This is a photo of my father Isaac-Azriel Feiman. He was photographed shortly before he got married. He gave this photo to my mother and she kept it in our family album. This photo was taken in Tartu, by photographer H. Riedel, in 1910.
Unfortunately, I hardly have any information about my parents' families. My father's parents lived in Estonia, but I don't know where they lived. My grandfather died before I was born and my father's mother died when my father was just a child. My grandfather remarried. My father told me that my grandfather was a rigorous and austere man. He had a few children in both his marriages, but I didn't know any of my uncles or aunts. My father was born in 1888. He didn't enjoy his childhood. He was sent to study a vocation at an early age and started working at the age of 13. My father tanned skins for tanners. Later, he went to work as a supplier for a factory in Tartu. My father had a religious education. He studied in cheder and could read in Hebrew. His mother tongue was Yiddish.
My mother, Ethe, was born in 1893. I don't know anything about her childhood. She didn't like to talk about it. My parents got married in 1913. Their marriage was prearranged as they lived quite a distance from one another. They got married in Zagare and the Zagare rabbi registered their marriage. After they got married my mother moved in with her husband in Tartu. She became a housewife, which was quite common with married women at that time.
