Vol. 4

No. 18

Restaurants:

Gold's Restaurant

The Jewish Encyclopedia:

Western Pennsylvania Auxiliary

for Exceptional People

Family Clubs:

The Ostfield Family Club

Calendar:

May 21: W. Todd Knowles

June 11: Alex Calzereth

Community:

Under the Dome of Rodef Shalom

JCBA "Road-Trip"

Jewish Daily Forward exhibit

Mystery portraits

Research Tools:

Newspapers, Cemeteries,

Memorial Plaques, Books,

Population Figures, Newsletters

Restaurants:

Gold's Restaurant

Advertisement for Gold’s Restaurant at 1603 Center Ave. Announces “milichika (dairy) dinner or supper.”

—from Jewish Criterion, December 21, 1923.

Pittsburgh Jewish Newspaper Project

Israel Gold (1883-1938) was a restaurateur with establishments downtown, Uptown, the Hill District, the Strip District, and Oakland over three decades. 

Gold immigrated to the United States from Romania around 1900 and settled in Pittsburgh. He started at 1345 Fifth Ave., running Gold & Menster with partner I. Menster in 1905. He went independent the following year. With partner Adolph Walter, he ran the Gold & Walter Lunch Room at 431 Water St. in 1910. 

Advertisement for Gold’s Restaurant at 3713 Forbes Ave. Copy reads, “The only lunch room in Oakland where strictly Kosher special prepared Passover meals for Oakland business men and students.”

—Jewish Criterion, March 27, 1925

Pittsburgh Jewish Newspaper Project

Gold went fully independent around 1915. He ran Gold’s Restaurant at 1600 Center Ave. until around 1917, when he moved across the street to 1603 Center Ave. He briefly operated a second location of the restaurant at 1905 Penn Ave. in 1922 and 1923. He relocated to 3713 Forbes Ave. in 1925, operating Gold’s Kosher-Style Delicatessen and Sandwich Shop. Sometime in the late 1920s, he left the restaurant business and began selling insurance.

Advertisement for Gold’s Restaurant at 3713 Forbes Ave.

—Jewish Criterion, April 17, 1925

Pittsburgh Jewish Newspaper Project

Few records for Gold’s Restaurant survive beyond advertisements, but the advertisements reveal something about the patronage of Jewish-owned restaurants before World War II. Early on, Gold marketed primarily to Uptown, downtown, and Strip District businessmen who were looking for easy lunch options during the day. After relocating to Oakland, he expanded his marketing to include students and then to families in Squirrel Hill and Oakland, promoting picnic basket specials for people visiting Schenley Park and Forbes Field.

Next Week: The 1800 Block

All year, the Rauh Jewish Archives is highlighting Jewish restaurants in Western Pennsylvania. If you would like to donate a material from a Jewish restaurant, or just reminisce, contact the archive or call 412-454-6406.

Jewish Encyclopedia of Western Pennsylvania

Western Pennsylvania Auxiliary for Exceptional People

Color photograph of Rebbetzin Pearl Heber and Marian Hershman of the Western Pennsylvania Auxiliary for Exceptional People.

—from Marian Hershman papers [MSS 585].

The Western Pennsylvania Auxiliary for Exceptional People advocated for Jewish people with intellectual disabilities living at state-run institutions and at group homes throughout Western Pennsylvania. The organization made personal visits, provided religious services and training, and hosted communitywide gatherings. The auxiliary was created to support the work of Rabbi Leib Heber and Rebbetzin Pearl Heber at 14 state-run institutions throughout the area.

Our entry for the Western Pennsylvania Auxiliary for Exceptional People includes articles, fundraising materials, and early financial records.

Family Clubs:

The Ostfield Family Club

Ostfield Family Club notice.

—from Jewish Criterion, March 28, 1958

Pittsburgh Jewish Newspaper Project

Rose Ostfield died in late February 1950 and was survived by nine children: Clara Cohen, Laura Gold, Sarah Greenberger, Isadore Ostfield, Joe Ostfield, Julius Ostfield, Phillip Ostfield, Samuel Ostfield, and Rae Sofer. Eight years later, on March 16, 1958, her children formed the Ostfield Family Club. The club met through at least December 1962, according to newspaper notices.

Known surnames in the Ostfield Family Club include Cohen, Fellheimer, Field, Gold, Greenberg, Kramer, Ostfield, Shapiro, Sofer, Stein, and Wedner.

