Unlike genealogy family history isn’t always direct, linear, clean, or pretty. In genealogy you have a chart with names, dates, births, deaths, and marriages – the facts. As I mentioned in my last blog once we add the factor of pictures and place of births we can make assumptions of connections, but just because Vava Brodsky or the poet Joseph Brodsky have the same last name, it doesn’t make them related. Just as births in very distant places doesn’t mean that they’re not. As with all history writing, family history is about interpretation of events. It involves sensing and perceiving what happened and, in the case of identifying the contents photos, intuition.
I recently read a manuscript of an unpublished book Wonderlust my friend Laurie MacDougall just wrote. It is a fast moving account of her life as the daughter of a Hollywood screenwriter living on a farm in the San Fernando Valley in the 1940′s and ‘50′s. What makes her book work so well is that she found her mother’s journals and poetry and had the transcripts of an interview of her father written for the Screenwriters Guild. It is a caring account of the humanness of family. There is no blame, just compassion and humor.
It is with this type of compassion that I am writing. We all have faults, problems and inconsistencies. Perfection isn’t interesting, but the stories that make us laugh or cry are. This blog is not a memoir or autobiography. It is what comes up for me or others when looking at these pictures. Laurie told me “My family wrote. Yours took pictures”.
Who’s in the photo
After my last post my cousin V wrote me asking “Ok the picture with the Brody Sisters 1946,,,,who is everyone???”
I meant to identify it, but it got late and I just wanted to post the piece. I asked my second cousin Mark to verify that it was his grandfather, Meyer in the photo. He said that he was unsure. I assume that it is (intuition) because of where he is standing in relation to both Alice and Reine. I also looked at other photos with Alice in them and he’s there.
Seated: Shirley, Rozzie (Lizzie’s daughter), Alice, Dora, and Lila (Dora’s daughter). Standing: Meyer Gaffen (Alice’s husband), Reine (Alice’s daughter), Lizzie, Robbie (Lizzie’s son), and his first wife (whose name I don’t know).
V also asked “Is that the ranch house on Laurel Street…what is the structure to the right???” It is Grandpa and Lizzie’s house, but in the ‘40′s the property was still a chicken ranch and not yet divided. That happened in the early ‘50′s. I’m unsure of what the structure is in the background to the right. It looks like scaffolding to me.
V grew up in that house. She was born after the property surrounding the house was sold and turned into a housing subdivision. The property was on Laurel St. between 53rd and 54th in east San Diego. I grew up about four blocks away.Up the hill at 55th and Laurel.
Comments from V
V also wrote:I read your new insights…you have an amazing, and accurate memory! I enjoy what you write, and I think you are very insightful. Thank you for doing this.I don’t think we are of the same family (rg: as Vava Brodsky)…but, she does look a lot like grandma. I think L looks the most like grandma Lizzie. 
I too looked in the mirror and for a moment…I thought I looked just like my Mom. My Mom and I had the exact same feet, but our features on our face were very different…but, for that moment…I looked just like her…I remember how it struck me…as it did with you as well, when it happened to you. I think my teeth were a lot like my Mom’s as well, and our teeth were more from the Goodwin side of the family.
RG’s note: We all have small jaws. As for the teeth, I think that she’s referring to the size and shape. She had to wear braces–I didn’t. She is blonde and freckled and I’m dark and olive complected.
Grandma’s family lived on a Grofts land. Her father was a blacksmith. I think he was manager of the property and lived well, compared to many Jews. That is why they had so much money when they came. I think they also needed the money, since they had no one in the US, and needed the money to be able to stay, by showing they didn’t need someone to sponsor them, and help support them.
RG: The story I remember is that the Groft’s sons and Lizzie’s older brothers immigrated to the US together after the Groft warned Lizzie’s father Max that things were going to get bad. This is much like Tevya being warned in Fiddler on the Roof. They settled in Providence, RI. The Ellis Island manifests document that Lizzie’s parents were going to join their sons in Providence.
Grandpa’s side of the family was very orthodox. Grandma was called the shicksta when she married Grandpa. I believe Grandpa revolted from what he considered the extreme rules of being orthodox and left home at a fairly early age. Grandma fit his world well…being Jewish was very important…but the orthodox ways were not what Grandpa wanted any part of.