Goldfoot Genealogy

Goldfuss From Ukraine and Israel

2012-01-25T15:12:00.000-08:00

Sara Goldfuss gave birth to Lea Goldfuss in 1890 in Lwow, Wojewodztwa, Ukraine. This is actually a German form of the spelling. Yiddish is usually as Goldfus, although some have preferred this spelling. With the names of Sara and Lea, I can figure they are Jewish.

Aryeh Goldfuss was born in 1903 and died September 4, 1993 in Rehovet, Israel. He died at age 90.
His father was Chaim Goldfuss and mother was Elka. I have several Chaims on our tree.

Yechiel Goldfuss was born in 1914 and died November 28, 1997, also in Rehovet, Israel at age 82.
Resource: http://data.jewishgen.org/wconnect/wc.dll?jg~jgsys~jripllat2

Jews into Poland: 1098: -History Zlota Jermulowske, Nathan's Wife's Polish Home

2011-11-17T11:10:00.000-08:00

Jews arrived in Poland during period of 1st Crusade in 1098. By 1550's 80% of world's Jews lived in Poland.

Poland was partitioned from 1772 to 1795 by Russia. 200,000 people after the 1772 partition were affected. Prior to the partition, Jews lived in Poland for centuries in relative freedom. Suwalki was one of the 10 provinces that was part of the Polish kingdom that became part of Russia. The number of Jews in Poland and Lithuania on the eve of the partitions amounted to 621,000 people according to the Polish census of 1764-66. In 1772, 1793 and 1795 Poland was divided among Russia, Prussia and Austria; Poland-Lithuania no longer existed. In 1772 Catherine II, Empress of Russia forced Jews to stay in "Pale of Settlement". By 1885 4 million + Jews lived in the Pale.

Nathan Goldfoot Had a Declaration of Intention or First Papers

2011-11-16T14:00:00.000-08:00

Last night our genealogy meeting had a speaker from NARA's office in Seattle. They have information from Oregon, Washington and Idaho.

We brought up the 1910 census on Nathan Goldfoot (Goofoot on 1910 census) and found he was listed with PA. PA means first papers, or the declaration of intention, had been filed! I have not seen that on the monitor when I had brought it up beforre, but on this huge screen, the speaker saw it right away, and so did others! I have the declaration of intent from his wife, Hattie, and some of her siblings, but didn't realize Nathan had also done this! I hope they are right as he died in 1912.

•Declarations of Intention - First Papers

Prior to 1952, a two-step process was required before an immigrant could become a U.S. citizen. Filing a Declaration of Intention was the first step. Sometimes referred to as the "first papers," the Declaration of Intention could be filed anytime after the immigrant arrived. After 1862, those who were honorably discharged from the U.S. Army were excused from this first step in the naturalization process (added for the Navy & Marine Corps in 1894). In 1952, a Declaration of Intent was no longer required for anyone, although some immigrants filed them.

While the content found on the declaration of intention varies dramatically by time period and location, pre-1906 declarations rarely contain much in the way of biographical information. Post-1906 declarations are more useful to genealogists, however, generally containing the following information: name, address, occupation, birthplace, nationality, country from which emigrated, birth date or age, personal description, date of intention, marital status, last foreign residence, port of entry, name of ship, date of entry, and date of document. They sometimes include a picture of the applicant. From 1929 to 1941, the declaration of intention also asked for the spouse's name, marriage date and place, and birth information, plus names, dates, and places of birth and residence of each child. A separate Certificate of Arrival giving details of arrival was usually required for arrivals after 1906.

I'm hoping that the did fill this out and it was done after 1906 when they moved to Portland. Nathan and Hattie married in Council, Idaho on November 20, 1905 and moved to Portland after Charlie was born on September 22, 1906.

A declaration of Intention can be filed in any courthouse, local, county, or federal. I found the others here in the county courthouse in downtown Portland. I can't even remember asking for a Goldfoot. Hope he's not listed as a Goofoot. I guess that Yiddish was hard to understand without an interpreter.

Goldfoos Buried in West Virginia

2011-10-28T13:08:00.000-07:00

Abe Goldfoos was born in 1879 and died in 1957 in West Virginia at the age of 78. He is buried at Beverly Hills Memorial Gardens / Garden of the Ten Commandments / Fairmont Jewish Community Section Morgantown / USA

Beverly Hills Memorial Gardens Cemetery. 36 burials total.
Tombstone readings were taken in June 2007 by Julian H. Preisler of Falling Waters, Berkeley County, West Virginia. For more information, please see: www.JPreisler.com

Resource: Jewishgen.org

Goldfus in Salt Lake City, Utah Cemetery

2011-10-28T13:04:00.000-07:00

Ann Goldfus was born on October 18, 1898 and died on Ocdtober 13, 1993. She is buried in the Bnai Israel cemetery of Salt Lake city in plot West A-68 B.'nai Israel Cemetery, formerly owned by the Reform Temple B'nai Israel, is currently owned by Congregation Kol Ami; it is managed and operated by the Kol Ami Cemetery Association per an Irrevocable Trust. Located within the boundaries of the Salt Lake City Cemetery at 1021 4th Avenue, B'nai Israel had its first burial in 1869; it continues to serve the Reform members of the Utah Jewish community. Contact kolamicemetery@yahoo.com or 801-484-1501 x 25 for information.

Resource: Jewishgen.org

Goldfoos Buried in Baltimore, Maryland

2011-10-28T12:56:00.000-07:00

Sime Sene Goldfoos died June 23, 1901 She is buried in the Herring Run - Beth Israel Cemetery / Mikro Kodesh Beth Israel in Baltimore / USA at Section 3 Row 1 Lot 30.

Jacob T. Goldfoos died 26 April 1922. He is also buried there at Sect 3A Row 1 Lot 2.

Resource: Jewishgen.org

Goldfuss in Maple, Canada Cemetery

2011-10-28T12:49:00.000-07:00

Marvin Goldfuss was buried on March 5, 1991 in the Pardes Shalom Cemetery on 10953 Dufferin St. of Beth David Bnai Israel Beth am Synagogue in Maple, Toronto, Ontario, Canada in section II Row D Grave 19.
The cemetery has 368 burials. Established: 1975 Office: 4600 Bathurst St., 2nd Fl, Toronto, ON M2R 3V2 Tel: 416-635-2883 ext. 697 Fax: 416-635-1405 Provided by: Dr. Stephen Speisman, Executive Director of Pardes Shalom Submitted by: Jewish Genealogical Society of Canada (Toronto)

South Africa's Goldfus Burial

2011-10-28T12:39:00.000-07:00

Freda Goldfus was buried on November 5, 1977 in the Bloemfontein Memorial in plot 2A:286A.
The oldest of the 3 cemeteries (The Old Cemetery), dating from 1871 is simply a small fenced off area of a public cemetery near the city centre. It includes a few graves of Jews several Jewish pioneers involved in the early days of the city who died serving on either side in the Boer War, 1899-1902. Each of the 30 or so tombstones of these pioneer families has been completely transcibed. Some of the gravestones are in poor condition and some graves are now unmarked. This database file was compiled by, and donated to JOWBR by Stan Hart of Durban, South Africa.

Research: Jewishgen.org

Goldfuss in Israel

2011-10-28T12:32:00.000-07:00

Aryeh Goldfuss was born in 1903 to Chaim and Elka Goldfuss. He died September 4, 1993 at the age of 90 in the Kaplan Hospital in Rehovot, Israel. He was buried on September 6, 1993 in plot 39.

Yechiel Goldfus was born in 1915 to Chaim and Hella Goldfuss. He died November 28, 1997 at the age of 82 in the Kaplan Hospital in Rehovot, Israel, also. He ws buried on November 30, 1997 in Plot 26.

Scottish Jewish Cemetery Holds a Baby Goldfus

2011-10-28T12:18:00.000-07:00

Myer Goldfus (also listed as Gullfish) died on July 30, 1897 at the age of one year and is buried in Glasgow, Scotland in the Eastern Necropolis Janefield Cemetery, Jewish section at 1264 Gallowgate Street. 542 burials are here in the cemetery. Cemetery records available on microfilm at Mitchell Library, North Street, Glasgow; Jewish records available at Scottish Jewish Archives Centre, Glasgow .

Resource: Jewishgen

Goldfus/fuss in Poland

2011-10-28T12:04:00.000-07:00

Salomea Goldfus was married to Leopold Goldstaub. Their son was Bernard Goldstaub who was born July 21, 1929 in Krakow and died in June 1942 in Belzic. That would have been in WWII and he was only 13 years old.

In Lwow Wojewodztwa, Ukraine, there was Sara Goldfus. She had a daughter, Lea who was born in 1890.

In Krakow, Wojewodztwa, krakow Province, I found Jocheta Goldfuss who was married to Joel Dintenfass. Their son, Markus Dintenfass divorced his wife, Rozalea Pipes z Heim(O'W). Rozalea's mother was Amalia and father was Izrael. This one was a little hard to decipher.

Mindl Goldfus was found in the cemetery of Warsaw Gubernia.

Josek Aron Janklowicz with the surname of Goldfus was found in Radom Gubernia, Kielce Province in 1845.

Fiszel Goldfus was found there in 1863.

Nachman Goldfus was found in 1865 in the Lublin Divorces list. He was the son of Aron Szmul Goldfus and wife Hena.

Note: There were no Goldfus/fuss people in Belarus on Jewishgen. I checked this country out as I have several dna matches from people whose ancestors were from there. The matches were not with Goldfus people.

Resource: http://data.jewishgen.org/wconnect/wc.dll?jg~jgsys~jripllat2

Goldfus on 1930 USA Federal Census from Lithuania

2011-10-21T16:39:00.000-07:00

Henry Goldfus, born 1876 in Lithuania was found on the 1930 census living in Coloma, Whiteside, Illinois. He immigrated in 1907. He was 54 years old. His wife, Mame, was 46. They had a son Harold, age 19 and Sol, 12.

Anna Goldfus, born in 1872 in Lithuania was a widow at age 58 in Minneapolis, Hennepin, Minnesota. She had immigrated in 1884 at age 12. She lived with her daughter, Rose Goldfus age 28 born in 1902 in Minneapolis. Her aunt, Gertrude Leventhal, age 77 and also a widow lived with them.

Being they were from Lithuania, I would guess that they were Jewish.

Resource: familysearch would not open the actual census.

Q1b1 Clade: A North African Berber Jew

2011-10-19T14:43:00.000-07:00

Nadene Goldfoot
I have been contacted by someone who has the Q1b1 haplogroup or clade just like my family. The difference is that he is a Jewish Berber from North Africa while my male paternal ancestors came from Telsiai, Lithuania. How did this clade become so diverse in its travels?

Berber turns out to be a generic term for a similar people, most of which are Muslims today. Now I learn that Jews have lived in North Africa who had not become Jewish through conversion.

I find that Judaic presence in the continent of Africa goes back to Abraham in the Nile Delta of Goshen where he and his family and herds of cattle waited to pass through during a drought in Canaan, where they had sought refuge after living in Ur, which is today's Iraq.

Also, Joseph, who became the vizier to the Pharaoh, sent for his family to join him in Egypt. Many Israelites followed as settlers, but then later became slaves captured in Canaan by the "Warrior Pharoahs." That's when we were put to work building for 400 years as slaves which led to Moses freeing us in the Exodus.

Much later after Jews had their state, it became divided into Israel and Judah. This was a time when Judaic traders traveled westward along the African coast with the voyagers of Tyre and Sidon, the Canaanite sea-farers called "the Phoenicians" by the Greeks. Israel was referred to in Egyptian records in 1209 BCE. It became a power in the 9th century BCE but fell in 722. Judah fell in 486 BCE and then after being reborn again fell in 63 BCE from Pompey, and of course Jerusalem fell in 70 CE.

Jews made up a major part of the population of the North African Canaanite settlement at Carthage, or "New City," which today is called Tunisia. "There were Jews already living in Carthage before its destruction by the Romans." Jewish presence has been well documented in other places along the coast during the Pre-Roman period. The Romans called the Canaanite settlers the Peonicus Carthagenians, translated as "Punic Peoples."

Carthage and Utica, the Canaanite city-states, were ruled by a Soffut, similar to the Israelite shoffet or judge. The legend is that Jews settled in NW Africa before the destruction of the 2nd temple in 586 BCE, as discusssed by George Gilbert in "the Mellahs (the Jewish quarters) of Morocco. To support this idea are Hebrew inscriptions on tombstones in the Roman town of Volubilis (west of modern Fez).

The Romans fought 3 Punic Wars with Carthage, and Carthage lost in the 3rd and final one in 146 BCE called "The battle of Carthage." All people left alive were sold into slavery.

Jews were always allowed to be in trades that other cultures deemed as unworthy for themselves. Jews practiced their artisan trades in North Africa under the Romans who considered manual trades base and inappropriate for themselves. Finally, Emperor Hadrian Augustus complimented the industrious Jews of Alexandria in a report to his consul, Servianus. He placed them among the proletariat of the city and allowed them the revolutionary process of glassblowing. However, it was also he who wouldn't allow Jews to circumcise their sons, leading to the Bar Kokba revolt in 133-135 CE which we lost.

It was said that the Jews in Alexandria were prosperous, rich and fruitful, and in it no one was idle. Some were blowers of glass, others makers of paper, all were weavers of linen or seem to belong to one craft or another. " The lame have occupations and the wounded have theirs as well as the blind as well as those with crippled hands (arthritis?). None of the Jews were idle. "

My friend tells me that after Cathage was destroyed by the Romans, the Jews went West to the North African mountains where invaders wouldn't find them as the mountains were dangerous. So it seems that the Romans weren't able to sell them into slavery. When the Muslims invaded in 600 CE the Jews stopped the progress of their invasion for about 4 years and were led by the Berber queen Kehana, which means Cohen. She died in the last battle and the Islam Jihad continued onto Morocco and then Spain, and up to the middle of France before being forced out and into Spain in 732.

His theory is that his line of Berber Jews "came from the 10 lost tribes and could have escaped the Assyrian invasion of 732 BCE before the Babylonians invaded the kingdom of Judah and exiled the remaining Jewish tribes of Judah and Israel. Jews were cohabitating with Phoenicians of southern Lebanon and were probably traveling with them for trade and commerce."

He went on to say that archaeologists have found a Jewish settlement and temple on Elephantine Island on the Nile River dating back from 500 BCE, showing that Jews traveled much more than we believed."

Tunisia today is the 23rd largest populated state of Sunni Muslims, the state religion, who amount to 98% of the population of about 10,383,577 people. Before 1948 there were 110,000 Jews living there. In the 50's half moved to Israel and the other half moved to France. That left about 1,000 Jews there. In January of this year riots were found to be chanting, Death to the Jews.

The latest news is that on Friday, the President of Tunisia fled the country and widespread violence ensues. Dozens of Jews are again faced with the same choice, France or Israel. There is no security, food or work, they reported. Their Muslim friends are fearful as well.

Research: from Albert
http://www.hebrewhistory.org/factpapers/africa19-I.html The Berbers and the Jews
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carthago_delenda_est
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_ancient_Israel_and_Judah
http://www.uiowa.edu/~africart/toc/people/Berber.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Muslim_majority_countries
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Jews_in_Tunisia
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/anti-semitism/tunisjews.html

Georg August Goldfuss 1782-1848

2011-10-19T10:41:00.000-07:00

He was a German palaeontologist and zoologist. George August Goldfuss was born April 18, 1782 and died October 2, 1848 at the age of 66. He was born at Thurnau near Bayreuth. This was the municipality in the district of Kulmbach, Germany. It's possible that he was baptised at the Evangelical Lutheran Church of St Laurentins, the church of Thurnau. There was even a castle in Thurnau.

Then he was educated at Erlangen, where he graduated Ph.D. in 1804 and became professor of zoology in 1818. He was subsequently appointed professor of zoology and mineralogy at the University of Bonn.

Count Georg zu Munster aided him to issue the important Petrefacta Germaniae (1826-44), a work which was intended to illustrate the invertebrate fossils of Germany, but it ws left incomplete after the sponges, corals, crinoids, echinoderms and part of the mollusea had been figured. He died at Bonn.

Ludwig von Beethoven was born in Bonn in 1770, and would have been 12 when Georg was born. Bonn was sized by the French in 1794 but became part of Prussia in 1815. It was Prussian when George died as it didn't get into German hands until 1871.

Resource: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georg_August_Goldfuss, forwarded by Albert Benhamou
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thurnau

Goldfoot DNA: Q1b1a

2011-10-17T16:27:00.000-07:00

Our Ydna has been classified further as Q1b1a. As more people test and familytreedna gets more information, this happens. Also, I had added a further small test to be done. Classifying takes time. Mutations are found in testing SNP's. As more are found, we may find that our origins were somewhere in the Middle East.

Wikipedia tells us that "Q1b1 (M378) — It is widely distributed in Europe, South Asia, and West Asia. It is found among samples of Hazaras and Sindhis It is also found in the Uyghurs of North-Western China in two separate groups The Q-M378 subclade and specifically its Q-L245 subbranch is speculated to be the branch to which Q-M242 men in Jewish Diaspora populations belong. Although published articles have not tested for M378 in Jewish populations, genetic genealogists from the Ashkenazi, Mizrachi, and Sephardi Jewish populations have tested positive for both M378 and L245.

We have the Q-M378 subclade and Q-L245 subbranch So far we're still only about 5% of the Jewish population.

Resource: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Ashkenazi-Q/message/1439
http://www.isogg.org/tree/ISOGG_HapgrpQ.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haplogroup_Q_(Y-DNA)

Simon Goldfus Born 1895

2011-10-02T11:53:00.001-07:00

Simon Goldfus was born February 15, 1895 in Cincinnati, Hamilton, Ohio to John and Lizzie Goldfus. He was found on familysearch, the LDS website.

Zimye Goldfuss, Born 1887 Russia

2011-10-02T11:53:00.000-07:00

Zimye Goldfuss was born in 1887 in Schagar, Russia. She took the ship Petersburg to Ellis Island, New York and arrived June 13, 1907 at age 20 as a single woman. She was listed as being Jewish. I also have her listed on my previous blog at http://goldfoot_genealogy.blogspot.com/2007/03/25-of-44-goldfuss-at-ellis-island.html. There I found that she was from Libau. Libau was a port of embarkation for emigrants from Russia-including Russia-Germans.

Resource: http://www.progenealogists.com/germany/articles/gdepart.htm

Simma Goldfoot of Russia Born 1881

2011-10-02T11:52:00.000-07:00

Simma Goldfoot was found on familysearch, the LDS website. She was born in 1881 in Russia to parents Aaron and Sarah. This gives me reason to think she was Jewish.

She married Albert Grabower on September 10, 1913 in Elk Rapids, Antrim, Michigan. She was then 32 years old. Her new husband was 44. He was born in 1869 in Germany. His parents were Wolf and Ernestine.

Countries My Genes Are From: My Goldfoot Revelations Found on 23&Me (DNA company)

2011-09-02T11:00:00.000-07:00

Nadene Goldfoot

23&Me has a section under AncestryLabs that told me what % my genes came from certain countries. I have the following countries within my 23 chromosomes

Russia 7.0% Romania 0.6

Poland 4.8 Ireland 0.3

Ukraine 4.2 France 0.3

Germany 1.6 Austria 0.3

Belarus 1.1 Argentina 0.3

Hungary 1.0 Morocco 0.2

Lithuania 0.8 Sweden 0.1 ( M.Grandmother born in Sweden-family to 1760's)

United Kingdom 0.7 Italy 0.1

Macedonia 0.6 Estonia 0.1

#1 Ukraine 18.0 cM and 8.2cM #11 Ukrarine 13.8 and 7.6

Russia 12.6cM and 7.9cM Hungary 10.9

Poland 7.9cM #12 Poland 9.0

#2 Ukraine 9.3cM Ukraine 8.2

Poland 7.7 and 13.6 and 7.6 Poland 8.4

Russia 7.9 and 10.1 #13 Ukraine 8.3

Sweden 8.5cM #14 Hungary 9.4

#3 Russia 14.8 and 8.6 #15 Hungary 7.8

Belarus 12.6 Russia 7.9

Poland 8.2 Poland 8.4

#4 Poland 12.4

Russia 10.4 and 9.4 and 8.4 (maternal grandmother source of one segment)

Hungary 9.3 and 10.6 #16 Belarus 12.5

Ukraine 7.8 United Kingdom 8.0

#5 Russia 8.1 and 7.9 Romania 16.2

Ukraine 9.3 Czech Republic 11.4

Poland 10.0 Poland 10.7

#6 Germany 26.6 #17 France 8.8

Poland 7.6 Russia 7.5

Lithuania 8.6 Czech Republic 7.8

#7 Ireland 10.8 Poland 9.1

Czech Republic 11.8 #19 Russia 9.6 and 20.2

Belarus 8.1 Ukraine 17.1

Russia 8.9 #20 Russia 10.4

#8 Romania 11.8 #21 Poland 11.7

Russia 8.6 Russia 11.6

Poland 10.1 #22 Belarus 7.6

Ukraine 7.5 #X Russia 10.1

#9 Poland 10.0 Poland 9.6

Morocco 8.3 Ukraine 8.6

Russia 10.7 Russia 7.7 and 8.8

#10 Belarus 9.1 and 11.3

Grmany 7.9

Ukraine 9.8 and 10.1

Russia 7.7 and 12.8

Austria 12.5

It's possible that when Ashkenazi Jews married each other they are actually marrying 5th or 6th cousins. We share multiple common ancestors of many generations ago. So if two people came from the same village, could be they were related and didn't know it.

