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Re- connecting with family

Actuallym a better title would be, " Connecting with Family". This photo taken early in the last century is of my grandmother, Toba Weissglass.

Toba came to the States in 1904 with her mother, Brana and her two younger sisters, Feige and Vechne. Toba's father and her brother, Lazer had arrived three or four years earlier.

Feige died before she reached adulthood. Vechne died while my mother was pregnant with my oldest sister. My grandmother adored her older brother.

I don't quite know why, but the two families drifted apart.

I have been doing some work on family geneology for the past several years. I had come across the name of Lazer's son in a synagogue bulletin that I had found by way of Google.

A few weeks ago, I wrote to the rabbi of the synagogue explaining my quest. This week I have been speaking to my cousins. We have been exchanging emails and photographs. It's a powerful thing to recieve a photo of a person who I have never seen before, who looks remarkably like me.

I look forward to meeting my cousins in person.
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  1. AnonymousNovember 10, 2011 at 5:15 PM

    She is lovely.
    I wonder if she was posing for the photo by the wall, or if she was helping to rebuild the drywall.
    We have alot of drywalls over here. It is a real skill to build them.

    Anyway, I am glad you are finding family. I have started doing that. It is alot harder when you are across the pond. But I am working my way back to when they went over from Europe in the first place.
    Sandy in the UK

    ReplyDelete
  2. Sarah JacobsNovember 10, 2011 at 5:49 PM

    I would be rebuilding the drywall, not Mama. Where i grew up in New England, there are lots of these sort os of walls. I grew up calling them stone walls. here drywall is that plaster sheeting encased by paper they use to put up houses today.

    The recors from www.ellisisland.org have been really helpful in our search. Census records too have been helpful. Google has been an amazing tool.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Kathleen C.November 11, 2011 at 11:21 AM

    My Mom has been doing some very deep geneological researching the last decade. SAt one point she received a photo album from a cousin that had photographs of generations of people whose names we knew, but we had never seen before.
    Then she handed me a group photo of four sisters... one my great Aunt Gladys. And in the middle, Gladys' younger sister... it was me. Really me! The hair, the nose, the smile.... I was spooked by that for a long time after.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Sarah JacobsNovember 11, 2011 at 11:38 AM

    Going through the photos of my late father in law it's really clear that my youngest looks remarkably like his grandfather. it's cool to know that I know what my son will look like at 97!!!

    ReplyDelete

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