The unusual marriage of Eva Gazan and Ruben Koperberg

We all have ancestors whose marriages were at times unusual. For some it may have been where they married, or when they married, and for others it was who they married. In one instance it was how they married.
 In his book, Stories Of Our Fathers; a multi-generational narrative of the Gazan Family through sorrow and triumph (FHL book #929.273 G258g); Harold S. Gazan describes one of the more unusual marriages that I have read about. He writes;

 "Eva Gazan was born on 11 June 1895. She married Ruben Koperberg. He was born on 25 May 1895, in Amsterdam and died on 3 Mar 1997 in Baarn. Eva's marriage to Ruben was a "marriage of the glove". This means that Ruben was not present for the marriage ceremony that was held in Amsterdam. Ruben had already traveled to the Dutch East Indies. It was neither practical nor possible for him to return home for the wedding ceremony. Because Ruben and Eva were engaged, the marriage ceremony occurred with a representative of the groom who stood in for him."

He later goes on to tell how after the marriage ceremony, Eva, departed on the six week journey to be united with her new husband. I guess it just shows that not even long distance can stop true love.

Knowles Collection - Jews of Africa and Orient updated

The Knowles Collection continues to grow. Today, the Jews of Africa and the Orient databases has been updated to now include the records of almost 23,000 Jewish people. This is an increase of almost 50% since this database was last updated in February of 2013.  While the increase came from multiple sources the greater part of the growth came from burial records from Turkey.
The remaining databases will all be updated over the next month. The entire collection now contains the records of almost 800,000 people.

Pennsylvania, Pittsburgh City Deaths, 1870-1905

On the 26th of May, Familysearch added a new collection of records that will helpful for those researchers who have family in the state of Pennsylvania. The collection, Pennsylvania, Pittsburgh City Deaths, 1870-1905 contains over 160,000 images of the deaths recorded in Pittsburgh.

The records give a great deal of information about those whose deaths were recorded. A search for the death of Lazarus Cohen, who died in September of 1873, finds the record of his death on 19 September 1873. He was the son of Marks and Anna Cohen.

On the basic record above, it show him to be age 0, and does not tell us where he was buried. However, the original image which can be viewed for free (seen below) adds some additional information.

From the original source, we find that he died at the age of four days, the family lived at 265 Fifth Avenue and the name of the cemetery where he was buried. This is also a great example of why it is always a good idea to try and view the original document. We would have missed some great information had we not viewed it.