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Note: 10/16/1901 Feyga Elka Gilgof from Gomel, age 22 married Nokhim Mikhlin from Bielitza, age 23 in Gomel. Feyga's father's name Unknown, Nokhim's Father Given Name Girsha
2/27/1900 Alta (Alias Sora Kahya) Gilgof from Gomel, age 20 married Movsha Kormov from Chechersk, age 22 in Gomel. Alta's Father's Given Name Itzho Leyb, Movsha's Father Given name Itzko
5/30/1897 Ita Gilgof from Gomel, age 17, married Simen Shatzov from Vetka, age 34 in Gomel. Ita's Father was Menashe and Simen's Father was Khaim Meer.
8/19/1905 Zelik Gilgof from Gomel, age 22 married Nekhama Vasilevitzky from Rechitsa, age 22 in Gomel. Zelik's Father was Mendel and Nekhama's was Abram Movsha.
11/30/1904 Shmil Gilgof (This is Chaim Shmuel), age 22 from Gomel married Maryasa Rasin from Unknown, age 28 in Gomel. Shmil's Father was Urov and Maryasa's Father was Zusya
5/18/1897 Aron Gilgof from Unknown, age 22 marriedRasya Obrant from Vetka, age 22 in Gomel. Aron's Father was Zelik and Rasya's Movsha.
12/23/1894 Basya Gilgof from Gomel, age 23 married Evsey Shapritzky from Chechersk, age 23 in Gomel. Basya's Father was Zelik and Evsey's father was Nison.
6/7/1899 Tzira Leya Gilgof from Gomel, age 20 married Evsey Demakhovsky from Rechitsa, age 22 in Gomel. Tzira Leya's father was Ura and Evsey's father was Abram.
Note: Byd near Gomel? or Budola Russia, or Buda-KOshelevo District Rogachev/Gomel; Province Mogilev/Belarus all possible birth places.
Our family in Russia was called “Gilgof”. The name was changed by U.S. immigration officers at Ellis Island. Apperently the letter “g” in Russian sounds like our letter “h”. The immigration people cut off the “hof”.
Leo has told me (Irving Hill) the Gilgof family came from the city of Minsk in Kovno Guberne, in White Russia. Leo has obtained a lengthy history of the Jewish community of Minsk from one of the institutions in Israel. A copy of that is attached to each copy of this document. The Gilgof family was a strongly Socialist one, affiliated with Socialist organizations such as The Bund. After 1903 the territory of Minsk became dangerous for Socialists and the family started moving out and overseas
Leo has told me that our grandfather owned and operated a general store and tavern. We do not know the maiden name of our grandother or even the first names of our grandfather and grandmother. We were not able with precision even to state how many brothers and sisters our fathers had, but we will account in this document for as many as we know about.
I am now going to talk to Leo about my father’s and his Fathe’s generation. We will cover as much as we can remember about what our parents told us concerning their life as kids in Russia and the work they did. We are also going to try to trace how the two brothers (our fathers) wound up in Lincoln, Nebraska, we know that thereafter, our fathers brought three sisters and two brothers to Nebraska.
The family’s connection with Lincoln, we believe, results from the fact that a cousin of our fathers named Nathan Zolot was the first of the Gilgof family group to come to Lincoln. He came there from New York. We do not know the year or circumstances. We don’t think that Zolat sent for either of our fathers or anybody else. We believe that our fathers came to Lincoln because Zolot was already therea and had established himself there. Either Nathan Zolat or his wife, Basha, was the cousin of our fathers. We don’t know which one was directly related to them, although Leo is pretty sure Basha was the cousin. We don’t know if she was a first or second cousin.
