Among Ashkenazi Jews, it’s traditional to honor the dead by naming children after them, but considered bad luck to do so if there’s a chance that the relative so honored might still be alive. This made the immediate aftermath of World War II problematic for many with missing family members, Jewish naming-wise. When my older sister was born, our father was still uncertain
Genealogy
Ich Bin Austrian: Some News and Some Musings
It was a long and circuitous route studded with emotional landmines, but today I can announce my arrival at the destination: My application for Austrian citizenship was approved. I was apprised of this fact via a phone call from the Austrian consulate in Los Angeles that I almost didn't answer. It was a late afternoon in January and I was watching Amy Schneider rout her
A Typo & A Tragedy: Tracing My Aunt Edith
As my CV will tell you, I am an editor as well as a writer. Correcting spelling and grammatical errors is second nature; I'm one of those people who proofreads restaurant menus (though not, you'll be relieved to hear, out loud when I'm with other people). So perhaps it's fitting that I should end up contemplating the fate of my namesake aunt because of a typo on a
A Tale of Three Siblings: Helena Neugasser, Siegmund Kornmehl, and Mina Allina
Though I am not as good as I'd like to be at keeping up with this blog—and not as good as Google would like me to be, according to my rankings--many people have nevertheless managed to find my posts over the years. Most recently, I heard from my cousin Rena, whom I'd been trying to locate for years. Those marital name changes wreak havoc on genealogy. She commented: I
Dual Citizenship: Pandemic Hair, DeJoy’s P.O. & Other Extremely Valid Reasons for Delay
It's been a while since I started working on my application for dual citizenship with Austria. So long that I forgot I had already filled out the preliminary forms and emailed them to the Austrian Consulate in Los Angeles. So long that I let my hair go Pandemic Grey and I am now I'm obsessing: If I put those grey-tressed images on my new Austrian passport (which I do not
My Father’s Great Escape: A Few Answers, Far More Questions
When I talk about my parents' forced departure from Vienna, I generally focus on the tragic outcome: the death of almost all their immediate family members, except for my father's brother, Fritz. On this Father's Day, I'd like to focus on the bravery -- combined with what must have been ingenuity and a bit of luck -- that got Paul Jarolim to America from Nazi-occupied
Paul & Fritz Jarolim: Post-War Rift & Reconciliation
Death and destruction take their toll on families in every war. Less common to major conflicts, World War II also scattered Jewish families to the winds, robbing them of the comfort of a homeland to return to -- at least not without mixed feelings. This was one factor in the rift between my father and his only surviving sibling. A Bit of Background My
The Jarolim Family: My Uncle Fritz & Military Resistance
When it comes to my mother's family, the topic of military service is fraught. I've written before about the fact that my grandfather Herman Rosenbaum served in World War I but was not rewarded for his service by such basic decency as not being deported from Austria and sent to his death. I've also written about how I disliked the idea of my family members as victims. It
This American Life (in Vienna): Parallel Playlists & Professions
Since I started exploring my family stories on the pages of this blog, I've often wondered what my life would have been like had my parents not been forced to leave Vienna. Several Hypotheticals There are many variables I'm ignoring here, of course. My mother liked to say that my father fell in love with her because "she sounded like home" when they met in Brighton
Survival in Vienna: My Badass Cousin Bruno
Here's another long-time-coming post from my blog archive, this one dating back to July when my cousin Andreas Oberndorfer first discovered this blog and contacted me. I wrote about Andreas's fascinating past, the missing links in his family -- and mine -- in the post Redheads, Resisters, & Red Light Districts, 1: Valerie Oberndorfer-Kornmehl. I have many excuses,
Rolled Beef, Wolf Blitzer & More Buffalo Kornmehls
In my backlog of unfinished posts, this one -- started in November 2019 -- seemed the most timely for this pandemic Passover. It's partly elegiac, which fits the current mood, but it's also about finding new family. And about endurance. A deli-denying newscaster plays a part in the narrative too. Fake news! Rolled Beef, Redux In my dual roles of amateur family
Redheads, Resistors & Red Light Districts, 1: Valerie Oberndorfer-Kornmehl
Freud's Butcher is the gift that keeps on giving. Just when I think I'm about finished with the story of my maternal grandparents' family, another member turns up. This time it is Andreas Oberndorfer, grandson of Valerie Oberndorfer-Kornmehl and nephew of my second cousin once removed, Bruno Oberndorfer-Kornmehl. My newfound Viennese relative appeared out of the blue.
Dayenu: A Kornmehl Reunion in Vienna
Dayenu: It would have been enough. That phrase, repeated as a refrain in a Passover song that offers a litany of thanks for blessings piled upon blessings, has been going through my head sporadically since last October, when I gave a talk at the Freud Museum in Vienna. It's been an amazing journey, albeit one that's taken a rather meandering, bumpy path, from the inception of
The Wedding Photo
It all started on a Facebook group I belong to: A posted photo of a Holocaust victim who had committed suicide rather than be captured by the Nazis led to a larger discussion of the topic. Somehow, I hadn't realized that many Jewish women and men took their lives, either to avoid being taken or to end their suffering at the death camps. I commented that I didn't know
Mystery Adoptions & Cryptic Crypts: Finding Cousin Erika
UPDATE: I was wrong. I hate that -- especially since it means the mystery of Erika remains unresolved. What happened? Sometimes I think that if I wait long enough, relatives will turn up to resolve all my genealogical issues -- or at least clarify them. The original post, below, posited that two childless members of the Kornmehl family, the Schweitzers,