Known meeting places include 1015 Mirror St. (Max and Clara Cohen residence); Hobart Street (Albert and Laura Gold residence); the Schenley Park Bowling Green; 3529 Beechwood Blvd.; the Ohave Zedeck Congregation Social Hall; the Holiday House; Mirror Street (Samuel Ostfield residence); Beechwood Blvd. (Harry Fellheimer residence); 5641 Hobart St (Henry and Rae Sofer residence); Flemington Street (Joseph Ostfield residence); and the Moose Club.

If you have information about the Ostfield Family Club, please contact the Archives at rjarchives@heinzhistorycenter.org or 412-454-6406.

May 21:

JGS-Pittsburgh presents:

"Using FamilySearch for Jewish Research"

with W. Todd Knowles

Billions of family records. Where do you start?

FamilySearch is an international, nonprofit dedicated to helping all people discover their family story. It is one of the largest genealogical websites online and grows larger every day. Learn how to make the most of the FamilySearch collection, with a special focus on locating Jewish ancestors among the records.

The program is Sunday, May 21 from 1:00-3:00 p.m. ET. This is a virtual program, occurring exclusively online. The program will be recorded, and the recording will be made available to current JGS-Pittsburgh members.

“Using FamilySearch for Jewish Research with W. Todd Knowles” is a collaboration between the Jewish Genealogy Society of Pittsburgh and the Rauh Jewish Archives at the Heinz History Center. Please register online. 

The program is free for JGS-Pittsburgh members and $5 for the general public. To become a member of the JGS-Pittsburgh and receive a free membership code for this program, please visit its website.

This program is possible through the support of the William M. Lowenstein Genealogical Research Endowment Fund of the Jewish Community Foundation.

W. Todd Knowles, AG, is a Deputy Chief Genealogical Officer at FamilySearch, where he has been for almost 25 years. Soon after being introduce to family history at the age of 12, he discovered his Jewish roots. The journey to find these Polish Jews led to the Knowles Collection, six databases containing the records of almost 1.5 million people. His blog about the collection can be found at knowlescollection.blogspot.com.

June 11:

JGS-Pittsburgh presents:

"Mapping Your Family History"

with Alex Calzereth

Create maps with your own data on Google MyMaps.

This presentation will teach you how to create a custom map, import location data associated with family history events or source records and then customize the appearance of that data on the map. Custom maps can be used in many ways, including visually conveying family migration patterns, showing the location of regional cemeteries, or which towns hold certain vital records. Resulting maps can also be imported into Google Earth.

The program is Sunday, June 11 from 1:00-3:00 p.m. ET. This is a virtual program, occurring exclusively online. The program will be recorded, and the recording will be made available to current JGS-Pittsburgh members.

“Mapping Your Family History with Alex Calzereth” is a collaboration between the Jewish Genealogy Society of Pittsburgh and the Rauh Jewish Archives at the Heinz History Center. Please register online. 

The program is free for JGS-Pittsburgh members and $5 for the general public. To become a member of the JGS-Pittsburgh and receive a free membership code for this program, please visit its website.

This program is possible through the support of the William M. Lowenstein Genealogical Research Endowment Fund of the Jewish Community Foundation.

Alex Calzareth is a genealogist focusing on Southwest Germany, the Czech Republic and Southern Italy who began researching his family roots twenty-five years ago. He is a board member for Reclaim The Records and the Jewish Genealogy Society of Long Island, serving as JGSLI’s webmaster. Alex is also the JewishGen Research Director for Germany. He lives in New York City and works as a CPA.

Community

From NEXT Pittsburgh

"What's Under the Dome at Rodef Shalom?"

NEXT Pittsburgh's Boaz Frankel visits with archivist Martha Berg to discover the secrets of Rodef Shalom Congregation's historic Fifth Avenue synagogue.

From the Jewish Cemetery & Burial Association

"Road Trip: The Jewish Cemeteries of Western Pennsylvania"

The Jewish Cemetery and Burial Association of Greater Pittsburgh has released a new documentary showcasing Jewish cemeteries in Western Pennsylvania.

“Road Trip: The Jewish Cemeteries of Western Pennsylvania” is a one-hour tour of the many cemetery properties overseen by the JCBA, as well as an overview of the organization’s ongoing work to care for these sacred burial grounds. The video is a wonderful opportunity to celebrate these special Jewish cultural sites in our region. The video includes many historic photographs and documents from the collections of the Rauh Jewish Archives. 

