I'm Bessie's great-great-granddaughter, and I've seen that tombstone in person a few times. One of the letters is obscured by damage but I am convinced that the letter is Zayin, not Vav, and in Yiddish Ayin is an "e" sound, not an "a" sound, making the father's name Avraham Zelig, not Avraham v'Alig. I have a close DNA match who apparently connects through Bessie's brother or cousin and his ancestor also has the name Zelig, though on the tombstone at Roosevelt the name is just Zelig (not Abraham Zelig) and it is spelled differently (Zayin-Yod-Lamed-Yod-Qof). Still it seems like more than a coincidence, as soon as I found out that his ancestor's name was Zelig I realized that Zelig had to be what was on the Bessie's stone.
I'm Bessie's great-great-granddaughter, and I've seen that tombstone in person a few times. One of the letters is obscured by damage but I am convinced that the letter is Zayin, not Vav, and in Yiddish Ayin is an "e" sound, not an "a" sound, making the father's name Avraham Zelig, not Avraham v'Alig. I have a close DNA match who apparently connects through Bessie's brother or cousin and his ancestor also has the name Zelig, though on the tombstone at Roosevelt the name is just Zelig (not Abraham Zelig) and it is spelled differently (Zayin-Yod-Lamed-Yod-Qof). Still it seems like more than a coincidence, as soon as I found out that his ancestor's name was Zelig I realized that Zelig had to be what was on the Bessie's stone.
Inscription
The Hebrew inscription says:
Our dear mother Batyah bat Avraham Zelig [Bessie daughter of Abraham Zelig]
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