An Immigrant’s Dream: Emanuel Ciner’s Story
1901- 1958
Emanuel Ciner’s Marriage to Dora Fischlowitz
In 1901 Emanuel, at age 36, married Dora Fischlowitz, who was 24.[1] It was an “arranged marriage” as their grandfathers knew each other in Cracow.[2]
Dora was born on October 11, 1877 in New York City. Dora’s parents, Isaac Fischlowitz (Fischlowicz) (1843-1918) and Anna Rochinger (Rauchinger) (1841-1929), were born in Cracow. On both sides, their ancestors can be traced back to the early 18th century. Anna Rauchinger immigrated to America from Crakow via Hamburg on the steamer Saxonia arriving in November 1, 1865; she traveled in steerage and seemed to be traveling on her own.[3] Israel (Isaac) arrived in December 17, 1866 on the Neckar from Hamburg. He left Hamburg on October 15 on a sailing ship; his accommodation was in steerage. His stated that he was from Krakau and his occupation was hatter (arrival manifest) and furrier (embarkation manifest).[4] Anna and Isaac married in 1868.[5] In New York City, Isaac began as a peddler and lived at 34 Orchard St.[6]. He became a naturalized citizen in 1884. By 1884, Isaac listed himself as a merchant of men’s furnishing goods, and the family lived at 297 ½ Greenwich Street.[7] In 1897 the family lived at 1708 Lexington Avenue and in 1898 at 71 East 107th Street.[8]
All of Isaac and Anna’s children graduated from college. Gustave Grant (Gus) (1869-1924), graduated from City College (1889) and Columbia Medical School (1892), and became a medical doctor.[9] By 1902 he established a medical practice at 1298 Madison Avenue and was affiliated with The German Hospital (in 1918, named Lenox Hill Hospital).[10] Abram (1870-1941), graduated from the University of the City of New York as a civil engineer in 1895 and became an architect and school principal in Brooklyn.[11] Bertha (1874-1957), graduated from Normal College in 1893, and Sarah (1881-1939) graduated in 1900.[12] Normal College accepted girls of all ethnic backgrounds; acceptance was based on entrance examinations. The young women were trained to be teachers. In 1914 Normal College was renamed Hunter College.
Dora graduated from Normal College in 1896.[13] When she and her sisters studied at Normal College, several of Emanuel’s cousins were there. After college Dora taught school for 7 years.[14]
The Fischlowitz family shortened its surname to “Fisch” in July 1917 during World War I. Isaac and Anna Rochinger Fisch were buried in Washington Cemetery, Brooklyn in the Congregation Agudath Achim M’Krakauer burial plot.
Emanuel and Dora Ciner’s Family
Emanuel and Dora had three sons: Irwin born in 1902; Charles R. (Charlie) born in 1904; and Leonard Fisch born in 1907. They moved uptown to West 119th Street and Lenox Avenue in a four or five-story building. By 1910 the family lived at West 110th Street and Central Park North.[15] By 1915 they lived at 249 West 107th Street and Broadway in a building with elevators near a park.[16]
Dora and Emanuel kept a kosher home. The family belonged to Ansche Chesed Synagogue at 114th Street and 7th Avenue. The Conservative Synagogue’s membership was mostly Jews with German origins. In 1908, the congregation “built a pillared, neo-classical temple.” [17]
Each son celebrated his Bar Mitzvah at Ansche Chesed Synagogue.[18]
Leah Eisenberg Ciner moved to Brooklyn to help her daughter, Lizzie Wasserberg, with her family and their children’s clothes store.[23] Leah would go by trolley or subway to Emanuel’s home in Manhattan once a week, often for Shabbat dinner, bringing chocolate pennies for her grandsons.[24] Leah died in 1921 at age 80 and was buried in Washington Cemetery, next to Isaac.
In 1914 at Mt. Sinai Hospital, Dora had one of the first successful operations on a brain tumor that left her with one glass eye. Nevertheless, she remained active. She was president of Bathia Lodge No. 10, United Order of True Sisters in 1925-1926 and was a lifelong member of Bathia Lodge No. 8.[19] United Order of True Sisters (U.O.T.S), a national German-Jewish women’s organization, was founded in 1846 in New York City.
Before joining his father in the jewelry business, Irwin took courses at City College and Columbia University in engineering, bookkeeping and design, and Charles took courses at Columbia University. Irwin joined his father in 1920; Charles, in 1922.
Emanuel and Dora’s youngest son Leonard Fisch Ciner did not go into the jewelry business. With considerable sacrifice to the family, he went to Union College and graduated from Harvard and Yale Medical School. With the help of his uncle, Dr. Gustav Fisch, he became affiliated as an obstetrician with Lenox Hill Hospital (the first doctor to do so who had not graduated from Columbia Medical School). In World War II Leonard saw active duty as a Lt. Commander in the Naval Medical Corps. Reserve.[20]
Between 1926 and 1930, the family moved to 50 West 96th Street.[21] They then joined Temple Israel on the Westside at Broadway and 91st Street. It was a Reform congregation with Conservative customs as well. Its members (numbering 950 by 1929) had German origins.
As with many Jewish men, Emanuel was a Free Mason; he was a member of Perfect Ashlar Lodge No. 604 A.F. & A. M. (Ancient Free and Accepted Masons) for 52 years.[22] Charles became a member of that lodge in 1926 and Irwin was a Mason as well.
