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We only have one US Federal Census for Sarah Gittel Frank (later Broida), and it states that she was born in Russia. The passenger list we have recently found states in some of the ‘transcriptions’ that her birthplace was Austria, but if one actually looks at the heading on the page, it doesn’t say, “Birthplace”- the heading is “The country in which they severally belong.” (One ‘transcription’ even states her ethnicity is Austrian- yet more junk genealogy, so read things carefully from the original image if possible.) Of course, we have already discussed that this person may not be “our” Gittel, but the names of the persons on the list before and after do not sound like they were from Austria, although that is the country that is listed for them. The young boy accompanying – or possibly just listed with- is named “Jankel Cohen” so while he may have lived in Austria, that likely was not his deeper origins.
All this basically means that we do not know where this Gittel started her journey. Did she travel from Lithuania or Russia to Austria, then to Hamburg, Germany or Le Havre, France before taking the SS Cimbria? That isn’t really a logical pathway, but one does not know the particulars of the situation, and whether she was fleeing the over 200 anti-Semitic pogroms of Russia that took place in 1881. We can only hope that someone in the family has heard a story that has been passed down, so that we may learn more about Gittel’s years before coming to America.
SS Cimbria advertisement, New York Herald, 19 June 1881. (Click to enlarge.)
Just like today, whether a passenger liner or cruise ship, there was probably a large building for passengers to gather and purchase tickets. The advertisement above states that the fare for steerage passengers was $28 for a one-way ticket from Europe, which is about $650 today (2018). That may have been her life savings, or that of her family, lovingly provided to give her a better life in America. It would be interesting to know Gittel’s thoughts as she counted out her money, and as she took a huge step into the unknown, and a new life.
An 1877 engraving of passengers in the steerage betweendeck, via NorwayHeritage.com. (Click to enlarge.)
Boarding the SS Cimbria, if Gittel was indeed traveling in steerage, she would have made her way below deck with the majority of the other passengers. The Cimbria carried passengers regularly to the US, about every two weeks. The steamer was also a mail carrier, and it is very possible that the very ship she was on had also brought letters to her from America, encouraging her to make the trip west- maybe even a letter from John Broida, her husband-to-be, or a matchmaker or family already in the States.
Finding a comfortable place to sleep for the next nine nights or so may have been challenging in the stuffy and cramped quarters of steerage. She would be taking her meals in that space, spending her waking hours as well as sleeping, and daily bodily functions would have taken place there as well. By the end of the trip, especially if seas were rough and many were seasick, or if the weather was very hot, it would have been a miserable place to be.
“Feeding time” in betweendecks steerage, a sketch from “The Graphic,” 30 Nov 1873, courtesy of NorwayHeritage.com.
Passengers would have been allowed above decks depending on the weather and the patience of the ship’s crew. Even then, breathing the clean salt air would have been done in a crowd.
Steerage passengers on deck of the SS Kaiser Wilhelm, a real photo postcard (RPPC) taken sometime after 1897, via NorwayHeritage.com.
When Gittel came to America, there was no statue of Liberty in New York Harbor to greet her and the other immigrants. (The US poet Emma Lazarus had been assisting Jewish refugees from the pogroms, and hearing their stories inspired her poem at the base of the statue that includes the lines, “Give me your tired, your poor/Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.” The statue was not completed until 1886.) Gittel would have slowly walked with the crowd off the ship and into her new country.
1878 engraving of immigrants arriving at Castle Garden, via NorwayHeritage.com.
She could not just go wherever she pleased, however- immigrants were “processed” as soon as they left the ship.
Gittel Frank would not have entered the great hall of Ellis Island, as it did not open until 1892. Instead, she would have gone through Castle Garden. Unfortunately, her name has not yet been found on the Castle Garden website- there are a number of persons named “Gittel” who were processed there in 1881, but no transcribed surnames and ages that would seem to fit. (Only the transcriptions are available, currently, and there may be errors in the transcriptions.)
