Ruth Doctor Egert

Turner: I wondered if we could begin by your giving us your given name and your birth date and birth place? 
EGERT: My given name is Ruth Rachel Doctor, just like any doctor, and I was born January 18, 1913 in Vienna, Austria. 

Turner: I would like you to begin by telling me a little bit about your family, who was in it, the very early times in Vienna. What it was like just when you were a little girl. 
EGERT: Well, I had a very happy childhood. I was the youngest of three daughters and we were southern.

Turner: Your sister’s names… 
EGERT: My sister’s names… the oldest was Clara and the middle one was Celia. And we were very close in age. They were five and four years older than I so I was the little one always running after them. And I guess my parents were middle-class Jewish people. They were, we were, very religious people. We belonged to a little shul, what they called a little synagogue, you know, and we children participated in all the religious things that happened, festivals and so on. I had a lot of young gentile little girlfriends in the neighborhood. We went to school together and I point this out because later, when Hitler came, they went on a different side of the street to avoid speaking to us–after all these years of being friends. It was very painful. 

Turner: What part of Vienna were you born and brought up in and the name of the shul? 
EGERT: Well, where I was born was not a very Jewish neighborhood. It was the Third District, Vienna’s residential district. And then later on we moved to a more Jewish neighborhood because I guess our parents wanted us to be more with Jewish children. Then again we moved when I was about 12. We moved further out, closer to the Danube, which was again a less Jewish neighborhood and again I had a lot of gentile friends. We never thought of anything about it. 

Turner: Now, I’m going to have to take you chronologically. Let’s go back to the first house that you remember and ….
EGERT: It wasn’t a house; it was an apartment. 

Turner: If you can even tell me what it was like, what your dad did, what your mother did. 
EGERT: My mother was of course, a housewife, cooking and cleaning and Friday making a big dinner, you know. It was very important to us children. We all helped along. My father was in furniture manufacturing. I guess we were not rich but we were just middle class. I never had anything really missing and growing up in Vienna was really lots of fun. We had lots of music, theater. From teenage on I went almost every week to either an opera performance or theater and we thought life was good. 

Turner: What were some of the highlights for you of your early life? 
EGERT: Highlight? Well, really I think when I first started ice-skating and skiing. I thought it was just wonderful. Vienna is surrounded by beautiful woods–very similar to Portland–the Vienna woods. We had a really, when I look back, a very good life. I was able to study. I became a kindergarten teacher for the city of Vienna. 

Turner: Now that is later on, right? A little bit? 
EGERT: Not really. 

Turner: Well, what school did you go to? 
EGERT: The regular schools. 

Turner: You see I didn’t grow up in Vienna. 
EGERT: Yes, I forgotten. Grade schools, I guess the fifth. Public school. .. and then similar to high school but we only went to the age of 16. And then when I was 16 I had the choice either to go to a gymnasium, which would be … what would that be… I can’t really place it. It is not quite college and it is not high school any more. I had the choice and I chose to become a kindergarten teacher. And we had, the Vienna city had, a special school for kindergarten teachers. They called it seminar, it was a four-year teaching school. And we did some work after two years. We worked without money, without payment. What would you call it, like doctors do? 

Turner: Like an internship? 
EGERT: Internship. So by the age of 20 I was a full-blown kindergarten teacher and immediately employed by the city government. 

Turner: In a school? 
EGERT: In a kindergarten, yes. 

Turner: You mentioned that you moved from your first apartment. How old were you when you moved the first time? 
EGERT: I must have been about seven because in my first grade I lived in that neighborhood. And from the second grade on we moved to a more Jewish neighborhood. 

Turner: And that neighborhood, did it have a name like we have in Portland here? 
EGERT: No, just the streets you know. 

Turner: Was it in the same district, or different? 
EGERT: No, it was in Second District. You’re right. The First District, this was second. No, we lived in the Third District, that is where I was raised and we moved to the Second District which had more synagogues and so on. 

Turner: When you said your family was religious, do you mean Orthodox or could you describe a little bit?
EGERT: I would say my parents were Orthodox. 