A Goldfoot From India 1823

2011-08-27T19:11:00.000-07:00

Georgiaen Maria Goldfoot was found in Colabah, Bombay, India. Her parents were James and Lucinda Susannah Goldfoot. She was baptised on April 2, 1923. This means that she is not a Jewish Goldfoot but probably one of the Goldfoots I have found on the East Coast of the USA that come from Germany or Austria.

Reference: familysearch

Another Mildred Goldfoot Found: Born 1911

2011-08-27T19:07:00.000-07:00

Harry Goldfoot was born in 1887 in New York. I found him on the 1930 census in Bronx, New York at age 43. He was married to Leah, also born in New York and was 42, so she was born in 1888. They had a daughter born in 1911 named Mildred Goldfoot and a son, Justin Goldfoot age 13, so he was born in 1917. Both were also born in New York.

The weird thing is that my mother married my father, Maurice Goldfoot, making her Mildred Goldfoot b: 1913. My grandson, son of my son, is named Dustin. That's pretty close to Justin. Odd things do happen.

Reference: FamilySearch: Goldfoot

Research of Vladimir Gurianov-Edelstein PhD on Origins-Goldfoot

2011-08-25T12:08:00.000-07:00

The Goldfoots were thought to have come from Khazaria and the research in clustering around a slow palindromic marker called DdYF395S1 was an idea to look into from Rebekah A. Canada. Edelstein found that the most commonly represented by the number of genotypes is a cluster f Khazar (Kh) consisting of several subgroups.

Our is DYS 395S1a 15. DYS 395S1b 19.

The research lists is as follows: (Kh) Khazar

Kh3 - DYF395S1=25-19, DYS395=14-18.

I'm not sure of the difference between DYF and DYS but our ranges from 15 to 19 must be that we fit the Kh3 =15-19 cluster of Hazar that is comprised mostly of descendants of Ashkenazi Jews who came from Ukraine, Poland, Belarus and Baltic countries of Hungary, Austria and Germany. We are of the SNPs of L245 and belong to Q1b1.

Maybe our ancestors came from Khazaria after all!

Resource: Alfred Krupa's Research paper from Vladimir Gurianov-Edelstein Ph.D 6/20/2011

Goldfoot Births in Dublin South, Ireland

2011-08-22T15:43:00.000-07:00

Ellias Goldfoot was born in Dublin, South, Ireland from October to December 1883.

Jacob October to December 1885

Samuel July -September 1890

Rachel October -December 1897

Bertha July -September 1898

Jane January to March 1899

Isaac July to September 1900

Abraham October to December 1900

Bernard April to June 1902

Louis October to December 1902

Esther Freda July to September 1904

Solomon July to September 1904

Gertrude Miriam April to June 1906

Louis October to December 1907

Moses Isador January to March 1907

Rose April to June 1909

These Jewish Goldfoots are from Russia,most likely Lithuania. They had first immigrated on many accounts to England and then to Ireland. From here some went to South Africa. These are all listed as having been born in Dublin South, Ireland by familysearch, the LDS website.

Why Lithuanian Jews Went to Dublin

2011-06-19T11:17:00.000-07:00

Nadene Goldfoot

I have found quite a few Goldfoots in Ireland including my own grandfather who came from Lithuania. I've often wondered why Jews went to Ireland. What did it have to offer?

Professor Keogh, 53 year old Catholic from University College in Cork, became interested in Irish Jews as he was researching Irish history during WWII. He has found that the Irish Jewish community came about between 1880 and 1901 with the arrival of Ashkenazim from one Lithuanian village, Akmene. They were fleeing from Tsarist pogroms. Dublin legend says that many of them had booked passage to America, but were landed in Dublin instead. Unscrupulous ship captains had assured them they had reached New York.

There were smaller communities with Jews in Cork, Limerick, Galway, Belfast and Derry which were found in prof. Diner's paper that investigated the origins and early years of the Jewish Community of Dublin.  First, there were Sephardic Jews who arrived in the 17th Century from Spain and Portugal who went to the Netherlands and on to Ireland. He found that there was a great migration of eastern European Jews who left the continent between 1820 and 1920. Most Jews in Ireland arrived from the 1880's on, though there was already a small group of about 600 in the country, mostly the children of an earlier immigration in the 1820's and 1830's.

Later, the Irish carried the British Aliens Act of 1906 in their own laws, so only a few European Jewish families were allowed in Ireland. In 2005 there were under 1,000 Jews in Ireland from having 6,000 in 1940's. In the past 2 years 200 more have "appeared".

There were lots of Jewish peddlers in the 1860's to the 1880's in Britain, and there were still many in Wales at the same time as in Ireland. Many Jews in Ireland had worked in factories in England and wanted to go into business for themselves.

Peddlers stayed with families where they were welcomed. Many cooked for themselves, some stayed in barns or out in the open. Intermarriage was relatively limited. Some who were well integrated married into the upper classes, like the painter, Estella Solomons.

Anti-Semitism was mostly non-physical. It  began when a priest used the pulpit to attack Jews. He called Jewish peddlers and merchants "leeches" who were sucking the blood of the Irish by overcharging or tricking the poor. He called for a boycott of Jewish merchants, and the town obeyed. Within a few years, virtually all of Limerick's 25 Jewish families and the rabbi had left. The Limerick pogrom was physical to an extent, as the Blueshirts threatened physical action, and there a few incidents before Limerick. One person was beaten up, and a brick was thrown at a Rabbi's window.

Gerald Yael Goldberg, b: 12 April 1912 in Cork d: 31 Dec 2003 was the Jewish Lord Mayor of Cork in 1977. He was a lawyer and a member of the Fianna Fail Party. He was the son of Lithuanian Jewish Louis Goldberg from the village of Akmian/Akmene, Lithuania. They were told that Cork was the Gateway to America. Akmene is 238 km NW of Vilna., Lithuania. His family was one who left Limerick in the pogrom for Cork. Louis's father was Simon and Elka Goldberg b: abt 1836 in Akmene.

I note that in Dublin on February 21, 1893, Lena Goldberg of 38 Warren Street, Dublin, daughter of Naftolee Goldberg, already deceased, married Nathan Abraham Goldfoot of 13 Arbutus Place S.C.R, a Com Traveller, son of Morris Goldfoot, who had been a Distiller but was already deceased. One of the witnesses was Leah Goldberg. Certain members could have intermarried or converted.

Both immigrations were Jews who arrived rather poor, found a niche for themselves in commerce, lived in cities, and were religiously traditional.  They improved both economically and educationally. Prof. Diner refutes Keogh's theory of being tricked to come here. He says there were never any pogroms in Lithuania, where they had come from. Besides that, many had already lived in Britain before coming to Ireland. He feels they came to Ireland deliberately. They saw the prospects for economic success-they went into small business, started with itinerant peddling which most arrivals did.

No other migrants arrived in Ireland in the 19th century, which was marked by mass emigration to Britain, USA and beyond.   Jews saw a demand for consumer goods, which itinerant peddlers could satisfy. In Ireland land mattered, and the Jews being in cities alienated themselves from the marker of Irishness. Also the cultural nationalist movement excluded Jews from the nation as they could not be associated with a pure, "Celtic" past, and Catholic domination in Irish religioius, political and social circles led to the exclusion of Jews. Only a small group of Irish intellecftuals, like Michael Davitt, welcomed Jewish particiipation in Irish life.

Israeli President Chaim Herzog came from Ireland, and Dublin had a Jewish lord mayor, Robert Briscoe in the 1950's and 60's. The entire island's Jewish population has been tiny-ranging from about 400 in the 1880's to 5,400 in the mid-1940's to less than 20,000 in 2007.

There is the Irish Jewish Museum in Dublin founded in 1985 and opened by Chaim Herzog, then president of Israel. It is in the former Walworth Road synagogue at 3 and 4 Walworth Road which opened in 1916. It is noted that in the 1940's young Jews became assimilated and there was a great deal of intermarriage. At that time the Church insisted that the non Catholic had to convert.

Dublin had an enormous main synagogue, the Dublin Hebrew Congregation, located at 37 Adelaide Road. It was erected in 1982 and can hold up to 1,000 people. It was almost sold a a mosque, but is now the headquarters of a high technology company. Stars of David are visible on its windows. Dublin's kosher bakery, The Bretzel, has been owned by non-Jews for two generations, but a mashgiach comes in daily to oversee kashruth. Until the 1950's there were enough Jews in Dublin to support 8 kosher butcher shops and a dozen synagogues.

Still and all, in 2007 there were 3 Jewish members of the Irish Parliament, and both Dublin and Cork have had Jewish mayors. the most famous Irish Jew of all is fictional: Leopold Bloom, the protagonist of James Joyce's novel, Ulysses. A plaque marks his house at 52 Clanbrassil Street in Dublin.

We do know that many Irish Jews migrated to South Africa where we find some of our relatives today.

http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m04111/is_is_3_48_ai_64507455/pg_3 2/21/2007
http://www.columbia.edu/cu/seminars/IrishStudies/Sep_2003_minutes.htm
http://www.jewishsf.com/content/2-0-/module/displaystory/story_id/8878/format/print/dis
http://www.isjm.org/jhr/IInos1-2/ireland.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerald_Goldberg

Our Goldfoot Family: Litvaks on Both Sides

2011-06-18T09:48:00.000-07:00

Nadene Goldfoot
Being a Litvak is very special. Lithuanian Jews had special attributes. They were distinguished by their intellectual and rational attitude. This group was nicknamed "Litvak" and also "Tseilem Kop" or "Cross Head", meaning that Lithuanian Jews would be ready to strike out vertically and horizontally in order to achieve his goal, or in other words, alternatively to cross check his findings in order to reach the absolute truth. This was found in dealings in daily life and in the social-cultural strata. For example, they were not ahout to believe in false messiahs, and even opposed the Hasiduth, or Chassidism. They showed much diligence in studying Torah in the synagogues as well as in the yeshivoth. The great Yeshivoth of Slabodka was in Telzh (Telsiai). Hundreds of foreign students were also there. The Ethics Movement began and spread by Rabbi Salanter whose principals were on the idea of intellectual activity and knowledge to correct and improve the behavior of the individual. They fostered and adopted the Zionist idea and also challenged the Enlightenment Movement whether in Yiddish, Hebrew, Russian or German.

Babylonian and others Jewish settlement began 9th, 10th Century (800's-900's)

The first settlement of Jews in the Great Lithuanian Princedom (Magnus Ducatus Lithuaniae) began in the 14th Century (1300's) by invitation of the Grand Dukes Gediminas and Vytautas.

1387 Christian-Catholic religion introduced in Lithuania
1388 Christians granted Jews civil status and bills of rights of protection, freedom
1413 Christianity toNW Lithuanians (Zamut) populated by ethnic Lithuanian tribes, lacked Judo phobia
1492 Jews expelled from Spain
1495 Jew expelled from Lithuania 6,000+ people, confiscated their property
1503 Jews permitted back , received half of property lost , gained back most rights
1648-1667 Period of Tribulation: Cossacks mutiny, Russian army occupied Vilna; Black Plague
1795 Most Lithuania annexed to Russia (NW Zone), Suwalk, Lazdijai in SW also added
1795-1917 half population in NW were Jewish, saw The Jews' Street, in Pale of Settlement , restricted, lilmitations, great hardships
1797 census: Telsiai-1,650 Jews-66%
1804 Jews forbidden to live in villages and sell alcohol to peasants, schools opened for Jews
1812 Napoleon invaded Lithuania
1831 Polish uprisings against Russian rule
1855-1857 census: Telsiai-3,209 Jews-61% Goldfus
1855-1857 census: Lazdijai-1,546 Jews-60% Jermulowske
1863 Polish uprisings against Russian rule
1897 census: Telsiai- 3,088 Jews-51%-Jewish population increased, other towns decreased
1897 census: Lazdijai-1,439 Jews-57%
1905 revolution against rule of Czar, Jews supported Lithuanians
1923 census: Telsiai-1,545 Jews-33% , census done by Independent Lithuania
1923 census: Lazidijai-1,141 Jews-48%
1941 Lithuanian Jews on eve of Shoah: abt a quarter of a million including Vilna region and refugees from Poland
1945 census: Telsiai-unknown -liberation from Nazis
1945 census-Lazdijai-0 Jews
1970 census-Telsiai-70 Jews

1989 census Telsiai-23 Jews

Reference: Preserving Our Litvak Heritage by Josef Rosin by jewishGen,Inc.
Map of Pale of Settlement from Avotaynu 2011 Catalog cover
Map of Lithuania from Perserving Our Litvak Heritage

Goldfoot/Goldfus dna Origins Upgraded: Q1b1 or Q -L245

2011-06-17T09:48:00.000-07:00

Nadene Goldfoot
Our Q1b1 status is in shorthand, called Q - L245. This group came from parts of Turkey, Iran, Iraq, and possibly southern Saudi Arabia. Iraq is the location of Ur, where Abraham and Sarah came from. They left, seeking their own land that would become free of idol worship with Abraham's leadership.

The Q line did come from Siberia, Mongolia and parts of Turkey in the Atlai Mountains. Our line, a more recent branch off the main one, has not been found in Siberia and Mongolia. It is Q3 that became the native Americans who migrated down into North America.

Before I jump to the conclusion that Ur could be the site of our origins, Ur was an ancient Babylonian city and housed Abraham before he and his family left for Haran. He was living among the Canaanites and the Philistines.  His father, who came with him, was Terah and he was the father of Isaac by Sarah and of Ishmael by his concubine, Hagar, the Egyptian. His last residence was in Hebron.

He lived at the beginning of the 2nd millennium BCE. Modern excavations in the ruins by Sir Leonard Woolley have revealed a highly-civilized nature of the city in Abraham's time as well as evidence of an extensive flood at an earlier date. Our line comes from an ancestor of much more modern times, less than 1,000 years.

Looking at a globe, I can trace a path from Ur in Iraq or Babylonia and go directly West to Canaan, or today's Israel. It is very close by. Israel is right on the Mediterannean Sea and would be the crossroads of the world with access to water, which would have been a great draw or reason to remain. Of course from Canaan, one had access to Egypt, which is what happened with Abraham's family later on.

Our Goldfus family was from Lithuania, mainly Telsiai. How and why Jews first reached Lithuania is a matter of informed hypothesis to be found possibly through dna analysis along with archaelogy, but historian Abraham Eliyahu Harkavi said that they came from Babylonia and elsewhere in the Near East in the 9th and 10th centuries CE. We may have come from Ur, and if we had found our way to Judea, which was originally Canaan, we were then taken back as slaves to Babylonia, most likely. From there we joined up with other Jews to traverse to Lithuania at least by the 10th century or perhaps a little later, knowing there already was a Jewish settlement there. A lot of this hypothesis depends on the date of when our Q-L245 was determined to have happened, and that I don't know.

According to Behar et al. 5% of Ashkenazi males belong to haplogroup Q This has subsequently been found to be entirely the Q-M378 subclade and may be restricted to Q-L245.

Abraham's Family Tree

0. Noah of the Flood
1. Japheth
   1. Ham
1. Shem
   2. Arpachshad---after the flood
       3. Shelah
          4. Eber
             5. Peleg
                6. Reu
                   7. Serug
                       8. Nahor
                           9. Terah b: Ur, d: Haran
                              10. Abram-Abraham
                                  c: Hagar
                                      11. Ishmael
                                  m. Sarai-Sahar
                                     11. Isaac
                              10. Nahor
                                 m. Milcah, daughter of Haran
                              10. Haran b:Ur, d: Ur --Hebrew settlement found here
                                    11. Lot

Abraham and Sarah went to Haran after living in Ur. Haran was a trading town of NW Mesopotamia: and was also a center of a moon cult. Iraq was formerly called Mesopotamia. It was conquered by Arabs in 637 ACE. Jews actually had helped them because they were trying to free themselves from Sassanid persecution. Shortly after that happened, Jews had been expelled from Arabia and they seettled in Kufa. This area continued for centuries to be the center of Jewish life.
Resource: Rebekah Adele , leader in H and Q1b haplogroups from familytreedna
The Tanach, Stone Edition, Genesis 10:26-11:24
The New Standard Jewish Encyclopedia
The Jews of Lithuania: A History of a Remarkable Community 1916-1945 by Masha Greenbaum
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haplogroup_Q_(Y-DNA)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4o6X2465EeM on Turkic Homeland 14,000BC-12,000AD
http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=2HiUMlOz4UQ&vq=large-BBC on Human Planet

6/20/11 Comment from Prof. Krupa of Ashina Royal Dynasty Group in answer to my query: Q1b1 (OR L-245) IS OF KHAZAR ORIGIN AND EVOLVED FROM Q1B (WHICH IS SOME 2300 YEARS OLD AND FROM SIBERIAN XIOGNU EMPIRE) SOME 1000-1100 YEARS AGO..

AFTER THE "BLACK DEATH" WE HAVE BRANCHING IN MORE SIGNIFICANT PROPORTION; 500 YEARS AGO. MY FAMILY BRANCHED SOME 200-150 YEARS AGO ETC..

BABYLONIAN LEVITS GET MARRIED DAUGHTERS TO ASHINA ROYAL KHAZARS.

VLADIMIR GURIANOV INDEPENDENTLY CONFIRMED ALL OF MY RESEARCH WHICH I HAVE REVEALED IN 2007

6/21/11: from Prof. Krupa:

1) In 1346 the plague was brought in Crimea, and in 1351 in Poland and Russia. Later, in Russia there were outbreaks of plague in 1603, 1654, 1738-1740 and 1769. (Russian Wikipedia)

2) The plague repeatedly returned to haunt Europe and the Mediterranean throughout the 14th to 17th centuries.[54] According to Biraben, plague was present somewhere in Europe in every year between 1346 and 1671.[55] The Second Pandemic was particularly widespread in the following years: 1360–1363; 1374; 1400; 1438–1439; 1456–1457; 1464–1466; 1481–1485; 1500–1503; 1518–1531; 1544–1548; 1563–1566; 1573–1588; 1596–1599; 1602–1611; 1623–1640; 1644–1654; and 1664–1667. (English Wikipedia).

Sam Goldfuss 1891 England

2011-06-15T21:35:00.000-07:00

Sam Goldfuss, age 26, was born in Russia. He was a lodger in Manchester, Central Lancashire, England in 1891

Resource: FamilySearch

Isaak Goldfuss, Immigration 1915

2011-06-15T20:50:00.000-07:00

Isaak Goldfuss, born 1897, was only 18 when he arrived in Ellis Island alone on May 16, 1915 from London, England on the ship, Saint Paul. He had left the port of Liverpool to get to the New York. He had been born in Russia and was Jewish.

Research: FamilySearch

Lewis and Sofie Goldfus, Russia to Ellis Island 9 May 1909

2011-06-15T20:44:00.000-07:00

Lewis, 42 and wife Sofie, 38 Goldfus left Russia and arrived at Ellis Island, NY on May 9, 1909. Their ship was the Cedric. The port they had left from was Liverpool. They had been living in London. Their children were:
Yette 17, Abe 14, Ester 11, Rosa 10, Benny 8 and Sarah 6. All had been born in Russia.

Resource: FamilySearch

High I.Q's: Coming from Mothers or Fathers

2011-06-14T19:33:00.000-07:00

Nadene Goldfoot

We humans have 23 pairs of chromosomes, or 46 total in each of our cells. The 23rd pair are the sex chromosomes, the X and the Y. The X holds the key to our IQ.

Males have an X and a Y chromosome, while females have two X's. It is found that females average a little better than males on IQ tests. More males are both mentally retarded or have IQ's at 135 and above. What causes all this seems to be the X chromosome. This is because only 54 out of the 1,098 protein-coding genes on X functions like the Y, of which the few genes Y carries are related to sperm production and male physical characteristics.

