demolished and rebuilt during the twentieth century, the area is now bounded by White’s Row, Wentworth Street, Bell Lane and Toynbee Street (formerly Shepherd Street).

I looked up these streets on the map of London and was not surprised that this area is very close to New Goulston Street where my ancestors were living in 1841.

The About Jewishness site also provided some insight into what happened to this community and perhaps why my ancestors left London and moved to the US. According to this site, “the successful introduction of machinery for the mass-production of cigarettes ultimately led to the collapse of the cigar-making economy on which the Chuts community depended. Many Chuts returned to improved conditions in Amsterdam, some emigrated further afield to places such as Australia and the USA, some assimilated into other Jewish families, and some eventually lost their Jewish identity altogether.”

In addition, the huge influx of Eastern European Jewish immigrants in the late 19^th century caused tensions between the older established Chuts community and the newer immigrants, most of whom were poor, not as well skilled, and not used to living in a big city. Interestingly, the Chuts community had traditions and practices that made them different both from the older Sephardic community and from the newer Eastern European Ashkenazi community. Again, from the About Jewishness site:

[T]he Chuts were treated with suspicion by other Jews because the former had developed specific customs and practices, many of their families having lived in Amsterdam since the first synagogues were established there in the early years of the 17th century. Uniquely in Amsterdam, Ashkenazim (so-called “German Jews”) and Sephardim (so-called “Spanish Jews”) lived in close proximity for centuries, resulting in a cultural blend not found elsewhere. Most remarkably, the Dutch Jews were well accustomed to the sea, and ate seafoods considered not kosher by other Jewish communities.

From this information, it seems reasonable to infer a couple of things. First, it seems that despite the fact that the Amsterdam Jewish community was fairly well-established, there must have been those, my ancestor Hart among them, who believed that there was greater opportunity for financial success in London. These Dutch Jews decided to emigrate in order to achieve greater economic security. Secondly, it seems that at some point many of those Dutch Jews either left or assimilated into the greater Jewish or non-Jewish society. Some may have left because economic conditions were not as good as they had hoped; others may have left because as a “Chut,” they were not well integrated into the world of London’s Jews. With different traditions, different practices, different synagogues, they may have felt isolated and disrespected. I don’t know specifically what motivated my ancestors first to leave Amsterdam and then to leave London, but I’d imagine it was a combination of these factors.

Once again I am finding out new things about my own history and about Jewish history by doing genealogy. I never knew about the Chuts, and I certainly never knew I was descended from one. I have written to Rachel Lichtenstein to learn more about her project and will report back with whatever else I learn.

Also, in researching more about the Dutch Jews in general, I came across a genealogy blog I’d not seen before written by Kerry Farmer called Family History Research. Kerry had a post from two years ago about searching for a Dutch Jewish ancestor using information she was able to obtain from a book compiling information about marriages performed at the Great Synagogue in London, Harold and Miriam Lewin’s Marriage Records of the Great Synagogue- London 1791-1885. I was very excited when I read this post and contacted Kerry, who generously looked up Hart Levy Cohen and Rachel Jacobs’ wedding for me in the Lewin book. She was able to provide me with the information she found there:

(Groom) Cohen Hart Levy

(Groom’s father) Leib Katz

(Groom’s patronymic) Hertz b. Leib Katz

(Groom’s address) Not listed

(Bride) Jacobs Rachel

(Bride’s father) Yaakov

(Bride’s patronymic) Rechel b. Yaakov

She also suggested that I contact the owners of the Akevoth site to see if this additional information would help in locating the records of my ancestors, and I have done that. Now I will wait to see if they can provide any further assistance.

So yesterday I was ready to put aside the search for my Dutch ancestors, and then, with the help of Su Leslie and Kerry Farmer, I was able to make some progress in understanding who they were and why they left Amsterdam and why they left London. Once again I am humbled by and grateful for the generosity of the genealogy community. Su and Kerry are from New Zealand and Australia, respectively, and they have helped me in my search to find a Dutch Jew who lived in England and moved to America. What a small world it is when you find such wonderful, helpful and knowledgeable people.

The Brick Dyke in Amsterdam?

Posted on May 7, 2014 by Amy

Before I write about the next phase in the life of Hart Levy Cohen and his children, I want to explain what I have learned or rather tried to learn about his life and his family before he came to London. From the English census of 1841, I knew he was born in “foreign parts” outside of Great Britain. The 1851 English census was more specific; it said that he was born in Holland. The 1860 US census was even more specific than that. It reported his place of birth as Amsterdam.

Knowing his Hebrew name, his father’s Hebrew name, his English name and his approximate year of birth, I thought that I would be able to find some record of Hart’s birth and of his family in Holland fairly easily. When I first found this information over a year ago, I searched every way I could on a site called Akevoth, which has a huge database and lots of information on Dutch Jewry. It’s a wonderful resource, but I was soon overwhelmed. There were just too many people with the names Hart(og), Levie, and Cohen or some combination of two of those three. I had no way to figure out whether any of those people were my relatives. I’ve just looked again, and now I remember why I was overwhelmed. It’s like looking for a needle in a haystack. Last time I had not known about FamilySearch, so I have now looked there as well, and once again, I have not found anything definitive there or on ancestry.com.

I’ve also had a chance to try and find evidence of Hart not only online, but also in Amsterdam itself. Last spring we took a weeklong trip to Amsterdam. We had an amazing time and loved the city. It was not a trip we took for genealogical purposes, but rather a general interest trip to see the art, walk the canals, visit the museums, drink the beer, and learn about the history of Amsterdam. Part of that history is, of course, the history of the Jews in Amsterdam, and in addition to an incredibly moving visit to Anne Frank’s house, we also took a walking tour of Jewish Amsterdam with Jeannette Loeb, a Dutch Jew herself with expertise in the history of the Jews in Amsterdam.