From the Jewish Studies Program

PRESSED: Images from the Jewish Daily Forward

Detail from front page of Jewish Daily Forward, including photograph showing President and First Lady Kennedy, 1960.

Founded in 1897 on Manhattan’s Lower East Side, the Jewish Daily Forward became the most widely read Jewish news source anywhere. By the 1920s, this Yiddish-language daily had more readers than the New York Times. With rigorous reporting, incisive editorials and powerful commentary, the Forward chronicled the events that affected immigrants eager to earn their place in American life. This was the paper read by congregants from its neighborhood’s many synagogues, by families squeezing into tenement apartments, by sweatshop workers and pushcart vendors. Its articles were debated on park benches and at local haunts like the Garden Cafeteria and the Royal Café, its discarded pages then used to wrap fish for Friday night Sabbath eve dinners. The Forward’s ideals have been held dear for generations of readers, not just on the Lower East Side but across the country and around the world.

The new exhibit Pressed at Hillman Library on the University of Pittsburgh campus looks into the vast Forward archive to present a selection of metal plates used to print photographs in the paper from the 1920s to the 1960s. These plates are accompanied by prints made just for this exhibition. These prints have rendered the images with greater clarity than they had as dotted, halftone prints in the newspaper. The Forward pages on which some of these images appeared are also displayed. These pages are enlarged and reproduced from microfilm and photographs because printed copies of the newspaper have not been preserved at the Forward or in any other archive, although they occasionally pop up at auction or in private collections. Together these images of strikes and activists, Yiddish theater stars and baseball players, daily life and historic moments, present the depth and breadth of this singular publication, its audience and Jewish life in America and around the world.

Pressed is organized by the Forward in collaboration with the Museum at Eldridge Street, and hosted by the University of Pittsburgh Library System and the Jewish Studies program. It will remain on display through April 2023.

As part of the exhibit, the Rauh Jewish Archives has created a display surveying the history of local Yiddish newspapers in Pittsburgh. The display includes enlarged reproductions of pages and advertisements from The Volksfreund, the Jewish Indicator, and the regional office of the Forward.

From Rodef Shalom Congregation

A mystery in primary colors

The Pittsburgh Jewish Chronicle reports on an effort by Rodef Shalom Congregation to identify two people from a pair of mid-19th century portraits in the congregation's holdings. Do you recognize these two people?

Research Tools

The Pittsburgh Jewish Newspaper Project contains digitized, searchable copies of four local English-language Jewish newspapers between 1895 and 2010. It is a valuable tool for researching almost any topic about Jewish history in Western Pennsylvania. For a primer on using the website, watch our video.

Western Pennsylvania Jewish Cemetery Project

The Rauh Jewish Archives launched the Western Pennsylvania Jewish Cemetery Project in 1998 to preserve burial records from Jewish cemeteries across the region. Over a period of fifteen years, the information was compiled into a searchable, online database containing approximately 50,000 burial records from 78 Jewish cemeteries throughout the region.

Western Pennsylvania Yahrzeit Plaques Project

The Rauh Jewish Archives launched the Western Pennsylvania Yahrzeit Plaques Project in 2020. The goal was to create a comprehensive collection of burial records from memorial boards at synagogues across the region. Volunteers are currently transcribing these boards and records are being added monthly to our online database. The database currently contains almost 400 listings.

Rauh Jewish Archives Bibliography

University of Pittsburgh librarian and Rauh Jewish Archives volunteer Laurie Cohen created this comprehensive bibliography of the Rauh Jewish Archives library holdings from 1988 through 2018. It lists nearly 350 volumes arranged by type and then by subject. This a great tool to use early in your research process, as you’re surveying available resources on a given subject.

Jewish Population Estimates

Looking to figure out how many Jews lived in a certain part of Western Pennsylvania at a certain moment in time? This bibliography includes more than 30 estimates of the Jewish population of Pittsburgh and small-towns throughout the region, conducted between 1852 and 2017.

Rauh Jewish Archives Newsletter

The Rauh Jewish Archives has been publishing a weekly newsletter since 2020. The newsletter contains a variety of articles about local Jewish history, including much original research not found anywhere else. You can find and read every issue—more than 150!— in our new index.