If a gene on X chromosome mutates in a female, there is a backup gene on the 2nd X chromosome which can fill the gap. But in a male, his Y genes cannot step up to the bat and help out. This accounts for about 300 genetic diseases and disorders in males like color blindness, muscular dystrophy, and about 200 brain disorders.

The male gets his X gene from his mother in her mtDNA.   If he gets a favorable X-related-genetic mutation, it will not be overridden by a gene on his Y chromosome. The problem is that he cannot pass this gene to his son, but will always pass it to his daughter. The daughter's paternal X-chromosome recombines with her mother's X-chromosome in the formation of the daughter's egg cells. There is a 50% chance that she will pass it to the next generation. In the female, however, a good mutation on one X might be overridden by a normal gene on her other X.

This causes me to wonder about me inheriting any of my paternal grandmother's genes from her haplogroup W. She was often distracted while cooking and would burn something and I do the same thing. Our body shape is similar. My very bright father must have inherited his IQ from her.  I also would have some of her IQ abilities along with my mother's IQ genes.

Does this mean that my grandson from my son has not inherited my mt X chomosome which is in my H2a1 haplogroup? My background and love for dancing and art work is coming out in my grandson. Of course, the mother of his mother has those same qualities, giving him a double dose which is quite possible. I'm sure he's brighter than I am. Then my grandson did not get my X chromosome holding the IQ genes.

My son is gifted with a wonderful IQ, and his father had an extremely high IQ. We can assume that his father received a mutated X gene from his mother to have such an unusual high I.Q, and believe me, his mother was a sharp cookie, but so was his father. I see that under this way of passing the gene along, his daughter would get the mutated X but not his son! I suppose then that my son inherited his high IQ from me! And all along I thought it was his father. My daughter has both her father's single X with the IQ and my X with the IQ. Little do we daughters know how capable we can be.

I'm bright, but not half as bright as my brother! There's another case of having a very high IQ and it being the male sibling. This means that my brother could not have received the X chromosome from his equally bright father, but from his mother, but that's where I got my brains, from my father! My brother was lucky to have had a very bright mother.

I wondered if on that very male Y gene there could possibly be a segment labeled High IQ along with broad shoulders, bass voice, etc. Evidently not. If that were so, only males would inherit it.   Females have two chances of getting smart but one of those chances can be canceled out by the other, and the male has to depend on getting his smarts from his mother by having a 50% chance to do so, but with his odds, will turn it into a much higher IQ
.
So, bright females. Thank your fathers for adding to your brains. There's nothing that says our mother's IQ genes aren't working for us as well. We have the double dose of 2 XX's. No wonder we can do two or three things at the same time. Bright males, your probabilites for having extremely higher IQ's than females are great. You can thank your mothers for that. We females can be counted on to have a nice steady above average IQ but have less problems mentally and physically than males.

Perhaps more mutations have been happening in females as we are using our brains more and succeeding in the world in all fields. This will certainly improve our sons and our daughters. As females' skills have improved throughout the ages, so have the males of the nations. I see this as a most positive step in group evolvement. It's important to keep females educated in order to elevate the whole community. Look at what happens in a controlled group whereby the females are held down and minds are not expanded. Look at the productivity of that group. It's not doing well at all. For the well-being of a nation, the best thing to do is to keep women educated.

Reference: DNA and Genealogy by Colleen Fitzpatrick and Andrew Yeiser
Reference: http://ghr.nlm.nih.gov/handbook/basics/howmanychromosomes
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heritability_of_IQ added 6/15/11
http://www.askabiologist.org.uk/answers/viewtopic.php?id=1958
http://www.cerebrals.com/board/viewtopic.php?f=12&t=3233
http://wilderdom.com/personality/L4-1IntelligenceNatureVsNurture.html

Calendar Difference: Gregorian versus Julian of Eastern Europe

2011-06-14T18:21:00.000-07:00

The Julian calendar was a reformed calendar from the Roman Calendar created by Julius Caesar. It was used in 45 BCE onwards till 1582 when Pope Gregory introduced his Gregorian Calendar, which is still in use today. The Julian calender went from vernal equinoxes to the next vernal equinox and consisted of 365.25 days, well, actually 11 minutes shorter than that.

The Gregorian calendar is 12 days later (also 13 sometimes) than the Julian calendar used by our ancestors in eastern Europe. That accounts for the differences: our forefathers were not aware of this. (Dennis Kahn)The Gregorian calendar has 365 days, 5 hours, 49 minutes and 12 seconds. Leap year every 4 years adjusts the time.

Russia changed over to the Gregorian in 1918.
Prussia changed in 1700.
The British Empire changed in 1752.
Most all countries had changed over by 1927.

Now when we get dates in our genealogy research I'll wonder which calendar was used and will have to look at the dates involved. The question of different calendars is clearly shown by Christine Usdine. She researches Latvian sources for jewishgen. In each of her birth, marriage and death presentations she tells one how many days to add to get our date. Her email: uzdine@orange.fr from Dennis Kahn.

Dennis Kahn.
http://www.nestle-watersna.com/pdf/julian-calendar.pdf Julian Calendar graph
http://landdb1.nascom.nasa.gov/browse/calendar.html
http://www.hermetic.ch/cal_stud/cal_art.html#Julian_Calendar
http://www.fourmilab.ch/documents/calendar/ excellent calendar converter in Julian, Gregorian, Hebrew, etc
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julian_calendar what countries changed to Gregorian on what dates

Goldfoot SNP Test In-L245 Positive Q1b1 Haplogroup

2011-06-13T10:04:00.000-07:00

I found out something new. When you have a SNP test, you are not notified by e-mail. The results are to be found on your webpage. I also found out that SNP tests come in quickly. The results were known by the 25th of April and I wasn't aware of that. I had sent in the request on the 12th of April. Now I still couldn't follow the directions of the gal answering my phone call. I found the results on the certificate that came up for SNP results after speaking to her.
3:16pm: Just now tried again and it did come up.

Q1b1	P36.2+ M378+ L245+ L272-

The result is that our Goldfoot line was positive for L245 and negative for L272. This puts us in the catagory of Q1b1 now instead of Q1b. In shorthand this is P36+2 + M378+ L245+. Evidently people positive for L272 have the tag of Q1b1a1 and we are not in that group.

The Q's were from the Altai/Baikal region of Northern Eurasia and that's how Native Americans got into America. As for our small Jewish group that left the original Q's eons ago, we're only about 5% of the total Jewish population. Maybe this SNP test will help us learn what path we took and when.

The haplogroup of Q started 17,000 to 22,000 years ago and was a branch off of haplogroup P.
Most Europeans and all the people of the Americas come from P. So do the Central and Southern Asians. This was a branch developed 27,000 to 41,000 years ago.
P, Q and R are descendents of K. P's came from Siberia, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan or along the Silk road around Kinjiang, Gansu or Ningxia about 35,000 years ago. Sea levels were much lower at that time and the weather was different.

Without any kind of transportation, except the horse when people were still enjoying cave homes, people traversed this whole planet, most likely in search of food and safety instead of wanting a holiday. There's still a lot to learn about the travails of our Q1b1 ancestors.

Answer to question found on http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Ashkenazi-Q/message/1439

"But the L245 SNP is downstream from the M378. Downstream means evolved later in time. This makes us even more unique. Two of our members have SNPs downstream from the L245. One is the L272 and the other is the L315." (our particular test shows we were negative for L272.)

These more recent mutations may have evolved within a few hundred years in the Mediterranean area.

Resource: familytreedna
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haplogroup_Q_(Y-DNA)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haplogroup_P_(Y-DNA)
http://www.familytreedna.com/public/Jewish_Q/default.aspx?section=ycolorized
http://www.khazaria.com/genetics/abstracts.html

More on Telsiai, Lithuania

2011-06-10T14:48:00.000-07:00

It was called Telz in Yiddish. This town is one of the oldest towns in Lithuania and is in the NW part, the Zemaitija region on the shores of Lake Mastis. It was even mentioned in the chronicles of a Crusader Order in 1320.

In 1710 the Swedes invaded and it suffered badly. Two thirds of its population died from epidemics at that time.

Until 1795 it was part of the Polish-Lithuanian Kingdom, when the 3rd division of Poland by the 3 superpowers of those times; Russia, Prussia and Austria, caused Lithuania to become partly Russian and Partly Prussian. Telz fell under Czarist Russian rule, first from 1802 as part of the Vilna Gubernia or Province and from 1843 as part of the Kovno Province or Gubernia.

1812 came with Napoleon's retreating army going through leaving behind desolation and a big gun, now in the town park.

The town was damaged in the Polish rebellions of 1831 and 1863.

Jewish Settlement

Jews settle in Telz at the beginning of the 17th century. In 1800 the municipal council established included 3 Jewish delegates, but in 1804 they were removed at the request of the Christian delegates.

1,650 Jews lived in the city out of 2,500 population. That's 66% being Jewish.   In 1758 they suffered from "Blood Libels" and agin in 1827. Tlhe result was that the Jews suffered througha period of fear. Christians also saw Jews as competitors in producing and selling alcohol, so in 1825 the nobles asked the Tsar to expel the Jews because they "spread diseases and threaten to rob and to steal."

In the Polish rebellion of 1831 they suffered from the rebels and Cossacks. One was hung. Authorities started to arm the population against the rebels and the Jews asked not for the guns as they didn[t know how to use them or to fight but that they would be suppliers of steel, leather, gunpowder, and they agreed.

Years of familne were 1869-1872, just before and after my grandfather was born in 1871. By 1870 there were 6,481 people in Telz including 4,399 Jews. That's now 68%, and in 1897 there were 6,000 residents and of them 3,088 were Jews, down to 51%. Already Jews were immigrating to England and the United States as well as Argentina and South Africa. This immigration went on till WWI.

Persecutions and pogroms against Jews happened in the 1880's in Ukraine and other places. Telz Jews had their self confidence damaged because of being conscripted into the army for 6 years, another reason for immigration. From 1870 to 1923 the Jewish population decreased by 2,854 Telz Jews. 1893, when my grandfather was by then in Ireland, a cholera epidemic took many Telz victims, especially among the poor. who lived in overcrowed conditions with bad hygienic conditions. The rich gave money for the poor to have medicines, disinfeftants and medical help. It was then that the Telz Jewish hospital was established.

What work was there for Jews? The answer is commerce, crafts and peddling. In 1841 there were 25 Jewish artisans; 14 tailors, 10 shoemakers and one watchmaker and many wandering artisans. Up till WWI there was a strong organization of them helping their members with loans for buyhing raw materials and tools.

There were several Jewish merchants who had big businesses of grains and flax and made a good living. I had heard that a Goldfus was a dealer in corn and even had a pass into Russia out of the Pale of Settlement.   Several were textile merchants who imported goods from Germany. Ya'akov Rabinovitz was one and I've seen that surname pop up as a dna match to me, I believe.

The Telz "Yeshivah" was built in 1880 by 3 young men, an Openheim, Atlas and Abel.   It became the main institution of orthodox education.   By 1889 it had about 400 students and was one of the greatest in the world. Next door was a preparatory class called Yeshivah Ketanah for boys age 10-16. It was the source of income for many families who supplied rooms and food for many of the students. They also maintained the gardens. In the 1880's many Jewish families earned their living by living in the surrounding villages. The economic situation was difficult. There were poor people on welfare and some beggers going from house to house. The town housed 4 synagogues.

Between the army and famines as well as the economic conditions, it is no wonder my grandfather left town for the USA. But first he went to England and then Ireland trying to make up his mind and collecting enough money. The shame of it all is that by the time he got to Idaho, he only lived for 7 more years and died around the age of 40.

from Dennis Kahn: Goldfus is: “surname found in Tel’shi, Shavli, and Rossieny. It is an artificial surname, spelled goldfus [Northeastern dialect of Yiddish], Goldfuss [German] and means golden foot. That explains Goldfoot [English].” This shows that our Goldfoot line does certainly come from Telsiai along with the other towns mentioned here as well as others I've found.

Reference: Preserving Our Litvak Heritage by Josef Rosin and Joel Alpert, Editor, published by JewishGen, Inc.
http://litvak-cemetery.info/   Great site to see Vilnius cemetery, translate into English at bottom of page. Also translates into many other languages.

Goldfus Passports 1919-1940 from Lithuania

2011-06-10T13:32:00.000-07:00

1. Khana Goldfus was born in 1851 and was going to be 69 in 1920 when she applied for a passport. She was born in Telsiai and was a merchant's wife or was also a merchant. Her passport # 41018/98.

2. Ruvel Goldfus was born in 1869 and was going to be 63 in 1932. He was born in Akmene, Lithuania and was a tradesman. #28484/819747.

The next three were all from Liepaja, Lithuania and may have been from one family.

3. Zara Goldfus, born in 1854, would be 68 in 1922 and was a housewife. #28485/819727.

4. Beyla Goldfus, born in 1890, would be 32 in 1922 and was a dentist. #28486/819731

5. Marta Goldfus, born in 1892, would be 30 in 1922 and was a music teacher. #28483/819750.

Research: Jewishgen.org

Chaim Goldfus b: 1880

2011-06-10T08:39:00.000-07:00

Tzvi Goldfus, possibly born about 1855, was the father of another Chaim Goldfus b: 1880 probably in Telsiai, Lithuania. He married Elke Saks.

His son was Samuel Goldfus. He left Lithuania in 1927 for South Africa to work for his uncle in Bloemfontein. Then he moved to Capetown.

This information is from a family that most likely is part of ours, as my grandfather was originally a Goldfus. His father according to his headstone was Chaim Itzhak Goldfus, who would have been an older Chaim, born most likely in 1850 or even before that. I've very grateful to have been contacted regarding our possible connection. This is great news.

The Pale of Settlement: Where Goldfus Came From

2011-05-31T15:42:00.000-07:00

First Jews were locked up inside the ghettos in Italy. That's where the term came from. They were actually locked in at night. This happened in Venice from the 16th to 18th century.

Then Jews were confined in the Pale of Settlement. They were not allowed in Russia proper unless they were special and had a special pass allowing them to do so. When I first received a tree of the Goldfoot clan, it showed that one had a special permit to sell corn in Russia. That was very special.

"In 1772 and 1793, parts of Poland were ceded to Prussia, Austria and Russia. In 1795 the final partition of Poland ceded the balance of Poland to these 3 countries, and Poland ceased to exist as an independent country until 1918. In the part ceded to Russia, Jews were permitted to live only in the area just acquired. This area became known as the Pale of Settlement. " Avotaynu.

"The "Pale" was created in Czarist Russia in 1835 and lasted till the 1917 revolution. This area covered 386,100 square miles from the Baltic Sea to the Black Sea. The 1897 census recorded 4,899,300 Jews, which formed 94 percent of the total Jewish population of Russia. Most Jews lived in shtetlach (plural of shtetl, "small town").Nathan Goldfoot, born in 1871, and Hattie Jermulowske, born in 1886, were no doubt included in the 1897 census figures though I haven't found her as yet. I just found Nathan a week or so ago on http://jewishgen.org/.
Visit the Pale of Settlement website for a map and more information. I just received a catalog from Avotaynu with the Pale of Settlement on the cover. Telsiai is on the northwest side of Kovno which is very far north. That's where Nathan Goldfoot came from. Suwalki landed in the Kingdom of Poland and was just below Kovno. It was also very close to vilna, which was in the Pale. Suwalki had once been a part of Lithuania. This is where Hattie was from. They could have been neighbors.

The pogroms and anti-Jewish decrees, especially those during the 1880's to 1906, resulted in major Jewish immigration to Western Europe and the United States. The door slammed shut for Jewish Eastern European U.S. immigration in 1921 Passage, by Congress, of exclusionary laws in the 1920's - The Quota Act of 1921 reduced Jewish (and all other ethnic groups) immigration to 3% of 1910 numbers; and the Reed-Johnson Immigration Act of 1924 further reduced immigration to 2% which effectively ended most Jewish immigration until 1965. For more information about the history of Jewish life in the Pale and why many left spend, visit the informative and extensive Beyond the Pale, The History of Jews in Russia website exhibit.

Bryan’s research found that many Jews migrated to South America in the 1400s after being expelled from Spain and Portugal. They spoke the language, etc. During the 1700-1900s, if you had the money, you went where you could... eventually you get tired of getting beaten or having your neighborhood set on fire... and there were established Jewish communities in South America and the Caribbean (specifically, Jamaica -- first temple built in the early 1600s) Common Spanish-Jewish names... Perez, Ramirez... Portuguese... Cardoso (as in Supreme Court Justice Benjamin Cardozo 1932-1938). " Ronald Miller

"In the Russian Pale of Settlement, Jews were required to take surnames at various times in different countries, having previously been known as by given name and father's given name. Czar Alexander I unsuccessfully mandated that Jews adopt surnames in 1804. However, it was not until 1836 that all Russian Jews had surnames. By 1844, they were compelled to enter their names in a public register. Surnames were chosen according to various schemes: profession, town of birth, physical appearance or purely ornamental. It is generally accepted that those with Spira or Shapiro type names originated from Speyer in Germany, which welcomed Jews in the 11th century at the behest of Rudiger, Bishop of Speyer. As an example, source documents from this period make reference to Reb Kalonymos ben Reb Yosef haKatan miShpeira (mi - from; Shpiera - Speyer). As outlined in the history section, it is possible our ancestors moved from Germany to Poland and Lithuania in the 16th century and would still have carried the tag 'from Speyer' in their name (names being largely of the form A, son of B, from C). Alternatively, Saperia may have been an ornamental name derived from the Hebrew word for sapphire. Letters received from Mr S. Szapira and Mr M. Freedman argue for Speyer and sapphire respectively.

Whilst this surname is not common, is has a curious persistence amongst those who emigrated to Leeds from the Suwalki area. This strongly suggests that the various Saperia family trees are linked and that those who emigrated were following in the footsteps of their relatives, though we have not been able to establish this from records.

Aswell as sharing a surname, the Saperias evidently favoured a limited selection of given names. Amongst the girls, Rachel, Fannie and Ann(ie) were exceedingly popular, whilst Louis, Harris and Nathan recur as choices for boys. A word of caution: there was a brief fashion for 'Simon' in the 1890's, which faded rapidly as all the unfortunate babies died in their first year! " Saperia.com
Our surname, Goldfoot, came from Goldfus, and I have found many Goldfus/fuss in Lithuania and in several particular towns. Telsiai had our family. In the USA, we are the only family. Our other branch is in South Africa. They both came from Telsiai and went through London and then Dublin, Ireland before disembarking for South Africa and Oregon.

http://ronaldimiller.com/pale.htm
Avotaynu, publisher of works on Jewish genealogy 2011 Catalog
http://www.saperia.com/Pages/name.htm
http://www.sacred-destinations.com/italy/venice-ghetto
http://www.romanhomes.com/your_roman_vacation/quarters/jewish-quarter.htm (with music)
http://www.frommers.com/destinations/rome/0064022151.html

Dachau concentration Camp Records: WWII

2011-05-26T19:51:00.000-07:00

Laib Goldfuss, born May 20, 1917 in Leukova, Telsiai, Kaunas, Lithuania entered form Muhldorf Prison August 6, 1944.

Josef Goldfuss, born February 5, 1925 in Leukova, Telsiai, Kaunas, Lithuania entered from Muhldorf Prison August 6, 1944.

They were probably brought in a truck in a group on this day. Most likely they were brothers or cousins.

Goldfus Births in Lithuania:.Telsiai and Laukuva

2011-05-26T18:20:00.000-07:00

Births

Iankel Meier son of Leib, son of Khaim mother was Ita b: 8/3/1876 Adar 24 in Laukuva, from Varniai

Freida daughter of Khatskel, of Josel and mother sheina on 9.9/1859 22 Elus in Telsiai, father is a merchant

Zelman David son of Leyb Meer, son of Faiavush, mother Pere Glike, grandfather Leyb 24/4/1876 Kaunas, father from Raseiniai

Abram son of Leyb Meer, son of Faivush, mother Pere glike, daughter of Leyb 18/12/1870 6 Tevet in Kaunas, father from Nemokschiai

Sora Leia daughter of Leiba Meer, son of Faivush, mother Pera Glika, father Leiba on 14/6/1873 Kaunas, father was Nemakasciai resident

Gita Menukha daughter of Abram, Iosel, mother Ginda, 23/2/1856 Telsiai

Feiga daughter of Berel, grandfather Iosel, mother Beila 22/9/1856 5/Tishri Telsiai

Khaim son of Abram, of Iosel, mother Inde 19/11/1865 4 Kislev in Telsiai

Nokhum Abram son of Movsha, of Iosel and mother Beile, 1/1/1871 20 Tevet, Telsiai

Itsyk Goldfus: Death in Telsiai, Kaunas, Lithuania

2011-05-26T11:21:00.000-07:00

Itsyk Goldfus, son of Mark, died on September 13, 1854 at age 68 from Cholera. He lived in the town of Varniai, Telsiai, Kaunas, Lithuania. He was born in 1786.