Castle Garden was at the tip of Lower Manhattan, and designed for efficient processing of all the new immigrants to America. The passenger list at the time was handwritten, and was used for statistical documentation of immigration, but also used in a legal cross-examination and inspection of the new immigrant before they would be allowed to live in the United States. About 98% of the immigrants passed. Sometimes, however, inaccurate information was recorded, whether ‘misheard,’ given wrong purposefully, or just ‘misremembered.’
1880 engraving of immigrants being registered after arrival at Castle Garden, via Heritage Ships/NorwayHeritage.com.
It must have been a very stressful time for the new immigrants, especially if they spoke no English. It would be wonderful to know if there was someone waiting to greet her and take Gitel to her new life in America, but we do not have any information about what happened next. We do not know if she knew John Broida in “the old country”, whether it was an arranged marriage, or if they just met in New York and decided to marry. We have not been able to find John Broida in the 1880 census, so he may have been living in New York City then, as his granddaughter, Gertrude Belle (Broida) Cooper stated that the family members were ‘rag-pickers’ in NYC when they first immigrated. John’s naturalization papers state that he entered the US in Pennsylvania, so that would imply a different scenario. We have no marriage record for John and Gitel either, and have searched in New York as well as Pennsylvania. (There were no requirements back then to record a marriage with either state government.) We do know that their son Joseph Jacob Broida was born in Pittsburgh, Allegheny County, Pennsylvania on 15 May 1882.
If anyone has more information on this early period of John Zelig or Gitel Frank Broida, please let us know!
Heritage Ships/NorwayHeritage.com has graciously allowed use of their collected images as long as the watermark is retained and attribution provided. If you are interested in higher quality images, they can be purchased on their website, which benefits NorwayHeritage.
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We would love to read your thoughts and comments about this post (see form below), and thank you for your time! All comments are moderated, however, due to the high intelligence and persistence of spammers/hackers who really should be putting their smarts to use for the public good instead of spamming our little blog.
Original content copyright 2013-2018 by Heritage Ramblings Blog and pmm.
Family history is meant to be shared, but the original content of this site may NOT be used for any commercial purposes unless explicit written permission is received from both the blog owner and author. Blogs or websites with ads and/or any income-generating components are included under “commercial purposes,” as are the large genealogy database websites. Sites that republish original HeritageRamblings.net content as their own are in violation of copyright as well, and use of full content is not permitted.Descendants and researchers MAY download images and posts to share with their families, and use the information on their family trees or in family history books with a small number of reprints. Please make sure to credit and cite the information properly.Please contact us if you have any questions about copyright or use of our blog material.
Finding when our immigrant ancestors came to America is one of the chief goals of most family historians. We can now share one more record that indicates when an ancestor arrived- Sarah Gittel (Frank) Broida.
The above ship’s passenger list was for the SS Cimbria, a Hamburg America steamship with sails that was built in 1867 in Scotland. (More about the ship itself in another post.) The ship arrived in New York City from Hamburg, Germany, by way of Le Havre, France.
Engraving of the SS Cimbria, via Ancestry.com, with various maritime resources used for their database. Note the small boat- possibly a lifeboat- used to take passengers out to the ship. (Click to enlarge.)
(While we cannot be certain that this is our Gitel Frank, there is information here that makes it highly likely this is the Gitel Frank who later married John Zelig Broida. We have found another “Gitel Frank” who immigrated later and with persons appearing to be her husband and children, so can rule out that person as a possibility.)
The SS Cimbria arrived on 13 July 1881, which is consistent with the information in the 1900 US Federal Census which states that “our” Gitel arrived in 1881, and had been here 19 years.
“Gittel Frank” was number 717 on this passenger list, and it states she was 20 years old and female. (There were not 717 persons on board but this appears to be the list kept in New York City, and added to as immigrants were processed.) The 1900 census states that Gitel was born in November of 1859, which would have made her 21 in July when she stepped foot in America for the first time. Folks did not always know exactly when they were born as it was not a big celebration like today, or there may have been a reason for changing the age, as maybe there was a lower fare if less than 21, so an inaccurate age does not always use out a possibility.
