Julius E. Noga

Life

References for this account: [1][2][3][4]

Where they lived

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The pins show approximate places. The line only joins them in time order; it does not prove the route travelled. 3 of the places listed above are recorded only as a county or country, so they are not pinned. Cemetery and burial places have red pins.

Historical context

These background articles explain the places, work, and events in this entry.

What we still don't know

• [SEQUENCE, STATED PLAINLY] He married Lottie Florence Mayer on **13 October 1914**, and **both were entered as single** — meaning neither had been married before, which is what the word means and is not a claim about children. Their daughter **Ruth was born in 1908**, six years earlier. So Ruth was born before her parents married. That is worth knowing rather than smoothing over: it means her birth may be registered under her mother's surname, **Mayer**, rather than Noga.
• [A DNA TEST IN THE DIRECT FAMILY BEARS ON THIS] An autosomal test taken by a living descendant shows a small but unambiguous **Ashkenazi Jewish** component, reported as eastern European. No such ancestry is documented anywhere in this archive. Until August 2026 the archive believed its Jewish line ran through Samuel Selig and Gussie Nathanson — and finding 117 removed that family entirely, having shown they were attached through the wrong Florence. **The Jewish ancestry is real; the paper trail for it is missing.** This page is one of a small number that could carry it. Percentages and the test itself are deliberately not published here. His wife was a **Florence Meyer**, whose own origins are unrecorded and who is the leading candidate for the family's documented-by-DNA Ashkenazi ancestry.
• **Where the Nogas actually came from is not settled, and the census answer may mislead.** Charles Noga is recorded as born in **Germany** about 1852 and as arriving in **1875**, with his two eldest sons born in **Michigan** in 1877 and 1879. But **Noga is a Polish surname**, not a German one — it is the Polish word for *leg* — and between 1871 and 1918 a great part of Poland was inside the German Empire. A Pole from Posen, Silesia or West Prussia would be entered as German by any American enumerator, and would have said German himself. So 'Germany' here is a statement about a passport, not about a people. **The distinction matters**: it decides whether this line runs back to a German parish register or a Polish one, and they are different archives in different languages. A passenger list for 1875, or a naturalisation, would name the town and end it.
• [COMPLICATION — STATED PLAINLY] The 1920 census enters him as **single**, living as a son in his father's house at Brooklyn AD 3. In 1915 he was head of his own household with Florence, 24, and Ruth, 6. **This is the same signal that got his brother John rejected as Ruth's father**, and it has to be faced rather than waved away. The ages agree exactly — 38 in 1915, 43 in 1920, both about 1877 — and both are Brooklyn Nogas, so this is almost certainly one man. The likeliest reading is that **Florence died or the marriage ended between 1915 and 1920**, Julius went home to his parents, and the enumerator wrote "S" where "Wd" belonged — a very common census shorthand for a man living as a son again. But a widowed column exists and was not used, and that is a real weakness in the identification. **What would settle it:** Ruth's own New York City birth certificate, about 1908-09, naming her father; or a death record for Florence Noga of Brooklyn between 1915 and 1920.
• [CONFLICT] Ruth's 1927 marriage record names her father **John**; this census names him **Julius**. Both are recorded. A New York birth certificate for Ruth would settle it.
• His own death. Nothing after the 1920 census has been found for him.

References

1. [1] Julius E. Noga household, 1915 New York State census, BrooklynBack to citation 1
2. [2] Julius E. Noga in the Charles Noga household, 1910 and 1920 censuses, BrooklynBack to citation 2
3. [3] Charles Noga household, 1920 United States census, Brooklyn Assembly District 3Back to citation 3
4. [4] Marriage of Julius Edward Noga and Lottie Florence Mayer, Manhattan, 13 October 1914Back to citation 4

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