Ernst Ostertag (and back)

I have over 10,000 photos and 300 videos backed up in my iCloud account. And I have had a phone with a camera for only 30 percent of my life. If I live as long as I hope to, I will leave behind an incredible amount of searchable data. I think I rank low in typical phone use, so suffice it to say, people in the future who want to know about the age we live in will have far too much information. Going back only five generations, we obviously have the opposite problem. Surviving records of lives lived before the 1800s are few.

The name Oster is what most people associate with my grandfather Harry, but the name itself has history. It is just one of many family names that are the roots of the tree that Harry and Phyllis cultivated. Oster, Ostertag, Rosenthal, Sontheimer, Loewenberger, Schwarzschild, Dampf, Henle, Hirsh are the names that go straight back from Granpa Harry until the time before last names. I never considered myself a Dampf. Turns out I am 1/16 Dampf. Sofie Dampf was my GreatGreat Grandmother and we each have 16 GreatGreats.

Before the early 1800s, it is difficult to build out Jewish family trees because our ancestors only took surnames in the early 1800s. Sometimes people kept yartzeit lists in the back of prayerbooks, but most of those things are lost to time. In several branches of the family names I’ve mentioned above, there are naming conventions before they took last names that makes it even harder…Daniel the son of Aaron the son of Daniel the son of Aaron…sort of like the generations leapfrogging each other, preserving and honoring the memories of ancestors and making it very difficult to trace.

The incredible website findagrave.com has a fair amount of biographical data for many of the graves it has in its database. It isn’t clear where all the information comes from, but it is considered a legitimate source, probably researched in local archives etc. On the Ostertag branch, we can trace back to the first ancestor who carried that name. It was Pesach Abraham Ostertag. We find his name in the record for his son Joseph Ostertag on findagrave. It says there that the family adopted the name “Ostertag” in 1813. Joseph was born in 1788, meaning Pesach Abraham, his father was born somewhere around 1760. As I found on the headstone for Bernard Ostertag in Stuttgart, Joseph gave him the name Pesach as his Jewish name. Cleary a family name. Bernard was named for his grandfather, Pesach Abraham. Perhaps he too was named for his grandfather.

**Here in Hebrew on his headstone, Bernard is listed as Pesach bar Joseph. Pesach son of Joseph. Joseph was Joseph bar Pesach.**

I like to imagine that in 1813, when the Jews needed to take family names, an elderly Pesach Abraham and a 25 year old Joseph, son of Pesach Abraham trying to come up with a family name. Perhaps they were sitting around the shabbos table discussing it, or maybe they were in business together and talked about it at work. But I am certain it was not a coincidence that a family who continued to pass the name Pesach back and forth, meaning Passover in English, took the name Ostertag. Ostertag means Easter Day…a strange name for a Jewish family. Unless you wanted to take a good German sounding name that was reminiscent of a meaningful family name. Passover and Easter always fall pretty close on the calendar. I think it is kind of brilliant.

We don’t know much about Pesach Abraham. He was married to Bala the Daughter of Solomon. They were my 4xGreat Grandparents and they had a son Joseph. If Joseph had any siblings, I have not found them. Joseph married twice. He first was married to Sara Monheimer and they had nine children. The first was Abraham in 1813, scandalously born 9 months before they married. The ninth was named Sara, born in 1829. Presumably Sara the mother died in childbirth or soon after which is why they named her Sara.

Jospeh married a second time to Babette (Bala) Loewenberger (May 22, 1794-May 12, 1866). It was with his second wife that my family line came to be. They had four children, one of which was Bernard Ostertag (1835-1900). Bernard was my Great Great Grandfather, born in Oberdorf, but moved at some point to Jebenhausen and married Paulina Rosenthal (1833-1910). Paulina’s tree goes back to Aron Fleischer who I have previously written about. Bernard and Paulina had several children, one of whom was Ernst Ostertag, my great-grandfather, Harry’s father. Which brings us to Ernst who was far back as we knew before I started this project. Nothing was preserved of what I have written above, nor much of what is below. There is no living memory of him. He died before his granddaughters were born.

