The Drachman Family
Values Codes I – H – E – L – P
Philip Drachman (1833-1899) was born in the Russian Pale of Settlement in 1833 and left for America at the age of sixteen to avoid conscription into the Russian Army.
Drachman met Michael “Big Mike” Goldwater (1821-1903) on a ship traveling from London to New York and they became friends for life.
Drachman followed Goldwater, first to California, then to the Arizona Territory, arriving in Tucson in 1865.
In 1867, Philip invited his younger brother, Samuel Drachman (1837-1911), to join him and he did.
Soon thereafter, their sister Augusta arrived from Russia with her husband, Hyman Goldberg (1818-89), and they settled in Yuma.
Philip Drachman ventured into Arizona politics immediately upon his arrival in Tucson.
He was elected to the Territorial legislature in 1867, was voted onto the Tucson city council four times (1874-1877) and, in 1874-1875, was chosen Tucson’s mayor pro tempore.
Hyman Goldberg served on the Yuma city council in 1873 and won a legislative seat in 1874.
Samuel Drachman won a legislative seat in 1874 and was elected to the Tucson school board several times.
Starting in 1893, the next generation of the Drachman clan launched their own political careers. Aaron Goldberg (1860-1933), Hyman’s son, was elected to the Phoenix city council in 1893 and won a second term in 1898.
Philip’s son, Harry Drachman (1869-1961), served a term as Tucson treasurer (1895-98) and was elected treasurer of Pima County (where Tucson is located) in 1898 and 1900.
In 1906-11, Philip’s other son, Moses Drachman (1870-1935), was elected to the Tucson city council three times and, in 1914, he won a two-year term in the state senate.
In 1922, after a long hiatus from politics, Harry Drachman won a two year term in the state senate and ended his political career as Pima County assessor in 1927-30.
In 1960, Aaron Goldberg’s grandson, Chet Goldberg Jr. (1924-2009), won the first of two terms in the Arizona House, and then served one term in the senate, where he was chosen as Republican majority leader.
Philip Drachman
Samuel Drachman
Source
- Mark Rutzik, Breaking New Ground: The Untold Story of Early America’s Jewish Electoral Pioneers – 1788 to 1920, 2025.
Mark Rutzick is the curator of this Drachman Family exhibit.
