Gherda Kagan’s paternal grandfather Samuel Kagan

This is my paternal grandfather Samuel Kagan. This photo was made in Odessa in 1890. My paternal grandfather Samuel Kagan was born in Mogilyov town in 1860. In Odessa he was a clerk in a store. My father said that grandfather was a member of Odessa society of support of clerks. On Friday, when grandfather's working week came to an end he looked into his son's sins in a past week. His children waited for this moment with trepidation and tried to delay it as far as they could. They knew that as punished they might not be allowed to have their favorite delicacy: khalva. Their trick was in asking mother for another cup of tea and them she added some more khalva in their saucers. From what my father told me I know that grandfather Samuel, like many Jews who had come up in life from its very bottom didn't admire the tsarist regime and supported revolutionaries with money. Grandfather Samuel died of cholera during an epidemic in Odessa in 1920. He was buried in the Jewish cemetery.