Under “Occupation” are ditto marks for “Single.” (Some passengers are listed as “woman” or “baby” under “Occupation.”) If this is the correct person, this document also answers our question as to whether Gitel and John were married in Lithuania or the US- Gitel was single and using her maiden name when she crossed.
Interestingly, it states that Gittel was from Austria. This could mean that this not “our” Gitel, but could also mean that she did not want to state that she was from Lithuania and Jewish. The ship left from Hamburg, Germany, and we do not know what route she would have taken to get there from her home, although Austria is not exactly on the way to Germany from Lithuania. Others on the ship’s list were from Austria, with a few from Russia. The SS Cimbria did take immigrants from Lithuania per one of the sources listed below, as well as Austria, Russia, and Hungary.
There are persons listed as from Austria on the line above and the line below Gittel’s name. A 20 year-old single woman indexed as “Ruske Granek” is passenger 716, and passenger 718 was “Yankel Cohen”, and listed as a 7 year-old boy. Perhaps they knew each other and traveled together? Those do not really sound like ‘Austrian” names.
Please do let us know if you have any further information as to whether we have the correct Gittel Frank or not.
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We would love to read your thoughts and comments about this post (see form below), and thank you for your time! All comments are moderated, however, due to the high intelligence and persistence of spammers/hackers who really should be putting their smarts to use for the public good instead of spamming our little blog.
Original content copyright 2013-2018 by Heritage Ramblings Blog and pmm.
Family history is meant to be shared, but the original content of this site may NOT be used for any commercial purposes unless explicit written permission is received from both the blog owner and author. Blogs or websites with ads and/or any income-generating components are included under “commercial purposes,” as are the large genealogy database websites. Sites that republish original HeritageRamblings.net content as their own are in violation of copyright as well, and use of full content is not permitted.Descendants and researchers MAY download images and posts to share with their families, and use the information on their family trees or in family history books with a small number of reprints. Please make sure to credit and cite the information properly.Please contact us if you have any questions about copyright or use of our blog material.
In case you missed it (ICYMI), we have published some sweet pictures of John and Fannie (Robinstein) Broida in previous posts. After finding their marriage record, and being a bit sentimental, it seemed only fitting to post some of their pictures again.
The above picture could have been taken on their honeymoon, or maybe not- does John look 46, or older? They do look much younger in this picture than in the others we have.
John “Zelig” Broida and his second wife, Fannie (Rubenstein?) Broida, 2 November 1924.
They were married for over 20 years when the above picture was taken.
John “Zelig” Broida and his second wife, Fannie (Robinstein) Broida, 5 July 1929.
This image may have been taken in Israel, where the couple immigrated to in the 1920s. John did return to the US in June of 1930, but Fannie was not included in the passenger list, so we don’t know if she accompanied him or not. John was 72 when this was taken, Fannie 55.
Notes, Sources, and References:
Family treasure chest of photos.
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We would love to read your thoughts and comments about this post (see form below), and thank you for your time! All comments are moderated, however, due to the high intelligence and persistence of spammers/hackers who really should be putting their smarts to use for the public good instead of spamming our little blog.
Original content copyright 2013-2018 by Heritage Ramblings Blog and pmm.
Family history is meant to be shared, but the original content of this site may NOT be used for any commercial purposes unless explicit written permission is received from both the blog owner and author. Blogs or websites with ads and/or any income-generating components are included under “commercial purposes,” as are the large genealogy database websites. Sites that republish original HeritageRamblings.net content as their own are in violation of copyright as well, and use of full content is not permitted.Descendants and researchers MAY download images and posts to share with their families, and use the information on their family trees or in family history books with a small number of reprints. Please make sure to credit and cite the information properly, i.e, reference this blog.Please contact us if you have any questions about copyright or use of our blog material.