From Jeannette and other sources, I’ve learned some of the long history of the Jews in Amsterdam. Like England and like the United States, the earliest Jews in Amsterdam were Sephardic—traders from Portugal and Spain. When the Netherlands established their independence from Spain, religious freedom was one of the important tenets of the new state, allowing not only Protestants but also Jews to practice their religion. The Sephardic Jewish community became well-integrated both socially and economically in Amsterdam, although Jews were not given the full legal rights of citizens.

Portuguese Synagogue Amsterdam

It was not until the late 17^th century that Ashkenazi Jews from Germany and Poland began to settle in Amsterdam to escape persecution and poverty. These immigrants were helped by the established Sephardic community, although the two communities retained their own languages, practices and synagogues. Although they started off poverty-stricken, the Ashkenazi community became more economically stable over the years. In 1792 Jews were finally given full legal rights in the Netherlands, certainly late but nevertheless a full forty years before Jews were given such rights in England.

Joods Historisch Museum (Jewish Historical Museum) in Amsterdam, Holland. {| cellspacing=”0″ style=”width:400px; text-align:left; color:#000; background:#ddd; border:1px solid #bbb; margin:1px; direction:ltr;” class=”layouttemplate” | style=”width:22px; height:22px;” | 20px|link= | style=”font-size:8pt; padding:1pt; line-height:1.1em;” | This is a photo of rijksmonument number 265 |} 00000265 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Before World War II, there were 80,000 Jews living in Amsterdam, about 10% of the overall population. Almost all of them were killed during the Holocaust, leaving only 20,000 Jews in Amsterdam after the war. Today there is a small Jewish community in Amsterdam, but nothing like that large and active Jewish community that existed before the Holocaust.

Holocaust Memorial Amsterdam

Thus, in the late 18^th century when Hart was born, the Ashkenazi Jewish community in Amsterdam was fairly well established, and Jews had full legal rights by the time he was a young adult in 1792. Why did he leave? What was the economic situation of his family? Who was his family?

While we were on our walking tour, I asked Jeannette Loeb where I might be able to get some help in tracking my Dutch ancestor, Hart Levy Cohen. She suggested that I visit the Amsterdam city archives and ask for some help in searching the city records. I followed her advice and spent a couple of hours there with an archivist who specialized in Dutch Jewish genealogy. He sifted through many books of records of births and circumcisions, but was unable to come up with anything definitive. As he explained to me, until 1812 most Ashkenazi Jews in Amsterdam (and in Europe generally) did not have surnames. People were known only by their patronyms, that is, by their Hebrew name paired with their father’s Hebrew name. Because of that, it is nearly impossible to identify specific families. Rather, there are just a very large number of people with very similar names. Hart was probably Hartog in Amsterdam, a Dutch version of Hirts, and there were many Hartog Cohens. Cohen was also probably a patronymic label, referring to the Cohanim tribe, not a specific family.

Thus, for now I am going to once again put aside any attempt to find Hart Levy Cohen’s father or other relatives and ancestors. Perhaps I will have another chance to go to Amsterdam or find some other clues to help me sift through all the data. Perhaps there will be some hole in this “brick dyke” that will allow me to find my ancestors. For now instead I will bring the story forward and trace Hart’s children and grandchildren all the way to my father and to his children.

Hart Levy Cohen and A Very Brief History of Jews in London

My Father’s Family, Part I: The Cohens

Posted on May 5, 2014 by Amy

My surname is Cohen, and it always has been. I have always been proud to be a Cohen. It is a clear marker to the outside world that I am Jewish. Because I grew up in a secular home and did not go to Hebrew School like almost all my Jewish classmates, some of them expressed skepticism about whether I was “really” Jewish, but my name always gave me some authenticity.

The Cohens (Cohanim) are the high priests, a line that is supposed to descend from Aaron, Moses’ older brother. Observant Orthodox Jews who are Cohanim do not go into cemeteries or attend a funeral or touch a dead body in order to maintain their priestly purity. In a traditional service, there is a special ritual where the Cohanim bless the congregation. Cohanim get the first aliyah for the reading of the Torah.

Birkhat cohanim 4 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Although I do not believe in any of the “special holiness” of the Cohen tribe and in fact am not even sure my family are true Cohanim, I do feel proud to have the name and some of the tradition and history that goes along with it. It was one reason that I did not change my name when I got married. I wanted to remain a Cohen—it was my name, it was my family’s name, and it was my ancestors’ name.

So perhaps it is not surprising that one of my first genealogical tasks was to trace the Cohen line. It was fairly easy to get as far back as my great-great-great-grandfather Hart Levy Cohen, who was born around 1772 in Amsterdam and emigrated to England as a young man. The English records and then the American records on my Cohen line were clear and easy to find through ancestry.com, and thus within a short period of time I was able to create a tree that went from Hart Levy Cohen to Jacob Cohen, my great-great-grandfather, to Emanuel Cohen, my great-grandfather, to John Nusbaum Cohen, my grandfather, to John Nusbaum Cohen, Jr., my father, to me. I have census reports going back as early as 1841 in England and 1850 in the United States as well as tax records and a marriage record from England. I have the names of Hart’s children, his grandchildren, his great-grandchildren and so on. I compiled a lot of information very quickly, but now I need to go back and learn from all those documents and see what I can find out about Hart Levy Cohen and all his descendants and also to see if I can find his ancestors from Amsterdam and before.

This research will require learning about English records and census reports and also about Pennsylvania records. From the little bit of initial work I’ve done this week, I already know that it will be more difficult to obtain Pennsylvania records than New York City records. There is not much online and not much available through the Family History Library. Most of it will require snail mail requests or traveling to places that are not as accessible to me as New York City. I do not foresee traveling to Harrisburg in the near future, so it may require hiring someone there to retrieve documents for me. And as for the English records, well, a trip to London sounds a lot more fun than a trip to Harrisburg, but I don’t think it’s too likely either.

