Tuesday, October 14, 2025
Maurice Goldfoot's Silver Falls Wholesale Meats' And His Father, Nathan's Trek to Portland, Oregon
Nadene Goldfoot
Meat Packing Co. on Columbia Blvd. Maurice's father was Nathan Goldfus/Goldfoot of Portland, b: 1869 in Telsiai, Lithuania and d: Portland, Oregon July 19, 1912 in a horse and wagon accident. He was
Nathan "Nokhim Avram"Abraham" Goldfus/Goldfoot. Maurice's only son was David Alan Goldfoot, PhD, psychologist, practicing in Wisconsin and Texas.
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Several factors fostered the acceptance of Jews suggested by these political achievements. The timing and composition of Jewish migration was key. Jews first arrived in Oregon in 1849, just years after the first Overland immigrations brought resettlers to the region. The vast majority, like Goldsmith and Wasserman, were immigrants from German lands; but rather than coming directly to Oregon from Europe, most spent years elsewhere in the United States before following the Gold Rush west and establishing merchandising networks anchored in San Francisco and extending north to Oregon. Those who settled in Oregon brought with them knowledge of English, familiarity with frontier society, and connections to San Francisco-based trade networks that positioned them well to join with fellow pioneers and help create new communities.
In 1869, Bernard Goldsmith, an immigrant Jew from Bavaria, was sworn in as the mayor of Portland. Two years later, he was succeeded in office by his friend, countryman, and coreligionist, Philip Wasserman, a former state legislator who would later serve on the city’s school board. Jews comprised only about 0.5 percent of Oregon’s population in the late nineteenth century, yet Goldsmith's and Wasserman’s political achievements were hardly unusual. At least seven Jewish mayors served towns across the state, and others held statewide office, served in the legislature, and sat on city councils and school boards. Between 1877 and 1911, Joseph Simon, a German Jew, served on Portland’s city council, in the state senate, in the U.S. Senate, and as Portland’s mayor.
-There is no indication of any other name for Moshe in the Lithuanian records, though he surely had one. Chaim Yitzchak is totally different than Moshe. It seems unlikely to me that this could be the same person. It is possible that Nathan's widow mis-recalled the name of her father-in-law, whom she presumably did not meet (though she was also a Litvak, so perhaps the families knew each other), but this is unlikely. This discrepancy is really mysterious. I spent a little time researching a family with the name Goldoft/Goldovis from Merkine. There was a Nokhim, born around 1870, whose father was Itsko and there was an earlier Khaim, so this Itsko could have been Chaim Yitzchak. But the relationship would be too distant from the Dublin family for you to have confirmed a 3rd cousin relationship, so this situates your grandfather within the Dublin family.
12/5/08 "Nathan' Not listed on ancestry.com UK incoming passengers 1878-1960, though many other Goldfoots are in there. http://tinyurl.com/668qq5.
3/2/17: Not listed on "Maryland, Baltimore Passenger Lists, 1820-1948.
Died at age 39 years 11 months 14 days in horse and wagon accident in Portland, Oregon.
4/13/11 Feb 21, 1893 married in Dublin, Ireland. By June 14, 1893 was on ship headed for Winnipeg listed as single.
Winston Churchill was born in 1874, and
Nathan Goldfoot b: 15 August 1871 in possibly Telsiai, Lithuania or Ukraine, Russia and died 19 July 1912 in Portland, Oregon.at age 43.
Nathan is found on the www.findmypast.com list having left Liverpool, England, Londonderry (Irish port) bound for Quebec and Montreal in 1893 at the age of 22. If the age is correct, he was born in 1871 and not 1874 as I have thought.
Nathan was born at the worst period in Russian history. The 1880's was another dark period of rising anti-Semitism, expulsions from large cities and many other general restrictions. It was mandatory for Jews "to keep the same names that had been entered in the vital records." 1881 saw Alexander II assassinated causing antisemitism. Jews were traders and artisans since Middle Ages and were now restricted in Russia including much of Poland. in Pale of Jewish Settlement. Serfdom was in Russia until 1861. In 1891 22,000 Jews in chains led from Moscow and St. Petersburg to the Pale.