Turner: As you think back on it now, what would that mean in terms of your practices on a daily, weekly?
EGERT: My father would say prayer in the morning, every morning you know. And we celebrated Friday night, Saturday and all the religious holidays. We children went along until we were teenagers and started to rebel, of course, which all teenagers do. [laughter] 

Turner: Your rebellion was … ? 
EGERT: Well, we would… for instance, you are not supposed to eat pork as Jews. We would eat wieners with pork in them but mother didn’t know about it. Things like this, just you know how teenagers are? 

Turner: I know how they are now but I’m not sure I know how they were then. 
EGERT: Quite innocent compared with what is going on now. 

Turner: What were your mother and dad like? Can you describe their personalities a little bit? 
EGERT: My father was the man of the house. You know we loved him but we were quite scared of him. When mother would say, “You don’t do that or I am going to tell Daddy,” we did everything. She was very giving and was very kind. I never remember her saying anything wrong to us. She was very lovely. 

Turner: Were there much in the way of having people over or a community?
EGERT: We had a lot of relatives you know. My father had a brother, my mother had sisters and we had cousins and got all together all the time, which I confess to say I did not really appreciate. I didn’t really like getting to these Saturday afternoons always with either go to this aunt or they come to us. We children had to behave always, you know. So I guess I didn’t really care for it too much. 

Turner: When … you made a comment that your first neighborhood was a mixture of Gentiles and Jews. How did you become aware of the difference between Gentiles and Jews?
EGERT: Well, really mostly in school. Austria was a Catholic state. You know what I mean? Catholicism is the religion and the children in the morning, they had, of course, a picture of the Madonna and Jesus Christ were in every school room hanging. And of course, children started in to ask “What is it?” They would explain to us. In the morning they, the children, had to say the prayers and we Jewish children, they told us to just stand and hold our head down. So we began to think “What is, you know, why is that?” 

Turner: Do you remember asking your parents? 
EGERT: I don’t think I had much to ask because I had two sisters who would tell me everything. 

Turner: What did they tell you? 
EGERT: I guess they told me, “You don’t say the prayers, you just stay there and you know this is a different religion. They believe in a different God and we believe in a different God.” You know, that is how they explained it to me. 

Turner: So, your early memories are that it was quite friendly? 
EGERT: Very. Sure. I never felt any antisemitism as a child. 

Turner: And, in high school, was that the same? 
EGERT: That was already a little different. By high school, I think it was different. Yes. When we had our holidays we stayed home, of course, and they always envied us very much [laughter] the gentile children. They would kind of kid us about it, you know? But still I never had any feeling that we were different except it was, “Your God my God,” you know? I never had that feeling. 

Turner: Would that extend to dating as well, in high school was there…? 
EGERT: We didn’t date yet. At that time you stayed with your parents until you got married. We had groups, youth groups. That is where I met my husband. 

Turner: You tell me because I don’t know.
EGERT: I have forgotten a lot. But, we had young people got together either they were athletic groups like the Maccabees, that was the Jewish athletic group. And there girls and boys met, you know. It wasn’t dating in the sense like they do here. 

Turner: Now, if there were Maccabees, the Jewish athletic group, would there also be mixed… 
EGERT: Yes, the Maccabees have mixed athletes, too. 

Turner: Both Jewish and Gentile? 
EGERT: Yes. As far as I remember everything was mixed. Except in the neighborhood, when you lived in a neighborhood which was mostly Jewish kids. So there were more Jewish kids in this group than in another group you know. No, it really was not nothing until Hitler. I should say there was another group that you wouldn’t know.  Dollfuss and Schuschnigg started about five years before Hitler and that was a fascist group. And that really started rolling the whole politics. 

Turner: Tell me something about it because you are right I don’t know. 
EGERT: I don’t really know. At that time I wasn’t very politically minded. But after World War I when Vienna was social democratic it was voted in and they were very liberal and they built housing for poorer neighborhoods. For instance, all the kindergartens were in these big housing units. I worked in these kindergartens there. They tried to do a lot for the workers. And then came, of course some people started to rebel, they wanted more profits or whatever and then they had Dollfuss and I don’t quite remember how he got in power but he was already leaning toward fascism. You couldn’t speak your mind any more, people were looking over their shoulders. It eventually became like that. And then we had Schuschnigg, you never heard of him either. He lived in the United States for a while. Before you were born I guess. And he left Austria when Hitler came. 

