Goldfoot Genealogy

Nadene Goldfoot                                    

Oppenheim, Germany

 The town is a well-known wine center, being the home of the German Winegrowing Museum, and is particularly known for the wines from the Oppenheimer Krötenbrunnen vineyards.  However, to Jews of today, it is known for other reasons.  We have to remember our history of being forced to become moneylenders because no other profession was allowed by the countries we were living in.  It was also a profession that Jews excelled in from experience on the Silk Road trading in the Orient.  Wherever Jews lived, whether it was in Europe or the Middle East where they were 2nd class citizens called dhimmis, they had to pay more taxes than the native population because they were Jews.  For this reason alone they had to be good at handling their own money so they could live.  


Jews are first mentioned there in the tax register of 1241, according to which they were obliged to pay the emperor an annual tax of 15 marks. The Jews of the town, legally the property of the emperor, were placed under the protection of the officers in charge of the local fortress, to whom they paid their taxes. They also paid a house tax to the archbishop of Mainz. *Rudolf of Hapsburg and other kings gave letters of credit to various noblemen which were to be defrayed from the taxes paid by the Jews of Oppenheim; at times, they also leased these taxes. The burden of their taxes appears to have caused several Jews of Oppenheim to join the group that fled from the Rhineland and, under the leadership of *Meir b. Baruch of Rothenburg, attempted to emigrate to Eretz Israel (1285). At the end of July 1349, during the persecutions that followed the *Black Death, most of the Jews of Oppenheim were murdered, while others chose martyrdom (*kiddush ha-Shem) and burned themselves to death in order to escape forced conversion at the hands of the mob. Among the martyrs was the rabbi Joel ha-Kohen.

Some time later the community was reestablished. After 1400 the right of residence was made renewable at the end of every six years, and the amount of taxes to be paid was fixed. In 1422 a plot by two Christians to kill the Jews of the town was frustrated by the municipal council. Certain protection fees and "gifts" that the Jews of Oppenheim were compelled to pay weighed upon them so heavily that despite the additional support of such communities as Worms, Mainz, and Frankfurt, Oppenheim Jewry could not meet their payments and were therefore penalized (1444). In 1456, R. Seligmann Bing (or R. Seligmann Oppenheim) attempted to establish a union of the communities of the Upper Rhine, but because of community opposition and that of R. Israel Isserlein (c. 1390–1460), the project was abandoned.       
                                                                       
  
Rabbi Samson Wertheimer born in 1658 in Worms, Germany at a time when it was part of the Holy Roman Empire and died in 1724 in Vienna, Austria after being a court financier.  His uncle was Samuel Oppenheimer.  The bank they both worked in that Samuel had established was in Vienna.   Samson and his son had lent large sums of money to the emperor.  In 1719 he became the Chief Rabbi of Hungary and also of Moravia.  He also was the rabbi of Eisenstadt, Austria where Joseph Haydn lived.
                                                                                 
     His uncle, Samuel Oppenheimer, was born in 1630 and died in 1703.  He was a philanthropist and Court Jew.  Jews had been expulsed from Vienna in 1670 , but he was the first Jew to resettle after that.  He had become Leopold I's agent and financier, helping to finance his wars with the Turks and the War of the Spanish Succession.  Another nephew of Samuel Oppenheimer was David Oppenheim/Oppenheimer born 1664 also born in Worms, Germany and had become a Rabbi.  He served as rabbi in Nikolsburg, and from 1702, in Prague.  He had built a library of books that was very valuable, and because of the censorship in Prague, had to keep them in Hanover, Germany.  Much later in 1829 they were transferred to the Bodleian Library Oxford serving as the basis of its Hebrew section.

     The ridiculous happened in 1697.  This was when he was accused of conspiring to murder  his nephew, who others saw as his rival, Rabbi Samson Wertheimer.  He was even put into prison until he was vindicated.  Samuel Openheimer was known to be a man who supported the poor liberally, Jewish scholars, and even Judah Hasid's movement to settle in Palestine-the return to Israel.  So evidently Zionism started then.
                                                                           
For people studying their genealogy, I am one who has found that my family shares a DNA connection that leads to Rabbi Wertheimer.  In fact, I was told that two paths lead to him.  He in turn kept a genealogy that led him to RASHI, the famous biblical commentator whose comments are found in most all Jewish prayer books.  Rashi had his genealogy that led him to King David.   The family genealogy of Wertheimer:  a line of it is below:
at http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~prohel/names/wertheimer/wertheimer.html.

Rabbi Samson WERTHEIM (WERTHEIMER) Born: Jan 17, 1658 Died: Aug 6, 1724 in Vienna. Landesrabbiner + Veronica "Frumet" (see BRILIN family)Born: Mar 15, 1658/9 Died: Apr 24, 1715/18 in Vienna Father: rabbi Isaak Brilin (Brüll) (Worms? - 3/17/1678 Mannheim bur. Worms, Germany) Mother: Sorle (Sarlan, Sara, Serle) Oppenheim/er (Wolf) (Worms, Germany - 3/3/1673 Worms or Mannheim, Germany)

By the marriages of his children,  Wertheimer became connected with the most prominent families of Austria and Germany. His stepson,  Isaac Nathan Oppenheimer,  married a daughter of the wealthy purveyor Pösing; his eldest son, Wolf, married a daughter of Emanuel Oppenheimer. 