It was hard to leave Russia. They had to cross borders illegally into Austria/Hungary, then to Vienna or Berlin. In Hamberg, Bremen and Rotterdam, thousands tried to find passage to America, standing in long lines. Then they crowded into steerage for 2 to 4 weeks of seasickness and hundreds sharing a toilet. In 1904 20,000 people did not pass the inspection and were sent back to Europe. Between 1881 and 1910 1.5 million Jews emmigrated to USA. Of that 1 million were from Russia. Most Eastern European immigrants destined for Oregon stopped on the Lower East Side before traveling by train across the country to Portland. Others came more directly because relatives or families had already settled here.
Pograms in Russia=age 9
May Laws of Jewish Discrimination, age 10
Grandfather Nathan "Nahum" came over to the U.S.A in 1896 ? when he was 24 years old.(according to census information or death certificate. He died at age 40 years 11 months 4 days. That would be two years after being in Quebec.
He was born on August 5 or 15, 1871 according to www.findmypast or 1874 on a Saturday. It is possible he was born in Telsiai, Lithuania, commonly referred to as "Russia."
According to the Goldfoot family in South Africa, they came from the Ukraine in Russia. On the 1910 census he said he was born in 1872. When he died, his wife was not told about the accident as it was Shabbas. She learned about it later. He had money hidden, and she never learned where it was.
Lithuania lies in the eastern Europe, on the coast of the Baltic Sea. In the north Lithuania borders with Latvia, in the east and south with Byelorussia, in the south-west with Poland and with the Kaliningrad region of the Russian Federation.
12/20/08 I found him in Quebec arriving in 1893 on ship Parisian. Reference RG76; microfilm C-4539. He contracted to get off at Winnipeg. He was number 29520 on the ship of 8 men and 2 women passengers. Parisian was the 1st large steamer of the Allen Line taking immigrants to Canada. It weighed 5,359 tons and sailed first on May 1881. It took 13 1/4 days from Liverpool, England to Canada and took 18 days from Glasgow, Scotland.
His name, Nathan, and Natan is a Jewish name from the ten Polish Provinces of Kalisz, Kielee, Lomza, Lublin, Pietrkow, Plock, Radom, Siedlce, Suwalki, and Warsaw. Poland was partitioned in 1772, 1792 and 1795. Then it was part of Russia. Nathan must be the anglicized name.
Naum\Nakhim\(Nahum 1:1) Variants: Nakhim (L), Nokhim (L,P,V), Nokhum (L), Nukkhem, Nukhim (P,V) Nukhimche(P). (L )means Lithuania, present-day Lithuania and northern Belarus. (P) means Poland, the 10 Polish provinces, and (V) Volhyn, present day Zhitomir, Rovno, Luts'k and Volyn regions.
Some earlier history causing the Pale of Settlement where Lithuania was :
On December 23, 1791, Empress Catherine of Russia
issued a decree restricting Jewish habitation to specific areas.
This decree applied to White Russia (Byelorussia), the
Ukraine and other areas taken in the partition. After the Third Partition, the decree was extended to include the newly
acquired territories along the Baltic Sea. Thus was born the
Pale of Settlement, the area where Jews were allowed to live;
an area that stretched from the Baltic to the Black Seas.
Of the areas then inhabited by Lithuanian Jewry, ethnic
Lithuania and Byelorussia became an integral part of Russia
and the southerm part, around Grodno and Suwalk, became
part of the Duchy of Warsaw (Poland). Although Lithuania
may have been divided, the Jewish Litvak community
remained integrated until World War I.
It has been estimated that, at the time of partition, 25 percent of all the Jews of easterm Europe were Litvak
Resource:
My notes through the years from other genealogists
Labels: Dublin, Ireland, Jews of Portland, Lithuania, Russia, South Africa
