Anyway, today I looked for Papa Joe's parents' birth records and Mama Manya's parents' birth records, as well as records of Mama Manya's grandfather living in Zborow in the 19th century. Papa Joe's father's record was the easiest to find: in that set of documents, the newborn child's name was listed clearly, and both parents' names were given. I found the record that Nachman Birnberg (Papa Joe's father) was born in 1880 to David Salamon Kerner and Ruchel Birnberg in Kolomyja. Yes, his father's last name was Kerner and his mother's was Birnberg, but for whatever reason, Nachman (and in turn his family) used the Birnberg family name. We had known, though, that he used the name Kerner in business. And it was funny--my mom always said that there was some point in the family when someone took their mother's last name, and there it was on paper (well, microfilm). The record also listed Ruchel Birnberg's parents' names, so now I can say I know not only some of my great-great-grandparents' names, but also some of my great-great-great-grandparents' names!
I was unsuccessful in finding Papa Joe's mother's birth record because although we know she was born in 1896, the listings for that year (and for 1895 and 97) only list the child's mother's name, and her last name. Again, last name confusion, because there's no way to tell if the child took the mother's or the father's last name, and if they took the father's, then it's impossible to tell what that name is from the record. This was also the case of the records for Mama Manya's father's birth--although I found some records of children with the same name as his, we don't know what his mother's name was, and none of the surnames were Nussenbaum. One record, though, did have a reference to an Isak Nissenbaum, so I'll have to investigate that further. The records for Mama Manya's mother's birth are apparently not in the AGAD archive, although they're more than 100 years old, so I'll have to investigate that further as well.
The last things I looked at were the birth records from Zborow from between 1880 and 1890. We had seen in records in Ternopil that Moses Wolfzahn, Mama Manya's maternal grandfather, had come to Zborow in 1880, but those records didn't say from where. They also listed whom we think was his wife at the time. After looking through the records, I learned a few things. First, the first two birth records with Moses Wolfzahn listed as the father said that he was from Zalosce, another city in Poland, and they also listed his middle name--Isak. His wife's name was Menje (or Menie), but I saw in records online that she passed away young, so it would make sense that he had a second wife by the 30's, the date of the records from Ternopil. Also, Mama Manya had written in some papers that she was named after a grand-aunt, so perhaps she was named after this Menie, which is close to Manya. The records also listed Menie's parents' names, and they were Labiners--a name I had known was connected with Mama Manya's family.
Anyway, I've requested more records for tomorrow--mostly marriage records for Kolomyja to find Nachman Birnberg's marriage to his first wife. And it's finally supposed to be sunny, which means a possible sightseeing tour!
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