So I have a big learning curve ahead. I am up for the challenge and ready to learn more about my Cohen relatives and about genealogical research. I will start by posting what I already know, and then I will fill in the details as I learn more.

Meanwhile, I will also continue to look for more information about the Brotmans, the Goldschlagers, and the Rosenzweigs. Tomorrow I hope to talk to David Goldschlager’s son and grandson and maybe learn more about the Goldschlagers. I am still hoping to work with Larry Brotman about a Brotmanville connection. I am still hoping to hear from my cousin Lois about her family and Lizzie and Ray Rosenzweig. I have written to descendants of Ray Strolowitz Adler and Zusi Rosenzweig Mintz, and I hope to hear back from them. So at the moment I am depending on these others to help me break down the brick walls that remain on my mother’s side. Without their help, I am at an impasse for now, but will keep on looking for any and all clues.

Assessment time

Posted on April 21, 2014 by Amy

It’s time for my periodic review of what I have learned and where I am going in my research. I keep a Word document with lists of things I need to do, but sometimes I need to step back and see the whole picture, then step forward and see the details.

English: Forest trees Part of the forest which is a bit more mature than some of the other parts along the path here. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

On the Brotman side, I think I am in fairly good shape. I have found descendants of all but one of Joseph and Bessie Brotman’s children, although I am not in touch with all of the descendants. The only missing link is Sophie Brotman; I’ve had absolutely no luck finding any records for her. I don’t know when she arrived, whether she married and, if so, who she married, where she lived, where she died. And sadly, I don’t think I ever will. There is no one left alive to ask about Sophie; none of the descendants I’ve spoken with know anything about her. Perhaps one of Abraham’s descendants might know something, so I will contact Paula, the one Abraham descendant I’ve been in touch with, and see if she has ever heard of an aunt named Sophie.

Bessie

The big research area remaining for me on the Brotman side is finding out whether we are related to any other Brotmans, in particular the Brotmans who settled in Brotmanville. I am in touch with a few of Moses Brotman’s descendants, and one is a genealogist, so we plan to collaborate and see whether we can find the connection between our families. If we can, that may also lead me to other clues about where in Galicia Joseph and Bessie lived and to clues about other family members.

Moses Brotman—Joseph’s brother?

On the Goldschlager branch, I think I am also in fairly good shape. I have found the descendants of Moritz, my great-grandfather, and of Betty and David Goldschlager, my grandfather’s siblings, and I know about the lives of Betty and David and their children. I’d love to go back and research Moritz Goldschlager’s family, but since his parents died when he was a young child, there does not seem to be too much more I can learn. My Romanian researcher did not find anything more related to my Goldschlager relatives, so I may have reached the brick wall with respect to that line.

Moritz Goldschlager

On the other hand, the Rosenzweig branch, my great-grandmother Ghitla’s family, still has a number of unanswered questions. I have been able to learn a great deal about most of the children of David and Esther Rosenzweig, my great-great-grandparents, but Zusi Rosenzweig remains a mystery. Her descendants were not responsive to my inquiries, so I may have to find another way to get closure on Zusi and her son Nathan and her husband Harry Mintz. I’ve had better luck with Tillie Rosenzweig Strolowitz Adler and her children and grandchildren and have been in touch with two of her great-grandchildren. There are still some loose ends there, but for the most part I have been able to find a fair amount about the children of Tillie and Jankel and even about their grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

Ghitla Rosenzweig Goldschlager

As for the family of Gustave and Gussie Rosenzweig, I still have some open questions, mostly about the daughters Lillie, Lizzie and Ray. This week I spoke with one of Sarah’s granddaughters, and I am hoping that she will also be able to help me find out more about her grandmother’s sisters, but as of right now, I have not been able to find any of the descendants of Lillie, Lizzie or Ray.

So that’s where I am in this journey to find my mother’s family. I feel as though I am seeing the light at the end of the tunnel, though there is still plenty of tunnel to get through.

What do I do now besides continue to search for answers to the remaining questions? I have a number of thoughts.

For one, I want to continue to build the relationships I’ve made with all my new cousins on both sides of my mother’s family—the Brotmans and the Goldschlager/Rosenzweigs. Having found them, I don’t want to lose them again. Facebook and email make this so much easier, but it will still take effort. I also want to see if I can organize a meeting for the Rosenzweig/Goldschlager cousins like we had for the Brotmans earlier this month.

I also want to pull all my research together into a format that will make it more easily accessible. I’d like to tell the story of the Brotmans, Goldschlagers and Rosenzweigs as a chronological story so that someone can pick it up and get the whole story without having to jump from blog post to blog post, searching for the next discovery. That is a larger project, and I don’t even know how to start it, but that is what I see as my ultimate goal—to write the book that tells the stories so that our descendants will have it and know who their ancestors were.

And then there is the next huge research task: my father’s side. That will be a very different research experience. His family has been in this country for about fifty years longer than my mother’s family. They came from Germany and from England. They settled and lived in other places: Philadelphia, western Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New Mexico, among other places. There will be a lot more American and European records available, which will make the task both easier and harder. I’ve already traced one of my father’s lines back to the 1750s or so in Amsterdam, a full century earlier than I’ve been able to trace any of my mother’s relatives. I look forward to this research with some trepidation because of the size of the task ahead. But I am also excited by the idea that I have more discoveries, more stories, more understanding of my family and of myself ahead of me.

Hyman and Sophie Brotman’s Sons: A Family Album

Posted on April 18, 2014 by Amy

Sophie and Hyman Brotman

One of the benefits of getting to meet six of my Brotman second cousins was that I was able to obtain a lot more photographs of my Brotman relatives. All six of the living grandchildren of Sophie and Hyman Brotman, my grandmother’s older brother, were able to attend our “reunion”—the three children of Saul and Vicky Brotman and the three children of Manny and Freda Brotman. Sadly, the two daughters of Joseph Brotman, Hyman and Sophie’s oldest son, have passed away. But I now have a good collection of pictures of Hyman, Sophie, their three sons, and their grandchildren.