This house was first the home of Paulina (nee Rosenthal) and Ulrich Wolf Rosenheim. Ulrich died in 1856 and Paulina married Bernard Ostertag on May 21st, 1861. Ernst Ostertag grew up in this home. The house is located at 152 Hintere Berg in Jebenhausen in the heart of what had been the Jewish settlement. 500 yards from the cemetery. (I previously wrote about Jebenhausen.)

This is the only known photo of Ernst & Elsa (nee Schwarzschild) Ostertag, together, likely taken in Germany before they emigrated on November 10, 1939.

Of all my Great Grandparents, I knew the least about My mother’s father’s parents, Ernst and Elsa (nee Schwarzschild) Ostertag. They were both born in Germany and died in New York, more than 30 years apart. Ernst was born on March 23, 1877 and died on January 23, 1943. Elsa lived from June 10, 1887 to October 10, 1975.

Ernst died when he was 63, not long after coming to the US, possibly on Harry’s enlistment day. Harry was 28 when his father died. Several people on that branch died at 63. Harry died at 63 as well.

I am only aware of three photos of Ernst, a portrait, one with Elsa and one in a field, perhaps with his sister Anna and brother-in-law Ernst Pick.

This chart goes back six generations on parts of each side of Grandpa Harry’s family…to my GX6Great Grandparents. In Jewish genealogy, relying on records, this is about as far back as one can go because most families didn’t take family names until the early 1800s. If you cannot see this chart well enough, email me and I’ll send it to you.

Ernst was a tailor, and business partner, in his brother-in-law’s store. His name was also Ernst. Ernst Pick. I wrote a bit about him in the blog on Stuttgart/Canstatt. Ernst Pick was married to Ernst Ostertag’s sister, Anna. Ernst Ostertag was the baby in the family, born last of the siblings on March 25, 1877.

Ernst’s siblings (Children of Bernard and Paulina (nee Rosenthal) Ostertag) were:

Joseph Ostertag, 1861-?

Anna Ostertag (spouse Ernst Pick) 12/15/1864-2/8/1936

Berthard (Benjamin) Ostertag Jan 7, 1867-April 13, 1941

Louis Ostertag (Spouse Rose Steinhart) Oct 7, 1868 - 1954

Alfred Ostertag (married Gertud Callomon) Oct 29 1871, murdered in Aushwitz in November 1943.

Julius Ostertag (spouse Hilda) April 8, 1874-?

Ernst Ostertag (spouse Elsa) March 25, 1877 - January 23, 1943)

Ernst had two, much older, half brothers from Paulina’s first marriage to Ulrich Wolf Rosenheim.

Bernhard Rosenheim, September 30, 1853 - November 17, 1890. He died in Stuttgart when Ernst was 13 years old.

Daniel Rosenheim (Spouse Fannie Rendsburg (Pattier)), 1855 - February 9, 1912. He died in New York and was the key to piecing the whole family back together.

Ernst Ostertag is definitely the one on the left. Is that Ernst Pick on the right indicating that the woman is Ernst’s sister, Anna (Ostertag) Pick?

Ernst Pick, different angle so it is hard to say if it is him in the photo above.

In 1930, when the lives of the Ostertag family were probably still somewhat normal, Ernst Ostertag likely had six living siblings, three in the United States and three in Germany. In Germany, Ernst and Elsa lived near Anna and Ernst Pick. The men worked together. It is quite possible that is them in the outdoor photo. I imagine Elsa snapping the shot.

There is evidence the family was in touch, even across the Ocean. As I wrote above, Ernst’s half brother Daniel Rosenheim was the key that unlocked the whole family because when he died in 1912, he left a will that included gifts to his siblings as he had no living next of kin. He died a widower with no children. The probate record listed everyone. It was the gifted researcher Susan Weinberg who uncovered all of this. I could not describe it better than she did, so I include a link to her words here.

**This is the 2nd page of the probate filing for Daniel Rosenheim in which Louis Ostertag is named the executer of the estate. This is the key that unlocked the Ostertag Family Tree.**

Visits TO/From Abroad

In 1902, Bert Ostertag visited Germany from Ohio.