Turner: What was Schuschnigg like? 
EGERT: Schuschnigg was really also fascism. You know what fascism is? 

Turner: I would like to hear it from you.
EGERT: I don’t know that. I wasn’t .. 

Turner: What did you observe? What subtle changes were there? 
EGERT: Well, the fear. You didn’t say your opinion you were afraid to say what you really meant. It was sort of a preparation really for Hitler. Of course, at that time Hitler was already in Germany when we had Schuschnigg. 

Turner: So that would have been 19-?
EGERT: 1935 or something. 

Turner: And you would have been about…?
EGERT: 20, not even 20. 

Turner: Were you teaching at that time? 
EGERT: Yes, I started when I was 20. I had my first job. 

Turner: That would have been …. I have forgotten your birthdate. 
EGERT: Forget it [laughter] … 1913 to … yes, 20. 

Turner: So in 1933 you began to teach? 
EGERT: Yes, I think 1930 to 32. Well, internship I had probably still. 

Turner: So up until the time that you began to teach there was not much difference or was it already somewhat fascist? 
EGERT: Well, I really personally didn’t feel it so much because we all were very good friends and we didn’t talk politics. I don’t think young people liked to talk politics. I really didn’t know very much about politics and …. no, I really didn’t. I must say in fact, we had people come from Germany, immigrated from Germany to Austria because Austria was still considered free and we couldn’t understand why they came. They lost their jobs in Germany and so on. They tried to explain to us and I am ashamed to say I really didn’t understand what they were talking about. 

Turner: Now, were these folks Jewish or Gentiles? 
EGERT: They were Jewish. Gentiles didn’t come to Austria, I think. Of course the real smart Jewish people went to America or England or Czechoslovakia or wherever they could. But some of them went to Austria thinking Austria would not be overrun by the Nazis. We didn’t realize that many of these people who were Social Democrats or so they were secretly already supporting the Nazis. The day when Hitler came all of a sudden they were in their Hackenkreutz. You know what is Hackenkreutz?

Turner: The iron cross? 
EGERT: Not the iron cross. What is the English word? Swastika … swastika. To my great surprise still we used to go out and went to theater together. All of a sudden there was the swastika. 

Turner: That year was? 
EGERT: ’38. 

Turner: Did your family talk politics during this time? 
EGERT: Not really. I don’t think we were very political, none of us. 

Turner: You didn’t sense something in the air? 
EGERT: Yes, everyone was … had that terrible feeling something bad is going to happen. But, we just didn’t realize it. Like my father had a foreman in his factory, a young man who went to Palestine. At that time we couldn’t understand. Why would you go to Palestine? It is such a terrible poor country and undeveloped. And when Hitler came he wrote to Daddy and said, “Please come. We can open a factory there.” And so on. My father said, “Why would I leave my country?” We didn’t understand what really was going to happen. So he stayed on. 

Turner: Let’s see, it is 1938, you have been teaching now for five years. Were you married then? 
EGERT: No. I was engaged to my husband then. 

Turner: Tell me how you met him then. 
EGERT: In the youth group, skiing.

Turner: Which one?
EGERT: I don’t remember. It was just a youth group you know. A group of young people.

Turner: Do you remember meeting him? 
EGERT: Well, we always went together with a lot of crowd. But he was a good skier and I wanted to learn to ski so we went skiing to the Viennawald and then we went out together too. Usually it was in crowds, it was always in a crowd until you got married. But don’t forget it’s a long time. When were you born by the way, you must be much younger?

Turner: Well, yes, I am. I was born in the 1940s. It was a different time and that is partly the reason behind my asking so that we can fill out what it was like for you. 
EGERT: Just for me, because I don’t know how other people lived or saw it. In March 1938 Hitler came and the very first day there was the announcement made, “All Jewish teachers are not to report to school any more.” It was just dismissed like that. They sent me later on … I think I got two months wages. 

