Ruben Vinitzki - Winitch

In Fall 2008 I emailed my then 83 years old cousin Mildred in the USA for help with my family history research. She generously answered all my questions with an alacrity that belied her age and reminded me when I had repeated a question which she had already earlier answered! The text that follows is my re-writing of her many emails as a narrative and of course any mistakes are entirely my own fault not hers.

My dad Rubin Vinitzki (Winitch) came to the US by steamer when he was about 16, having saved his pennies whilst employed as an apprentice to a tailor in Daugavpils, Latvia. He used his skills in America and saved enough money to send for his sisters, Fanny, and Katie, and his niece Lilly, the daughter of his sister Sora Masha.  

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As far as I can recall, aunt Fanny and aunt Katie came to America together, and Lilly came last. They came all through Ellis Island The two sisters (Fanny and Katie) both lived near my family in New York and grew up here. Aunt Fanny and Katie sometimes squabbled, mostly about who was older of the two. Sadly all are deceased now and I have lost touch with their children.

Cousin Lilly’s mother Sora Masha Vinitzki was murdered in a progrom in Latvia, and her father David Moisey Rubinshtein (Married Sora 30/10/1906) stayed in Europe. Lilly married here to Joseph Niegelburg but after having a son Martin (27 Mar 1928-15 Mar 1975), subsequently divorced. Martin later married Leonore Robbins.

My father's parents came to the US as well (Abram Itzik Vinitzki and Sheina Zisla) about 1920, long before i was born. Abram was admitted, but my grandmother had pink eye (conjunctivitous) and was sent back to Latvia. 

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Grandfather Abram lived with my mom and father, and opened up a Hebrew school for about 3 years to support himself. He was a Rabbi (or at least a learned man in Hebrew).

He subsequently returned to his wife and remained in Latvia until his demise. Sheina passed away in Latvia, and I can also remember my father, Rubin, getting a letter that his father was gone. He cried bitterly, and I may have been about 8 yrs at the time, but always asked questions, and papa Ruby always read me the letters he received from Europe. He translated the Hebrew into Jewish as he read them, so I could understand. I don’t really know anything further about my great-grandparents.

I was very friendly with all my aunts and cousins

Fanny married in America to a American named Irving Siegel who was in the printing business. Unfortunately he met with an accident and drowned about 1938. She never  remarried. 

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I was about 13 at the time, and she had to bring up two small children named Herman and Shirley alone. Herman has died, and Shirley was very ill several years ago. She is one year my elder and I am of the opinion that she is also now gone.

Herman had 3 children 2 girls and one boy but I do not recall their names, as we were not that much in touch. I was friendlier with his sister, my cousin Shirley who married Herman Kaplan, and had 5 children, Irving, Josie, Guy, Robert, and Jonathon.

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Aunt Katie married Harry Halikman, and had 7 children named Murray, Louis, May, Eileen, Tootsie, Leonore, and Melvin. 

My father, Rubin, married my American born mother Gussie Sherman, and there were three children, Mildred (me), Anna, and Irwin. My mother was 2 years younger than papa and about 3 inches taller. She passed away at age 63 in l965, and papa died 1967 at age 65, 2 years later from Parkinsons disease . My mother Gussie was the best mom, and my father Rubin was loving, devoted, and a wonderful father as well as good provider, and a family man who was loved by all. He was devoted to his sisters, and to Lilly.

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My mom worked in a factory as a young girl. She had to quit school at a young age to take care of her siblings, due to the premature death of her own mom.

One day i visited Ellis Island where my father came through, and just stood there trying to get a feeling for where papa had stood on 22 September 1915. 

As a child we had always had an agreement that when I saved 99cents he would give me that extra penny to make a dollar. We did this for years!. So imagine me standing there and trying to feel what my father had felt at Ellis Island.

I walked over to the spot in my imagination where he had stood, and lo-and-behold, there was a penny lying on the floor! It was soooo strange, but I interpreted this as a sign that he had left it there for me.

