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5-Coming to America
On your trip to America, you mentioned that there was a story about the name of the ship?
Oh, the ship was called the "Count of Monte Cristo." It was called the "Conte de Savoya," "The Count of Savoya" rather. Did you want to know something else about the ship?
Why is it that you remember the name so well?
Well, my goodness, it was the ship to take us to freedom. I knew that. I could pronounce that name so well. There was so much drama connected with that ship. The drama went on for three months. Just being on the ship for seven or ten days, I forget now, was full of angst, and also playfulness on my part.
How did seeing the Nazis on board of the ship, affect what you thought about going to America?
We were told that these were Americans, but they were Nazi sympathizers, and they could be as dangerous as Nazis. We were to absolutely behave so that we would not draw attention to ourselves. So, we were very frightened of them.
But as I say, on the other hand, I was a little girl. I was eight, and I found friends. We did all kinds of things that we could have been punished actually, because it's very interesting though this is a war time, and these American Nazis returning home- they don't want to be caught in a war- they still had a tier system. There were three classes on the ship,: the lower class, the middle class, and the highest class. We friends would sneak around and find our way to the highest class, and see what was going on there. What was going on there was that everybody dressed formally for dinner, and they had an orchestra, and they were dancing. It's a bit of surrealism. We loved watching them, in that secret spot. Now, if we were caught it would have been very bad, but when you're very little you take chances.
Could you describe the month in Genoa before you left for America?
We stayed there for three weeks. We stayed in a little hotel. The Jews had to – I think its in the previous interview – get off the ship. Everyone had to get off the ship after they were on the ship. They got on the ship and we stayed there three days and were told to disembark. We were standing there as a small group of Jews not knowing what we were going to do with ourselves. We had no money, it was all spent, and very soon a committee arrived of Jews. There was a Jewish organization in Genoa and they knew about what was happening with this ship and with the Jews who were stranded. They worked it out for us and they put us up in a couple of little hotels which I understand had been brothels.
So we stayed there for the three weeks. Actually, it was very nice to be there. I suddenly had freedom that I didn't have for a whole year. It was close to the harbor and I would go by myself and watch the big ships come in – being unloaded and being loaded and becoming familiar to a lot of the dock workers. They would give me things and I would take them and eat them: grapes, candies. I took everything they gave me. I wasn't scared. Again, my mother trusted that nothing would happen to me. It's not like today. You tell your children never to speak to a stranger. This is a different time.
Did you feel sad leaving?
No, no I wanted desperately to leave with the ship. I knew this was a temporary stay I didn't know anything about the politics of Italy and Mussolini, I learned to know about later on. But I had a good time. I had a good time on the ship too. You know in a strange way because I could block out the scary part if I wanted to.
Were you more excited to see your father in America or going to America?
That’s hard to say. I imagine I was very happy to see him because he was alive and he was well, although he didn't look good but then to young children their parents always looked very old, you know. Seeing him was as important as being in America.
When you first saw the Statue of Liberty did you have your own understanding of what that meant?
Well, everybody on the ship felt this tremendous sense of awe because it meant freedom to everybody on a different level for different people. The Nazis returning were happy to see the Statue of Liberty. They were not going to be in this war and might get killed by Americans, in fact bombers. So everybody was absolutely quiet. You could hear a pin drop as the ship passed the Statue of Liberty. It was a great moment.
Did you remember experiencing any anti-Semitism when you got to America?
When we got to America? No I never did. I didn't experience it in Boston, where we lived many years, where I went to school, as I told you, where the kids were mean to me. But they weren't mean to me because I was Jewish. I don't think they even understood that. They were just mean because little kids like to pick on other kids. Somebody who is vulnerable is going to get it, but I managed to get above that.
When your father left for America did it ever enter your mind that you might not see him again?
It didn't enter my mind. I just knew he was safe. I didn't think about things could happen on the way, he could get arrested again. My head wasn't working that way. He was safe.
Did you think about him a lot, do you remember missing him?
A little bit. I mean I have little memories of that.
Did he change at all when he came to America?
