Back in the USSR

I had this photo for years without realizing what it was.  Finally, I had the inscription translated in 2019.  Here is what it said: “For the good memory of my esteemed uncle, my aunt from your niece, Sonya Shafir.”  Here I had in my possession all that name a note from Mariasi’s daughter Sonya (the little girl to the left in the photo above) to my grandmother, who was her aunt.  The photo is from 1930 and Sonya would have been 20 years old at the time.  The photo was probably sent from Zvenigorodka or Dnepropetrovsk.

My great-aunt Chana is standing on the left and her sister Dotsie is seated on the right.  The inscription reads, “March 19, 1923 To the memory of my dear sister Fania and brother-in-law Pincas from Dotsie and Chana Bezbrozh.  I love you like an angel loves God. I love you like a brother loves a sister. I can’t love you anymore, but don’t forget me, please.”  A very poignant message from two sisters who knew they probably would never see their sister again.  This is the last known photo of Dotsie.  (The other two young women in the photo are unknown, but they look like sisters and perhaps are cousins of Dotsie and Chana.)  I do not know if Chana and Dotsie were just visiting Zvenigorodka or if they lived there, but in a few years, Chana, Dotsie and their father (and my grandmother’s father) Moshe would all be living in Dnepropetrovsk.

I don’t know if Slava and Froim lived in Zvenigorodka or if they just got married there, but they would soon settle in Dnepropetrovsk.

Here is a beautiful photo of Slava and Froim taken in 1924.  As with all the photos on this website, please click to enlarge the photo.

Slava and Froim’s marriage license from Aug. 27, 1923.  Click to enlarge.

Finally, I don’t know if Moshe and Ruchel’s son Avrum lived in Zvenigorodka, but his son Isaac Bezbrozh was born in the city in 1923.  There is an addendum to the record in 1939 saying that it was forwarded to the city of Kirov, so perhaps Avrum, his wife Riva and their son Isaac had moved to Kirov.  We do not know what became of them.

Click on the left and right arrows to scroll through photos from Yekaterinoslav/Dnepropetrovsk.  Click on the photo to enlarge.

During the Soviet period Jewish organized communal life in Dnepropetrovsk virtually ceased to exist. Most of the synagogues were either closed or turned into clubs or Kindergartens. All non-Soviet political activities, including Zionist ones, were halted by the authorities in the mid-1920s.  In the late 1920s and 1930s, Dnepropetrovsk had several Yiddish schools and a technical college with teaching in Yiddish. In the 1930s there was also a Yiddish theater in the city.  Dnepropetrovsk attracted many new residents due to the flourishing of new industrial, scientific and cultural activity, and many Jews found employment in these new industries.  According to the census of 1939 the Jewish population of the city was 89,525 (total population 526,000).

Slava and Froim’s marriage brought the Bezbrozh and Lyutrovnik families even closer together.  Cousins now became brothers and sisters-in-law. Here is a photo of Froim (on the left holding his son Uzik) with his sister Chana (sitting in the middle front), and Slava with her sister Esther and brother Chaim.  The photo was taken in 1927.  Tragically, Froim died in 1930 from blood poisoning at the infectious diseases hospital in Dnepropetrovsk.  His son Uzik was only four years old.

Chana, who apparently did not get married, also moved to Dnepropetrovsk along with her sister Dotsie and her father Moshe.  Here is a card that she sent to my grandmother Fannie (Feige) in America in about 1928.  The inscription reads, “For lasting memory to my beloved sister Fannie, brother Pinnie and niece and nephew. From your sister and aunt, A. Bezbrozh.”  The Russian transliteration of “Chana” is “Anna”, so  “A. Bezbrozh” stands for “Anna Bezbrozh.”  The card says “Dnepropetrovsk” at the top.

We also have this photo of Chana which looks like it was taken in the late 1930s.  Until June of 2019, these photos of Chana and Dotsie were the only information that we had about them.  We knew that Dotsie was alive in 1923 and that Chana was still alive in the late 1930s.  In June of 2019, I made a big discovery about what happened to them, but I will save that for a later section in this website.

Slava’s brother Chaim and sister Esther also settled in Dnepropetrovsk.  After his father was killed in 1920, Chaim Lyutrovnik decided that since he was the breadwinner, he would not get married until his sisters Slava and Esther were married and taken care of.  As we saw above, Chaim’s sister Slava married her cousin Froim Bezbrozh in 1923 and they had a son named Uzik. 

In 1928, Chaim and Slava’s sister Esther Lyuotrovnick got married to Yaacov Baider, who was a supplier of leather and fur.  Esther and Yaakov settled in Dnepropetrovsk and had their first child, a daughter named Rita (or Ruth) in 1928.

Here’s a beautiful portrait of Esther, Yaacov and their daughter Rita taken in about 1933.

With his sisters “married off”, Chiam finally got married to Lena Ganapolskaya in about 1940.  In about a year, their son Boris was born.

Moisey got married to Anna and they had a son named Dmitry.

Moisey and Klara’s mother Ita also lived in Dnepropetrovsk along with their sister whose name unfortunately we do not know.

Klara Bezbrozh married Aron Kofman, and they had two children, Oleg and Natalya. 

Click on the left and right arrows to scroll through the photos.  Click on the photo to enlarge.

Arkady Shmorgun reported that his grandfather Meyer Bezbrozh (the oldest of the three Bezbrozh brothers) passed away in around 1932.  Arkady reported that his family along with his grandmother Chana Yastrovsky Bezbrozh moved to Balaya Tserkov somewhere between 1932 and 1934.