More than Eight Decades in America
In 1950, Emanuel and Dora lived at 27 West 96th Street.
Emanuel and Dora celebrated their 50th Anniversary in 1951 with a formal meal and reception at the Hotel Pierre. Guests included close and distant relatives as well as family friends.
Relationship with Rabbi Stephen Wise
Emanuel had a special relationship with the renown Rabbi Stephen Wise (1874, Budapest-1949). Dora’s brother, Gustav Fischlowitz, married Ella Wise, the sister of Rabbi Stephen Wise in 1897. Rabbi Wise (with his sister and brother-in-law, Ella Wise Fisch and Dr. Gustav G. Fisch) founded the Free Synagogue in New York City in 1907.[25] Rabbi Wise was “a champion for social justice, civil rights, and the Jewish people, …one of the most prominent US Jewish leaders of the 20th century. Among his many accomplishments, Wise cofounded the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People in 1914, founded the American Jewish Congress in 1920, became president of the Zionist Organization of America in 1936, and served as a member of President Roosevelt’s Advisory Commission on Political Refugees from 1938 to 1945.”[26]
Rabbi Stephen Wise officiated at Irwin’s and Charles’s weddings.
Emanuel and Dora purchased a perpetual care plot in Westchester Hills Cemetery, Memorial Park of Rabbi Stephen Wise’s Free Synagogue located in the suburbs north of New York City. The cemetery was established in 1929.
Emanuel worked until a week before his death at age 93 in 1958.[27]
Notes
[1] NYC Marriages 1686-1980.
[2] Irwin Ciner, interview. Emily Ciner Rose, 1997.
[3] Germans to America, Vol. 16, Nov. 1864-November 1865, 430. Ship manifest: Ancestry.com. New York, Passenger and Crew Lists (including Castle Garden and Ellis Island), 1820-1957 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2010. Embarkation Manifest: Staatsarchiv Hamburg; Hamburg, Deutschland; Hamburger Passagierlisten; Volume: 373-7 I, VIII A 1 Band 019; Page: 962; Microfilm No.: K_1710.
[4] Germans to America, Vol. 18, June 1866-December 1866. Ship departure:. Staatsarchiv Hamburg; Hamburg, Deutschland; Hamburger Passagierlisten; Volume: 373-7 I, VIII A 1 Band 020; Page: 1177; Microfilm No.: K_1712. Ship manifest arrival: Ancestry.com. New York, Passenger and Crew Lists (including Castle Garden and Ellis Island), 1820-1957 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2010.
[5] Germans to America, Vol. 18, June 1866-December 1866. Ship departure:. Staatsarchiv Hamburg; Hamburg, Deutschland; Hamburger Passagierlisten; Volume: 373-7 I, VIII A 1 Band 020; Page: 1177; Microfilm No.: K_1712. Ship manifest arrival: Ancestry.com. New York, Passenger and Crew Lists (including Castle Garden and Ellis Island), 1820-1957 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2010. Isaac Fischlowitz, Naturalization card, December 13, 1884.
[6] New York City Directory 1883, 384.
[7] Naturalization card, December 13, 1884. New York City Directories- 1884, 529; 1885, 545; 1886, 594; 1889, 619; 1890, 621; 1897, 449; 1903, 860.
[8] New York City Directory 1897, 449. New York City Directory 1899, 405.
[9] New York City Directories- 1897, p. 449; 1898, p. 405.
[10] New York City Directories 1902, 998; 1906, 825.
[11] New York Times, June 7, 1895.
[12] Commencement Program, Normal College,1893, 10, 12. Commencement Program, Normal College, 1900, 24.
[13] Commencement Program, Normal College, 1896, 25.
[14] Dora Ciner Obituary, Scarsdale Inquirer, New York, July 21, 1955
[15] New York City Directory 1910, 251.
[16] New York City Directory 1916, 399; Bar Mitzvah Announcement, Irwin Ciner, New York Times, Aug 29, 1915; US Census, 1920; Trow’s New York City Directory, 1925.
[17] http://www.anschechesed.org
[18] Announcement, Irwin Ciner Bar Mitzvah, New York Times, August 29, 1915.
[19] Dora Ciner Obituary, New York Times, July 21, 1955.
[20] Certificate of Service, signed by Secretary of the Navy James Forrestal, August 27, 1946.
[21] US Census, 1930; Polk’s New York City Street and Avenue Guide, 1933-4; Cruise boat manifest, December 23, 1936.
[22] Emanuel Ciner Obituary, New York Times, February 10, 1958. Westchester Hills Cemetery,
Hastings-on-Hudson, Westchester County, New York. Section: WCH Plot: 534.
[23] US Census 1910. Interview with Suzanne Wasserberg Klapper and Lorraine Wasserberg Rumpler. Emily Ciner Rose, 2002.
[24] Irwin Ciner, interview. Emily Ciner Rose, 1997.
[25] Obituary, Mrs. Gustav G. Fisch, New York Times, February 20, 1967.
[26] History, Steven Wise Free Synagogue.
[27] Westchester Hills Cemetery, Hastings-on-Hudson, Westchester County, New York. Section: WCH Plot: 534. Emanuel Ciner’s birthdate was not correct in some documents and his obituary; he died at age 93.