Summary of meetings on 28 July 1999


I am addressing this to Jair, since it it his cousin I met,
with copies to others with Skalat interests.

Jair, I met with your mother's cousin Miriam Reiner in Netanya
on Wednesday.  Your cousin David Dekel was there as well.
Before the meeting, I went to the Netanya cemetery and photographed
all the seven Pickholz graves there, plus Miriam's husband.  They
are already developed and I hope to get them scanned and on
the website next week. Miriam has trouble walking, which is
why she is in the retirement home.  Until two years ago she
kept house for herself.  I didn't get an exact age, but I
believe that she is older than her late brother David, who
was born in 1908.

Miriam's memory is excellent, but like all of us, she cannot
remember something unless she knew it once.  First she filled
in her own grandparents' family - Moshe and Chanche.  Miriam
remembers Chanche, but Moshe died in his forties.  They had
seven children (she doesn't know the order): her father Getzel,
your grandfather Tuvia, Chaim, Zalman, Cyla, Chaya and Sara.

She gave me the names of Chaim's children (they were all killed
- the mother survived and built a new life in the US).  Zalman
died before the War and had no children.  Cyla, Chaya and Sara
married Messing, Epstein and Liebergal.  They and all their
children were killed.  All of these families are full of the
names Cyla, Matla (Mathilda) and Moshe.  I'd assume that Cyla
and Matla were the mothers of Moshe and Chanche, but that will
require proof.  Miriam herself was Matla, but they changed her
name here.

She also filled in a few wives names, which helped me connect
some "loose" people - such as her brother David's wife, who I
have on the US Social Security index.

One of them had a flour mill with a partner named Hirschhorn.

I went through the list of all the other Skalat Pickholz families
(we have quite a few from the area, by now), but she didn't know
much. Miriam knew of Rosa the teacher, who is listed in the
Skalat book, but did not know her personally.  She did know
Rosa's brother,  Moshe the policeman.  She also knew Yitzhak
Kiwetz, from Haifa, who filled out pages for Yad VaShem for
Rosa's family back to her  great-grandfather, but Miriam did not
know that Kiwetz was connected to Rosa.  (I am looking for
Kiwetz' family separately.)

Everything else came up blank.  She did not know any family
stories about a cousin who went to America or even to Vienna.

She mentioned Etka Pickholz from Skalat, who married the
photographer Binder and lived in Rehovoth.  David Dekel will
check this with Pinchas Bomze, a cousin on your grandmother's
side.

I gave her a general survey of our work and when I mentioned
Zellermayer (who come from Pickholz), she said that David
Dekel's father (Chaim Dlugatch) had a sister who married a
Zellermayer.  I'll check that with my Zellermayer source.

I left after about ninety minutes.

Then I met Shammai Segal in Rehovoth.  HE KNOWS EVERYTHING.
Kind of.  Shammai is eighty, lived in New Jersey after the
War and is now here with all his family.  He led a group
that went to visit Skalat about three years ago, and he
showed me  pictures and a video.

He is not a Pickholz, but is related to your Bomze family.
And actually, his family name should be Epstein.  His father
had a grocery store in Skalat, so they knew everyone.  He
offered to take me to Etka Binder's grave, if I come in daylight.

He and his wife - a Sass from Skalat - couldn't speak highly
enough of Rosa the teacher and knew her and her brother Moshe
well.  They too did not know that there is a connection between
Rosa and Kivetz, whom they also knew.

This Moshe is the Munio mentioned on the last page of the Skalat book.

Shammai knew the family of Leizer Pickholz, who married Yenta
Pickholz.  (Yenta was the sister of Tova Pickholz, whose children
we found recently in Brooklyn.  Tova married an Orenstein, but the
children were Pickholz.)  Leizer had a brother Moshe who lived in
Podwolczyska and bought at their store.  Also a sister Tova, whose
husband was Avraham - they had Yosef and Adele.  Another sister
of Leizer was Etil, who married Israel Kuperschmidt - they lived
here and I am looking for descendants.  Leizer's mother was Ciel
(Cyla?) and she had a wealthy brother in Lwow.

Shammai also remembers a butcher named Shea Yitzhak  Pickholz.
Not connected to anyone that he knows of.

Shammai gave me an English translation of the Yiddish yizkor
book for Skalat, and I'm passing it to Jewishgen for further
processing.

That's about it.  Meeting the people is important and I'd like
to think that I can stay in touch.  A few good leads and we'll
see what happens.

Israel P.