Subject: Genealogy #15
Date: Wed, 19 Apr 2000 05:51:01 +0300

We are all busy today, so I shall be brief. 

I have had the chance to visit Yad VaShem several times in the 
past few weeks and have used their new computer system to get at 
Pages of Testimony that we couldn't get before.  For instance, I 
could look up Pikholz as a maiden name. Or I could ask for all the 
Pages submitted by a particular person.  I printed out about a 
hundred new Pages, many for people we already knew, but quite a 
few for Pickholz descendants of other surnames, whom we didn't 
know before. 

This led to two new major contacts in the family we call RavJG, 
which is now by far our largest.  (Until I follow these up properly, I 
have not updated the website - I mean why do it badly now, when I 
can do it right in a few more weeks.)  Among other things it is now 
clear that the head of the family called Baruch is a son of that 
family, so we can eliminate "Baruch" as a separate family. 

Sunday I shall be meeting with a woman named Mahla Tisser, 
from Bene Berak (she spends the holiday in Jerusalem), who is 
part of that family and claims to have much written information.  
This follows another meeting I had with Dina Ostrower where we 
made the preliminary discoveries.  We also have added another 
connection to the Shteg family - via the Rabbi of Skole. 


The other new connection we have here is the Haftels, who are 
also descended from the RavJG family.  There were two Haftel 
brothers who married Pickholz women, one of whom is identified 
clearly.  I now have a connection with a Haftel genealogist here in 
Israel who confirmed Sunday that this is the same family.  She'll 
get back to me in the next few days, after talking with her mother. 


In those two families, the center of activity seems to be Zurawno 
and Synowodsko - both not far from Stryj.  


One of the searches we did at the Warsaw archives was for 
Pickholz births in Rozdol for the period 1869-1880.  That search 
produced seventeen records.  As I mentioned before, the search is 
paid for in advance and afterwards we pay ten dollars each for the 
records.  One of the seventeen is the mother of someone living in 
the US today, and his family has sent a check for the entire $170.  
That payment is on the way to Warsaw now, and we hope to see 
actual records in maybe two months. 


We approached non-Pikholz Skalat researchers regarding the 
search we want to make of the thirty Skalat ledgers and received a 
nice response.  We now have enough to do the search as well  
some additional archives related expenses.  Thank you to those 
who have participated from among the Pickholz descendants.  
We'll get back to you when we have specific records to request. 


Our good friend Carole Feinberg in Atlanta - who helps with US 
census research - found some of the first US residents in the 
Philadelphia family we call "Steve."  She found them in a new 
online database of passengers leaving Hamburg.  Turns out that 
they arrived in Baltimore, just as family lore had it, but they did so 
under the mother's name Bernstein.  We have now identified the 
"Steve" family as coming from Skalat and have a good line on 
some his Bernstein relatives as well.  (In one case, there is 
probably a relationship with a family here who KNOW that none of 
their relatives survived the Holocaust.  That family also has a 
Bernstein-Pikholz marriage.) 


Steve himself has found a 1726 christening in Prussia of a Roman 
Catholic Pickholtz.  My own inclination is to put this down an 
anecdotal and unrelated, but we'll keep an open mind.  I will be 
surprised to find that any of our own Galicianers had last names in 
1726. 


Finally, today I received further confirmation of a connection 
between the "Eliezer" and "Ilan" families.  The term "second 
cousin" has been used to relate a member of each of these 
families to one another, but that may not be accurate.  At least it 
gives us something else specific to look forward to in the Skalat 
records.  


Actually I believe that the Skalat records will help several familes 
coalesce around the Eliezer family.  (The late Yitzhak Kiwetz of the 
Eliezer family filled out Pages of Testimony for members of several 
other Pikholz families, but since he rarely wrote how he was related 
to these people, we are quite in the dark.  For now.) 


I promised "brief," didn't I.  Oh well. 


So have yourselves a happy and kasher Pesah. 


Israel P.