Turner: And what was your reaction? 
EGERT: Stunned. We just were stunned. I didn’t know it … and my fiancé then too, of course, he lost his job two months later because he had to train the people for his job. He was a textile technician. He had to train his follower and then he was dismissed too. 

Turner: Before the Anschluss was there any hint from your life that something like this was coming other than this vague unease? 
EGERT: No. I guess we weren’t smart enough. We couldn’t imagine, you know. How could you imagine things like this? People educated, literary people and romantic and musical that they would go to such barbaric tactics. 

Turner: What did you do when you were dismissed from the school? What did you think? 
EGERT: Well, two years before, I had studied English and I became an English teacher to be allowed to teach in German schools. So I used that when I was teaching people who were going to emigrate. I taught them English. I had own method to teach them like they teach children, you know, so they could communicate for their work. Most of them if they got their jobs to come to England or America it was usually to be a domestic worker. So I taught them things in the kitchen and in the household and they were all very grateful to me. I always used to get letters from them. And myself, I made an application for England, to immigrate to England and I did get a job to teach in a private house, children. 

Turner: Now, I am going to push you a bit because there must have been a lot of thinking that went into this, discussing and about what was happening with you that you would take the step. 
EGERT: Well, my parents agreed. They knew that young people had to go, but my parents themselves said, “What could happen to them?” My father was 59 then and my mother 55 or so, and they said, “What are they going to do to old people?” At that time it was old, you know. But they wanted us young people out. I was very lucky. My mother had a maid working in our household about five or seven years from Bosnia. A young girl, when she came to us she was only about 15 years. She was in our house and she felt my mother was like her own mother. When Hitler came they had an agreement with England, Anglo-German exchange of domestic workers. Irene was her name. She went. The minute she was there she got a job for me and this is how I got out safely and I met her then in England too. 

Turner: Well now let me go back to your observations in the changes in Vienna after the Anschluss, what did you see and experience? 
EGERT: You saw young men in these black uniforms grabbing any Jewish men making them sweep the floors and scrub with brushes, you know. You saw all over they were doing this. Fun, it was fun for them. And things I didn’t see probably. You read it in the paper all the time. And then they arrested everybody in the street who looked Jewish, they arrested them and many were sent to concentration camps without any reason. I mean they hadn’t done anything. I knew of quite a few, you know, friends of ours who disappeared.

Turner: Well, what were some of the first incidents that you remember? 
EGERT: That I remember … that was the first that I saw people scrubbing the cobblestones. 

Turner: Was there anything that identified who Jewish people were? 
EGERT: I don’t know. They probably asked. No, at that time they did not have that yellow star. That came much later, after I left. It was a time of such uncertainty and fright, you know. You knew things are going to be worse but you never expected it quite that worse, ever that bad. 

Turner: You said something about the change in your friendships with the Gentiles. Describe that to me. 
EGERT: They just ignored us. Ignored us all. When I called them they wouldn’t answer. They either were scared or maybe they told them not to associate with Jewish people. There was only one friend who was a kindergarten teacher and she happened to be engaged to a Jewish fellow who came to England. She went to England too like Irene our maid went. Anglo-Austrian, what you call it? Domestic help. So she went as that, and she lived in England and we were good friends in England, too. 

Turner: So, was this as you recall immediate, this sort of partition between you and your friends? 
EGERT: Yes. It just … they just left you on the other side. They saw you; they would go over there on the other side. 

Turner: They would cross over? Did you try to talk with them? 
EGERT: At the beginning you know they just ignored you. Especially the ones I worked with close in kindergarten. Humph. At that time, of course, it was very painful. You are young and you haven’t done anything wrong and all of a sudden … and then we started reading about what went on in Germany and I began to understand really what this whole thing is. 

Turner: What did you begin to understand?
EGERT: The behavior of the Germans there against the Jews. And not just the Jews but the Poles and the Catholics. Very much against the Catholics they were too. It was an atmosphere of hate. Everybody hating everybody. 

Turner: What did you and your fiancé talk about in regards to this? 
EGERT: [Sigh] Well, we tried to see what the future would be and we knew that we couldn’t get married now because I had my visa to go to England and I thought that would be the best thing. If I go to England maybe I could help him from there then. But he had to leave. Fortunately he left in August before it became very bad for the young men. They took any young men in the street and just put them in trucks and took them to concentration camps without any letting the family know or so. 