Reference: Jewishgen.org

Telsiai, Kauknas, Lithuania, : Marriages

2011-05-26T11:14:00.000-07:00

Gute Golda Goldfus, daughter of Nokhim age 20, married Iontaf Opengeim, son of Sender, age 20, married on September 4, 1859/17 Elul.

Rivka Mera Goldfus, daughter of Borukh, age 18, married Gershon Perl, son of Iudel of Luoke, age 25, on December 3, 1863/5 Tevet.

Khana Mina Goldfus, daughter of Mark Aizyk age 25 and Leib Tavirinski, son of Nokhum age 35 and widower, married on May 31, 1874/27 Sivan

Joesel Goldfus, son of Yankel of Telsiai age 70 married Khaia Esterman, daughter of Abel age 45 on April 12, 1876/ 30 Nisan. Both were widowed. He was born in 1806, she in 1831.

Ginda Mira Goldfus, daughter of Josel of Telsiai age 56 married Movsha Leib Khatskelevich, son of Mendel of Skidel age 58, both widowers on April 3, 1885/30 Nisan

Girsh Goldfus, son of Leib of Lavkovo age 48 and a widower, married Tserna Levit, daughter of Movsha of Plunge age 27, on January 1, 1909/14 Shevat

Reference: Jewishgen.org

Telsiai, Lithuania, Births: One could be Ours

2011-05-17T13:54:00.000-07:00

Nathan Goldfoot born in "Russia" in 1871 was my grandfather. His birthday is recorded in Portland as either the 5th or 15th of August. We know nothing about him because he died in 1912 in an accident at age 40 when my father was only 4 years old.

I have found a birth in Telsiai, Lithuania, a probable city of his birth.

1. Nokhum Abram Goldfus was born 1/1/1871 in Telsiai, or the 20th of Tevet.
His father was Movsha. His grandfather was Iosel. His mother was Beile.
The wedding certifcate I found in Dublin, Ireland said his middle name (first I knew a middle name) was Abraham. It said his father was Morris. (We thought it was Chaim Itzhak as that's written on his tombstone.)
The Town of birth is Telsiai. The Ujezd is Telsiai. The Guberniya is Kaunas.

I checked the Hebrew calendar. The 20th of Tevet in the year 1871 was: January 13, 1871!
The recorder simply did not get the 3 included, I have a feeling. This is him!

I have a feeling that he only knew his birthdate as 20 Tevet 1871. Someone transcribed the wrong date for him.
Next, I'll check out marriages there. http://data.jewishgen.org/wconnect/wc.dll?jg~jgsearch~model2~[lvrnewb]lvrnewm10

Jermuloski in Lomza, Poland

2011-05-13T13:25:00.000-07:00

A death record has been found for David Gersz Jermulowski in Szczuczyn, Lomza, Gubernia Bialystok Province, of Poland in 1868. He could have been born anytime form 1768 onward. This place is located at 53 23' 22 18' on the map. I know that on the 1910 census of Council, Washington, Idaho they had been from Poland, most likely Lazdijai, but this man was born before my grandmother.

Resource: jewishgen.

Goldfus in Riga, Latvia

2011-05-13T10:53:00.000-07:00

Moses Goldfus married Zipa Blumberg in 1867.
Itzik Goldfus married Fruma Wagenheim in 1886.
Merle Ruvel Goldfus married Sara Stember in 1889.
Mira Goldfus married Judel Finkmann in 1899.
Hana Goldfus married Shmuel Blacher in 1900.
Roche Lea Rosenberg Goldfus married Note Rummer in 1920.

Resource: Jewishgen.org.

Goldfus in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania from Russia

2011-04-29T16:14:00.000-07:00

Samuel Goldfus was listed on the 2 June 1900 Philadelphia, Pennsylvania census. He was born on January 1862 and was 38 at the time of the census. He was listed as an undertaker. He immigrated in 1887 from Russia and was speaking Yiddish. They lived on S 3rd Street in Philadelphia in Wd 4, Dist 76. .

His wife was Esther age 38 born March 1862 and she immigrated in 1891 with her children. This is typical finding the men coming first, getting a job and home and sending for the family.

Freda was 16, born March 1884 and became a tailoress.
Abraham was 14, born December 1885.
Sarah was 12, born December 1888.
Then Goldie 7, was born November 1892 in Pennsylvania.
Louis was 4, born May 1896 in Pennsylvania.
Bennie, age 1 was born May 1899, also in Pennsylvania.

April 22, 1910 census in Philadelphia found Samuel must have died, for Esther age 48 was head of the household now. She was also the manager of the undertaker business.
Abraham was 24 listed born in 1886. He had a printer shop.
Sarah was 21 and a saleslady in a department store
Goldie was 17 and also working in the department store as a saleslady at her young age.
Louis was 13.
Bennie was 11
Berty was 9. I think this must mean Bertha.
Charles Kahn was 29 and was the son in law. With him was his son, Ester's grandson Robb Kahn age 4. Charles was now the undertaker..
His wife must have been Freda and she must have died for she wasn't listed.

3 Jan 1920 census at 2322 S. 8th in Philadelphia listed Abraham Goldfus age 33., a printer with his own shop. They live in Wd 39; Distr 418. Abraham immigrated in 1891 and became a citizen in 1904.
Lillian was 28 and his wife.
Stanley was the son and was 6.
Beatrice was 1 and 4 months.

5 April 1930 census in Philadelphia finds Abraham age 42 He married at age 24 He is now working in real estate.
Lillian born 1890 is 40
Stanley is 16.
Beatrice is 11.
Irene is 5.
They all live on S. 8th Street.

Social Security listed that Lillian Freilich was born 22 June 1889 and died January 1979 in Atlantic City, New Jersey. Her social security # was 163-18-8186 and was received before 1951. She became naturalized 6 May 1947 in Pennsylvania.

WWI Draft and Registration listed Abram born 12 Sept 1887 and was 29 on June 5, year unknown.
He lived at 2414 S. Ause St in Philadelphia, Penn. He was a printer at 21 S. 7th. He was medium in height and weight, had blue eyes and light brown hair. He had a wife and a child.

They were Jewish from Russia and spoke Yiddish. They could be connected to us.

Papile, Lithuania also called Popelany on Immigration Records: Abraham Goldfus

2011-04-29T15:44:00.000-07:00

I found leaving Hamburg Port, Abraham Goldfus leaving on 12 January 1902. He was 17 years old, having been born in Papile, Lithuania in 1885.

He was on the ship, Pretoria and was listed as a day laborer.
With him was Rochel, 20 and a hard to read name and age, possibly Berel age 51. I'm guessing.

The ship was heading to embark at Plymouth and New York. This Abraham is not listed in my data bank, but still could be a relative.

Hattie Jermulowske's Family of Lazdijai, Suwalki, Lithuania and Elsewhere?

2011-04-24T17:58:00.000-07:00

All I know is that my grandmother, Hattie Jermulowske, was born in Lazdijai, Suwalki, Lithuania on January 11, 1866 and that her father was Joshua Charles "Hatzkel" Jermulowskie and her mother was Esther or Essie of which her daughter was named Elsie for her mother. Esther died after having 3 children and Joshua remarried Dora Leah or "Deborah" and there were 4 more children born. Below could be some of their relatives. Hattie was the wife of Nathan Goldfoot.

Yakov Jermalauskas/Yermolovsky/Yermalovsky, son of Shuel, was born in Grodno, Kaunas in 1892 and was a mechanic. He is on the list to get a passport. The following are also on the passport list.

Sheyna Jermolauskaite/Yermolovsky/Yermalovsky was born in 1918 in Grodno, Kaunas.

Shmuel Jermalouskis/Yermolovsky/Yermalovsky was born in 1922 in Kaunas and his father was also Yakov. He was a student and applied for a passport on 17 July 1939.

Leah Jermolauskaite/Yermolovsky was born in 1921 in Kaunas and her father was Yakov. She was a dressmaker and applied for a passport on 17 May 1939.

They applied for passports at the time of the start of the 2nd World War. I wonder if they made it out. By 1941 the Germans went through Lithuania.

Resource: ancestry.com under Jewish lists
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qyb5XjFP_Ug

Morris Goldfuss of Russia and other Goldfus on Lists

2011-04-24T15:51:00.000-07:00

Morris Goldfuss arrived in New York on 12 August 1886. He was on the ship, Ludgate Hill out of London. He had said he was heading for Boston as a destination. That's strange as another ship would have landed in Boston. Morris was born in 1858 and was 28 years old from Russia.

Leyb Gershon Goldfus was born in 1843 and was found to be living in Laukuva, Lithuania on 25 February 1914. His father was Chaim.

Volf Goldfus was born in 1848. He was living in Rietavas, Raseiniai, Kaunas on 20 June, 1868 which was listed on the Belarus ; Lithuanian census. At age 20, he was listed as missing.

Mendel Mowsza Goldowicz was born in 1850 in Suwalki, Poland, which was found on the Polish Jewish birth index. His father was Idzko and his mother was Fejga. His mother's father was Idzkowna.

Abram Goldfus was born in 1846. He was living in Papile, Siauliai, Kaunas, Belarus on 27 May 1858 according to the Belarus and Lithuanian census. This 12 yr old was the son of Leba and Feyge Goldfus.

Gersha Goldfus was born in 1860. In 1903 he was living in Laukuva, Lithuania, Telsiai, Kaunas. His father was Leyba. Laukuva is a town, Telsiai is the region, Kaunas is the district, and it's in Lithuania. The Latitude is 55" 37', and the Longitude is 22" 14'.

Roche Leah Goldfus was born in 1855. She was also found in Papile on 27 May, 1858.

Shmuel Iosel Goldfus was born in 1852. He was found on 17 June 1885 in Papile, Belarus on the census. His father was Leyba.

Zara Goldfus nee Sternberyte born in Liepaja, Kaunas, applied for a passport on 13 June 1922 to leave the country. I hope she got it.

Itsyk Goldfus age 36 b: 1822 was living in Akmene, Siauliai, Kaunas, Lithuania with his wife, Chaya, age 30 born 1828 and son Shakhne Goldfus age 12, who had left because he was conscripted. (This means he was forced to join the Russian army at this young age, so hopefully he left before they got him and he escaped it. This happened to many Jewish boys.) Itsyk was not the head of the household. They had been living with his cousin, Girsh Streydman, age 42, who had left in 1854. His son, Movsha, age 16 had died, and he still had Mordkhe, his son age 12. This was on the Belarus and Lithuanian census and family lists with revision list of 27 May, 1858.

It's interesting to me to find that Papile was part of Belarus as I have matches at 23 and Me; with people with Belarus roots. We must have lived there. I see that Papile is listed as part of Lithuania with coordinates of 56"8' 60 N and 22"48' 0E. . Evidently Belarus is :Until the 20th century, the lands of modern day Belarus belonged to several countries, including the Principality of Polotsk, the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, the Russian Empire, and the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. As a result of the Russian Revolution, Belarus became a founding constituent republic of the Soviet Union and was renamed as the Byelorussian SSR. The capital is Minsk.

Resource: ancestry.com; Jewish section
Wikipedia on Belarus.

Samogitia Plateliai, Telsiai County, Plunge Dist, Lithuania

2011-04-15T08:35:00.000-07:00

An area our Goldfoots could have lived in was Samogitia. In 1897 there were 171 Jews living there. This made up 28% of the population of the town. Some went to the USA and others went to South Africa, where several of our Goldfoot family went.

The name 'TELSIAI' is the Yiddish version of PLATELIAL (originally settled

during ROMAN CHRISTIAN times on the trade routes). Approx after the Jewish

people were expelled from Spain 1492 the name of the town was called

'SAMOGITIA'
During the II World War the Jews were all shot and thrown into a trench.

Resource: http://www.iajgsjewishcemeteryproject.org/lithuania/plateliai-kaunus.html
Contributor: Cousin Denise Bremridge

Lazdijai and Telsiai, Lithuania; Homes of Our Grandparents

2011-04-14T18:59:00.000-07:00

Łoździeje, Sejny, Suwałki, Russian Empire is what it was called around 1900. This is where my grandmother, Hattie Jermulowske came from.

Lazdijai, Lithuania

54°14' N 23°31' E

It was 127 km WSW of Vilnius, the capitol of Lithuania which had 63,841 Jews in 1900 and called Vilna.

She was right in saying that she was a Litvak. Countries changed hands quickly. She lived in Lazdijai when it was part of Lithuania. In 1900 there were 1,439 Jews in Lazdijai which was in Suwalki gubernia of the Russian Empire. It was near the Polish border.

Telsiai, Lithuania was 55" 59' N 22" 15' E, 150 miles NW of Vilnius, the capital of Lithuania. In 1900 it was called Telshi, Kovno of the Russian Empire. In 1900 there were 3,088 Jewish living here. This is where our grandfather could have come from being many other Goldfus people were also from there.

They met and married in Council, Idaho. No doubt they spoke the same Yiddish. He was very tall with brown hair and she was extremely short with black hair, but they were an excellent match. She said she had to stand on a chair to kiss him.

Resource: jewishgen

Goldfus/fuss/foos Burials in USA and Canada

2011-04-14T09:42:00.000-07:00

1. Sime Sene Goldfoos died 23 June 1901 in Herring Run-Beth Israel Cemetery, mikvo Kodesh, Beth Israel, in Baltime, Maryland in Section 03, Row: 01: Lot 30.

2. Jacob T. Goldfoos died 26 April 1922 in the same city and buried in the same cemetery only in Lot 2. .

3. Abe Goldfoos was born in 1879 and died in 1957 at the Berly Hills Memorial Gardens, Garden of the Ten commandments, Fairmont Jewish Community Section, Morgantown, West Virginia.

4. Marvin Goldfuss died 5 March 1991. He's at the Pardes shalom Beth David Bnai Isrel Cemetery, Beth Am Synagogue, in Maple, Ontario, Canada. He's in Sect II, Row D, Grave 19.

5. Anne Goldfus (mentioned a Goodman) was born 18 October 1898 and died 13 Oct 1993 and is at the B'nai Israel Cemetery in Salt Lake City, Utah in West A-68.

Reference: Jewishgen

Ordered Two New SNPS Test for Goldfoot

2011-04-12T11:54:00.000-07:00

I was just told that we could order SNPS for $29 each so I ordered 2 of them just now; the L245 and the L272 that are advised for our Q1b branch on the tree. (I've since read that L272 is rare, so we may not reflect this SNP. )

This is getting very technical, but up to this point I had found out that our place on the tree was a Q1b branch with the SNP's of P36.2+M378+. These two new ones may or may not apply to us, so I have to find out. They're the ones we should take. What if it shows nothing? What will it show?

I read in my dna book that there are SNPs on every chromosome and there are 10 million of them in nuclear DNA. They account for 90% of the genetic variation in humans. The Y SNPs used for genetic genealogy are not the only ones on the Y-chromosome, either. They just are the ones used by population geneticists and genetic genealogists. A SNP is also known as a polymorphism. it is possible that the same alteration is in less than 1% of another population and then is considered to be a mutation. What's being tested are SNPs used in genetic genealogy. They give information in finding the origins and migration patterns of indigenous peoples. but is only an indicator of the development of present populations. What must be done is to correlate theories of population development based on SNPs with archeological and anthropological evidence SNPs are markers with 2 values. They have mutated only once in human history. Each SNP can be traced to a single common ancestor where it first appeared.

The earliest SNPs can be traced to a Y chromosome Adam who lived between 60,000 and 90,000 years ago and a Mitochondrial Eve who lived about 150,000 years ago. These are the only ones who have survived to the present day, but we know there had been others who didn't. .

What's interesting to me is that haplogroup Q is found most frequently in Eastern Europe and Scandinavia, having originated in Central Asia and migrated through the Altai/Baikai region of northern Eurasia into the Americas. This is referring to the native Americans who are a Q3, as I remember. Q1b's were found mostly in Eastern Europe. I don't know what my mother's Swedish grandfather would have been, but it would be something if he were also a Q. Now I"m excited about getting the results of this test.

From wiki: According to Behar et al. 5% of Ashkenazi males belong to haplogroup Q.[20] This has subsequently been found to be entirely the Q-M378 subclade and may be restricted to Q-L245.

5/3/2011: From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haplogroup_Q_(Y-DNA) The Q-M378 subclade and specifically its Q-L245 subbranch is speculated to be the branch to which Q-M242 men in Jewish Diaspora populations belong.[20][32] Although published articles have not tested for M378 in Jewish populations, genetic genealogists from the Ashkenazi, Mizrachi, and Sephardi Jewish populations have tested positive for both M378 and L245.

Reference: DNA & Genealogy by Colleen Fitzpatrick & Andrew Yeiser

Pogroms: Cause for Leaving Russia

2011-04-06T08:45:00.000-07:00

Let me recount what Mary Antin wrote in 1911about the horrors inflicted upon the Jews in Russia as they celebrated the festival of liberty in the Exodus story during the festive Seder meal. Ms. Antin wrote of what routinely took place at Passover and of how Russian neighbors reminded the Jews that for them it was another Egypt: from Victor Sharpe.

“… in Russian cities and even more in country districts, where Jewish families lived scattered, the stupid peasants would hear lies about the Jews, fill themselves with vodka, and set out to kill their Jewish neighbors.

“They attacked them with knives and clubs and scythes and axes, killed them or tortured them and burned their houses. This was called a pogrom.

“Jews who escaped the pogroms came with wounds on them and horrible, horrible, stories of little babies torn limb from limb before their mother’s eyes. Only to hear these things made one sob and sob and choke with pain.

“People who saw such things never smiled any more, no matter how long they lived and sometimes their hair turned white in a day and others went insane.”

My cousin and I wonder if this isn't the reason that our grandmother, Hattie Jermulowske had had her legs broken. She was short to begin with, and this disability made her even shorter.

Origin of Lithuanian Goldfoot Jewish Family

2011-04-05T14:55:00.000-07:00

Nadene Goldfoot
Goldfoot has been found in Telsiai, Lithuania by the other recent found branch of Goldfoot. They happen to both be Q1b haplogroup and the two parties tested are at least 3rd cousins. The report it that our other branch was also in the Ukraine. We have no knowledge as to where our Nathan Goldfoot b: 1870 was from other than "Russia" on the 1910 USA federal census other than his wife, Hattie Jermulowske of Suwalki, Poland, was a Litvak. They met and married in Council, Idaho. One can figure that their only language, Yiddish that they both spoke was the same. Chaim/ Hyam Goldfoot of the other branch was b: 1867 most likely in Telsiai, Lithuania and also lived in Elizabethgrad, Odessa, Russia

When Jerusalem fell in 70AD, some remained and their descendants are there today, but out of those that were not taken as slaves, many left and set up villages along the way from the Mediterranean to North Eastern Europe. They traveled through the homeland referred to as the Levant, then Anatolia and Greece and sailed to Italy, which is not that far away if you look at today's map. Rome in 70 AD had a large Jewish population already and some Romans and Greeks converted to Judaism. This happened in Jewish communities and in Roman colonies and villas in "Palestine" during the time of Roman rule. Remember that the Romans had changed the names of Judea and Samaria and Israel to the blanket name of Palestine to wipe out the Jewish presence.

Some Jews who were in Anatolia joined the cities of Byzantine Jews there. Some kept moving north in Italy, though the Southern Italian peninsula was the first home for the new communities of Jews.

In the 4th century CE Jews kept moving north into Northern Italy until the 10th century when they went north into the Rhineland (Germany) and set up communities which became the cultural center of the northern European Jews. They moved northeast after the 11th century and settled in Eastern Germany and Poland. This area became the largest Jewish Diaspora community in Europe before WWII which killed 6 million of them. It must have been while in Germany that the Goldfuss surname was attached to the family, which became Goldfus in Yiddish and then anglicized to Goldfoot. It was in 1012 CE that Jews migrated from Germany to Poland near Bialystock and Grodno. By 1495 Lithuanian Jews also migrated to Bialystock, Poland.

The founding families of Lithuania are said to have come from Babylonia in early medieval times. What had happened was that there was the plague in 1347 followed by a 1348 migration of Jews going from Eastern Germany to Lemberg and Temopol with Hungarian Jews from 1349-1360 migrating to Temopol also.

Wherever a plague broke out, the Jews were thrown out of some German town and went into Poland. Jews were accused of creating plagues because they didn't get sick and die to the degree that others did. This was because of Jews keeping their kashrut laws which contained a lot of sanitary habits, such as bathing and washing.