Hyman Brotman was born in Galicia and arrived with his mother, my great-grandmother Bessie, and his sister Tillie in 1891 when he was about eight years old. He lived on Ridge Street with his family until he married Sophie Weiss on March 12, 1904. Hyman and Sophie had three sons. Joseph Jacob was born on February 4, 1905, and was named for Hyman’s father, my great-grandfather Joseph Jacob Brotman. Their second son, Saul, was born on April 27, 1907, and their third son Emanuel or Manny was born on May 9, 1910.

Hyman worked at various occupations, including as a chauffeur and in the sweatshops of NYC, but in the early 1920s he and his family moved to Hoboken, NJ, where he opened a liquor store. My mother has childhood memories of visiting her uncle and aunt in Hoboken, though by that time the three boys were all grown, and sadly she has no memories of her cousins.

Hyman, Bruce and Sophie in the Hoboken liquor store

Bruce, Hyman and Sophie in the Hoboken liquor store

As their children reported, all three Brotman brothers were very close and very athletic. They were all excellent swimmers and loved competing against each other, always arguing over who was the fastest.

Saul Sophie Joe and Manny

Joe married Perle Gorlin on May 1, 1935, and they lived in Queens where Joe was employed as a salesman for Abbott Laboratories, according to the 1940 census. Joe was a pharmacist in New York, but later moved to Florida where he became involved in commercial real estate.

Joe and Perle Brotman 1940 census

Joe and Perle had two daughters, Barbara, born in 1939 and probably named for Bessie, who had died just five years earlier, and Merle or Miki, born in 1941. Here are some photos of Joe and Perle and other family members:

Perle, Joe and Sophie Brotman

Hyman (second from left) and Joe (far right) and two unknown men

Joe and Saul Brotman

From Front Center, Clockwise: Joel, Herman, Sophie, Joe, Perle, Manny, Freda, Denny, Saul , and Vicky Brotman

Saul Brotman was an excellent athlete, especially in swimming and handball. He graduated from Hoboken High School and started college at the New Jersey College of Pharmacy in 1926; he then transferred to and graduated from Panzer College, which has since merged with Montclair State University in New Jersey. He later got a master’s from Rutgers University.

1932 Panzer College yearbook

Saul at Panzer College

Saul

In a comment posted in response to an earlier blog post, Bruce wrote the following about how his parents Saul and Vicky met:

“In Manhattan Beach (Brooklyn) there was a beach club, Manhatten Private. It had pools, handball courts, tennis and other sports. My parents were playing handball, my parents were both fine athletes, but not with each other. The ball from my mom’s court was accidently hit toward my dad’s court some distance away. My mom called to my dad saying “ball please”. Dad picked it up and threw it to mom. He then turned to his cousin, with whom he was playing and said “I’m going to marry that girl”. That was about 1940 or 41 I guess. He asked her out several times but she refused. On December 7 1941 my cousin Mel was born. Somehow my father found out and went to the hospital. (Mel was mom’s older brother Al’s first child). Mom asked dad what he was doing there – he said that he thought she might need some help, noting that Pearl Harbor had just been attacked. She apparently knew at that moment that she loved him. The rest is history.”

Vicky Horowitz Brotman

Saul and Vicky were married in 1942.

Saul served in the US Army during World War II and won a handball championship while serving in the army. After the war, he became a teacher in New Jersey, where he coached many state championship teams. After 32 years as a teacher, he left teaching after being assaulted by the parent of one of his students. Saul then became the pension director for a union.

Saul in the army

Saul and Vicky 1940s

Saul and Vicky had three sons, Bruce, Ronald and Lester.

Les, Bruce and Ron

Bruce, Ron and Les Brotman

Saul, Bruce and Vicky at Bruce’s bar mtizvah

Saul remained a great athlete all his life. In fact, Bruce told me that when Saul was in his seventies, Bruce challenged him to a game of handball, thinking that he could easily beat his father. Instead, Saul soundly defeated his much younger son; he won four straight games, with Bruce unable to score a single point in any of the four games.

Saul and Bruce

Saul and Vicky

Manny, the youngest of Hyman and Sophie’s sons, was also an excellent athlete like his older brothers.

Manny (far left) at camp in 1925

Manny November 1928

Like his brother Saul, he began college at the New Jersey College of Pharmacy, but he transferred to the University of Iowa, from which he graduated.

Manny with his fraternity brothers at U Iowa

He also graduated from John Marshall Law School (New Jersey), which was later taken over by Seton Hall University. Manny became a member of the New Jersey bar in 1938.

Letter informing Manny that he has passed the New Jersey bar exam

Manny married Freda Feinman on December 22, 1940.

Freda and Manny’s wedding invitation 1940

Manny and Freda 1940s

Manny enlisted in the US Army in 1944 during World War II.