Turner: How did your own family fare? You had two sisters and a mother and father? 
EGERT: My oldest sister was married and had a little boy. My second sister was married and expected and they … I really don’t know how they made it, but they went to Luxembourg on a train. At that time Luxembourg would accept people without any visas and they made it to Luxembourg, both sisters and the little boy. And my other sister gave birth to her daughter in Luxembourg. Then Hitler invaded Luxembourg too, in May 1940. And the Luxembourg Jewish community as well as the Luxembourg non-Jewish people transported them all in busses to Portugal. Portugal gave them a safe haven and from there I guess it must have been under Roosevelt he gave them visas to come to the United States. My sisters came to the United States in 1940. Then when I was in England we kept in touch. 

Turner: I’m going to go back.  
EGERT: It is very complicated. I have tried to forget all this; you are bringing it back. 

Turner: So the summer of 1938 was rather tense?
EGERT: It was tense. You saw what was going on but you really couldn’t comprehend it. You couldn’t comprehend it – why? why? They took people from the busses. They went on the bus and asked “Who is Jewish?” and would make them go and scrub the floors outdoors. I was on the bus many times, but not women, at that time only the men. 

Turner: What would you describe as the next development? 
EGERT: Then I would say the next development was the Crystal Night and we knew it was coming. 

Turner: How did you know it was coming? 
EGERT: Well, we had a radio. I don’t know. All of a sudden we all knew. It was supposedly a young Jewish fellow who had burned. Did he burn something in France? I really didn’t know how the whole thing started but all of a sudden it is Crystal Night and all the Jews will have to burn and they were running in the streets, the Nazis, these black uniforms, and you know destructing… 

Turner: It was crime as you remember. 
EGERT: I remember it was, it must have been about 1:00 o’clock in the afternoon, and I was in my father’s office. I helped him out you know. He still had work to finish, for the government, for the schools he did all the benches, for school benches. And they had an assignment to finish so he was working there. He still had Gentile workers with him and I think it was time to go home for lunch, because in Vienna you eat dinner at 1:00 o’clock, lunch. Daddy and I went down and there was a huge truck and there were these Nazis and they took every man as they went by and threw them in the truck and they saw my dad and pushed him in the truck. He was all beaten when he came back in two days. He was all beaten up you know they wore these boots with the stuff on the back. I was standing there. Stunted there, you know, what to do? So I went home to tell mother and we just sat there and waited and prayed and hoped he would come. After two days he came back all beaten, severely beaten. And he had an attack of gall bladder and we had to get a doctor. And the doctor was more informed and he told us what had happened with that Crystal Night. We really didn’t know the details. Now I have a hunch it was really made up that it really never happened. 

Turner: At the time or now? 
EGERT: At the time. I mean now, even now, too. 

Turner: So you yourself don’t recall much happening that particular night? 
EGERT: Well, yes. There were many others too. All the men in the street they just put them in, they asked if they were Jewish. Of course, we have Jewish features, too; they could recognize. Maybe some weren’t even Jewish. Just everybody who was walking in the streets they put them in trucks and a lot of them went to concentration camps. But the people who were 60 or near 60 they released them because they wouldn’t be able to do enough work. They wanted people to work. That’s how I understand it. So then we knew that it was getting serious and my parents were very anxious for me to leave and I finally left.

Turner: Had you your visa by that time? 
EGERT: By that time, I had my visa and I left January 1st, 1939. 

Turner: I’m not sure if you mentioned how you happened to apply for a visa. 
EGERT: Well, I told you that maid, Irene, who went. She was non-Jewish. She went to England with the Anglo-Austrian agreement or something. England always needed maids and workers and she went there and she found a couple. She worked in a restaurant. No, more like a motel at that time; it wasn’t a motel. What would you call it? A boardinghouse. And there was a couple who had just arrived from South Africa. They were English people and they wanted to start life again in England. They had a little boy and I guess she accosted them. She told them, would they need somebody to help them. And they sent the papers for me. They goes to the embassy and I got the papers to come. I was allowed to come and work there. That is how I got there. I took a few things along and that’s all.