Yes, it seemed to me he had changed quite a bit. Of course, it was so fast, as I explained, when the lawyer got him out of jail and brought him back to Baden and that he was whisked away the following day. There was very little time to observe him and I wouldn't be in that state of mind to observe him then and compare him again when I saw him. But when I saw him in the United States, I was, of course by that time, I had become very much mature, too. So I then took a look at him and I saw that he looked like a different person than I had remembered him. He was totally white; his hair was all white and at the time he was thirty-eight years old.
Where did you meet him when the ship came in?
Well, we came into New York and he was living in Boston and then we were helped by an organization called HIAS which stands for Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society. It was their job to meet refugees coming into the United States and helping to get them to the locations that they were bound to. So they put us on a train after we had lunch in their shelter and we went to Boston and that’s where we saw him.
You mentioned in the previous interview that you overheard an argument between your father and your cousin can you talk more about that?
Oh yes, that’s a great scene. I totally love it. I woke up very early in the morning and I've already described to you in a number of scenes that I sort of gave the impression of being this tiny little sweet, obedient little child, but there was this other part of me that took chances and great risks, like on the ship or later on going roller skating with sailors at the age of thirteen. Now, guess what? I forgot your question.
The argument?
Oh yes. I woke up very early in the morning and I wanted to look around the house before anybody was awake. So I got dressed in my very nice clothes that’s the clothes we bought. I went down the stairs very quietly not to awaken anyone but as I was approaching the kitchen I heard my father having this terrible argument with our cousin whom we called Uncle Tritter, although he wasn't an uncle. He was a second cousin to my mother.
They were having a horrible argument and I was standing by the kitchen and I didn't know where to hide. I didn't want them to see me because I was doing something that I shouldn't. That was my interpretation. I shouldn't be up. I should be coming down with my mother and sister. I shouldn't be sneaking around the house alone. So I saw this big kitchen table, this big table, not like a kitchen table, bigger, with a table cloth that went all the way down to the ground. I scooted underneath there and they came into the kitchen. They sat down and they had this terrible argument, where my father yelled at him. "He was a communist," he yelled at him and I guess while we were away they must have had lots of discussions between communism and noncommunist and religious people and their beliefs. My father said to him, "What do you mean all the good things the communists did for the Jews?" screaming at him like that, banging on the table with his fist. I'm sitting underneath there, you know, like that and Uncle Tritter said "Well, he liberated them. There were no more pogroms and no more ghettos." Then my father's answer was, "Fine liberation. They took their synagogues away from them, their right to practice their own religion. You call that liberation?" That was the fight that was going on. Then, they stormed out, my father stormed out. He couldn't take it anymore. Then Uncle Tritter stayed. Do you remember that scene?
No one ever found out?
I think Uncle Tritter knew because I had peeked out to see what was going on and he was standing by the stove. I took one very quiet step out and stood up and he must have heard something because he suddenly turned around. He never said to me, "Oh you were under the table the whole time listening to me." He didn't say that. He just was smiling and he offered me cocoa, while smiling and laughing. I was so embarrassed, I said, "No, I couldn't have any. I had a belly ache," and he laughed and he said, "Oh yes okay." But every time I saw him he would ask me did I have a belly ache that day and try to tell me that he knew I was under the table cloth but he never really came out and said it. Maybe he didn't want to embarrass this little girl, this little shy goody-good.
Did your father resume his work in the United States?
He did but he was profoundly unhappy. You see, he was a learned man. He was ordained. It was a holy position that he had. And who were his companions in the work place? The people who would come to the slaughter house were butchers and of course they were on another rung. They were sort of ignorant. They didn't know anything about the Talmud. They didn't even know a word of Hebrew. They couldn't even read Hebrew. He disliked the company he was in and then physically he was a changed man, too. He had aged tremendously and the badness and the bad news that was coming from Europe, he was totally broken up. He was not his young self as he had been prior to the Anschluss.
Did your parents stay Orthodox?
Oh yes, they became even more fanatical.
What about you what did you think about your religion?
I liked my religion. I didn't know of any other religion. The Friday nights the Shabbat continued to be like an oasis of happiness. It was the one day of the night and the day it was the one time of the whole week when there was a lightness where my father was transformed into a whole other person. He sang. He was joyous. We drank sweet wine and had delicious food. We were very poor in the United States, very poor, poorer than in Europe because he didn't work enough. He didn't bring home enough money. He gave to charity all the time in spite of that because that’s what the Jewish law was that you give charity. He was a very religious man and fulfilled the laws.