I recall a family story of a gypsy kidnapping a sister in the fields of Latvia, where the family worked to eke out a living. Those times were very difficult, and I know from papa that his mother never got over losing a child to the marauding gypsies. My aunts and Lilly spoke Jewish and English when I knew was young. They were all extremely bright, hard working, and good people, as was my father. He worked at tailoring, and always made a living. Even during the hard times he worked on week-ends to earn extra money for food and rent. He was a wonderful and caring good person, as a father and husband. My mother and sister and brother and I were blessed.

Whilst aunt Katie was looking for an apartment in Williamsburg, Brooklyn she happened upon a group on young girls playing in the street. She questioned them and one of the girls, my mother, knew of an apartment for rent in the building she lived in, and showed it to her. Aunt Katie moved in and when my father came home from World War l, she introduced them to each other. The rest is history!

Shortly after my father became a US citizen he was conscripted into the American army to fight in WW l. For a while he reported as missing in action, as he was hositalized after being mustard gassed by the Germans. When he came to, his family was contacted as to his condition.  I do not know his battalion details.

As we lived so close to aunt Katie and aunt Fanny, and Lilly and their offspring there were a million interactions and we were a tight-knit family. As a matter of fact, later when I moved to another apartment, as my family grew in size, there was a vacant apartment where we moved and I requested the landlord to rent it to aunt Katie, and her daughter May, who had two children named Lynn and Ira.

So we lived in the same 2 family building for several years, getting along very well. Eventually Ira went to fight in the Vietnam war, (and did survive) and Lynn being younger, went to school. Eventually aunt Katie passed away and her Irish husband, Harry also. We moved away into the suburbs to our own home.

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 After aunt Fanny’s husband died, she became the janitor of a building, and took wonderful care of her children. She had also worked in a factory making children's dresses in New York.

Cousin Lilly lived very nicely. Her son, Martin Neigelberg, who she loved dearly, married and had two sons but developed cancer and passed away

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in his late 40's or 50s. I mentioned that Lilly divorced her husband Joe Neigelberg, and she married again much later in life to a very nice but never married gentleman. He lived into his 90's and she subsequently went to a nursing home, where she passed away.

Lilly always had a heart condition, but chose not to be operated on. She outlived all the doctors who insisted she be operated and she fooled them all. She gave me a picture of her mom and dad taken in Latvia and printed on metal, which I still have. 

I have 5 children, Ilene, Stewart, Lori, Marcie and Roberta and each one a gem, devoted to me and very loving. As a young mother, when my children were in school, I worked as an office manager, head bookkeeper, and credit manager. I was married to Sam Rosenblatt, for 31 and one-half years. not a long marriage, but a quality one. He was the love of my life, but gone in l983, at the tender age of 61 and one-half, from heart disease.

I lost touch with a lot of cousins when my husband Sam took ill and died but later reconnected with them.

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I clearly remember your aunt Hilda, and daughter Geraldine and as a matter of fact they came to visit my mother and father, and stayed with us for several days. As I remember that she once left the house in a huff because papa Rueben ate dinner without her!

Later I went to visit her and her husband in North Carolina. Also your aunt Sadie came to America, and stayed with Lilly, the daughter of Sora Masha, my father's sister that was murdered in a pogrom.

Aunt Katie's daughter Eileen, married Sam Pinnolis, and moved to, I think, High Point, North Carolina.

With your help I was able to get in touch with my cousin Eileen and her son Michael

My sister, Anna was born March 12-l921 and died at age 68 in November of l989. from had fatal brain tumor. You could not have asked for a better sister. She married at a very early age, to Harry Okner and had 3 children. He worked as an oil burner serviceman, and she was very adept at office work but did not do too much in that regard. She stayed home and took care of her children. Her first child Arthur had many health problems, mainly asthma, and survives at about age 68. He was married twice, and divorced, and has a son named Matthew, who has a baby boy. My sister also had a daughter named Joani and a son named Matthew.

My brother Irwin born 1931 passed away 2001 and is survived by his son Charles