Turner: Did you notice much of a shift in the social climate after Crystal Night? 
EGERT: Certainly. Lots of unemployment, Jewish people lost their jobs then the ones who had big stores, they took the stores away from them. They took my father’s manufacturing thing over. They took it away from him and the foreman took over. A Gentile foreman took over. Then, of course, when I came to England I was so involved, I am ashamed to say, I was so involved with myself and my future and so on that I really didn’t ask too many questions. My parents always would write we are fine, “We are healthy.” You know how parents are. That’s how it was. 

Turner: How did it go for your parents after you left? 
EGERT: Well, that’s one thing I don’t want to think about. They were sent to Minsk Concentration Camp where both died. 

Turner: This was when? 
EGERT: In 1941. Of course I am not sure but we got it from the … Israelitisch Embassy, you know what is, like here, where the Jewish community in Vienna had dates, you know of people. You know the Germans were very…. They kept all dates where they sent them. 

Turner: Was this after the war? 
EGERT: It was after the war. I had no idea. I kept writing through the Red Cross and did not get an answer. 

Turner: When did their letters stop? 
EGERT: About the beginning of 1941 I never had any more answers. I had one or two answers through the Red Cross because England was already in war then. We were at war and actually I really did not know too much in England. They did not tell us what was going on in Austria. It was war time and they kept all the news out. So really not until I came to the United States, which was in ’46. 

Turner: It sounds like your parents really didn’t give you an accurate picture of what was happening.
EGERT: No. Seeing Anne Frank, I can realize what happened. They got them all together. All the Jewish people in one apartment. You got 20 people together or something. I really don’t want to think about it . . . Horrible times. I must say I am lucky that I didn’t have to go to a concentration camp. You know what these people went through? 

Turner: How was life in England? 
EGERT: It was full of hopefully a new future. I liked my work and as soon as the war broke out they needed trained people to work with the children for the mothers who did munitions work. So I got employed right away at the London County Counsel and I work there until January 1946 when I left England to join my husband here in America. 

Turner: You must have had some experiences in wartime London. 
EGERT: Oh yes, I was bombed out three times and survived. 

Turner: You tell it with such savoir-faire. What was it like? 
EGERT: The first time I lived pretty high up, it must have been six floors or so. We heard the bomb come and it was at the beginning of the war. They were small bombs and the Molotov bombs fell underneath the stairs. You know the English houses have the stairs you go up, and it tore away the stairs, and we couldn’t get out any more. It was dark. Of course all the lights were off. We made it down the six flights and we came to a big hole and then we heard some voices in the back. They had patrolmen with helmets and they got us from the other side, got us down in the underground. We stayed all night. I slept most of one year in the underground. Every night. Then we had to move because the house was condemned. I moved to another neighborhood and that’s right, I moved in a very nice apartment and something went wrong.  We were too many people in one apartment so I had an opportunity to move across the street. The very same night I moved across the house was bombed and all the people I had known were killed in that. I guess my time hasn’t come. I survived just across from them. I stayed there until I had my visa to come here to the United States. There were many bombs. I lost a lot of friends. Lots of them. In the underground there was one bomb attack hit the underground and it went right down. It was 200 feet and the bomb went right down and killed everybody who was sleeping. It was a horrible experience. Then of course, my sisters got in touch with me and I was able to help them you know. They had, they were refugees. They had nothing so I was able to send them some things. 

Turner: They were in Portugal? 
EGERT: They were in Portugal and then they came to the United States, to New York. The men couldn’t find any jobs but the women of course immediately got domestic jobs. That’s all the educated women doctors and so on, always it was, you know, which is all right. It was a start. And of course, the war industry started to employ everybody. They did all right. 

Turner: Now, in England did you feel like or did you keep up going to…..
EGERT: Religious? 

Turner: To synagogue? 
EGERT: There was no synagogue where I lived. No, I don’t think there were any Jewish people at all. It was in a small town in Suffolk. Then when I moved to London…. I had a cousin in London I forgot about it. They were from Leipzig. They were lucky they had moved in 1930. They were able to get their furniture and money and so on. She was very nice to me but of course, I had to have a job. So I stayed with her a little while and then I got a job not too far from her for a time. Then when the war broke out in September ’39 then they needed me in the wartime nurseries. That was all the work I did for almost seven years. 