Manny Brotman

Manny practiced law for some time, but then joined J.I. Kislak Mortgage Corporation, a subsidiary of J.I. Kislak, Inc. J.I.Kislak, Inc. was a residential and commercial Realtor, originally based in Hoboken and then in Jersey City, and Kislak Mortgage was primarily a residential mortgage banking company, one of the largest in NJ at the time, based in Newark. He was president and then chairman of Kislak Mortgage for many years, was president of the Mortgage Bankers Association of NJ, and a long-time board member and two-term Treasurer of the Mortgage Bankers Association of America, where he received the Distinguished Service award. Kislak Realty, a commercial mortgage firm, where he became the president. He was often quoted as an expert on veteran’s housing and housing in general in various newspaper articles. Here is one example of an article that ran in several newspapers across the country: Lebanon_Daily_News_July_10__1971_Lebanon__PA_Manny_Brotman

Manny and Freda had three children: Joel, Denny and Bonnie. Here are some pictures of Manny and his family:

Manny, Joel and Freda

Denny, Bonnie and Freda

The Feinman and Brotman families June 16, 1932

The Feinman and Brotman families June 16, 1937

From left to right: Aron Feinman, Hyman Brotman, Mary Feinman, Sophie Brotman, Manny Brotman, Sam Feinman, Freda Feinman, Saul Brotman (according to the back of this photograph)

I did not know Hyman or Sophie or any of their sons, but I was very fortunate to meet six members of the next generation, my second cousins Bruce, Ron, Les, Joel, Denny, and Bonnie. They all made the effort to come to New York City, some from as far away as Florida and Ohio. I really enjoyed meeting and talking to each one of them and getting a chance to meet some of their children, four of whom also showed up during the course of the weekend.

What a wonderful tribute to their grandparents and parents that these cousins and their children cared enough about the extended family, including some second cousins they’d never met, to make such a united effort to come to New York so that we could all be together.

Six of Hyman and Sophie’s grandchildren and three of their great-grandchildren

The Legacy of Rebecca Rosenzweig: Her Son, Irwin Elkins

Posted on April 16, 2014 by Amy

Iriwin Elkins 1960

I recently connected with Richard Elkins, the grandson of Rebecca Rosenzweig Elkin. Rebecca died in 1921 at age 27, when her son Irving was less than two years old. Irving grew up to be Irwin Elkins, who married Muriel, with whom he had two sons, Michael and Richard. Richard was kind enough to share with me some stories about Irwin’s life. With his permission, I am including some of what he shared with me in his own words.

First, some background. Rebecca Rosenzweig, my grandfather’s first cousin and the daughter of Gustave and Gussie Rosenzweig, married Frank Elkin in 1914. Her son Irving was born in 1919. After Rebecca died in 1921, Frank married Frances Reiner in 1922 and moved to Boston. Frank and Frances had a son named Stanley, who was born in 1925. In 1930 Frank was back in Brooklyn with Frances and the boys, but sometime thereafter they returned to the Boston area, where they settled permanently. I had assumed that Irving had stayed with Frank and his new wife during the 1920s, but Richard informed me otherwise.

“When Rebecca Rosenzweig passed away in 1921, Irwin Elkin moved into the home of Gustave and Gussie Rosenzweig, where he resided for eight years until 1929. Irving adored his Grandma Rosenzweig, and Grandma Rosenzweig adored my Dad. My Dad thought of Gussie as his mother. My Dad said Gussie was a fabulous cook. My Dad never spoke about Gustave.”

Perhaps the reason that Irwin never spoke about Gustave was that by 1921, Gustave and Gussie were divorced or at least no longer living together. If Irwin’s years with his grandmother were from 1921 to 1929, he was living with just Gussie, Ray, and Lizzie.

One of Irwin’s favorite stories about his years living with his grandmother was this one, according to Richard: “There was a large family gathering at Gustave and Gussie’s home, and Gussie discovered that she did not have enough food to feed the entire clan. Gussie pulled my Dad aside and told him to tell all the other children that when Gussie asked who wanted chicken for dinner, all the children were to say, ”No, thank you,” because they were not hungry. That way there would be enough food for the adults. When everyone sat down at the table, Gussie asked who wants chicken for dinner? All the children dutifully said no thank they were not hungry and were excused from the table. After the dinner was served and completed, Gussie then announced, ‘Any child who did not eat my chicken dinner will get no dessert!’ “

Richard also shared this story about his uncle, Jack Rosenzweig: “The only other story I recall about my Dad growing up in the Rosenzweig household is someone my Dad referred to as Uncle Jack who had a wild sense of humor. Jack worked behind the counter in the post office. One day my Dad walked into the post office to see Jack and Jack told my Dad he went to Yankee Stadium and met with legend Babe Ruth. Jack then tossed to my Dad a baseball with Babe Ruth’s autograph on it. There was just one problem. The autograph was written in purple indelible ink that was the same color ink that Jack used to address packages for postal customers.”

Irwin’s time with the Rosenzweig family ended in 1929. Richard wrote: “In 1929 Irwin was told to pack up his belongings. Frank arrived from Boston, picked up Irwin, and they went back to Boston on the train. My Dad was aware that Frank had remarried and had met Frances (Fan) Reiner. What my Dad did not know, until he arrived at his new home, is that he had a kid brother named Stanley who was six years younger than he was. That fact had been withheld from him while Irwin was living in the Rosenzweig household.”

I asked Richard if he knew why Frank and Frances had moved to Boston rather than stay in NYC. He wrote:

“Although Francis Fan Reiner was born in New Jersey, her extended family lived in Boston. … The second move back to Boston occurred because Frank changed professions. He met a couple who were twenty years younger than he was named Joseph Cohen and his wife Rene Cohen. They opened up a business called Debonair Frocks located on Kneeland Street that was in the high rent fashion district in Boston. Frank was the salesman who traveled throughout New England.”

Richard also told me that his father graduated from Boston English High School and was accepted into the MIT School of Engineering. He could not afford the $600 per year tuition and instead went to Northeastern University, which had awarded him a football and baseball scholarship and the opportunity to work on a paid co-op job. According to Richard, “Frank and Fanny Elkins were very unhappy that Irwin wanted to study engineering in college. They believed it was a useless profession. They would invite family and friends over to convince my Dad that the future was in clothing, not engineering. People need things to wear, they don’t need mechanical engineers.”