There was also a Lithuanian migration of 1445 southeast to the Crimea. At the same time Byzantine Jews and the Judaic Khazars might have gone to Khakov from southeast to the north in Russia. Also the Jews of Kiev who was a mixture of Byzantine, Western European and maybe even Khazaria and other Jewish communities living in Kiev moved into the Crimea in 1350. This was when the plagued finally ended.

Resource: Tracing Your Jewish DNA For Family History & Ancestry-Merging a Mosaic of Communities by Anne Hart copyright 2003.

Goldfus (2) Found in States in 1920

2011-04-04T19:17:00.000-07:00

Abraham Goldfus was born in 1887 in Russia. He was found on the 1920 census at age 33 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
His wife was Lillian age 28. Their son was Stanley Goldfus and daughter Beatrice was only 1 year and 4 months.

Another Abraham Goldfus was born on 28 November 1895 in Pskov, Russia. On the WWI Draft and Registration of June 5, 1917. He was a music teacher living with his parents at 552 N. Gay in Baltimore, Maryland. He was medium height and weight with brown eyes and black hair.

He was also found on the 1920 census in Maryland at the age of 24 living with his parents, Joseph Goldfus age 52 and Ethel Goldfus age 50. Abraham was also born in Russia. Joseph was a timer with his own shop. They all immigrated in 1902. By 1914 they became citizens. Now Abraham was a musician in an orchestra. By April 18, 1930 Abraham was living in Atlantic City and was 34 years old and married living in a $70 per month apartment with his wife, Henrietta who was also 34 years old. She was born in Germany and her father had been born in England and mother in Germany. Abraham was a musician in a hotel. No doubt he was with a group.

Goldfus is the Yiddish spelling for the anglicized form of Goldfoot. Goldfoot people from "Russia anglicized it to Goldfoot when they moved to England, which many did. Some never did change their name.

Resource: FamilySearch.
ancestry.com

Jewish Genealogy Special Problems

2011-03-23T15:52:00.000-07:00

Condensed by Nadene Goldfoot
Usually we figure 25 years for a generation when figuring dna matches. The marriage age of Jewish people was ususally much younger than other groups probably up to 1900. Jews in Eastern Europe married very young. Boys married between ages 15-18 and girls could marry from age 14-16.

In the Middle Ages gentiles that were landlords or others would harass Jews by carrying off their girls. Later early marriages were the parents' cures to keep the children studying as they wouldn't be thinking of sex if they were married. Sometimes marriages were arranged very early but did not live together until later.

First cousin marriages were common. In 1875 7.5% of all English Jewish marriages were among first cousins. Of course the bible cites marriages with 1st cousins. Uncles could marry nieces, especially where there was a lack of suitors. This was found to be true even more so with Sephardic Jews.

Jewish families had larger families than most "to be fruitful and multiply". They had a lower mortality rate than other groups because of good hygenic conditions due to keeping kosher and ritual bathing practices. They also had very rare illigitimate births and more medical assistance. Where they had problems in staying alive was in the persecution mortality rate.

Both Ashkenazis and Sephardis named after their ancestors. This began in the age of the Maccabees of the 2nd Century BCE. 800 years later they began to use biblical names. After the 12th Century from living in Christian lands children had two names; Hebrew and Christian.

By the 19th century family or surnames came into being. In some cases it was up to individuals like people in Spain, Portugal and Italy who had them from the 14th century on. Many used the names of towns they came from. Emperor Joseph II of Austria was the first to require that Jews take surnames in Galicia in 1785. They had to buy names by paying for the registration fee. Goldstein and Rosenthal were expensive (gems and flowers). By 1808 Napoleon required surnames for Jews. The Baden Law of January 13, 1809 forced Jews to change their name if of biblical origin. Levites had been using Levi but now had to choose new names-basically ones that were place names. In Russia the laws of 1804 and 1835 allowed Jews to alter their family names, but by 1844 Russian Jews were first made to enter their names in the public register and they had to assume family names. In Poland this happened in 1821 but was not really enforced until 1844, so our surnames might not be very old. We shouldn't be surprised, then when we can't follow our family any earlier on Jewishgen.org.

Resource: Finding Our Fathers-a guidebook to Jewish genealogy by Dan Rottenberg

Goldfoots in 1911 in Dublin, Ireland

2011-03-20T18:30:00.000-07:00

Wood Quay in Dublin County must have been a district which held quite a few addresses for Goldfoot.
Victoria Street had quite a few Goldfoots.

1. Abraham Goldfoot was 10 years old, born in Dublin, a scholar and could read and write. He was a son.
2. Hyman Goldfoot was 43, born in Russia and a jeweller. He was the head of the family and married.
3. Bl?m? was Bluma Goldfoot, age 39, born in Russia and had been married for 18 years.
4. Annie Goldfoot was now 17, born in Russia, a scholar and the single daughter.
5. Louis Goldfoot was 8, born in Dublin, a scholar and the son.
6. Solomon Goldfoot was 6, born in Dublin, a scholar and the son.
7. Janie Goldfoot was 12, born in Dublin, a scholar, and a daughter.
8. Isedor Goldfoot was 4, born in Dublin, a scholar and a son.

Another section was Fitzwilliam in Dublin County. Harcourt St. had Goldfoots.
1. Arthur Goldfoot was 18, born in Wales and was a dental apprentice and the cousin of the head.
2. Jacob Goldfoot was 25, born in Dublin and was a Dental Assistant and head of their family.

Another section was Clifton in Antrim County of Ireland. Hillview Street was one Goldfoots chose to live on.
1. Isaac Goldfoot was 10, born in Dublin and a scholar. He was a son.
2. Esther Goldfoot was 7, born in Dublin and a scholar.
3. Sarah Goldfoot was 36, born in Russia, and had been married for 14 years. She had had 8 children.
4. Gerty Goldfoot was 5, born in Dublin and could not read. She was a daughter.
5. Morris Goldfoot was 42, born in Russia and was a general Draper. He was head of this family.
6. Louie Goldfoot was 3, born in Dublin and a son.
7. Rachel Goldfoot was 13, born in Dublin and a scholar and a daughter.
8. Bertha Goldfoot was 12, born in Dublin and a scholar and a daughter.
9. Barney Goldfoot was 9, born in Dublin and a scholar and a son.
10. Rosie Goldfoot was 2, born in Dublin and a daughter.

The county of Cork had the district of Cork #1 Urban with Grand Parade Street.
1. Abraham Goldfoot age 60, born in Russia was a Dentist, head of his family and married. His wife is not listed with him.

Also in the county of Cork was the district of Cork #6 Urban with South Mall Street.
1. George Goldfoot age 30 , born in Liverpool, England, and was a Dental Surgeon.

Joining Two Branches of Goldfoot

2011-03-20T11:53:00.000-07:00

Denise just pointed out to me that her grandfather, Chaim/Hyman Goldfoot, was living at the Arbutus Place on the census in 1901. This is where our grandfather, Nathan was living at the time of this first marriage in 1893. Her grandfather was born in 1867 and our grandfather was born in 1871. However, her grandfather's name was Abraham, as far as I know and ours was this Morris/Chaim Itzhak. So they were first cousins once removed according to my calculations. (originally I had ignored the Arbutus Place address favoring the Wood Quay not knowing my granddfather had lived at Arbutus Place-Wood Quay)

This makes us (my generation) 3rd cousins once removed to Denise and Ian. I have taken the liberty to join our trees together now to an unknown Goldfus born about 1780 in Telsiai, Lithuania, being pretty sure without paper evidence in front of me that it is that city and country. We knew we had a common ancestor somewhere along the tree. This must be it. Being we also have a distance of 3 alleles out of 67 alleles in our dna test, I think this is pretty accurate. According to the tip report on familytreedna, and without changing the 1 in the box, we had a 67.49% chance of sharing a common ancestor at 8 generations, and figuring 25 years to a generation, I figure we are 9 generations apart, which would be a 75.48% chance of sharing a common ancestor I have named "unknown Goldfoot".

Finally. I hope this is it. Thank you to Mike Posnick who told me of the Nathan Goldfoot at the Londonderry Port in Ireland on the Parisian going to Winnipeg. We had no idea our grandfather had been in Ireland, though we had heard about England and a brother or brothers he was traveling with and then left to come to America. What a trip!!! It's very hard finding 3rd cousins, especially during the time of emigration and immigration that our people have gone through. This is so amazing!!

Nadene Goldfoot

1901 Dublin, Ireland Goldfoots

2011-03-19T22:56:00.000-07:00

My grandfather, Nathan Goldfoot, now known as Nathan Abraham Goldfoot, was found getting married in Dublin, Ireland on February 21, 1893, so I checked out the 1901 Dublin, Ireland census since he is not found in the United States until 2005 marrying my grandmother in Council, Idaho. The marriage certificate had his address in 1893 which was 13 Arbutus Place S.C.R. His first wife was Lena Goldberg who lived at 38 Warren Street. She is not listed as a Goldfoot.

On the 1901 census I found five Goldfoots living at that address of Arbutus Place. He was said to be traveling with a brother or brothers, so I wonder if one could be a brother. Nathan would have been 30 in 1901. He was not on the lists.

1. Abraham Goldfoot was just born in 1901in Dublin.
2. Hyman Goldfoot was 33, born in Russia and was a Pedlar and a traveller in drapery, could read and write and was the head of his family and was married.
3. Jane Goldfoot was 2 years old and was born in Dublin..
4. Blume Goldfoot was 30.She was born in Russia and could read and write and was a married wife.
5. Annie Goldfoot was 8, born in Russia, could read and write. and was a scholar.

1. Solomon Goldfoot lived at St. Kevins Parade. He was 53, born in Russia and was a Draper and Pedlar and could read and write and was head of the family and a married man.
2 Fanny Goldfoot lived at St. Kevins Parade. She was 48 and was born in Russia. She could not read and was a wife.
3 Louis Goldfoot also lived there. He was 24, born in russia and was a dental student, could read and write and was an unmarried son.
4. George Goldfoot lived at St. Kevins Parade. He was 39 and was born in Liverpool and was a medical student. He was a cousin of the head of the household and wasn't married.
5. Barnett Goldfoot lived there, too. He was 22, born in Russia and was also a medical student. He was the son of the head of the household.

1. Morris Goldfoot lived at St. Kevins Road. He was 33, born in Russia and was a Draper and head of the family.
2. Rachel Goldfoot lived at St. Kevins Road and was only 4 and was born in Dublin. She was the daughter.
3. Saraha Goldfoot was the wife and mother and was 26, born in Russia.
4. Berta Goldfoot was 3, born in Dublin and was a daughter.
5. Isac Goldfoot was just born in Dublin. He was a son.

Grand Parade was another address for a Goldfoot family.
1. Jack Goldfoot lived in Cork, Ireland at #6, Urban, South Centre, was 155, born in Dublin City, was a scholar and a brother of the head of the family.
2. Moseley M. Goldfoot was 22, born in Liverpool and was a medical LRCP and 8JLM, coudl read and write and was the head of the family but not married.
3. Bella Goldfoot was 47, born in Russia, could read and write, and was a mother and was married.
4. Jessie Goldfoot was a 21 year old female. She was an artist and could read and write.

Goldfoot Marriage Certificate from Ireland

2011-03-19T21:15:00.000-07:00

My grandfather had spoken to my grandmother of his first marriage that was short and fruitless. We never knew who or where this marriage took place. A fellow relation, found on 23 &Me, discovered my grandfather listed on familysearch getting married, so I very excitedly sent for the information to Ireland.

Here it is as it just arrived.
For the first time we find out that Nathan Goldfoot had a middle name: Abraham.
He lived at 13 Arbutus Place, S.C. R., and it looks like this happened in Dublin, Ireland.
He married on February 21, 1893 to Lena Goldberg who lived at 38 Warren Street.

Nathan was a com traveller. His father was Morris Goldfoot who was deceased. He had been a distiller.
Lena Goldberg's father was Naftolee Goldberg and was also deceased and had been a cap maker. The amazing part of all this is that my father, the 2nd boy, was named Moshe (or Morris in English). The 3rd boy was named Abraham.)

They married in the Registrar's Office in Dublin.

Something happened to this marriage as the next time Nathan is seen is at the Londonderry Port in Dublin on the ship Parisian on August 14, 1893 heading for Quebec with a ticket that said he was to get off at Winnipeg. Now Winnipeg is just north of North Dakota, so how he ever worked his way over to Council, Idaho would had to have been by train, I would think by 1905.

Silale, Kaunas, Lithuania and a Goldfus

2011-03-14T16:16:00.000-07:00

Jokubas Goldfus was born about 1878 to Leibas and Seine Goldfus. He died on March 5, 1938 at the age of about 60 just at the start of uprisings of the 2nd World War in Silale, Raseiniai, Kaunas, Lithuania.

Reference: Ancestry.com in the Jewish records.

Update on Nathan Goldfoot, grandfather

2011-03-04T13:05:00.000-08:00

Another researcher has found Nathan Abraham Goldfoot b: 1871 in Ireland. The last I had found was that he had been at the Londonderry port in Ireland heading for Quebec, Canada on July 14, 1893 with a ticket to get off at Winnipeg. This port is at Lisahally near Derry, Ireland. It is a famous port where immigrants went to USA and Canada and is a deep sea port. He was only 22 years old. His birthday was either August 5 or 15th 1871. He was listed as age 22 on the ship's manifest . The ship was the Parisian, a huge steam and sail ship that looks an awful lot like the ship my Swedish grandmother came over on in 1888 only hers was the Orlando, which is now the icon on the Svenson Institute's website. . She also came through Canada. She told of being in steerage, so I imagine that Nathan was there as well on the Parisian. Immigrants were not rich people.

This new piece of information was a wedding registration found on familysearch. It included a middle name which has been unknown to the family. The online information only said that between January and March of 1893, he had married.

Let me interject that there were a lot of Goldfoots in Ireland, especially in Dublin. Stanley's family and relatives lived in Ireland. They had immigrated from Lithuania to England and from there found better ground in Ireland. Stanley and others had moved on to South Africa as well. It's possible that my grandfather, who's oral tradition has been that he had traveled with a brother or brothers to England, could have wound up in Ireland. This is two pieces of evidence, and the name: Nathan Goldfoot is extremely rare to non-existent.

Yesterday, on 3/3/11 I mailed in an application to Roscommon, Ireland to get the marriage certificate or registration paper, whatever they have. The online information was most scanty, just enough to tell me a little. This application also required my visa card information. Visa works even in Ireland. They're on Euro dollars. I just hope it will say more than birth was in "Russia." A town and country would be fantastic!

My most helpful researcher friend is a young man who matches some of my genome that I have found on 23&me. In trying to figure out how we have matched in a % of some of our genome, we started comparing names and places. They say there are no accidents, and that we believe in beshert. I certainly do now. He has been most helpful. I never would have thought to recheck Nathan on familysearch again. This is like going back to the same dig to find oil and suddently you get a strike. So in about two weeks I hope to have more to report.

Joe and Annie Goldfoot in 1900 in Minneapolis, Minnesota

2011-03-02T19:28:00.000-08:00

On the 1900 census in Minneapolis, Minnesota was:
Joe Goldfus age 35 b: 1865 Russia, merchant, married 9 years in 1891, immigrated in 1883
Annie Goldfus age 28 b: 1872 Russia, immigrated 1884
Sami Goldfus, age 7, son, born August 1892-all children born in Minneapolis, Minnesota
Hyman Goldfus age 6 born October 1893
Ida age 4 born August 1895
Charles age 2 born October 1897
Harris Goldfus, Older brother of Joe, age 40, immigrated in 1897, goods peddler
Reference: family search

Goldfoot Births in Dublin

2011-03-02T19:13:00.000-08:00

Ellias Goldfoot was born between October to December 1883 in Dublin South, Ireland.

Jane Goldfoot was born between January and March of 1899 in Dublin South, Ireland.

Bernard Goldfoot was born between April to June 1902. I have Barnett and Barney listed on my tree but on different dates. This is a new one. He was born in Dublin South , Ireland

Reference: familysearch

Goldfoot Marriages in Dublin

2011-03-02T18:22:00.000-08:00

Annie Goldfoot got married from April to June 1891 in Dublin South, Ireland.

Siebbi Goldfoot got married between July to September of 1892 in Dublin South, Ireland. I'm not sure if this is a man or a woman.

Moris Goldfoot married betwen October to December in 1896 in Dublin South, Ireland. This is interesting as my father born in 1908 in Portland, Oregon was born Moses, then the American name was Morris and then he changed it to Maurice when my mother suggested the spelling. to me this says that an ancestor was the same person for both of these branches as the custom has been to name after a eceased relative.

Nadia Goldfoot married between October to December 1920. There is an Annie Nadia Goldfoot born about 1891 in Russia who died in Capetown, South Africa. I have no record that she married at this date since she married Arthur Abrahams about 1907 in South Africa. I love the name. My nickname is Nada. Again, this is a name for a Nathan.

Henry Goldfus in Whiteside, Illinois

2011-03-02T17:54:00.000-08:00

The 1920 USA census of Coloma Rock Falls City in Whiteside, Illinois listed:
Henry Goldfus age 49
Wife: age 39 b: 1881 in Russia
Julia age 12
Harold age 9
Sol age 2

This was on familysearch

Goldfus/fuss/fluss in Poland

2011-03-01T14:27:00.000-08:00

There was a divorce in Poland in 1865 for Nachman Goldfus son of Aron Szmuel and Hence.

In the town of Gniewaszow in , Radem Gubernia, Kielce Province in 1845 was Josek Goldfus son of Aron Janklowicz
Also in the town of Sturzow in Radem Gubernia, Kielce Province was found Fiszel Goldfus.

In Warszawa Gubernia in a cemetery was found Mindle Goldfus.

In 1902 in Krakow, Wojewodztwa was found a marriage ban for Jocheta Goldlfuss's son, Markkus Dintenfass. The father was Joel Dintenfass. They lived in Tucho'w, Poland.

In 1890 Sarah Goldfuss had a daughter, Lea in Lwow Wojewodztwa

Salomea Goldfus had married Leopold Goldstaub. Their son, Bernard Goldstaub was born February 7, 1929 in Krak 'kow and died in June 1942 in Bel z'ec. He would have been 13 when he died. I wonder if he was bar mitzvad in those days of the Holocaust.

On July 7, 1890 Rosalie Goldfuss was found on the ship Rhaetio. She was an immigrant from Poland arriving in New York. .

31642-26 Philip ROSENBERG, 22, shoemaker, Poland, 4 D'Arcy St, s/o Moses Aron (b. Poland) & Ester nee SALINGER, married Sarah KELMAN, 20, operator, 204 Augusta Ave, d/o Simon (b. Poland) & Figa nee GOLDFLUS, witn: S. BRODT of 8 Sullivan St & J. NEUMAN of 384 College St, 27 Dec 1926 [Hebrew] (researcher: AJ Levin)

There were people from the Golflus family in Staszow, Kielce, Poland, but none of the names you mention are familiar to me. from Researcher Judy for Poland information for jewishgen.

Resource: Jewishgen

Family Tree of ggrandfather and grandfather Goldfus from Lithuania?

2011-02-28T14:30:00.000-08:00

Descendants of Chaim Itzak Goldfus Goldfoot-my great grandfather.

1 Chaim Itzak Goldfus Goldfoot b: Abt. 1850 in prob. Kovno or Telsiai, Lithuania/Poland/Russia

. +Devorah Unknown ? b: Abt. 1850 in Lithuania/Poland/Russia

... 2 Nathan Goldfus Goldfoot b: August 05, 1871 in Russia, probably (Poland/Telsiai, Lithuania)

....... +Unknown First b: Abt. 1872

... *2nd Wife of Nathan Goldfus Goldfoot:

....... +Addie Zlata "Hattie Ettie" Jermulowske b: January 11, 1886 in Lazdijai,Suwalki Zuwalta", Lithuania/Russia/Poland

Their children who have all passed away now were Charles, Moses (Morris-Maurice) Abraham-died in infancy, Elsie and Anne.

The oral history from my grandmother was that Nathan had been married before but that the marriage produced no children.

My grandfather, Nathan Goldfoot, died in 1912 in Portland in a horse and wagon accident. Nathan was thrown out of the wagon which had no writing on it. He was an expressman taking packages from the dock and delivering them in Portland. The accident happened in the SE Portland area. He hit his head and never regained consiousness and died in St. Vincent Hospital. Today, his great grandson is a nurse in the new St. Vincent Hospital in the CCU.

Because he died in 1912 and my father was born in 1908, we never learned about Nathan's family.

