Can't say for certain, but based off of the years that they came to America, I would say that their lives back home weren't too great, and they expected better here
My dearest friends family was in the camps. I reach water aerobics. One of the moves was called the solver walk. One couple (their family was nazi) called it the Gooshstomp. It really upset my friend. I very nicely asked them to stop.
They thought that was just hilarious and very funny and the insist on calling that name. So I changed it to the monster walk. They are no longer in my class by the way.
My great grandmother was nearly killed three times before coming to the U.S. Once she was trapped in the basement in an earth quake. Once she nearly got hit by a train. (the train hit the back of the ladder she was carrying across the tracks.)
My great grandfather went to New York because propaganda had been spread that in America you can move up in the system really quickly if you work hard. He went to NYC with one bag and his family counting on him to send money back home.
There were basically no jobs, had to scrape his way through the city doing small jobs for crap money, after a year of hard work he had saved a few hundred dollars and came back to Puerto Rico
My mothers family came from Britain in the 1700's before America was formed as an independent nation, and my fathers family came from Croatia in the early 1900's
Grandparents and my dad escaped from Cambodia during the Khmer Rouge and mass killings. Went to Thailand, got sponsored and came to New York then eventually cleveland. Where they are now.
The German side of my family escaped what ended up becoming East Germany. Though separated, each was fortunate enough to get out before the wall went up. A very, very close friend of the family lived through the Auschwitz concentration camp.
Life would have been very, very different for me if they hadn't, that's for sure...if I even would have come into existence that is. Maybe not since my grandmother would never have met my grandfather if she hadn't escaped.
One of the best books my husband and I have listen to is called. "The invisible bridge". It covers a Jewish family from before the war till after it. Little hard to get into but once you do your stuck.
My grandparents came from Ireland. They sent back 1/3 of everything they earned. When I went back and met the other side of the family they told me how that money supported several families and kept them from starving.
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