Irwin soon proved them wrong. Richard wrote:

“When World War II broke out with the bombing of Pearl Harbor, my Dad had just graduated Northeastern and tried to enlist as a fighter pilot. He was rejected for two reasons. He stood 6’4 and weighed 200 pounds which made him too large to fly. He also had his degree in mechanical and aeronautical engineering that made him too valuable to serve in the armed forces. My Dad was assigned to be a civilian contractor working for Bethlehem Steel at the Fore River Ship Yard in Quincy, Massachusetts. His responsibility was to oversee the construction of light cruisers and destroyers, take them to sea on shakedown cruises, and sign off on their seaworthiness before turning over the ships to the War Department.

“It was my Dad’s crew of engineers at the Fore River Shipyard who perfected the “Davit” that was first invented in 1928. It’s the device that holds a ship’s lifeboats in place that would lower the lifeboat by hand cranking the boat down into the water. My Dad was the lead engineer who re-designed the Davit into a fully automated self-contained hydraulic system that would first lower the two arms holding the lifeboat from their vertical position – while keeping the lifeboat level – into a horizontal position for boarding. The Davit hydraulics would then resume lowering the lifeboat into a fully locked horizontal position at which point a second set of hydraulics would automatically lower the lifeboat while maintaining its level stability even if the weight distribution in the boat was not balanced. The end result was an automated steady descent onto the water regardless of the surf conditions or high winds.

“If you want to see first-hand the engineering legacy of Irwin “Tiny” Elkins, then take a vacation cruise on a Princess, Carnival, Disney, or Royal Caribbean ship. Look closely at the hydraulics on the Davit’s holding up the lifeboats. Nothing has changed in the past seventy years. The survivors of cruise ship disasters like the Concordia in Italy can thank the Rosenzweig family genes for that innovated engineering solution.”

Irwin Elkins with Piper Cub 1958

Richard also shared these recollections of his father:

“My Dad was physically a large man and a wonderful athlete. Growing up we skied together, played tennis, and golfed. In a batting cage he could outdo me with little effort. Whenever anyone asked my Dad why such a large person like him was called “Tiny,” his standard response was “I was an incubator baby, and the nurse in charge turned the heat up too high.” Whenever he was asked why he did not have a middle name, his standard response was, “My parents were so poor they could not afford one for me.” Whenever someone asked him why he was so tall, his standard response was “So if I cut off my legs, will it make you feel any better?” In his business dealings he often told his customers, “It will be done my way and don’t worry about it. If I’m wrong, I’ll deal with it after I’m dead.” If someone did something that my Dad considered to be stupid, my Dad would point to his head and say “That’s using your toukis.”

Finally, I asked Richard whether his father ever reconnected with the Rosenzweig family. He shared this story:

“In 1969 a woman and her son walk into my Dad’s office in Brattleboro. When my Dad asks if he can help her, she introduces her son named Steven Rosenthal who will be a student at Windham College in nearby Putney. My Dad replies, why is that of interest to me? She informs my Dad that her name is Rebecca Kurtz Rosenthal. She was named after my Dad’s mother Rebecca Rosenzweig. Her mother was Sarah Rosenzweig, the sister of Rebecca Rosenzweig. To say that my Dad was completely stunned at this unannounced visit is an understatement.”

Irwin Elkins reunited with his cousins Rebecca Kurtz and Ben Kurtz and others in Florida 1992

The following year Richard himself met the Rosenzweig family:

“In 1970 at a family reunion in Long Island, New York, at the home of Rebecca Kurtz Rosenthal and her husband Sam Rosenthal, I arrived with my parents. Other than Rebecca and her husband Sam, none of the Rosenzweig family knew that my Dad would be attending the reunion. When we walked into the backyard Rebecca introduced my Dad to all of her family. I distinctly remember a flood of tears because the entire Rosenzweig clan had not seen Irwin in over forty years.”

“Rebecca’s and Sam’s son, Steven, introduced me to a woman he called “My Great Aunt Lizzie.” She must have been Lizzie Rosenzweig. She knew the name of the cemetery where Rebecca was buried. When my Dad asked her what his mother died from, Lizzie replied that she succumbed to a flu pandemic in 1921 that devastated NYC. Lizzie also informed my Dad that he had two older brothers named Milton and David who also died from the same pandemic that took his mother’s life. “

“When the emotions settled down several hours later, Lizzie told my Dad a comical story about when Frank showed up at the Rosenzweig household to court Rebecca, Lizzie’s parents would lock all the other sisters into their parent’s bedroom. However, they were allowed to put their ear to the door and listen.”

Rebecca’s death certificate indicates that Rebecca in fact died from tuberculosis at a sanitarium in Liberty, New York, where she had been a patient for a little over a month before her death. I also found the death certificates for Rebecca and Frank’s two other sons. The first born was Milton, born on December 14, 1914, just nine months after Rebecca and Frank were married. He died just five months later on May 16, 1915. It seems he had been sick for two months, in other words, since he was really just an infant.

Milton Elkin death certificate

The second child was Daniel (not David). He was born October 31, 1916, and died December 16, 1917, when he was just over a year old, from broncho pneumonia.

Daniel Elkin death certificate

Although the family lore was that Rebecca and the two boys died during the flu pandemic of 1921, that appears not to be true. It would appear instead that Milton died over a year before Daniel was even born, and that Daniel died two years before Irving was born and four years before Rebecca died. Maybe the family remembered it differently because it was just too painful to imagine Rebecca and Frank losing one child after another and then Frank losing Rebecca when Irving was not yet two years old. It is too painful to imagine.

I am deeply appreciative of Richard’s willingness to share his family stories. They preserve not only the memory of his grandmother Rebecca, who never saw her son grow up; they also preserve the memory of that son, Richard’s father, Irwin Elkins, who despite losing his mother at such a young age, grew up to be a man with a great sense of humor, a wonderful father, a successful businessperson, and an inspired engineer. The resilience of the human spirit is remarkable.