Dan Hill came to Lincoln in 1906. I believe that my father, Nathan, came in 1907. I think each of them saved up the money to go to Lincoln by working in New York. Leo’s father, Dan made the money to come to Lincoln to join Zolot by davening (leading prayers in a synagogue) for money. He was very learned in the Torah and a pretty good chasen. Apparently some group of Jews thought enough of him to hire him to daven for them, probably on the high holidays or maybe regularly. He made enough for his ticket and no more. When he got to Lincoln he had less than a buck. My dad told me his situation was the same. He too got off the train from New York completely broke.
Let’s go back to Russia nad Dan’s story. Leo says Dan left the place where he and nNathan wer raised at about age 13. Leo says that the family placed Dan with the owner of a country store. We’re not sure if the store was in the same town or a distance fromhome.
My Father, Nathan, told me that at about age 11, he was sent a long distance away from their home to be an apprentice to an ironworker. The master ironworker would keep him and two or three other apprentices in his own household, housing and feeing them and instructing them. My dad told me that the master was very stern and very demanding. All the apprentices were boys abut the same age. They lived togthe apparently in a barn. My father told me that one day as a kid, 11 or 12, he was up on a high fence. He fell off this fence and broke both legs. He was in terrible pain for weeks but was afr4aid to tell his master, and suffered through it all without any edical help. Those breaks were later seen in x-rays of his legs. The doctor told him that’s why he didn’t grow any taller than he did. My dad was 5’5” or 5’6” in height and would have been considerably taller.
Dan Hill was much smaller than n dad. He was just barely 5 feet, maybe 4’ 11” tall. Bet he was a little dynamo. He was very articulate and very intellectural, self taught. One time he ran in the State of Nebraska for the U.S. Senate on the Socailist ticket. Thereafter friends and family referred to him as the “Senator”. Running took a lot of courage, particularly for a businessman because Socialists were not exactly popular in Nebraska.
When Dand and Nathan came to Lincoln, (Dan was first) each of them started to work for the Burlington Railfroad. They worked at a big Burlington shop in Havelock. Dan was a sweeper, either sweeping out cars or just sweeping the roundhouse. My Father, Nathan, had learned to be an ironworker in Russia, so he becaue a boilermaker.
After both had worked for the railroad a few years, they decided they should start a business so that they would have more income to support their families. We are not sure when that business, Northwestern Iron and Metal, began. Both Dan and Nathan were married. Leo was born in 1913. We think the business go started arund the same year, 1913. It was decided that Nathan would keep working for the Burlington so they would have some sure and continuing income to support both families. Dan would start the business and Nathan would join him as soon as the business could support them both.
Leo tells a wonderful story and this may have been the real reason why Norhwestern Iron and Metal got started in the first place. Perhaps both of them would have stayed on as employees of the Brulington Railroad. Bit it turns out that Dan, who was always intellecturally curious, always trying to improve mhimwelf, was caught by his boss spending too much time in the toilet at the railroad. He was sitting there, trying to teach himself to read and speak English. They fired him. And that of course necessitated that he make a living some other way. That’s probably when they conceived the idea of going into business together.
With Nathan still working for the Burlington, Dan started the business by being a peddler with a horse and buggy. It wasn’t long before the business was doing well enough to support them both and Nathan quit theBurlington also.
Now comes a wonderful story. Not too many years after they started their business, Burlington had a major renovation of the wohole shop and roundhouse which generated a lot of scrap iron and metal. The railroad solicited bids. And who was awarded the bid? Dan and Nathan Hill, the two immigrants who had worked, there, so recently. They had accumulated the know-how and apparently enough money to swing the deal.
The new business started without any local facility or place of business. While Dan was out peddling and Nathan was working at the Burlington, they didn’t have anybody to man a local place of business. They seemed to be doing pretty well without one. But one day, Dan’s horse died in a snowstorm. By force of circumstance, they had to set upa place of business in town.
Later on, when Nathan was able to join also, Dan became the inside man who stayed put at the place of b usiness and Nathan was the traveler, first with a horse and buggy and then, as they got bigger and more established he traveled to receive shipments of scrap brought from other dealers in the states of Nebraska, Colorado, Wyoming and Kansas.
