Mossmans in Atlanta by Larry Hample

Grandma Ethel in Atlanta

by Larry Hample

Hi Joy, and everyone else,

On New Years Eve, literally, I realized the significance of this year for all us first cousins, and many of our second cousins. Thank you, Joy, for actually doing something about it to help us remember!

Rosie Fitterman was kind enough to welcome myself and Jula Bell into her home last Passover to help Jula understand her grandfather Oscar Bells's roots.

I **think** Rosie is the eldest member of her generation still with us. She provided a lot of the details and identifications I share below and hope to add in the future. (Rosie: I love you!)

[ Joy note: Any notes I add to clarify story are in italics and surrounded by these brackets. ]

[ Rosie would be same generation as Uncle Israel and Aunt Perle, and are her first cousins. ]

(I have attached four photos that I just scanned. Please keep in mind that I only recently got this scanner (from Sharon for Hannukah), so I hope to improve on the quality of these scans in the future. 

[Personal story deleted.]

This message is all about Grandma and she adored Jimmy Carter, for many things like overturning the racial policies of his predecessor as governor, and more so for the Camp David Accords. If Grandma loved him, then that's good enough for me.

Now the story... I mentioned to Jason Carter [President Carter’s grandson] that my family has now lived in his current state senate district for exactly 100 years. Actually, that was a bit of a fib, as aunt Perle Mossman recounted to me last night.  (…Jason Carter was duly impressed at the very abbreviated version of our family's history that I told him.)

Prior to moving to Decatur: When Great Grandparents Israel & Perle Balmazie/Bell first moved to Atlanta, they lived in what was then the Jewish neighborhood around Hunter St (now MLK, Jr. Blvd), where our synagogue Congregation Shearith Israel was originally located. That is in the general vicinity of the traditionally African-American schools Morehouse College (MLK's Alma Mater), Spelman College (Coretta Scott King) and what is now Clark Atlanta University. 

Leo Frank was lynched in 1915--a landmark event. 

[ Joy note:  Grandma said they moved out of Atlanta along with many other Jews because they were very scared for their Jewish lives because of the lynching. ]

Some of the family moved to New Haven around that time. Grandma & Grandpa [Mossman] got married in Atlanta in 1917 or 1918.  Libby was born 1919 in Atlanta. By the 1920 census, Grandma [temporarily] took Libby to New Haven, but Grandpa stayed behind (marital strife?). They came back to Atlanta and mom, Edith, was born in Atlanta in 1928. 

[ Joy note: Grandpa must have needed to earn the money and stayed behind. ] 

She/Rosie says that Grandma, Grandpa [G&G and their children], Libby, Edith and maybe (?) Israel moved to Decatur, GA around 1931 when they opened Mossman's Grocery at 346 N. McDonough St., Decatur, GA 30030 -- in downtown Decatur. The family lived behind the store. (Look it up on Google Maps.) Later, G & G bought the house at 125 Patillo Way, Decatur, nearby. (Mom & Dad [Hample] eventually bought 117 and Grandma bought 121 as a rental property.)

[ Joy: Those houses were a few houses down from a slightly raised RR track. Do you have a photo of store?]

So Jason Carter's senate district basically stretches from downtown Decatur north to the neighborhood I grew up in (after we moved from Patillo Way in 1963) and then to the little piece of the City of Atlanta I currently live in that is in DeKalb, not Fulton, County. Mind you, I now live less than a mile from where Grandma lived after she and Pauline moved there just before Pauline got married [to Julian Jolkovsly]. Aunt Rebecca and Uncle Joe Landau (Ida, z’l, & Rosie's parents) lived around the corner. But they lived in Fulton, not that that matters to any of you except Scott.

[ Joy: I visited Grandma when I was in H.S., I’m sure in 1964 on 125 Patillo Way. Nephew Mark was there that summer and Dolphe  (now aka Arielle) came to visit from Texas. Were you all moved before then?]

Grandma Ethel had to toss her infant/toddler Edith out of the window of their burning apartment (tenement?). An African-American customer in Decatur returned the blanket mom was wrapped in MANY years later. That fire probably hastened their move to Decatur in the early 30's. That's where I started this story above.

[ Joy: I also heard the fire and Edith story several times from Grandma! ]

So, I will start sending out more of my recollections about Grandma. This one has gone on too long. 

[ Joy: Thanks for all these stories. Larry, do you prefer that I use * to clarify at the bottom, and not [ ] inside of your story?]

~

Larry sent the following to family at the time of cousin Louis Bell's, z"l, funeral 2018 in greater LA, CA.

Grandma said home was at or near the intersection of the main train lines, at the time, connecting the two largest cities in the area, Kiev and Odessa.

Grandma’s family were part of an organization [Arbiterring], that fought for social justice in the era of tenements and dangerous working conditions.

Notes from Larry 2.3.2019:
"...distinct memories of what grandma Ethel had told me- great grandfather Israel Belmazel was a custodian in the train station in Brailov-Podolsky.

"I meant to add that I remember Grandma telling me that great grandpa's boss at the train station helped pay for the exit papers and travel expenses for the family in 1912.

"One more quick clarifications, from everything I've read*, heard, and remember from what grandma and her Jewish immigrant friends from the old pale of settlement told me firsthand, Jews were not allowed to own or run stores in the nineteenth and early twentieth century. Previously, they were money lenders and traders, but as restrictions became more severe and pogroms more frequent, Jews were almost all beneath even the status of serf or peasant during that period."

~ ~ ~ 

Note from JOY  2.3.2019: 

I am trying very hard to find more pieces of the Avram/Abe haKohen Mossman family tree. 

In Russia the names were:  Ismuzik, Ismasik and Ismosik but arriving the ship in Ellis Island these phonetic Russian names were changed to Mossman. Wish someone could give any deeper history of names and relatives. 

Who were Avram's parents and siblings? Greenwood Cemetery has no information because records were in fire. I've written to Abe and family's Atlanta synagogue rabbi, Congregation Shearith Israel and I'm waiting for archival reply.  Researched well Ellis Island ship manifest records. Wrote to people in Geneva from Russia with same name but they can't make connection. Abe's great nephews from his sibling Benjamin have no info.

- Joy Krauthammer

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