Max and Irving: The Sons of Abraham Rosenzweig

Posted on April 11, 2014 by Amy

Abraham Rosenzweig was the oldest son of Gustave and Gussie Rosenzweig and my grandfather Isadore’s first cousin. He was born in New York City on February 12, 1889, apparently the first of their children born in the US. He served in the Navy before and during World War I, and he worked for a bakery after the war and thereafter.

Although I do not have any documentation for Abraham’s marriage, it seems that he probably married in Pennsylvania. Rebecca Fagles, his wife, was born in Pennsylvania, and Abraham was stationed on the USS Georgia in Philadelphia in 1910.

Abraham Rosenzweig 1910 census US Navy

I assume that that was when and where they met and that they married around 1915 because although Abraham was living with his family and single as of the 1915 census, his first son Maxwell was born April 2, 1916. Abraham and Rebecca’s second son Irving was born April 26, 1919, and in 1920, they were all living in Brooklyn, according to the 1920 US census.

UPDATE: I was able to find the marriage of Reba Fagles and Abraham Rosenzweig in 1915 on the Philadelphia marriage index. I am assuming that that is the record for Abraham and Rebecca.

Abraham Rosenzweig and family 1920 census

Abraham and Rebecca, known as Abe and Beck, lived in Brooklyn for the rest of their lives, where they raised their two sons, Max and Irving. Max married Sylvia Herrick and had two sons, Joseph and Gerald.

Max and Sylvia Ross

Irving married Irene Rubenstein/Robbins and had two daughters, Jane and Arlene. Gerry remembers his grandparents very well since he grew up in Brooklyn where they lived. He remembers that his grandmother Beck served untoasted English muffins and used memorial candle holders as glasses. Gerry named his two children for his grandparents, his son for Abe and his daughter for Beck. Abe died in 1961, and Beck died in 1970.

Abe, Sylvia, Ray (Abe’s sister) and Beck

Here are some photographs of Max and Irving and one with their aunt Ray, an aunt I’ve otherwise been unable to locate.

Max and Irving Rosenzweig/Ross

Max and Irving with their aunt Ray

I was able to get some background information about the lives of Max and Irving from Gerry and Arlene.

Max and Sylvia settled in Brooklyn, where Max first was in the egg and poultry business and then in the business of reconditioning steel drums for storing oil. At some time after World War II while doing business with the army, Max changed his last name from Rosenzweig to Ross, believing that he would have more success with a name that was not obviously Jewish. Sometime thereafter Irving also changed his last name to Ross for similar reasons and also because their mother Beck did not like the idea of the two brothers having different last names.

Arlene told me that her father Irving had met her mother Irene when her uncle Max went to Sylvia’s house while they were dating and brought his younger brother Irving with him. One of Sylvia’s friends was there and arranged for Irving to meet her younger sister Irene. For Irving, it was love at first sight, but not for Irene. For a year, Irving pursued her. Irene had joined the Navy, one of the first ten women to become a WAVE, and Irving, himself in the US Army, placed an ad in the Stars and Stripes to find her and to get her attention. Eventually, Irene agreed to date him and fell in love with him as well.

They were married in 1945, and according to Arlene, to his dying day, her father would do anything to make Irene happy. Irving and Irene Irene and Irving lived at 41 Kew Gardens Road, Queens, and their two daughters were born at Kew Gardens General Hospital. Irving owned a share in a successful hardware business.

In 1957, Irving and Irene and their daughters went to visit Irene’s parents, who had moved to the Miami, FL, area. Irene was so taken with life in South Florida that within days after returning to Brooklyn, Irving sold his share in the hardware business and bought three tickets to Miami for Irene and his daughters, coming down a few months later himself once his business matters were resolved. He was, as Arlene said, determined to make Irene as happy as possible.

Within five years, Irving, a man who never graduated from high school, had obtained a license to sell insurance and had established a very successful insurance brokerage business. He was able to provide his family with a large, custom-built house and a comfortable lifestyle. Irving and Irene remained in the Miami area thereafter and only occasionally would they return to the New York area.

Sadly, their lives would be marked by tragedy. In 1968, Irving was admitted to Baptist Hospital in Miami for congestive heart failure. While he was being admitted, Irene and Arlene went to get something to eat, and while driving down North Kendall Drive, where Baptist Hospital is still located, they were hit head-on by a minibus going northbound on U.S. 1, South Dixie Highway. The minivan had defective brakes and had skidded across the median. Both Irene and Arlene suffered severe injuries, and Arlene underwent numerous surgeries and was laid up for a substantial time after the accident. For some period of time all three members of the family shared one hospital room.

Arlene and Irving Ross August1968

Not long after the accident, Irving was diagnosed with inoperable cancer and died at age 51 on August 5, 1970. Irene was only 49 when he died. She had to go to work to support herself and her children and became a purchasing agent at Florida International University, where she worked for many years. She died January 16, 2009, at age 88.

Irene Ross in 2006

Arlene Ross

Max also died at a prematurely young age. His wife Sylvia had a number of medical problems, and while accompanying her for treatment at Massachusetts General Hospital in November, 1975, Max had an aneurysm and died. He was only 59 years old. Sylvia lived more than twenty years after Max died.

Sylvia Ross

The two sons of Abraham and Rebecca, Max and Irving, thus had many parallels in their lives. Both were big strong men over six feet tall, both had changed their name to Ross, both had had two children and long marriages to women to whom they were devoted, and both had died before they were sixty years old. Gerry said he speaks to his father daily and has every day since he died in 1975; Arlene also spoke adoringly of her father. I could tell in speaking with both Gerry and Arlene that each of them loved their fathers dearly and want their memories preserved. I hope this blog will help to do that.