As the business got established and generated some money, Da n and Nathan brought over other members of the Gilgof family with their spouses and children. The first to come was Isaac, the oldest son in the family. He settled in Lincoln. Isaac was the father of our cousin, Sarah Hill, Fnny Hill, Abe Hill and Earl Hill. Isaac died early and neither Leo nor I knew him and we can’t remember anything about him. He committed suicide at quite an early age. Nathan and Dan took responsibility for his four children. Abe, the oldest son was a very talented violinist. Coincidentally, he too committed suicide at a fairly early age. The other three children turned out to be fine human beings. Leo and I both liked all of them vey much.
After Isaac, Nathan and Dad brought over their yuounger brother, Izzy. He was quite a bit younger than either of them. He joined them in the scrap business. It is not a secret that Dan and Nathan did not have the highest respect for Izzy’s intellectual abilities. But they kept him in the business with them. Later on, to their complete surprise, he left Northwestern and , with a partner, started a competing business. It prospered; it did very well. So maybe our fathers did not correctly judge their brother.
After Izzy was brought over with his wife, they brought over a sister, Esther Kaplan and her husband Jake Kaplan. They lived in Omaha where he, too, ran a scrap business. I’m sure Dan and Nathan proided the initial financing. Esther was a lovely woman who recently died at age 100.
Then Dan and Nathan brought over another sister, Rose Lotman with her husband, Morris Lotman. They also settled in Lincoln and owned a grocery store. When Leo and Irving were quite young in their early teens, a famous feud erupted between Dan and Nathan on the one hand and Morris Lotman on the other. We never knew what the feud was about except it seemed to be around some type of a money problem. In any event, Dan and Nathan did not speak one word to Morris Lotman for more than 25 years. Nathan was very close to his sister Rose and Irving is quite sure that he did break the boycott and speak words to his sister once in a great while, and perhaps even uttered a word or two to Morris. Dan kept the boycott. After Irving left home in 1936, the feud continued for decades. But Leo says that Morris and Dan made it up at the end. Nathan was already gone.
There was still another brother, Dan’s twin brother named Hayim Schmul Gilgof. He was a very ardent Zionist. He wanted to leave Russia and Dan and Nathan provided the money for him to do so with his family. I think he may have been the last or next to the last of the whole family to leave Russia. He migrated to Palestine. Making a living was very hard in that barren place, so Dan and Nathan supported him and his family for many years, finally giving him a sum of money to buy a parcel of land, install irrigation and plant orange trees. They had to keep sending money to support Hayim Schmuel and his family and the orange grove for decades. The orange grove never made a nickel. Hayim Schmuel and his family in Palestine used the name Gilgof. They produced many decendants. Some of them have come to the U.S. for education and Leo has seen them in Lincoln and has provided money for them and housed them. Three of Hayim Schmul’s children, persons of our generation, but who were born in Russia, are still living in Israel . Hayim Schmul settled in a suburb of Tel Aviv called Petach Tikvah. The orange grove was also in Petch Tikvah. Leo has promised to speak with or write to these three from our generation to find out moore about our grandfather and grandmother antd the was in which they made their lving. Etc.
In about 1929 or 1930, Nathan and Dan brought over from Russia one last member of their family. This was an older sister, probably even older than Dan, named Sarah Leah. She was married and had many children when Dan and Nathan sent her and the family the money to come to Lincoln. Leo places that around 1930 when Leo was 17 years of age. Leo says he met the newcomers at the station. The husband’s name was Demahovsky. They changed it to Diamond when they arrived. The husband went to work for Northwestern and their oldest son Earl also went to work there as soon as he was able. Another son was a butcher and worked in Lincoln before going back to New York. One daughter, Fanny became the mother-in-law of the Chief Justice of Nebraska, Norman Krivosha, a fine lawyer and a delightful man. Sara Leah had other kids . We are not sure what became of all of them. All we knew married, founded American families and did reasonably well.
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