2003 Page Two

The annual Jewish Genealogy Conference was held in Washington, D.C. in July, where they invaded and took over several floors of the J. W. Marriott Hotel.

We took advantage of traveling to the east coast to meet family along the way. Leaving L.A. on Monday, July 14 for Baltimore, on Tuesday we re-acquainted ourselves with Lee & Janet Rosenstock Greenwald. We first met in 1986 when I started this quest for family roots. They most generously schlepped us around Baltimore to the Baltimore Hebrew Cemetery, Corn Beef Alley, and the

Jewish Museum of Maryland. New information was found on headstones at BHC, and the exhibit of Jews of the Small Towns of Maryland displayed several photos of Frederick, MD, in which Janet and her twin sister Susan Nolan appeared. In the evening Janet & Lee wined & dined us with a feast of farm-fresh edibles prepared by Lee.

During an afternoon break, we were able to squeeze in a visit with Sally Palmbaum, who was on her "day off" at the office. She brought us up-to-snuff on the doings in the Palmbaum family: her sister Anne was being married the following weekend (see photo of Sheldon and Anne on page 4), so things were really busy. Anne's son Rabbi John Fishman is pursuing his doctorate at Penn and his wife Rabbi Jennifer Cleyman has taken a position at a synagogue in New Jersey. They have left Southern California for New Jersey and we will miss them.

On Wednesday, we drove out to Annapolis. I wanted to do some research in the Maryland State Archives, and Tom & Darcey Rose invited Jeb & Shari Brownstein, as well as many others who couldn't come, for a dinner on the shores of Chesapeake Bay. The atmosphere was lovely, and it was so nice to share some time with them.

The next morning I was back at the archives and about mid-day we met U.S. Navy Adm. (Ret.) Douglas & Sharon Katz, who live on another shore of Chesapeake Bay. It was beautiful from both sides. Doug is doing consulting work and had to be in D.C. in the afternoon, but he did give us a quick tour of the Naval Academy. It is quite impressive, and it will be interesting to see the new Jewish chapel when it is finished.

We drove back to Baltimore for an evening meeting with James & Audrey Rothschild. Audrey was under the weather so we only had the pleasure of Jim's company. However, we did get a royal tour of their home, which was decorated beautifully by Audrey.

And just as a curious side note, Audrey Rothschild and Shari Brownstein are cousins but their spouses are not in the same families.

On Friday we spent a good portion of the day at the library of the Jewish Museum. One very exciting find was the notice of an unveiling for Ludwig Loewenstein. It mentioned the cemetery where he was buried, so it gave me a great source for information.

dinner. When their family had moved out of the home in which they had grown up, Irv & Shirley decided they needed a bigger home to accommodate their growing family. So with just a few slight re-arrangements the living and dining rooms become one and a table for many fills the space. It was a wonderful feeling being among the children and grandchildren, as well as Shirley's mom Rose, her brother and a friend, and an aunt who was visiting as well. It was a real family Shabbat evening.

On Sunday morning we left for DC and the conference. At the opening meeting we learned that about 1200 people from 18 different countries were attending. What a group! The keynote speaker was Mr. John Carlin, Archivist of the United States. There are several regional archives around the U.S. and what they hold can tell many stories. But what was so fascinating were his words about the future ways in which data will be stored and retrieved, and how much more will be available through the Internet someday.

Monday morning found me at the National Archives I, 700 Pennsylvania Avenue. The crowd was less than I expected, and I think that was because many of the attendees were attending classes at the hotel. I prefer to research. The rest of the week I spent either at Archives I, Archives II in College Park, MD, or in the computer resource room at the hotel. The things I found were amazing.

An introductory talk at Archives II reminded me about one of my cousins who had served as a military nurse.

In 1927, a cousin, Esther Louise Klein, was serving as a U.S. Navy nurse in the Philippines. Two days before she was to ship home she died under most suspicious circumstances. The Military Inquiry ruled it was a suicide, but her friends and family thought she was murdered. In a file at Archives I, I found the whole proceedings of the inquiry, plus many letters written to the Navy JAG, by the Navy, from senators, presidents of organizations for women's rights, and various others. It would make for a very intriguing JAG episode, or an interesting item for the Museum of Jewish Military Persons.

The other most interesting item I found was at the computer center. Yad Vashem has been digitizing all the pages of testimony that people have completed over the years for lost family members. There was a prototype program on line during the conference. It is scheduled to be completely finished and available by next year's conference in Jerusalem. I found several members of Sam's family on pages that had been completed by his cousin Rivka in Haifa in 1956. The fascinating page was the one made for his cousin Shulamit, who was thought to have perished when the whole family was taken in their shetl. What Rivka and the rest of the family didn't know was that Shulamit's mother had sent her to stay with her family in Kharkov, Russia, where she survived the Holocaust, and grew up to be a school teacher in Russia. And only after Glasnost did she attempt to contact the family in Israel. She was 65

when she made contact and has since emigrated to Israel. But there was that page that Rivka had made for her. It was eerie.

Each evening in D.C. we spent with cousins who live in the area: Charles & Barbara Fox, Ed & Linda Zurndorfer , and the sister of my late best friend from my teen years and her husband, Barbara & David Marblestone. David is related to Betty Joseph Abeles. And, it turns out that Barbara's grandmother was the best friend of Nellie Newmark of Lincoln, NE, whose mother was Bertha Langsdorf Newmark. It is, indeed, a small, small world.

We returned to Baltimore to spend the week-end, having Friday lunch with Aaron Hirshey at a great Chinese kosher restaurant in Pikesville. Then dinner at the Suburban Club with Lois & Dick Hess and Marjorie Weinberg Ottenheimer. They were very interested in hearing Sam's story of his first year in the U.S. and his adventures at Taft College, Taft, CA.

On Saturday afternoon we spent a delightful hour or so with Matthew & Lisa Berkun Freedman and their charming 2-year old daughter, Sara, who decided Play-doh was a fantastic decoration for her nose.

Sunday took us out to Frederick to visit with Robert & Ann Weisburger Lebherz. Ann is very active in the Frederick Historical Society and has edited several books for the same. She kindly gifted me with two of them about interesting people who had lived in Frederick. After lunch we spent an hour or so in the library, which is open on Sunday, and then drove back to Baltimore to go to the cemetery where the above Ludwig Loewenstein was buried.

I didn't know the cemetery closed at 4 p.m. on Sunday -- that didn't stop me. I saw a place where the fence was broken down and found a way in. I found his stone--another piece of the puzzle in place. I guess I was lucky that I wasn't arrested for entering a closed cemetery. We then drove up to Philadelphia to spend the night.

Monday morning I spent an hour in the Free Public Library and then we drove out to meet Susan Silberstein Beneman, her daughter Nancy and three of her grandchildren. It was a wonderful visit, and then we drove up to Long Island.

Patrick, Nancy Dennin, Susan Beneman, & Michael Dennin

Susan & Allison Romano, Joan Rimmon, Sam & Nell Iseman

I will say this about the freeway system in California, it is much better than the beltways, parkways and toll ways of the east coast! We were supposed to get off at exit 22 and were sailing along beautifully. But then we got to exit 19 and it took 45 minutes to get to exit 22. I don't know how far it was, but it took 45 minutes!!!!

At noon on Tuesday Sam & Nell Iseman (see story on page 10) picked us up from our hotel and took us to lunch at a restaurant in a building from the time of George Washington. Their daughter Susan, who was the one that "found" our family website while looking for information about her grandfather, joined us, as did her daughter Allison. After lunch we went back to Sam & Nell's home to look at the memorabilia that they had. It was amazing. Sam's grandmother, Myrtle Birkenwald Iseman, had saved newspaper articles, receipts, programs, etc. All the stuff that genealogists love to see.

Werner Neuburger, Joan Rimmon,
Henny Neuburger & Sam Rimmon

Sam also had photographs of people and didn't know who they were. We solved a few of the questions. We also answered the question: who was Joseph Rosenstock whose signature appears in the drawer of a chest that he owns. He was Sam's grandmother's grandfather. We spent the rest of the day looking at things, many of which Sam is scanning and e-mailing to me. The rest of their children who were in town stopped by and we finally returned to our hotel thoroughly exhausted but highly invigorated. It was quite a day!

Wednesday morning Naomi Wurzburger came to visit us at the hotel. Not only did she bring photos of the grandchildren, but also a little bag of goodies to keep us on our way. We had a nice chat and then we were off to Westchester County.

During the next five days we met with a cousin of Sam's who drove down from Massachusetts, Jim Robinson and his sons Jared and Jager from Waccabuc, Nina Robinson Crooks from Bronxville, Werner & Henny Neuburger from West Nyack, Frances Langsdorf Greenebaum from Scarsdale and ended the weekend in Weston, CT at the country home of Steve & Jaynee Berkman Lipman, where almost all of the living Berkman family gathered. The highlight of the day was seeing young Ian Lipman learn to ride his two wheeler assisted by his aunt Stacey Berkman Rosenberg.

Jim, Jared, Jager Robinson,

& Nina Robinson Crooks

Ian Lipman & aunt Stacey Rosenberg

To all a huge thank you for your hospitality -- it was so great to be with you. My apologies to anyone we didn't get to see, but remember you are always welcome to visit us in Los Angeles. And Ha-shem willing, we will be back.

Smal World Notification

Of course it's always interesting to find out that one of the people you know is your cousin, but imagine my surprise when Jeremy Duksin, a cousin of my husband wrote me: " I am writing because it turns out that both myself and my girlfriend have family history traced on your website. She (Lauren Cohn) is a grandchild of Erika Sundheim, daughter of Jacob Rothschild, son of Zadek Rothschild, who is listed as a member of the Nusbaum family. We were having trouble finding the connection, if one exists, between the Nusbaum and the Duksin families. Any idea?” I assured them there was no connection, only through me.


Joan, Lois Hess, Marjorie Ottenheimer, Sam Rimmon & Dick Hess