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

Sometimes You Win, Sometimes You Lose

Posted on April 10, 2014 by Amy

I have had some incredible luck following my hunches when ordering vital records about people who I think are my family members—finding Frieda Brotman’s death certificate and marriage certificates, for example, or finding Susie Mintz and Gustave Rosenzweig and Tillie Strolowitz and their relatives. But lest anyone think that all my hunches have worked out, I want to give you three recent examples where I just guessed wrong.

The first example involves Gussie Rosenzweig, Gustave’s wife. Recently I was able to obtain her death certificate and saw that her son Jack had listed her as a widow with a husband named Ben. I was very puzzled by this as Gussie had not been listed as living with any man in the most recent census reports before she died. Had she married sometime in the 1920s or 1930s and been widowed in between census reports? I did a search and found only one Gussie Rosenzweig who had married a man named Benjamin. I ordered that certificate, and this is what I received:

Clearly, this is not the right Gussie. This Gussie was only 27 in 1934, whereas our Gussie would have been in her 70s; this Gussie had different parents who had come from Hungary. So I still have no idea whether there ever was a Ben who married Gussie after she and Gustave split up. Strike one.

The next bad guess involved a search for the other children of Gussie and Gustave who did not survive infancy. I had seen on Rebecca’s birth certificate in 1893 that Gussie and Gustave had had five children, four living at Rebecca’s birth. Somehow I miscounted and thought there was a missing child, although now when I go back and re-read my blog post, it seems pretty obvious that I had found all four living children (Lillie, Sarah, Abraham, and Rebecca) and the one deceased child (David). But I thought I had found another—Samuel Rosenzweig—and sent for that death certificate. Not surprisingly, he was not the child of Gustave and Gussie, as you can see below. Strike two.

The last example of my bad hunches involved a man named Paskel Rosenzweig who came from Iasi in 1900. I thought that he might be another Rosenzweig sibling and decided to research his life in the US. I was able to determine that he had changed his name to Charles and ordered a death certificate, hoping it would show that he was the sibling of Gustave, Tillie, Ghitla and Zusi, but as you can see below, he was not. Strike three.

Perhaps he was a cousin, but it would require some further digging into Romanian documents to see if Charles’ father was related to my great-great grandfather David Rosenzweig. For now I will accept that my hunch is unproven, if not yet proven wrong.

There are other examples of times I made a bad guess. Fortunately for the most part these bad guesses are not costly, as the documents usually came for free from the Family History Library. But even so, every time I open a document, either electronically or in hard copy, my heart is beating, hoping it will provide an important clue or confirm a hunch. When it does not, it is very disappointing. Inevitable—what are the odds I will always find the right person?—but nevertheless, disappointing.

Gifts from Doing Genealogy: My Wonderful Cousins

Posted on April 6, 2014 by Amy

Ten of Joseph and Bessie’s great-grandchildren on the Lower East Side

Lower East Side tenement (Photo credit: Salim Virji)

After much planning and anticipation, ten of Joseph and Bessie Brotman’s great-grandchildren, four of their great-great-grandchildren and one great-great-greatgrandchild as well as a number of spouses spent the weekend, talking, eating, laughing and connecting and reconnecting in NYC. Some of us had known each other all our lives, some had never met at all, and some had not seen each other in many years. We represented two of Joseph and Bessie’s children, Hyman and Gussie. Although a few people could not make it for various reasons, there were several others who wanted to join us but were unable to do so, including one of Max’s granddaughters and one of hisgreat- granddaughters and one of Abraham’s granddaughters. We had a wonderful tour of the Tenement Museum and several of us walked along Ridge Street between Rivington and Delancey where our ancestors lived between about 1891 and 1907.

Sign outside Lower East Side Tenement Museum (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

It was everything I had hoped it would be and more so. We shared stories about our lives and about our grandparents and parents. We shared photographs. We got to know and learned about our children and grandchildren. We came from as far away as Cleveland and Florida and Massachusetts. Some lived closer by in New Jersey or even in NYC itself. There were lots of photos taken. Included here are just a representative few to illustrate the excitement and love that was shared.

Saul and Manny’s descendants

cousins

I cannot speak for everyone, but for me it was magical. A year ago I did not even know I had second cousins. Through the course of doing family research, I had found all these new wonderful people, people I would have chosen as friends even if they were not my relatives. We may live far apart, we may have known each other only for a short time, but I know that for me I felt a deep connection. No, it’s not the same as growing up with a first cousin who shared grandparents and holidays and vacations, but it is nevertheless a real connection. We all came from the same place, we all are here because Joseph and Bessie decided to leave Galicia and come to America. We all started somewhere on Ridge Street where our grandparents learned to speak English and the skills that were necessary to rise above the poverty.

Lower East Side (Photo credit: InSapphoWeTrust)

I am so grateful for all who were able to make it and all who helped make this dream come true. I hope that those who were unable to join us will be able to do so another time. And now I am inspired to starting planning the first Goldschlager-Rosenzweig reunion and then the second Brotman reunion. These things take time and effort, and I was lucky to have lots of help with the planning, but I encourage any of my fellow family researchers to reach out and make your family tree more than a two-dimensional document or digital record. Find a way to meet your cousins and make them a part of your life.

UPDATE: For more photos, click here.

Brotmanblog: A Family Journey

Adventures in Genealogy

Tag Archives: genealogy

Hart Cohen and family 1841-1851: Before the Move to America

My Ancestor was a Chut: More on Dutch and English Jews

The Brick Dyke in Amsterdam?

My Father’s Family, Part I: The Cohens

Assessment time

Hyman and Sophie Brotman’s Sons: A Family Album

The Legacy of Rebecca Rosenzweig: Her Son, Irwin Elkins

Max and Irving: The Sons of Abraham Rosenzweig

Sometimes You Win, Sometimes You Lose

Gifts from Doing Genealogy: My Wonderful Cousins

Related articles

Share this:

Share this:

Related articles

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Related articles

Share this:

Share this:

Share this: