I have had this picture of Reizel Halpert for years, obtained from Cecil Halpert and Rachel Tucker.

On the back, it was clearly labelled as Henry’s sister. But he had two sisters. In the Yiddish, I could see that this was Reizel rather than Faiga. But I could never make out the surname.

I showed the back to some Hebrew and Yiddish readers, but they didn’t give me anything for the surname either. They probably knew how hard it was to figure out, so they didn’t want to guide me in the wrong direction if they were wrong.

Scouring through JRI-Poland once again, I finally found something. There is a 1928 marriage in Lodz for Rajzla Halpert and Symche Worowski-Konskier. The record isn’t filmed or digitized, so all I have to go on for now is the index. Other records show the name listed as Wozowski or Wiazowski. By golly, I think that’s what the name says on the back!

Does anyone else see it?

It also appears that Symche died in 1929. Also in JRI, the Lodz cemetery lists him in 1929 and her in 1940, with her father’s name as Icek, which is correct. And my cousin’s 1969 family tree also shows her death in 1940. According to their ages in the cemetery records, he was 15 years older, but that also means she married at 48 years old. If the cemetery age is correct, that also moves her up to the second oldest in the family and the oldest to survive to adulthood.

But there are still so many questions. Who is in the picture with her? If her husband died the year after their marriage, is this him? She died with his surname, so this couldn’t be another husband after him. And whose child is that? I couldn’t find an earlier marriage for him indexed (which doesn’t mean there wasn’t one) and she got married under her maiden name, so it’s less likely she had a child at marriage.

Typical genealogy. Answer one question, generate several more.