Wertheimer's first son was Wolf Wertheimer who suffered a reversal of his father's fortune. "Samson's second son, Löb, married a daughter of Issachar ha-Levi Bermann of Halberstadt, a relative of Leffman Behrens, court Jew of Hanover; thus the three great "shetadlanin" were closely connected. Samson's sons-in-law were: R. Moses Kann of Frankfurt-on-the-Main; Issacbar Berush Eskeles, father of the Vienna banker Bernhard Eskeles; Joseph, son of R. David Oppenheimer; and Seligmann Berend Kohn, called Solomon of Hamburg. His youngest son, Joseph Josel (b. 1718), married a daughter of his stepbrother Wolf. Joseph died in Vienna (1761), where he was reportedly greatly esteemed for his charity and Talmudic learning. 

The community suffered during the wars of Louis XIV, and by 1674 only three families remained in the town. By 1722 the number had grown to eight. Many Oppenheim Jews settled in Frankfurt and other south German cities, where they were known as "Oppenheim" or "Oppenheimer," and the name became widespread.  Joseph Ben Issachar Susskind Oppenheimer was born in 1698.  He was known as Joseph Suss or Jud Suss.  He was a financier.  This is because Jews were kept out of most all other professions, and since in Christianity, gentiles were not allowed to lend money, it became the undesirable but needy profession that was open to Jews.   It was Carl Alexander of Wurttemberg who appointed Joseph as his finance minister in 1732.  Joseph endeavored to consolidate the duchy's finances and free its ruler from dependence on grant from the estates.  His modern financial methods aroused much opposition.  After the death of the duke in 1737, he was accused of embezzling state finances and was hung in Stuttgart, supposedly for having sexual relations with Christian women.  He refused to save his life by accepting baptism.
                                                                             
 I wonder if President Trump ever read about him at his Wharton School of Finance in Pennsylvania because Oppenheimer's career, ahead of its time, is the subject of many books.  A novel was even written about him by Lion Feuchtwanger, titled  JEW SUSS, written in German.

The community numbered 20 families in 1807; 257 in 1872; 189 in 1880; and 56 in 1933. Of the 17 Jews who remained during World War II, 16 were deported. In 1970 no Jews lived in Oppenheim. A memorial plaque commemorates the destroyed synagogue and the Oppenheim Jews who were victims of the Holocaust. The municipality organized two meetings of "Oppenheims" and "Oppenheimers" in 2000 and 2003."

Our Connections:
Descendants of Sender Opengeim Oppenheim

1   Sender Opengeim Oppenheim b: Abt. 1814 in Telsiai, Telsiai, Kaunas, Lithuania
. 2   Iontaf Jontaf Opengeim b: 1839 in Telsiai, Kaunas, Lithuania
..... +GUTTA GOLDA bat Nochem GOLDFUS b: 1839 in Telsiai, Kaunas, Lithuania
..... 3   Khaim Nokhum OPPENHEIM b: September 12, 1875 in Telsiai, Telsiai, Kaunas, Lithuania
. 2   Iosif OPPENHEIM b: Abt. 1841
..... +Guta (Golda)
..... 3   Mikhail Itsyk Opengeim OPPENHEIM b: July 09, 1877
. 2   [1] Shaia Opengeim OPPENHEIM b: Bet. 1842 - 1843 in Telsiai, Telsiai, Kaunas, Lithuania
..... +Zlate Pere
..... 3   Zelman OPPENHEIM b: July 23, 1878
. *2nd Wife of [1] Shaia Opengeim OPPENHEIM:
..... +Tsipe Guta b: 1843 in Telsiai, Telsiai, Kaunas, Lithuania
. 2   [2] Leib Opengeim OPPENHEIM b: Abt. 1845 in Telsiai, Telsiai, Kaunas, Lithuania
..... +Rokhel b: Abt. 1845
..... 3   Liba Tsivia OPPENHEIM b: September 06, 1897 in Telsiai, Telsiai, Kaunas, Lithuania
. *2nd Wife of [2] Leib Opengeim OPPENHEIM:
..... +Grunia
..... 3   Rokha Opengeim OPPENHEIM b: October 31, 1859 in Telsiai, Telsiai, Kaunas, Lithuania
. 2   Iomta Opengeim b: Abt. 1849 in Telsiai, Telsiai, Kaunas, Lithuania
..... +Gute b: Abt. 1849 in Telsiai, Telsiai, Kaunas, Lithuania
..... 3   Lozar Nokhum Opengeim b: May 18, 1870 in Telsiai, Telsiai, Kaunas, Lithuania

Yet another with Ullmann connected to Werner Oster-married to Ann Goldfoot:
Descendants of Isaac Ullmann 1 Isaac Ullmann b: 1812 in Westerburg, Germany d: 1853 . 2 Sarah Ullmann b: 1848 d: 1904 in Bad Ems Rheinland Pfalz, Germany ..... +Seligmann Oppenheimer b: 1847 in Laufenselden, South Hesse, Germany d: 1906 ..... 3 Moritz Oppenheimer b: 1878 ......... +Hedwig Blumental b: 1885 in Nassau ..... 3 Louis Oppenheimer b: 1879 ......... +Frieda Kaufmann b: 1892 in Mannheim ..... 3 Bertha Oppenheimer b: 1883 ......... +Karl Heinemann b: 1877 in Poppenlauer, NY ..... 3 Toni Oppenheimer b: 1889 d: 1923 ......... +Felix Herz b: 1879 in Witten
BIBLIOGRAPHY:

OPPENHEIM from Jewish Virtual Libary http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/judaica/ejud_0002_0015_0_15132.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samson_Wertheimer
https://www.google.com/#q=wertheimer+family
https://www.ancestry.com/name-origin?surname=wertheimer


FJW, 405; P. Lazarus, in: ZGJD, 5 (1934), 200–4; Germania Judaica, 1 (1963), 255–6; 2 (1968), 629–32; E.L. Rapp and O. Boecher, in: Festschrift 1200 Jahre Oppenheim (1965), 91–105. ADD.