New Surnames and Towns Coming Into Our Genome of Goldfoot

2011-02-22T11:48:00.000-08:00

Through the dna company 23 & Me of Los Angeles, I am finding people who are matching a % of my genome who have different surnames and haplogroups. I have only known my ggrandfather's name of Chaim Itzhak Goldfus and possibly his wife could have been Devorah, and that's it. Chaim would have been born in about 1850, and I have no paper trail other than the 1910 Federal USA census of Portland, Oregon for his son and my grandfather, Nathan Goldfoot.

Possible surnames are: Aron, Boldo, Cohen, Drace, Friedland, Gold, Goldberg, Goldstein, Israel, Jaekel, Kaganovich, Korchin, Lehrer/Lahrer, Leshin, Levene, Midler, Mishelow, Olson, Poliner, Rabinowitz, Salas, Schtafinsky, Shaffer, Spitz, Stavfinsky, Stern, Stevens, Volodarsky, Yomulsky,

Possible towns/countries are : Austria, Slutsk, Belaus, Lyubcha, Belarus, Brehin, Bobrusk,

Goldfus in Chicago, Illinois 1920, 1930

2011-02-20T14:09:00.000-08:00

January 12, 1920 Federal Census of Chicago, Illinois, Wd 34

1. Samuel Goldfus age 59? a peddler of clothing, head of house b: Russia
2. Bertha Goldfus age 65, b: Russia
    3. Philip Goldfus 23 clerk in office born Illinois
    4. Louis Goldfus 21 clerk in office, born Illinois

1930 Federal Census of Chicgo, Illinois
1. Bertha Goldfus, age 59, mother in law, b: Russia, speaks Yiddish, immigrated 1890 NA, widow
    2. Annie Shugun, daughter age 35, married at age 20, b: Illinois
    3. Harry Shugun, son in law, age 35 b: Illinois
Reference: ancestry.com

Riga, Latvia Marriages of Goldfus

2011-02-20T13:25:00.000-08:00

   Groom............................Bride
1.Itzik Goldfus   married Fruma Wagenheim in 1886
2. Moses Goldfus "        Zipa Blumberg           1867
3. Ruvel Goldfus             Sara Stember            1889

Bride................................Groom
1. Hana Goldfus                Shmuel Blacker      1900
2. Mera Goldfus                Judel Finkman        1899
3. Roche Lea Goldfus/Rosenberg m: Note Reummer 1920

Resource: Jewishgen.org

1816 Telsiai, Lithuania Revision List Database #3 (One Household)

2011-02-17T14:01:00.000-08:00

1. Iankel Golfus, son of Abram, 42, head of household August 17, 1816
2. Khana Golfus, his wife, age 40
3. Ginde Golfus, daughter of Iankel, age 15
4. Iosel Symkha Golfus, son of Iankel, age 10
5. Iones Goldfus, son of Mikhel, nephew of Iankel, age 17
6. Leib Khonon, son of Abram, brother of Iankel, age 46
Abram Goldfus, son of Iones, died in 1813

Evidently the information was also taken 5 years earlier. Perhaps it was a every 5 year census.

Resource: hattp://data.jewishgen.org/wconnect/wc.dll?jg~jgsearch~model2`{NEWRL_REG}NEWRL

Goldfus Marriages in Telsiai & Vicinity, Lithuania

2011-02-15T10:32:00.000-08:00

Male Goldfus

1. Josel Goldfus son of Yankel of Telsiai age 70 married Khaia Esterman daughter of Abel age 45 on 12/4/1876 or 30 Nisan in Telsiai. Both were widowers.
2. Faivelis Goldfus son of Leibas Mejeras & Dvora Glika of Nemakciai age 62 married Libe Reize Shneider age 42 on 26/8/1929. Both were wodowers. They married in Raseinai.
3. Dore Goldfus son of Chaimas and Elke Zaksaite of Laukuva b: 1915 age 20 married Leja Gershon daughter of Gersonas and Mire Chaitaite of Laukuva born 1913 age 22 married 30/6/1935 or 29 Sivan in Pilviskiai, Vilkaviskia, Suvalki.

Female Goldfus
1. Gute Golda Goldfus, daughter of Nokhim, age 20, married Iontaf Opengeim, son of Sender, age 20, in 4/9/1859 or 17 Elul in Telsiai.
2. Rivka Mera Goldfus, daughter of Borukh age 18, married Gershon Perl, son of Iudel agd 25 of Luoke on 3/12/1863 or 5 Tevet in Telsiai.
3. Khana Mina Goldfus, daughter of Mark Aizyk, age 25, married Leib Tavirinski, son of Nokhum, age 35 on 31/5/1874 or 27 Sivan in Telsiai. Leib was a widower.
4. Ginda Mira Goldfus, daughter of Josel of Telsiai, age 56, married Movsha Leib Khatskelevich, son of Mendel of Skidel age 58 on 3/4/1885 or 30 Nisan in Telsiai.

Resource: Jewishgen Lithuania Marriages and Divorces
Town=Telsiai, Uyezd=Telsiai, Guberniya=Kaunas

Goldfus Births in Lithuania:.Laukuva, Tellsiai, Kaunas

2011-02-14T17:31:00.000-08:00

1. Iankel Meier Goldfus was born to Khaim Leib and Ita Goldfus on 8/3/1876/Adar 24 in Laukuva, Telsiai, Kaunas. The family was from Varniai.

2. Freida Goldfus was born to Josel Khatskel and Sheina Goldfus on 9/9/1859/22 Elul in Telsiai, Telsiai, Kaunas. The father is a merchant.

3. Zelman David Goldfus was born in Leyb Meer, son of Faivkush Golfus and Pere Glike, daughter of Leyb on 24/4/1876/12 Iyar in Kaunas, Kaunas, Kaunas. Rabbi Meer Goldshtein and Aron Itsik Deznet, father from Raseinai.

Reference: data.jewishgen.org

Goldfoot, Tax List in Telsiai, Kaunas, Lithuania

2011-02-14T16:46:00.000-08:00

1. Marek Goldfus, father: Itsik, poor people, February 1849-Varniai, Telsiai, Kaunas
2. Leyb Gershon Goldfus, father: Chaim, age 71 Feb 25, 1914 in Laukuva, Telsiai, Kaunas
3. Chaim Goldfus, father: Girsh, age 29, February 25, 1914 in Laukuva
4. Khatskel goldfus, father: Iosel, 1874 in Telsiai, Telsiai, Kaunas
5. Samson Goldfus, father: Iosel, 1876-1879 in Kretinga, Telsiai, Kaunas
6. Leyba Goldfus in 1877: Papile, Siauliai, Kaunas
7. Itsyk Goldfus, shoemaker; 2 males, 3 females, January 31, 1897 in Papile
8. Sheyne Ela Goldfus, 4 females, 1904, Siauliai
9. Sheyna Eta Goldfus, 1 male, 3 females 1904, Papile
10. Sameon Goldfus, father: Iosel, has tavern; Feb/March 1894 in Telsiai
11. Golde Goldfus, father: Chaim,has shop, Feb/March 1894 in Telsiai
12. Leyb Goldfus, father: Abram age 57, October 24, 1880 in Papile
13. Leby Goldfus, father: Abram age 66, signed in Yiddish, has real estate, right to vote, never been investigated, June 17, 1885 in Papile
14. Leyba Goldfus, father: Abram age 56, Russian translation -Goldorus, July 1879 in Papile
15. Shmuel Iosel Goldflus, father: Leyba, age 33, June 17, 1885 in Papile
16. Shoul Goldfus, father: Mendel age 66, June 17, 1885 in Papile
17. Iosel Goldfus, father: Yankel, 3rd guild merchant, Candle tax, May 23, 1846 in Telsiai
18. Rasha Goldfus, wife of Iosel, May 23, 1846 in Telsiai
19. Yankel Goldfus, father: Abram, well to do, May 23, 1846 in Telsiai
20. Zelman Goldfus, father: Yankel, well to do, May 23, 1846, Telsiai
21. Chana Goldfus, Zelman's wife, May 23, 1846 in Telsiai
22. Marek Goldfus, father: Ayzik, exempt from payment, May 23, 1846 in Telsiai
23. Sora Goldfus, Marek's wife , Telsiai
24. Leyb Goldfus, father: Itsik Mark, poor, February 1, 1849 in Varniai, Telsiai, Kaunas
25. Zelman Goldfus, father: yankel, age 49, Sept 28, 1860
26. Hatskel Goldfus, father: Iosel age 41, Sept 28, 1860 in Telsiai
27. Samson Goldfus, son of Iosel, well to do, March 1897 in Telsiai
28. Yankel Goldfus, father: Leyba age 26, 1903 in Laukuva
29. Girsha Goldfus, father: Leyba, in Laukuva 1903
30. Yankel Goldfus, father: Abram, wooden house 500 rubles, 1855 in Telsiai
31. Iosel Goldfus, father: Yankel, wooden house 1000 rules, 1855, in Telsiai
32. Simkha Goldfus, father: Yankel age 51, Sept 28, 1860 in Telsiai
32. Samson Goldfus b: August 15, 1836, tradesman, father: Iosel age 54, Aug 5, 188980 in Telsiai
33. Iosel Goldfus, father: Yankel, 4 men, 7 in family, 1851, Telsiai
34. Leyb Goldfus, father: Khaim, age 45, Illiterate, April 18, 1880 in Laukuva
35. Yankel Goldfus, father: Leyba, signed in Russian, June 14, 1899 in Laukuva
36. Chaim Goldfus, father: Abram, apprentice of tailors, August 1886, Telsiai
37. Girsh Goldfus, father: Leyb, age 40, Dec 29, 1903 in Laukuva
38. Iosel Goldfus, father: yankel died in 1879, didn't pay, March 1881 in Telsiai
39. Tevel Goldfus, father: hatskel, died in 1858, didn't pay, March 1881 in Telsiai
40. Movsha Goldfus, father: Iosel, died in 1878, didn't pay, March 1881 in Telsiai
41. Berel Goldfus, father: Iosel, died in 1867, didn't pay, march 1881 in Telsiai
42. Yankel Goldfus, father: Abram, died in 1861, didn't pay, March 1881, Telsiai
43. simkha Godfus, father: Yankel, died in 1874, didn't pay, March 1881 in Telsiai
44. Zelman Goldfus, father: yankel, died in 1862, didn't pay, March 1881 in Telsiai
45. Nokhom Goldfus, father: Inte, died in 1869, didn't pay, March 1881 in Telsiai
46. Morek (Marek) Goldfus, father: Ionte, died in 1867, didn't pay, March 1881 in Telsiai
47. Sroel Goldfus, father: Abram age 44, lame, unable to pay, March 1881 in Telsiai
48. Borukh Goldfus, father: Shimkha, age 33, poor, can't pay, March 1881 in Telsiai
49. Abram Goldfus, father, Iosel, 2 males, well to do, has house, May 1881 in Telsiai

Reference: Jewishgen Tax and Voters Lists: http://data.jewishgen.org/wconnect/wc.dlll?jg~jgsearch~model2

Jermulowski Found in Poland

2011-02-12T22:26:00.000-08:00

David Gersz Jermulowski b: 1868 with Patrinomic Aronowicz was found in Lomza Gubernia , Bialystock Province, Szczuczyun, Poland. He has to be a relative. The spelling is good.

References to Jewish residents in Łomża date to 1494. The population numbers date back only to 1808, when 157 Jews were officially counted. A magnificent stone synagogue was built there in 1881 on the initiative of Rabbi Eliezer-Simcha Rabinowicz. The Great Synagogue designed by Enrico Marconi became a centre of the Zionist movement.[2] In 1931, there were 8,912 Jews who lived in the city.

In 1857 the city had 5,881 general population with 2,608 Jews.

Reference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C5%81om%C5%BCa
Jewishgen.org

Jewishgen: Goldfus in Latvia

2011-02-09T14:45:00.000-08:00

1. Hana Goldfus married Shmuel Blacher in 1900 in Riga, Latvia.

2. Mira Goldfus married Judel Finkman in 1899 in Riga.

3. Itzik Goldfus married Fruma Wagenheim in 1886.

4. Moses Goldfus married Zipa Blumberg in 1867.

5. Ruvel Goldfus married Sara Stember in 1889.

6. Roche Lea Goldfus/Rosenberg married Note Rummer in 1920.

7. Freida Iziksohn nee Goldfus b: 1859 had to pay taxes at age 26 in 1885.

Jewishgen Lists of Goldfus/fuss in Poland

2011-02-09T14:20:00.000-08:00

1. Lubin, Poland: 1826-69 51: 15' 22" 34' Nachman Goldfus b: 1865, son of Aron Szmul Goldfus and Hena Goldfus.

2. Radom, Poland in Radom-Kielce Province 1844-1867 Josek Aron Janklowicz Goldfus b: 1845

3. Staszow, Poland 1826-1866, Fizel Goldfus b: 1863

4. Warszawa, Warsaw Cemetery 52: 15' 21" 00' Mendl Goldfus

5. Krakow Wojewodz twa: Markus Dintenfoss b: 1902, son of Joel Dintenfoss and Jocheta Goldfuss in Tucho'w, Poland.

6. Lwow Wojewodztwa in 1890, Lea Goldfuss, daughter of Sara Goldfuss.

7. Krako'w, Poland: Bernard Goldstaub, son of Leopold Goldfus and Salomea Goldfus, b: 7/2/1929, d: June 1942

8. Rosalie Goldfuss arrived in NY on 7/7/1890 on the ship Rhaetia from Austria, Poland, or Galicia. The spelling uss denotes a German form. I found her on ancestry.com coming on the day listed here at age 20. She was born in 1870 in Austria and came from Hamburg's port.

Searching Jermulowske to Jarmulowsky: Wife of Goldfoot

2011-02-08T12:35:00.000-08:00

Both Hattie Jermulowsky and Nathan Goldfoot lived in the Pale of Settlement of Russia. Hattie was from Suwalki, which was next door to Lithuania but had become part of Poland. We believe the town was Lazdijai, in the district of Suwalki.

Today I found an Albert Jarmulowsky, banker, born in Wirballen, Russia. on May 20, 1863, who had lived in New York and had become a banker. He immigrated here very early on the ship Suevia from Hamburg on September 2, 1876. His children were born in Hamburg, and they were Arthur, Alice, Dora, Alfred, Erwin, Estella, and Walter. He was very good looking for his passport picture in a black suit, 5'8" with light brown hair and dark brown eyes. There was nothing saying that he was Jewish either on his passport or the 1930 census I may have found.

It turns out that Wirballen, Russia was a part of Lithuania and was also called Virbalis. It was the scene of battle in WWI. Below is a message about Wirballen I found by googling. I was excited to see Suwalki mentioned being Jarmulowsky's name was so similiar to our Jermulowski/y.

Wirballen is called Virbalis in Lithuanian (present name) and Wierbolowo in Polish. Part of my grandfather's family line was from Virbalis. The Polish archives in the town of Suwalki, Poland, may have records for this area since all of the villages in question were in the Suvalkija/Suwalki gubernia during the Russian occupation. Since the villages in question all were within 5 miles of the German/Prussian border (now the border with Russian Kaliningrad), the German ports of Hamburg and Bremen would be good possibilities though my grandfather was from Virbalis and came over to the U.S. via Rotterdam. His choice of port was interesting in that he lived in Essen Ruhr, Germany for a time (likely earning money for passge to America) and was fluent in German. Hope this helps a bit.Tom

There were Jews in Wirballen. Isaac Levitan was born in a shtetl of Wirballen, Kowno region, now Lithuania, into a poor but educated Jewish family.

The 5 June 1880 USA Federal census tells me that Alfred came to the USA with his parents as a family. Alex, 39 was a broker and wife Rebecca was 38, both from "Russia" that we now know as Lithuania. Blooma (Bluma) 16, Albert 15, Meyer 12, Louis 10, Harry 2 and Jacob 1 mo. at the time and living with them were Rosa Friedman, listed as a servant and two nephews, Gerson Heyman and Gerson Markel, and they lived next door to David and Rachel Levy. I've decided from the names that they were Jewish.

Since he immigrated in 1876, I can't go back any further in the census, but I have found many other Jarmuloske/ Jarmulousky families that are from Russia. DNA could tell us if we are connected.

Russia's Pale of Settlement and Jewish Goldfoot Family

2011-02-08T08:03:00.000-08:00

Nathan Goldfoot, born in 1871, came from "Russia" according to the 1910 USA Federal census. What does that mean? Nathan emmigrated in 1893. He had immigrated to the states before 1905 but was found when 22 years old at the Londonderry Port in Ireland going to Quebec and Montreal with a ticket saying he would disembark in Montreal. I then found him in Council, Idaho in 1905 marrying my grandmother, Hattie Jermulowske from Suwalki, Poland/Lithuania. She had immigrated about 1903.

Between 1835 and 1917 the Pale was made up of the areas of Kovno, Suwalki (where my grandmother was from) Vilna (possibly Goldfoot came from here) Grodno, Lomza, Plock, Kausz, Warsaw, Piotrkow, Kielce, Radom, Lublin, Syedlitz, Vitebsk, Mogilev, Minsk, Volhynia, Podolia, Kiev, Chernigov, Poltava, Ekaterinoslav, Kherson, Bessarabia, and possibly Taurida.

Jews had been confined to this area by laws passed in 1795 and 1815. By 1885 there were over 4 million Jews living in the Pale. No wonder my grandfather left. If Jews wanted to live in Nikolsev in Kherson, or Kiev in the area of Kiev, or Yalta and Sebastopol, they had to have special residence permits as those towns were barred to Jews.

By 1882, 500,000 Jews who had been living in rural areas of the Pale, which my Jermulowske grandmother's parents may have, were forced to leave their homes and live in towns or shtetls in the Pale. 250,000 Jews living along the western frontier of Russia were also moved into the Pale. 700,000 Jews living east of the Pale were driven into the Pale by 1891.

In 1880, the town of Brody, which lie in the Austria-Hungary section on the boarder of the Pale, was the main town where over 2 million Jews living in the Pale began their emmigration to the USA, Britain, Europe, South America and Palestine. It was like a port only wasn't on water. Both Goldfoot and Jermulowske would have had to travel south to reach this port. In 1891, 2,000 Jews were deported, many of them in chains, from Vitebsk, which was the area next door to Vilna. This also could have been a cause to get my grandfather and others to leave "Russia.

Poland had had its first partition in 1772 and Russia tried many times to ban Jews from living there. Then Poland was divided by Russia, Germany and Austria, and Russia gained Poland and Lithuania, White Russia, the Ukraine and some of Galicia. This added hundreds of thousands of Jews to Russia's population.

Since Jews were a bane to the Russians, their laws of 1795 and 1835 had a limit of Jews to newly annexed areas which became the Pale of Settlement. The governments of Vitebsk, Mogilev, Chernigov, Poltava, Ekaterinoslav, Taurida, Kherson, Kiev, Minsk, Podolia, Bessarabia, Volhynia, Vilna, Kovno, Suwalki, Grodno, Lublin, Syedlitz, Lomza, Plock, Warsaw, Kalisz, Piotrkow and Kielce made up the Pale of Settlement governments with the last 10 being part of Poland.

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 were 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 of New York before traveling by train across the country to Portland. Others came more directly because relatives or families had already settled here.

Resource: Finding Our Fathers-a guidebook to Jewish genealogy by Dan Rottenberg.

My notes -last paragraph

Olkiesz, Kielce, Poland (Goldfus)

2011-02-07T15:56:00.000-08:00

I found an Abraham Bendyl Goldfus born in 1803 in Olkiesz, Kielce, Poland. he was listed on Jewishgen.org. Goldfus is the Yiddish spelling which is anglicized to Goldfoot. My grandmother's middle child of 5 was Abraham. He died as an infant. This is the first I have found of a Goldfoot from Poland. The fact is that we do not know for sure where our Nathan Goldfoot was born other than the Russian Federation which could have been many places. Nathan married Hattie Jermulowske who was born in Poland, but he married her when they met in Council, Idaho. However, the Yiddish may have been very similar.

Re-Surfacing Theory on Khazarians and Jews

2011-02-07T13:35:00.001-08:00

The Kazharian theory of the origin of some Jews has surfaced again because it has been found that 38% of Ashkenazi Levites are not from the male (Ydna) Semites but from Sorbians (Eastern European non-Jews).
The Sorbian language group are made up of Poles, Czechs, Slovaks, Kashubians around the area of Germany and Poland.

I know that many haplogroups other than Q1b have claimed they are the connection to Khazarians, but this one I fail to undestand. Perhaps someone can explain it to us.

That seems to let Q1b's out because they originated from Siberia, Mongolia and parts of Turkey thousands of years ago, connecting even to the native Americans. However, it seems to me that Turkey was closer to Khazaria than Eastern Europeans were. Q1b's make up about 5% of Jews today.

