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RP: Then your, I think it's, Ralph got sent to Austria for a while after, after the war was over?

MS: Yeah.

RP: Can you tell us a little bit about that?

MS: Well, let's see now. When we finished with the hostel, we moved to Elgin, and Ralph worked for the Brethren Service Commission, and he was working for M.R. Zigler. And when our first child was born in Elgin, well, there, we rented a house from somebody that had gone to Florida for the winter. And when they came back, we had to get out, so we found another house that we rented. And I know Ralph walked from there to the Brethren offices. [Interruption] We finally, then, they were gonna send five people to Japan, and Ralph decided he would like to go with them. It was an interdenominational group. And so we decided I didn't want to live back in Chicago, and we already had Janny, that was our oldest child. So we came back out here, and I stayed with my sister I think, we did. But then they chose the people to go to Japan, and they just chose five, and Ralph was number six, so he didn't get to go to Japan. So M.R. Zigler told him, well, he guessed he'd better just go to Europe, and he could start, help resettle people after the war over there. So my mom lived in Pomona, and my sister lived in Claremont. And we were at my mom's first, and our second child was born, I think while we were still living at my mom's. But, so Ralph decided he'd go to Europe. And you know, I've thought about this lately, and I couldn't understand how Ralph could go off and leave me here with two kids. But I think the reason he could is because there were people in the army that were gone, and there were many women left with the children, and their husbands were gone. So Ralph went, he went to Europe, and he started the work for the Brethren in Austria. And he was over there, like, I think it was... I don't know, it was twenty months or thirteen months without us, and we were right in Pomona. And we were gonna buy a house in Pomona, but at first I think we were just gonna pay so much and then so much a month. But they decided they wanted all cash or something, and we didn't have the cash, but my sister and brother-in-law did, so they bought the house, and so I moved into it. And we fixed this house, into two apartments, and my brother-in-law's brother (...) and his wife were in front, and the girls and I were in the back. And so we were there, I think it was... I don't know how many months, I think it was twenty.

And then Ralph got permission for us to come to Austria. And, of course, some of the people here thought we were crazy, for me taking two kids and going to Austria. And I said, "Well, the government wouldn't let us do it if it wasn't okay." And so finally, I took the two girls and we went to Austria. We had a kind of hard time finding a place to live over there. At first we lived with a man in a little apartment, and then in the Eighteen Bitzurk or something like that, we got an apartment. And we had, like a big bedroom and living room and kitchen, and it was part of somebody else's house. But they had a backyard, and it was on the street. But somehow I had to go shopping, and the government had a place where I could buy things. (It was) for the servicepeople that were over there. But I couldn't take the girls with me, and so I had to hire somebody to help me. And I had a little hard time finding somebody because, well, they had to speak some English and you couldn't find anybody. But the landlady where we had our apartment helped me find a nice young woman that, I guess spoke English. But I had a little trouble. I remember I had this one girl, and I must have raised my voice with her. "Don't cry me," she said. [Laughs]

RP: What kind of work was Ralph doing in Austria? Who was he working with?

MS: Well, he was working with the Protestants, and a man named Traar. Well, I'm trying to... I think that they were what they called the Volks Deutsch. They were really the German people that had been over in the Russian area, and they had to get out. So they were coming West, actually, into Austria. So I think they were finding places for them to live, and they also had... (to care for) the children somehow. They were working with the Volks Deutsch, that's what they called it, Volks Deutsch, but that (means) the German people, (they) had to get out of the Russian area. Of course, you know there were four powers over there, and they used to say there was Americans... I guess British, Russian... there was four, what's the four? French? No... they were riding around together in a jeep or something. Well, they had the Russian zone, and they had the, I guess, I started to say the British zone, but I guess it was American zone, I don't know.

RP: There was a British zone.

MS: I think they had the four powers, though, what was the fourth one? British, American, Russian...

RP: British, American, and French.

MS: Well, I guess so. You know, all that was so long ago, too. Because Marty was born in '46. So I think I was over there '48 and '49, something like that. Then Ralph decided that (as) he was already (an) ordained minister, (...) he had to get a theological education. So we came back to Bethany, and he was going to school there. So we got an apartment that time, up on the fourth floor, remember. No elevator, you walked up. And we lived there with Janny and Marty, we just had the two girls. And well, then what happened, we came out here for the summer or something, and we'd gone to the beach. I had a brother that lived down in Anaheim, and we'd all been to the beach. And our two families were split up, (riding) in different cars, and on the way home we had an accident and somebody ran into the car my brother was driving, and I was in it with Janny and Marty. And our oldest child was Janny, and she got thrown against the window in the car and she had a concussion and she never regained consciousness and she died. She was nine. It was kind of a very sad whole thing. But I think by that time... that must have been, it's funny, I think we already had Kenny, and he was born in, I think, '51. Oh, I can't remember all those years, I don't know just how that was. But anyway, we lost our nine-year-old child in an accident when we were out here. And I'd have to read my autobiography to tell you. I've got it all written down, but I can't come up with it right now.

<End Segment 13> - Copyright © 2008 Manzanar National Historic Site and Densho. All Rights Reserved.