Tag #117090 - Interview #78547 (Leo Ginovker)

My father had studied in cheder and was quite well-educated. His first language was Yiddish, but he could speak and write Russian fluently. For several years after graduating from cheder, my father lived alone in a place called Dubrovny, also in Mohilev province. He worked in a bakery, first as an apprentice and later as a principal worker. When he thought he had saved up enough money, he decided he was ready to marry and start his own business. He had been acquainted with his future wife – my mother – since their childhood; their families lived close to each other.

My mother, Haya Ginovker, nee Vysotskaya, was born in 1878. Her parents were Fridman Vysotsky and Hanna Vysotskaya, nee Ratner. My mother didn’t study much as a child. She could speak, read and write Yiddish well, but she could only speak Russian. In order to marry, my father went to Lyady where my mother lived with her parents. I think that both my father’s and my mother’s families were very religious because my parents knew all the religious laws and traditions very well. I don’t know what my grandfathers’ occupations were, but their families were very poor. I remember my father said that if he and my mother had settled in Lyady they would have been just as poor as their parents. My parents got married in the spring of 1900; the wedding took place in the synagogue in Lyady.