Resource: Avotaynu, Vol 12 # 5 February 6, 2011

The Gaon of Vilna; Possible Ancestor

2011-02-06T13:26:00.000-08:00

Jews were already living in Vilna, Lithuania by the end of the 15th Century but were banished in 1527 by Sigismund I at the burghers request. Some returned only to become victims of a riot in 1592. Jews were formally allowed to settle in the following year of 1593 to have a home and lend money. In 1633 they had permission to trade in precious stones, meat, and livetock and to be craftsmen. Again they had another riot in 1633 and those that lived through that were massacred by the Cossack army in 1655. A famine was in the land from 1709-10 when 4,000 Jews died.

In the 18th Century the city became a center of rabbinical study, being called the Lithuanian Jerusalem. This is when the best known scholar lived who was Elijah Ben Solomon Zalman, known in the Jewish world as the Vilna Gaon. He lived from 1720 to 1797.

My distant cousin that I located in Jerusalem, Stanley Goldfoot, told me that our family was related to him. Since then I've found many genealogies claiming to be related to him. Being our Goldfoot family came from Lithuania, it's possible. Gaon mean genious, and he was. He worked on the Talmud and did clarify it. He disagreed with the Misnagdim or Chassidim, however. He always wanted to live in Israel, but for unknown reason wasn't able to get there.

Since it has been found by genetic scientists that 70% of Jewish men still have a Middle-Eastern DNA pattern on the male line despite the 2,000 years or more of living outside the area, it's possible we can be connected. The Eastern European Ashkenazi community of over 8 million people is largely descended from a small number of "founders" of about 25,000. From 1300 to the Holocaust of about 1939, Jews had to almost totally marry within the Jewish group. So the Ashkenazi Jew is more closely related genetically to another Ashkenazi than other Jews outside of the group. All persons of Eastern European Jewish descent share many markers because they are descended from a rather small group of individuals, perhapps 50,000 who were alive in the year 1500. It's quite possible that we are indeed related to the Vilna of Gaon.

By the late 1800's Goldfoots were living only from 120 to 150 miles from Vilna in Telsiai and Rossieny.

Now all I need is to meet someone who definitely is connected to the Vilna Gaon and find out his dna and see if we share a few markers which can be done through 23 & Me, a company I just tested my dna with or I'd even settle with some paper evidence.

2/22/11 Update: I have bought the book, Eliyahu's Branches by Chaim Freedman and do not find the surname of Goldfoot or Goldfus/fuss listed in it as a descendant of the Gaon of Vilna. The connecting party that Stanley was sure to be connected out of the Goldfoot family could have been from the mother's side way back. Unfortunately, I cannot find this person. It is true that Jewish people in a community would have wound up being related to each other after a period of time, so that it is still possible; just not verifiable at this time. We need to find a person who is definitely an ancestor and then compare genes. Even at that, over a long time of a connecting person, the genes will not show a large percent of connection. Something would be better than nothing, however.

http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/biography/vilnagaon.html
Standard Jewish Encyclopedia

How Our Jewish Surname, Goldfoot, Came to Be

2011-02-06T10:04:00.000-08:00

I have found the surname, Goldfoot, in a family with Christian German roots as well as with Lithuania's Jewish ancestry. In German it would have been Goldfuss. In 1782 Emperor Joseph II of Austria put out the Edict of Tolerance saying that the Jewish language of Hebrew and the writing of it was to be abolished. By 1787 they had to pick a German name. Their Hebrew names like David son of Moshe was to be abolished. They could not pick just any name. Two thousand possibilities were submitted to authorities and only 156 were permitted to be used by the Jews. The subject of surnames could have been of religious occupations, nicknames, home towns, occupations or characteristics of the man. If a person was wealthy, they would want the name to reflect this so the surname was picked to show wealth, being pleasant or prosperous sounding. People did have to buy their name. Any name with gold must have been expensive. This edict was copied in other parts of Germany. The Prussian Jews in 1848 still had no citizen rights.

Before 1800 most German Jews lived in cities and used a double name like Chaim Itzak Goldfuss. In the countryside Jews just used a single name. The surname of Goldschmidt was a professional name, so I can deduce that Goldfuss may have also had something to do with a profession. It was a German non-Jewish name.

The name Gol'dfus has been found in Telsiai, Lithuania and also in Rossieny, Lithuania. Goldfus is the Yiddish form and Goldfuss is the German form. It refers to a golden foot. My grandfather, Nathan Goldfoot, said on the 1910 Federal USA census that he was from Russia. This is what Lithuania was called in 1893. It was part of the Russian Empire before WWI.

Rossieny was about 120 miles WNW of Vilnius. It lies 55" 22'25N latitude and 23"7' 18E longitude. Telsiai is about 150 miles NW of Vilnius. It lies 55" 59' N latitude and 22" 15' E longitude. When Nathan Goldfoot emmigrated from "Russia" which most likely was Lithuania, he went to England. There he anglicized his name to Goldfoot, which the non-Jewish family also did. The same happened with the other branch of Jewish Goldfoots who went from Telsiai, Lithuania to England, then Ireland, South Africa, and then some went to either America or Israel. I have found Goldfuss in Israel, so possibly some did not anglicize the surname.

It's not surprising that many Jews moved to Russia from Germany in seeking more freedom and possible jobs. What is sad is that they had to live in the Pale of Settlement in Russia and be confined that way. It must have been better for them in Lithuania, however. My ancestor, Nathan immigrated to America in about 1893, so he was one of the first in the big influx of Jews that came in the early 1900's. He didn't go to New York, however. He went from Londonderry Port in Ireland on a ship headed for Quebec, Canada. From there he wound up in Council, Idaho marrying my grandmother in 1905.

What a surprise for me. I had gone through Council several times on the the say up to McCall Lake, a resort in the summer as well as a ski resort in the winter. It is a lovely little town with a great history of being home to several of my family members in the early 1900's. What had gone on around there in the early days was mining.

http://web.me.com/ebauer/translations/page4/page4.html
http://data.jewishgen.org/wconnect/wc.dll?jg~jgsys~shtetlmaster~ROSSIENY_f18 KOVNO_f19~ZZ~MILES~~~~~SE~~
http://german.about.com/library/weekly/aa050399.htm
http://data.jewishgen.org/wconnect/wc.dll?jg~jgsys~shtetm~-2619849
Book: Finding Our Fathers-A guidebook to Jewish Genealogy by Dan Rottenberg

23 and Me Results In

2011-01-31T16:48:00.000-08:00

I have been looking over the results of the 23and me dna testing of my whole genome. It just came in today, earlier than I had expected. I have now been given a list of 985 relatives who share some dna with me. I've already heard from the one who matches me with the highest %. This is so exciting. Now we just have to figure out where we are connected.

Besides finding people who are connected, the main reason so many take this test with 23 and Me is to get their health report. A lot of people are not interested in their family trees, sadly. It is amazing to me how the science shows why I've had certain problems, but it also told me that I have good reason to think I can live to 100 years.

We can contact 5 people each day and hope for a reply. That would make it 35 in a week if I did this every day or about 140 per month. I have a lot of messages to send out in the next 7 months.

Humans Left Africa 125,000 Years Ago

2011-01-28T09:50:00.000-08:00

Hand axes, scrapers and other tools were found at Jebel Faya, Sharjah Emirate of United Arab Emirates show that they were made by people from East Africa. Anthony Marks from Southern Methodist U. in Dallas made this statement. It shows that people like you and me took an unknown till now route between 100,000 and 125,000 years ago. This was in the Journal Science. They call this the southern route and happened much earlier than thought. At the time, Saudi Arabia had a wonderful climate of lots of rain and would have been a grassland with lots of animals for hunting. The sea levels were lower. The point at the southern end of the Red Sea would have separated Africa and Arabia by only a few miles which would have been crossed with rafts or boats. My personal feeling is that our ancestors followed animals in their hunting who led them this way. They would have then taken their families on this trail and worked their way into the Middle East.

What has been known was that about 60,000 years ago man left Africa and came to other parts of the world. Evidence showed that they spread out along the Nile River valley and into the Middle East. at that time. This is known as the northern route.

There were not many routes leading out of Africa. The choices were:
1. Take the Sinai north of the Red Sea
2. Cross the straits at the south end of the Red Sea
This is from Hans-Peter Uerpmann of the Center for Scientific Archaeology of Eberhard-Karls U. in Tuebingen, Germany.

This was announced today when the Today TV show showed a male gorilla who walks upright like a human. His father walked upright at times. This son prefers to do it all the time. It's just amazing. I wonder if this is what happened with mankind. Through a mutation of genes, one walked upright and liked it.

From 230,000 up till just 30,000 years ago there was another kind of human on earth. He was called Homo Sapiens Neanderthalensis. He was living at the end of the Ice Age and was fit for cold living with a body about 5'5" tall, short arms and legs. Amazingly, his brain was bigger than ours but in a more oval shape whereas ours is rounded. He made tools with pointed tips and even buried his dead, so there was some intelligence here.

Fossils have been found of species that are similar to humans that were alive 5.8 million years ago. It's taken a long time to perfect Homo Sapiens (us). We were quite slow developing tools. In fact, it took us thousands of years. It's amazing being our rate of learning has increased by leaps and bounds just in the last 100 years. My mother was born in 1913 and saw a time period where she rode in a Model T Ford up to a 1989 Cadillac DeVille and flew in a jet while watching movies. She just missed the slim line TV era and had to watch on the one I am still using. From World War I to seeing the Twin Towers Fall covers a lot of tools using in wartime. Where will we go from here?

Resource: Oregonian 1/28/2011 page A7: Humans may have taken earlier exit from Africa.
https://www.msu.edu/~robin400/neanderthalensis.html

Six Skeletal Remains from 500 BCE Q haplogroup

2010-12-28T19:49:00.000-08:00

In wondering about the origin of our forefathers who carried the Q1b Y haplogroup gene, I have been tracking down any people who lived in the vicinity of where this group is known to have originated. This caught my eye. This is most interesting considering we are only 5% of Ashkenazi Jewish people. Q1b's are rather rare. That means that we are 5% of the 1% of the Jewish population of the whole world.

These 6 skeletal remains from 500 BCE were found in Pengyang, China, a farming and nomadic region. This place is situated in Guyuan, Ningxia, China, its geographical coordinates are 35° 51' 0" North, 106° 39' 0" East and its original name (with diacritics) is Pengyang. The funeral objects found with the skeletons show they were a nomadic people. The dna of the mt dna was of C, D4 and m1o, and Ydna of four of them was of haplogroup Q. The Q shows that they originated in Siberia. Scientists conclude that northern nomads had reached the Central Plain area of China about 2500 years ago.

These nomads found Central Asia easy for traveling because of wide grasslands that were suitable for horses, camels and just plain walking. Not far away was Russia where the Scythians lived at this time. They were a people who believed in many gods, such as Mithra, god of justice and contracts. However, they were a wild and warlike people who did not try to farm. They were around the Caucasus Mts area and other places.

Dienekes's blog reported thusly: yungsiyebu said...
Halpotypes of Pengyang nomads from upper yellow river match exactly with the present Mongolians, Siberians, Central Asian Turks and the altaic ethnicities of north China, that suggests there's a strong genetic link to ancient north asian groups, also consistent with their anthropological traits of north Mongoloid.

Resource: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20186156Ancient DNA from nomads in 2500-year-old archeological sites of Pengyang, China from Laboratory of Ancient DNA, Research Center for Chinese Frontier Archaeology of Jilin University, Changchun, China

http://www.historyforkids.org/learn/centralasia/religion/index.htm
http://dienekes.blogspot.com/2010/02/ancient-dna-from-pengyang-nomads.html
http://www.bible-history.com/isbe/S/SCYTHIANS/

Q1b Goldfoot Line-The "Smoking Gun" of Khazarian ancestry

2010-12-27T15:21:00.000-08:00

Nathan Goldfoot b: 1872 Home in Portland, Oregon. Moved there in 1906.

Charles b: 1906 and Morris Goldfoot b: 1908
at home in SW Portland, Oregon
Nadene Goldfoot

Dr. Behar is a famous geneticist. Reseachers, after discovering the haplogroup Q among Ashkenazi Jews, declared that only 5-8% of the Ashkenazi gene pool is made of Y chromosomes that originated from non-Jewish European populations. Haplogroup Q is a "minor founding lineage" among the Ashkenazim. It is found in 23 out of 442 Ashkenazi results (5%). They were interested to find that out of 50 non-Jewish Hungarian results, Q did not appear at all.

19 out of 23 Q results followed this pattern. DYS 19=13; DYS 388=12; DYS 389i=13; DYS 389ii=16; DYS 390=22; DYS 391=10; DYS 392=15; DYS 393=13; DYS 426=12; DYS 439=16.

The Goldfoot test of Q1b shows our DYS 389ii=29 and 30 instead of 16; and DYS 439=12 and not 16. Yet, after having the Deep Clade Test which comes after having all 67 alleles tested, we are in the category of M378, P36.2 along with many other Q's.

Behar called Q a "minor founding lineage," placing our group amng "those haplogroups likely to be present in the founding Ashkenazi population." The problem is that Q is rarely found in Middle Eastern populations in DNA studies, so most likely did not originate in Israelite ancestry. It's found among all Ashkenazi groups showing that the founders of this group either mixed with a number of separate Ashkenazi populations or entered through western Europe before Ashkenazis migrated in large numbers eastward in the 13th and 14th centuries.

The low haplotype diversity shows that a small number of closely-related founders merged with the Ashkenazim while living in Western Europe (most likely Germany, I think, due to our name of Goldfus/ss-Goldfoot). You can assume that the Ashkenazi population had 25,000 around 1200-1300 CE. This would mean that 1,000-1,500 Q's became part of the population then. Our ancestor was among them.

Q is rare in Europe as well. It occurs in Hungary 2.6% and much higher % in Siberia. It is found in Norway and the Shetland Islands of Scotland where many Norwegian Vikings settled. Q is found among Scandinavians as much as in Ashkenazim, and this is where most Q's are found. Both these groups evidently share a common ancestor from Central Asia or Eastern Europe.

Dienekes writes in 2004 that if Proto-Khazars were similar to today's Altaians, then they would have a frequency of about 22%Q. He thinks that Khazars have mixed into the Ashkenazi Jewish populations likely. The Khazars of Khazaria most likely were somewhat mixed with Western Eurasian elements, decreasing their frequency of having a Q haplogroup. He said that Q is found in high frequencies in only a few regions of the world. He agrees with familytree in that the origins were in Siberia or the Altai where Q continues to be a common Y chromosome haplogroup. Native Americans are Q3 and also originated there. They had left their Altai homeland earlier than the Ashkenazi or Scandinavians. They migrated to the New world between 10,000 to 17,000 years ago, giving them time to develop their own subgroup of Q3.

The Kets and Sekups who live on the eastern part of Western Siberia and the Yenisey River Valley can trace their origin further south on the slopes of the Altai mountains where Scandinavia's Q and K ancestorss originated. It could also be the homeland of Khazarian Q ancestors whose descendants are found today among Ashkenazi Jewish groups.

Research: A Mosaic of People: The Jewish Story and a Reassessment of the DNA Evidence by Ellen Levy-Coffman http://www.jogg.info/11/coffman.htm

W mtdna of Hattie Goldfoot nee Jermulowske's Line

2010-12-27T13:52:00.000-08:00

Beautiful Aunt Elsie Eichman nee Goldfoot, daughter of Hattie.
Nadene Goldfoot

Hattie Jermulowske had lived in Poland, on the border of Lithuania in Suwalki. Testing her daughter's daughter, we find that we carry the W mtdna haplogroup. This is a little section of the 30% of haplogroups of the mtdna of Ashkenazim.

We Ashkenazi Jews of W16145A, 16223T, 16265G, 16519C mtdna are a little branch off of N1b, the people of the Near and Middle East of Asia. So we came about being a mutation of N1b that occurred about 2,000 years after W's branch was started. Western and Southern Asia was the home of this minority clade. The home that has the most W mtdna today turns out to be Northern Pakistan. W started about 25,000 years ago. N1b shows a lack of haplotype diversity, so that they have a common ancestral origin. This means that N1b is of Israelite origin and is supported by the fact that this group appears to be spread throughout eastern and western Ashkenazim at about equal frequencies.

N1b, our mother branch that still exists, makes up 10% of the 70% of Ashkenazi mtDNA results.
Many Jewish groups did not share the same female ancestors. Ashkenazi populations as a whole are genetically more similar to Near Eastern non-Jewish populations than to European non-Jewish populations.

A haplogroup N subclade, N1b - has been identified as one of four Ashkenazi Jewish founder lineages. This is defined by the transition G to A at the nucleotide position 16176 - See:
D. Behar, et al. A NOTABLE "N" A famous member of haplogroup N is Ann Curry, a host on the "Today Show", who is haplogroup N9a. Her haplogroup designation was shared during a November 18, 2005 interview with Dr. Spencer Wells of <>National Geographic's Genographic Project. W made up3.1% of a Jewish population tested in Poland, and it was 2.7% of the population in Russ and the Ukraine.
　
Dad’s Ydna: Q1b This comes from the Altai Mountains of Siberia, Mongolia and parts of Turkey. Somehow it made its way into Germany and then on northward to Lithuania and the Russian Empire.
Mom’s Dad’s Ydna: R1b1b2:

Jews started off as slaves in Egypt well after Abraham broke off from Ur and took his large family to Caanan. Genetics confirm that various Semitic and Mediterranean people came together to form the Israelites of long ago. When we spread out into the Diaspora and traversed far and wide across Europe, we attracted converts and intermarried over time with other Europeans. This is how we came to have our diverse DNA ancestry of the Ashkenazi Jews.

There are differences between the eastern and western Ashkenazi populations. If you look at the French, German, Austrain, Lithuanian, Polish, Romanian and Russian Jewish women, there will be differences. Haplogroups that appear in eastern Ashkenazi, but are rare to absent in western Jewish groups include "W". This argues in favor of a post-Diaspora European origin.

Jews were first in Germany. Eastern communities were founded when Jews migrated from Germany and France after the 12th-13th centuries. It appears that eastward-moving Ashkenazim absorbed a number of separate European maternal founders once they settled in Eastern Europe.

Judaism has been opposed to intermarriage with non-Jews since biblical times. There are biblical prohibitions, bans, warnings, rules and laws. Christian authorities also outlawed intermarriage with Jews. Marriage was outlawed as well as any social contacts and backed this up with severe penalties including death on both partners. Sex found its way, however, as there was mingling. Reality saw converts to Judaism, individually or in groups and Jews to convert to Christianity or just leave the Jewish community when they faced so much oppression in Europe. We received genes from neighboring populations through proselytism, intermarriage, rape and illegitimate children fathered by Gentiles. We were locked up at night in Ghettos in Italy and kept in The Pale of Russia which should have kept the sexes separate, and it did for the most part. This is why scientists study Jewish genetics. We are basically a group that has been kept apart from everyone else.

Half of the sons of Hattie carried the W mtdna in their genes, so that it can be in all of her descendents.

Research: A Reassessment of the Jewish DNA Evidence, 19 page printout from http://www.jogg.info/11/coffman.htm

http://www.thecid.com/w/natlgeo.htm
http://www.nature.com/ejhg/journal/v15/n4/fig_tab/5201764t1.html#figure-title

Goldfoots of Haplogroup Q1b and Altai Mt

2010-12-26T10:36:00.000-08:00

One of the other members who found his haplogroup to be Q1b has found evidence of some Q1b's to be living in the heart of Altai's area, west of Altai Krai. Familytreedna had said that Q1b's originated in the Altai Mt. area which covered Siberia, Mongolia and parts of Turkey.

I'm wondering if these people just found have been there forever or if they migrated there for some reason. Being they are Mennonites is a big surprise to me. I read that Mennonites have Swiss and German roots as well as Dutch. They now number about 1 million and started about 1550 AD. They're found in North and South America, Africa, Europe and Asia. Their main thrust is pacifism, so they don't join any armies.

Resource: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mennonite_settlements_of_Altai ,

http://history.mennonite.net/

Jermulowske mtdna W

2010-12-23T09:49:00.000-08:00

Nathan Goldfoot, most likely from somewhere in Lithuania, born 1874, married Hattie Jermulowske in Council Idaho in 1905. In dna terminology, Nathan is of Q1b haplogroup and Hattie is a W haplogroup. Both haplogroups are found in the Lithuania/Poland area in Ashkenazi Jews.

Information on the W is as follows, a comment from Debra Katz : But for now, in a nutshell, there is definitely an Ashkenazi Jewish branch...likely all descending from a 17th or early 18th century Baltic lass who hooked up with a Jewish dude in the Latvia/Lithuania region.