**In 1904, Louis and Rose Ostertag also visited Germany. Their “young daughter” was future Broadway Actor, Bernard “Barna” Ostertag.**

**1906 Julius who operated a water purification company travelled from Germany to visit. He did again 20 years later. See next photo.**

It appears that the entire extended family lived a pretty secure upper middle class life. In the biography compiled for the stölperstein that was placed for Ernst Pick (husband of Anna Ostertag), it states (start in the middle of the first line):

A large number of the Ostertags appear to have worked in the textile and clothing industry. Bernard, Ernst’s father…Harry’s grandfather…was registered as a butcher in Jebenhausen.

Jebenhausen was also known for large textile factories and clothing stores. Bernard’s nephew Joseph (the son of Bernard’s half brother Aron Ostertag, Ernst’s half first cousin), had a successful men’s clothing firm there and it is likely others in the family worked for him. He died from Pneumonia in 1923. The 1927, History of the Jews Residing in Jebenhausen by Rabbi Aron Taenzer, relates the creation of that factory,

J. Ostertag, Herrenkleider-Fabrik (Male Clothing Factory)

“Joseph Ostertag originated in Albersweiler, District Landau in the Pfalz. He was an unusual industrious man, full of energy and he first founded in the year 1890 a detail business in male confection in Goeppingen. But in the next year he already began with manufacturing male cloth, first only with 6 workers. In the year 1900 he employed already 70 people, most in home production and he was able to expand his sales market to all of Southern Germany and Switzerland. At that time he re located the manufacturing business to a remarkable new building facility. In the year 1903 his brother in law, Sigmund Meinfelder, entered the company as a partner. The sales market was now expanded throughout Germany. In the year 1910 they employed already 100 male and female personal, of which 50 worked within the factory facility. Beginning in 1922 a part of the factory production was done electrically and transferred to building formerly belonging to Roehrenwerk Kunze (tube manufacturing Kunze). Those employees involved in home production mainly lived in the City or the vicinity of Goeppingen, but also in villages in Wuerttemberg and Bavaria. The home production workers in Ichenhausen were employed by the factory for 25 years already. The factory employed at the present time a total of 120 workers, half of those working at the factory facility. The founder, Joseph Ostertag, died in the year 1923. His son Paul Ostertag entered the company in 1920 as a partner.”

I first learned about Jebenhausen from a blog written by another Jebenhausen descendant, Ilana. We are not DNA relatives, but we do share some family names from the 1800s. In her blog she cited that, “Between 1830 and 1870, 300 Jews from Jebenhausen emigrated to the U.S. – such a dramatic exodus that one scholar wrote an article titled “From Württemburg to America: A Nineteenth Century German-Jewish Village on its Way to the New World.”

Ernst’s brothers Louis Ostertag & Bert Ostertag and Half-Brother Daniel Rosenheim followed a similar wave from Stuttgart to the States in the 1880s. Between 1880 and 1890, 1.5 million Germans immigrated to the US. Ernst, the baby in the family, probably barely remembered them living in town.

Louis first moved to Washington, but then settled in Piqua and began a clothing store that Bert would join him in as parter.

If there was any question as to whether Ernst and Elsa remained connected to Ernst’s brothers Louis and Bert in Piqua, Ohio, it is put to rest by the ship manifest from when they emigrated. In it, Ernst and Elsa listed Louis as the relative they knew stateside.

Check out the physical description of the the two in the third slice. Elsa listed her brother Siegfried as the relative in the “Old Country,” but I’ll come back to him. They set sail from Germany on October 28th, 1939 and arrived on November 10th. One year to the day after Kristallnacht. Which means they endured one of the most difficult periods for the Jewish residents of Cannstatt as they were concentrated into shtetl housing.

It is awful to think about how quickly things changed. When Harry left Germany in 1937, they were still living in their home on 11 Karlstrasse in Cannstatt. It must have been an impressive house situated on a corner lot. It is long gone, and an apartment building is there now. Looking at the back yard and the other houses around it, you get a sense of what it must have looked like.

By 1938 when Harry petitioned on their behalf for immigration to the United States, they were no longer living there. It is not clear what happened. Perhaps they were forced to sell, or they decided to sell, in order to emigrate. In his petition, the address listed was 4 Flandernstrasse. Perhaps they were renting or staying with other family. The store was closed by then too. They left Germany in November of 1939. When the census taker came around in 1940, they were living with Harry.