Sorting through emails can be a pain, but sometimes there can be wonderful benefits. Today was one of those times, as an email from Dick Eastman’s Online Genealogy Newsletter (EOGN.com) mentioned that Find My Past had new US marriage certificates. I randomly plugged in the surname “Broida” and the first result was John Broida, born 1857 in Russia. That was our guy! I have long searched for a marriage certificate for John and both of his wives, Sarah Gittel (Frank) Broida, and Fannie Rubinstein. The marriage certificate of interest was for Fannie and John, and as a plus, there were quite a lot of other Broida marriages listed.
Things we learn from this marriage license application:
John was living in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in 1904.
Fannie was living in Steubenville, Jefferson County, Ohio, in 1904, which is likely why the marriage took place there. (I would not have thought to search in Ohio!)
John listed his father as Joseph Broida, which we knew, but states his mother Jennie’s maiden name was “Corklinsky.” We do know the family used the surname ‘Karklinsky’ in Lithuania, but it is curious that John used that name for his mother but not his father. I do not know whether or not Joseph Broida came to the US. If he did, that may explain the Broida name for him, and possibly Jennie had passed away in Europe, so John used the name she was known by there. Hopefully someone will know the answer to this.
Fannie’s middle initial was “D.”
John was 46, Fannie 30 when they married.
Fannie was born in Russian Poland, not in Pennsylvania as previously thought.
The license application gives the names of Fannie’s parents, and her name as well as her father’s is spelled “Robinstein,” not “Rubenstein” as others has recorded it, and spell check likes to change it.
The license notes that John had been married previously, to “Gussie Frank, now dead.” We have seen Gittel’s name as “Gussie” in a number of documents, so this verifies they are one and the same.
Although it seemed this document would help us understand the puzzle of this couple, there is no previous marriage noted for Fannie. This will now require more research, as we had thought she married Jacob Cohen before 1892, when Ethel Broida was born. Ethel’s marriage certificate states her father was Jacob Cohen (and mother was Fannie). Ethel lived with John and Fannie after their marriage, as she was only 12 in 1904. John treated her like a beloved daughter, and she was the ‘mystery’ daughter whispered about in the family, which we recently identified through deep research. This puzzle of a previous marriage or not is another case where having a census return from 1890 might help, but those have been lost to us. We cannot find a 1900 census with her listed, or cannot tell if she is the same person- there were a lot of women named “Fannie Cohen,” and a lot named “Fannie Rubinstein” (or “Rubinstein”) in 1900. Perhaps it just wasn’t polite to mention that she had been married before, especially if it ended in divorce? So this omission on the marriage license will make us revisit our previous research and do a little more.
The application states they were to be married by a Rabbi, but actually they were married by a Justice of the Peace on that same day, per the Marriage Certificate at the bottom.Typical of genealogy, this document solves a number of puzzles but actually gives us one more big one. That is why, when someone tells me, “I’ve finished my family tree,” my mind thinks, “Then you haven’t analyzed enough materials thoroughly enough!” But I never say that…
Notes, Sources, and References:
“Ohio, County Marriages, 1789-2013,” database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:9392-S59N-F6?cc=1614804&wc=Q6SP-W37%3A121346401%2C121652701 : 15 July 2014), Jefferson > Marriage index and records 1903-1905 vol 18 > image 116 of 458; county courthouses, Ohio.
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We would love to read your thoughts and comments about this post (see form below), and thank you for your time! All comments are moderated, however, due to the high intelligence and persistence of spammers/hackers who really should be putting their smarts to use for the public good instead of spamming our little blog.
Original content copyright 2013-2018 by Heritage Ramblings Blog and pmm.
Family history is meant to be shared, but the original content of this site may NOT be used for any commercial purposes unless explicit written permission is received from both the blog owner and author. Blogs or websites with ads and/or any income-generating components are included under “commercial purposes,” as are the large genealogy database websites. Sites that republish original HeritageRamblings.net content as their own are in violation of copyright as well, and use of full content is not permitted.Descendants and researchers MAY download images and posts to share with their families, and use the information on their family trees or in family history books with a small number of reprints. Please make sure to credit and cite the information properly, i.e, reference this blog.Please contact us if you have any questions about copyright or use of our blog material.