W's seem to be a Johnnie come lately branch on the human tree. It wasn't even found when mtdna was first known about and a book was written about the daughters of Eve. There are Jewish and non-Jewish lines found. Marrying a Jewish man can't alter the mtdna of the female, but this would be the start of an all Jewish branch. Mtdna just doesn't change hardly at all since its inception thousands of years ago.

GOLDOVT FAMILY -Derivative of Goldfoot?

2010-12-22T19:17:00.000-08:00

Surnames: Goldfoot, Goldovt posted online on Dec 2, 2009. Here I am thinking I haven't worked on this surname ever, and I did last year. I never did get an answer.

Have you seen this information? My brother just found it. I'm trying to find my grandfather, Nathan Goldfoot I think from Lithuania born in either 1872 or 1874. My father was Maurice and my brother is David Goldfoot. I just found a Nokhim Goldovt b: 1874 in Merkine, Trakai, Vilnius and wondered about it. Could Goldovt be translated as Goldfoot? Then my brother found this:NATHAN and MAURICE GOLDOFT. Of the El Paso,Texaswholesale liquor firm of Goldoft Brothers, NathanGoldoft has had a prosperous business career. He wasborn in Russia. January 12, 1871, son of Isaac andEthel Goldoft, both of whom were natives of Russia.The father came to America in the early sixties andlocated in Chicago,ILLINOIS where he went into the dry goodsbusiness, built up a good trade and subsequently establisheda similar business in Minneapolis.He was in Chicago during the great fire of October,1871, and after that destructive event in which he lostall his property, he returned to Russia. Some years laterhe came back to America, and after, following merchandisingin Chicago and Minneapolis, moved out toDenver, Colorado, and subsequently to El Paso Texas wherehe died in, 1908 at the age of sixty-four. The motherwas educated and was married in Russia and died therein December, 1879, at the age of thirty-five years.Nathan Goldoft, the oldest child, came to Americawith his father on the second trip and attended thepublic schools of Denver, after which he worked for atime in his father's store, and thus laid the solidexperience in mercantile affairs. In Central City, Colorado,he established himself in business, but after ashort time sold out and with his brother Maurice wentto Santa Fe, New Mexico, where they engaged in thewholesale liquor business. Seven years later they cameto El Paso,Texas and founded a similar enterprise which has since been developed into one of the best known. firms of West Texas in this line. The business was started in a small way and the two brothers did all the work connected with the trade. At the present time they employ twenty-five people in all the branches, and the annual volume of sales makes it one of the largest and most prosperous concerns of El Paso. Mr. Nathan Goldoft was married in El Paso, December 16, 1905, to Miss Mollie Maykin, daughter of John and Elizabeth Maykin, of this city. The two children born to their union are Isaac, born in 1907 and Ethel, born in 1906, the latter being now a school girl. In political affairs, Mr. Goldoft has taken no active part. He is affiliated with the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, the Loyal Order of Moose and the Business Men's Protective Association of El Paso Texas, and his religion is the Jewish faith. He owns his own home and other real estate in El Paso, and during his career has built up a substantial prosperity. Maurice Goldoft, the junior member of the firm of Goldoft Brothers, was born in Russia, December 12, 1879, and like his brother attended school in Denver, Colorado. They became partners in business at Santa Fe, and have been closely associated and sharing equally in prosperity. Maurice Goldoft married December 18, 1906, at El Paso, Miss Annie Merkin, and the two children born to their union are Byron M., born in El Paso in 1907, and Robert R., born in 1910. The family worship in the Jewish church. Mr. Goldoft is Independent in politics and is affiliated with the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, the Order of Elks, and the Loyal Order ofMoose. He is a Spanish war veteran, having enlisted as a volunteer in the Territorial Regiment of New Mexico, but was mustered out at San Francisco, without being in active service. He owns his own home in El Paso,Texas and by strict attention to business affairs has gained a substantial place in his home city

Town= Merkine; Uyezd= Trakai; Guerniya=Vilnius

2010-12-22T18:52:00.000-08:00

Trakai District Alphabetical List of Males

1. Nisel Goldovt 24, son of Benjamin, is head of household on the 26 May 1858 census.
m: Ita 22, daughter of David is his wife.
Kuna is Nisel's mother, no age given, listed that she died in 1852 and was Benjamin's wife.

2. Itsko Goldoft, son of Nokhim, is head of household in 1874.

3. Mordkhel Goldovt, son of Khayim, is head of household in 1874.

a. . Shimel Goldovt, son of Mordkhel, is a son in the household in 1874.
b. Bentsel Goldovt, son of Mordkhel, is a son in the household in 1874

4. Movsha Goldovt, son of Khayim, is head of household in 1874.

5. Itsko Goldovt, son of Nokhim, is head of household in 1874.

a. Nokhim Goldovt, son of Itsko, is the son in 1874.

6. Izrael Goldovt, son of Nokhim, is head of household in 1874.
7. Shaul Goldovt, son of Nokhim, is the brother in 1874.

8. Benyamin Goldovt, son of Khayim, is head of household in 1874.
a. Nisel Goldovt, son of Benyamin, is his son in 1874.
b. David Aron Goldovt, son of Benyamin is his son in 1874.
c. Bentsel Goldovt, son of Benyamin, is his son in 1874.

9. Khatskel Goldovt, son of Khaym, is head of household in 1874.
a. Khaym Goldovt, son of Khatskel, is his son in 1874.
A. David Goldovt, son of Khaym, is a grandson in 1874.
B. Israel Goldovt, son of Khaym, is a grandson in 1874.

Lithuania Records on Goldfoot, Merkine

2010-12-22T16:59:00.000-08:00

I keyed in Goldfoot on the Lithuania records found in abundance on the Jewishgen website, knowing full well that this is the anglicized form of Goldfus/fuss. However, it just may be that Lithuania has its own way of spelling names.

Goldoft

In 1872 Nisan Goldoft of Merkine, Lithuania died.

Tsipi Goldovt died on June 23, 1892 in Kaunas. Her father was Bentseler who lived in Merkine. She was only 4 months old and died from a catarrh of the intestines.

On September 24, 1932, Evi Hirsetes Goldavtas/Goldavt was born. The father was Chezkeles born in the town of Semeliskes and the mother was Estera born in the town of Troke. The mother's maiden name was Groznikaite/Grozik. This is a 1932 record from Vilnius, Lithuania.

Chaim Goldovt was listed in Merkine Trakai, Kaunas in 1903. (My ggrandfather was Chaim Goldfoot).

There were marriages.

Bentsel Galdovt, son of Mardkhel and Merich (Merkine) 24 married Etela Oppengeim 18. in 1888 in Kaunas, Lithuania.

Benjaminas/Benyamin Goldovt/Goldovtas age 30, son of Meer/Mejenis Freide Balmanaiate (Balman) and Ruda Vishakio, a husband and merchant who was born in Merkine, married in Kaunas in 1930 to:

Jokhana Vinikaite 26, daughter of Shimshoras/Shimshon, daughter of Khana Rokka Zivaite/Ziv Betygala , a housekeeper.

Y Chomosome Phylogenetic Tree for Goldfoot's Deep Clade Test

2010-12-22T10:37:00.000-08:00

Our Deep Clade Test results are in.

Our Ashkenazi Goldfoot branch is a part of the tree of humans. We were Q haplogroup. Now we
are Q1b.

Our main branch on this tree from which we spring is called M242.
That branch has grown a twig on it. It's called P36.2.
P36.2 has now grown a twig off of it and it's called M378.

So the reading from familytreedna looks like this: M378 + P36.2+

DNA Testing with 23 and Me

2010-12-22T09:59:00.000-08:00

I sent in my sample to 23 and me for complete testing of my genome. The notification just came in that I can expect the results on about Washington's Birthday, February 22nd. It takes time and they have received lots of samples.

This is a completely different sort of test-covering both the Ydna and the mtdna. It will also give me a report as to my physical condition and what is possible to occur. It's pretty exciting. I've just begun to understand the usual test, and this will be different, so I hope I'll be able to learn something. I've been told that I'll love the results.

This test should tell me who I am related to and what the distance might be. Of course it depends on the results of people who have taken the test, so the results are from a limited population of others interested in dna.

I've not been the person taking a test till now. My brother and male and female cousin have been the testees. This test was not like theirs where the inside of the cheek was rubbed to get a sample. I had to spit into a test tube. I was so excited that I forgot to put the tube into a plastic bag before putting it into the mailer. I about died of shock when I found the bag on the table after I had hurridly gone to the post office to mail it all off. Well, I just couldn't contain myself, following the directions, waiting the 30 minutes after eating and all. At my age, it's a wonder I knew what I was doing. I emailed the company and told them of my neglect. It was a safety precaution for them to have the sample in the bag first. I hope others will be more aware. You might try having a friend with you as you follow the test directions to remind you of what to do.

Goldfoot South African Reunion in Capetown

2010-12-12T12:02:00.000-08:00

2/18/07 Denise Bremridge nee Goldfoot had a family reunion in South Africa and reported information:

Avroham Goldfoot somewhere in Lithuania between JANOVA and VILKIYA on the River Nieman in the region of KOVNO. VILNA is further from this area but also on the same River.

Abraham married Anna and had 6 children; one being Zalman b: 1848 who had the twin girls and 3 others. My grandfather HYMAN was a brother to ZALMAN. Her grandfather moved to ELIZABETGRAD in the Ukraine where he met and married her grandmother BLUME. Her (our) GOLDFOOT/GOLDFUS/GOLDFUSS family must have lived in German territory before moving to Lithuania and Elizabetgrad and finally into the WEST. We need to keep in touch with jewishgen.org. Supposedly Goldfoot is related to Gaon of Vilna of Lithuania, see below,

name is:Elijah ben SolomonElijah ben Solomon, 1720–97, Jewish scholar, called the Gaon of Vilna, b. Lithuania. A leading Jewish scholar of his time, he opposed the spread of Hasidism in Lithuania and Poland because he feared that the creation of these new groups would weaken the Jewish community. His many influential works include commentaries on the Hebrew Bible, the Mishna and Talmud, Midrash, and the kabbalah. He upheld the primacy of Torah study and the halakah, which he held as being of supreme importance for Jewish life.

The following is about Stanley Goldfoot who connects with us in about the 15th century.One such hero in our generation is Stanley Goldfoot. During his lifetime, >Stanley witnessed the rise of tyrants such as Hitler and Ahmadinijad, who are bent on destroying the Jewish people.

- Sidney L. Markowitz, in What You Should Know About Jewish Religion, History, Ethics and Culture (New York, NY: Citadel Press, 1955). HERE IS THE RUSSIAN TRANSLATION OF GOLD FOOT!"ZOLOTAYA NOGA". from Denise Goldfoot Bremridge.

Goldfuss in Dachau

2010-12-11T15:10:00.000-08:00

I found two male Goldfuss men in Dachau Concentration Camp Records.

Joseph Goldfuss, born February 5, 1925 in Leukowa, Lithuania was in the camp. He was listed there because of school Lit. J before Mukldorf. Leukowa, Lithuania is the town that Mike Pobantz reported that all his Goldfoots came from originally. Mike's Goldfoot line is that of the South African group that Stanley Goldfoot belongs to.

Laib Goldfuss was also there with him. He was born May 29, 1917 in Leukowa, Lithuania and had the same sort of record written about him as Joseph had. They could have been brothers or cousins.

Considering that they could have been put in prison in 1941, Joseph could have been 16 years old at the time and Laib 24 years old. I believe that they would have been killed.

Deep Clade dna Test Ordered: & 23 & Me

2010-12-11T13:30:00.001-08:00

I've ordered another dna test for our Goldfoot line. This time it's the Deep Clade Test. I should have the results by January 5th, they say. This will probably tell me what I already know; that we are Q1b but I think there will be a little more to it. I already know that Ian Goldfoot is the closest person found so far, and of course he is. He's a true Goldfoot. At 8 generations, or 200 years ago, we had a 67.49% chance of belonging to the same family. That would have been in 1810. My grandfather Nathan was born in 1872 and his father, Chaim Itzhak, could have been born about 1850. So this means that it could have been in the very next generation that we were connected. At the least, we have a 99.98% of being in the same family in the 28th generation.

Ian also had an ancestor Chaim Goldfus born 1865 and his father was Avroham. We also had an Abraham. He was the 3rd child born to my grandfather Nathan. Unfortunately, he died as an infant while sleeping with his parents in a feather bed in Portland. Jewish people at that period always named their children after someone deceased, so it could be that Ian's Avrohom is also ours, too.

On the 9th of this month I sent for the test from 23 & Me. I received notice the next day that it's on it's way. It will test me for both sides of the family and I'll be able to see through dna who I am connected to. This is exciting. It will cover my whole genome. My genetic profile will be ready after they receive it in 6-8 weeks. My biggest worry is: will I be able to understand the results? It will also tell me about my physical condition, I believe.

Telsiai, Lithuania, Home of Goldfus/Goldfoots

2010-12-11T13:15:00.000-08:00

10/22/08 From Preserving our Litvak Heritage by Josef Rosin by JewishGen.Inc.

Nathan Goldfoot's family is thought to come from Telsiai or Telz in Yiddish, as many of Stanley Goldfoot's family reported to come from this city. It is one of the oldest towns in Lithuania and is in the NW part of Lithuania, the Zemaitija region on the shores of Lake Mastis and is even mentioned in Crusader chronicles in 1320. In the 2nd half of the 15th century a royal estate was established there. The Swedes invaded in 1710. 2/3 of the population died from epidemics at that time. Until 1795 Telz was a part of the Polish-Lithuanian Kingdom. Telz fell under Russian rule from 1802 as part of the Vilna Province (Gubernia) and from 1843 as part of the Kovno Province. In 1812 Napoleon's army passed through and left their big gun which is now in the town park. The town was damaged in Polish rebellions of 1831 and 1863. A fire caused a lot of damage in 1907 that lasted 2 days. Old wooden houses were replaced with brick.

Jews settled here at the beginning of the 17th century. In 1797, 2,500 people lived here of which 1,650 were Jews (66%). 1831 Polish rebellion saw Telz Jews suffer from rebels and Cossacks. Famine hit the land from 1869-1872, and my grandfather was born in 1872. Pograms against Jews in 1880's in Ukraine and other places had damaged the self confidence of Telz Jews. They were being conscripted into the army for 6 years. This is when many young Jewish men left Telz and immigrated to America, Argentina and South Africa. This immigration went on till WWI. during 1893 there was a cholera epidemic and took many poor Jews who lived in overcrowded conditions that had bad hygienic conditions.

In 1841 there were 25 Jewish artisans, 14 tailors, 10 shoemakers and one watchmaker and a lot of wandering artisans.
12/24/08 "I'm so happy for you that this is most likely the arrival of your grandfather. I feel that Nathan could have been a brother to my grandfather who was Haim (Chaim) Goldfoot as as all their dates seem to coincide. Or perhaps they were at least cousins all descending from Abraham Goldfoot(Goldfus) of Lithuania. The fact that they all went to Ireland in the 1890s seems to indicate that they all had an early family connection there. My grandfather settled in Dublin and yours left for Canada/USA. My grandfather died in Cape Town in his early 90s in 1952 or 54, whilst your grandfather died 20 years earlier at age 70. They must be all connected so therefore we must be connected too.

1/25/09 Avotaynu: In the 2nd half of the 19th century, the territory of Lithuania belonged to the Russian Empirre. Directly on the border were Kovno (Kaunas) and Suwalki guberniyas (provinces), the westernmost portion of the Pale of Settlement. No major work yet has been done on the Jews of Kovno and Suwalki guberniyas. At the end of the 19th century, Jews comprised 13% of Kovno guberniya. Of that, 43.4% lived in the cities of Kovno (Kaunas), Panevezys, Siauliai, and Ukmerge (Vilkomir); 54% had settled in Shtetles (villages); barely 3% lived in the country-side.

Over the centuries, a few well-connected Jewish merchants got permits, often temporary, to live within the boundaries of Russia. According to the Goldfoot genealogy from Stanley Goldfoot, his family was allowed to do that. They were corn merchants. Even within the Pale, Russian authorities frequently expelled whole communities of Jews and made them settle in desolate rural areas where they had no hope of making a living, hoping that these measures would get them to leave the country.

A Few Hazara and Sindhi People with our DNA-Who Are They?

2010-11-21T17:37:00.000-08:00

It has been found that a few people of the Hazara tribe of India and a few people of the Sindhi tribe of Pakistan carry our M378 SNP of our Q1b1 haplogroup. Who are they? Could we be connected to these groups?

My latest theory has been that we come from Persian people, the land of Queen Esther. Are these people connected in any way to that land? How did the Jews ever happen to go to Persia? Before I had discovered that the Jews of Samaria (Judea and Samaria) were carried away as slaves to Iraq and then to Persia, most likely making up Queen Esther's Jewish population.

Pakistan has recently been created for the Muslim people living in India. Not all but many Muslims have moved there. It was not an empty land. The Sindhi tribe have lived there with settlements going back to 7,000 BCE. From these people developed the Indus Valley civilization around 3,000 BCE which rivaled the contemporary civilizations of Ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia in both size and scope with half a million population at the height with well-planned cities and sewer systems.

Now the Hazara were a branch of the Mongols like Ghengis Khan. They actually were in Afghanistan and were the remnant in western Asia of land conquered by Chinggis Khan in the early 13th century ACE. This is why they are known to have had high cheekbones and sparse beards. As it turns out, "Hazara" is from the Persian word "hazara, meaning "thousand," referring to to earlier Mongols called ming or minggan or thousand. These Hazaras are descended from Mongols who entered what is now the Hazarajat in central Afghanistan at various times between 1229 AD and 1337 AD. In 1229 a Mongol army was sent to the west. A part of it was stationed in the region of Ghazni until 1241. In 1256 a grandson of Chinggis Khan, Hulagu, marched west against the Muslim caliphs of Baghdad, and his descendants, the Ilkhans, ruled Persia for nearly 100 years. Many times troops stationed in NE Persia revolted against the Ilkhans. Possibly some of the rebels hid in the central mountains of Afghanistan.

The largest number of Hazaras came from Transoxiana, an area north of the Oxus where Chinggis Khan left to his son Chagatai. At the end of the 13th and beginning of the 14th centuries their armies went across the Hindu Kush and into India. The Ilkhanates fell in 1337 ACE. The Chagataians lived there and became the ancestors of the Hazara.

In 1380 ACE another Chagataian, Timur, invaded Persia and claimed the provinces of Kandahar, Ghazni and Kabul. some of his descendants and men remained when the Timurids returned to Samarkand in 1447. Another Timurid, Babur, invaded Afghanistan at the beginning of the 16th century. By then the Hazaras were a distinct people living where they were when Pakistan was created.

Who conquered this civilization of Hazara? The Persian Achaemenid Empire in the 6th Century BCE. They were conquered again in the late 300s BCE by a mixed army led by Alexander the Great. They kept it for about 20 years. When Alexander died it was under Seleucid rule. It was traded to the Mauryan Empire led by Chandragupta in 305 BCE. Their rule ended in 185 BCE when the last king was overthrown by the Sunga Dynasty. Greek rule returned when Demetrius I of Bactria led an invasion of India and annexed most of the NW lands, including Sindh. He was later defeated and killed but his descendants continued to rule Sindh as the Indo-Greek kingdom. Many converted to Buddhism.

In the 100s BCE, Scythian tribes invaded the Indo-Greek lands. They came through Sindh and became known as Indo-Scythians or later as Western Straps. Then the Tocharian Kushan Empire annexed Sindh by the 1st century ACE. The Kushans were Zoroastrian and tolerant of the Buddhist traditions.

Again the Persians were on the scene in the mid 200s ACE with their Sassanid Empire and defeated the Kushan Empire. They installed vassals known as Kushanshahs. They were defeated by the Kidarites in the late 300s. By the late 400s, the Hephthalite tribes known as the Indo-Hephthalites or Huns broke through the Gupta Emprie's NW borders and overran much of Northern and Western India. Sindh became independent under the Rai Dynasty around 478 ACE. They in turn were overthrown by Chachar of Alor around 632. It never ends.

Which all tells me that there were a lot of Empires that I have never studied. With all this warring, babies must have been born. Our line of Goldfoot as well as the other Q1b1's must have come from this group somehow. Otherwise, why would we have found that we had something in common with the Hazara and Sindhi tribes of India and Pakistan? Isn't it possible that we became involved with Queen Esther's Jewish population at one time or another while there?

Reference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sindhi_people
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sindh
http://boozers.fortunecity.com/jerusalem/47/History/history.html