Other than his name and the fact that Sara Lea Hurwicz (née Frydland) was his granddaughter, all I have been told about Abichke* “Ragoler” – the earliest known ancestor in the Frydland/Kocyn/Hurwicz line – is that he operated a karczma (Polish for “inn” or “tavern”). Innkeeping was a traditional Jewish occupation in Poland from the 16th through the 18th centuries, in part because Jews tended to be more literate, numerate and sober than other segments of rural Polish society, causing nobles to prefer them as leaseholders of the taverns. (See “Tavernkeeping” in YIVO Encyclopedia.)

Leo told me that “Ragoler” meant “from the town of Eiragola” (or Ejragola) in Lithuania. Since “Abichke” is a nickname for “Abraham”, “Abichke Ragoler” means “Abie from Eiragola.”

Although I have seen “Abbiszke (‘Ragoler’) Frydland” in a family tree, my father always referred to him simply as “Abichke Ragoler”. My guess is that Abichke, like many Jews born in the early 19th century, did not use a surname. Quite likely, his son Cheskel Frydland was the first known person in that line of descent to take a surname, as many Ashkenazi Jews were compelled to do by order-seeking governments in the early 19th century.

This name “Ragoler” is, of course, another strong indicator of our family roots in Lithuania: As of June, 2017, https://lastnames.myheritage.com/last-name/Ragoler indicated that people with the last name “Ragoler” were living 75% in Israel and 25% in Lithuania. So I think it’s safe to say that Abbiszke “Ragoler” Frydland-Friedland was a Lithuanian Jew!

(Our family has other connections to Lithuania, as well. The family tree says that Max Hurwicz‘s brother, Moses, was born in Lithuania in 1869. Klara Samuels says in “God Does Play Dice” (p. 19) that her mother’s family was in Vilnius in Lithuania. When Klara’s family became refugees in World War II, their immediate goal was to get to Vilnius.)

* “Abichke” may be just a phonetic spelling. I have also seen it spelled “Abbiszke”, which I believe would be a phonetic spelling in Polish. (Although “sz” in Polish is pronounced like the English “sh” rather than like the English “ch”.)