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MA: And what's your daughter's name?

BU: Her name is Barbara. So she has a dual citizenship, British and American, U.S.

MA: So your kids really grew up moving all over and living in new places.

BU: So they saw, yeah, Barbara doesn't remember England at all. From there, we went one year in France, and the two younger ones don't remember that at all. And Chris, though, the oldest one, started school while in England, so she remembers England. And there, the Air Force sent her to what we call private school. They referred to it as a public school where they wore uniforms and all. And so she started kindergarten there and first grade. And then we went to France. Interesting note here is that while we were in England, most of the wives had nannies to, for the children, and a lot of 'em had hired young girls from Germany. And so when we got there, my wife, Yas, contacted one of the (wives), and their German girl got a nanny from Germany for us. So she came to live with us in England, then we got transferred to France, and she stayed in England, Waltraud is her name. She came over when she was nineteen, and then she couldn't speak a word of English when she came to England. Only thing she knew was "Hello." And then we went to France, she didn't originally join us there, but then later on she came and joined us and lived with us again. And when we left France in 1959, she was fluent in English. She, very bright girl. She had a tough childhood, and, but she was a smart gal, and she spoke very well. We didn't... well, we kind of kept in touch loosely for about a few years, then we didn't hear from her at all. And a few years ago, all of a sudden, we hear from Waltraud. And she called us on the, talked to my wife on the phone, she was back in the area where she came from, but we made contact. And then just couple months ago, my oldest daughter Chris started getting contact with Waltraud through e-mail, and Waltraud wants to come to the United States to see us. So she came a couple weeks ago and stayed with Chris for two weeks. She hadn't spoken any English for fifty years. When we picked her up at the airport, she could still understand, but she couldn't speak very well, she had to think about it and translate. But we knew after talking with her for a while that her English was going to come back because she still understood. And just amazingly, we put her on the airplane here last Thursday, sent her home, and sure enough, her English proficiency was really good. She can get by anywhere in the United States and not have to worry.

MA: That's great.

BU: But she said, looking back on it, she learned her English from Chris, the oldest daughter, 'cause she was watching her. Patty, not that much, because for one thing, Patty was a late... but her, most of her English was learned from Chris, just talking with Chris and Yas, of course. It was really interesting to get to see, to talk with her, and this was her very first vacation she's ever had. First airplane trip she's ever been on. And for the two weeks she was here, she really, really, between my daughter and us, we really showed her a lot. I saw things that I'd never seen before, like Alcatraz. [Laughs] She's a bright girl, and she's had a tough life, yeah. She married, turned out it wasn't a good marriage, I don't, she kind of implied that it was abusive type of thing. I know her, her father was abusive, and I think it was, part of the abuses was sexual abuse. And then her husband, he passed away about seven years ago. But she just had a rough life. She's got some fingers that are all catawampus, and she broke her, she's been training people to ride horses, and she's feeding horses and things and broke her fingers and never went to a doctor about it, she just guts it out.

MA: That's great you were able to reunite with her.

BU: Yeah, it was really something. Yeah, that was fun.

<End Segment 22> - Copyright ©2008 Densho and the Topaz Museum. All Rights Reserved.