Turner: Were you aware of any antisemitism in England? 
EGERT: They didn’t know what Jewish people are. They thought Jewish people had horns. I had to explain to them that is not true. They saw pictures of Jews and they thought they had horns. And I always still think … you know Jewish people pray and they have something with, what is it called? You know you have the tallis and then you put on the tefilin and the tefilin looked like little horns. I have a hunch this must be the origin of thinking that Jews have horns. The tefilin, you know that is where the prayers is encased. So I had to tell them that I was Jewish and they didn’t know what Jewish were. So they had no idea with Hitler. They were really … in the country. In the towns it was different. London had a big Jewish community so yes, I did go to synagogue once or twice. But really I wasn’t very concerned about religion at that time. 

Turner: Where was your fiancé? 
EGERT: He had taken his sister-in-law and the two week old baby across to… what did I say was that? 

Turner: I thought you said Luxembourg. 
EGERT: Luxembourg, that’s right. She was joined with her husband and he got a visa to go to Uruguay. And my husband, who was a young man then, he was very smart. He went to the embassy and looked up all the Egert’s in the United States and New York and he got five visas to come to the United States. In 1940 he came to New York and found the people were not really related but they were just wonderful to him. For six months, he may tell you that, they kept him there. He had a good profession, you know. This is how he got to Portland because the Bishop family, Pendleton Woolen Mill, needed a textile technician. That is how he came to Portland. 

Turner: Did you correspond with him? 
EGERT: Well I couldn’t when he was still in Luxembourg and in Belgium because it was wartime. But he got in touch with my sisters in New York through, I guess the Jewish community. I never asked him. I really should ask him that, and they gave him my address. The new address. He had written to the old address but I had changed and so we got in touch again and we started dating.  I had hoped to come in 1941. I had already shipping but they wouldn’t take women across the ocean. Then I had another visa and it almost expired in 1945 when I finally got some very kind person who worked in an airline company. He felt so sorry for me, we had been engaged now for so many years. He said, “If you could be ready if I called you, could you be ready in two hours to join a flight?” I said, “Sure,” anything, you know. I had a little bag about this size packed with cosmetics, my books and you know underwear or something. And in about two days I get a call. He said, “I have airplane for you as a war bride.” My husband was already American citizen then. He was five years here and that is how I flew over as a war bride in an airplane with lots and lots of pregnant women who flew to their husbands. That is how I arrived here. 

Turner: I am curious, you went from London….
EGERT: From London we had to take a train from Kensington to somewhere. It was … I don’t know where it was. Then we went over Ireland. I really don’t remember anymore. I was so excited. I left all my stuff there and all my friends. But they did send all my books and music and things to Portland. 

Turner: Your husband, fiancé, was in Portland? 
EGERT: He was in Portland. 

Turner: How did you get from New York? 
EGERT: I went to New York. My sisters were there and they didn’t expect me. I ended up in, not in Ellis Island because I was in the airport. What is the airport? LaGuardia. I phoned my sister. I had the phone number. I didn’t know how to phone so somebody helped me phone and my sister almost fell down. She said, “Where are you calling from? London?” I said, “No, I am phoning from the airport in LaGuardia.” I had $16 with me from English money. She said, “Take a taxi and come here.” I knew $16 wouldn’t make it but I talked to the taxi and I told him the truth. I said, “I have 16 shilling, dollar, I believe. I don’t remember. I said “But my sister will pay you.” He was really kind. He took me to Brooklyn. They lived in Brooklyn, from LaGuardia to Brooklyn. They delivered me there and I stayed with them a few days to meet all my other relatives and my husband sent me money to, my fiancé then, for my ticket for Portland and we arrived here in Portland. 

Turner: Now, you were engaged seven years. What was it like to see him? You took the train? 
EGERT: No, I flew to Spokane and then from Spokane to Portland. Well, when I last saw him he had a lot of black hair. Did you meet him? He lost all his hair very young, you know. Well, we had to get accustomed to each other again and so on. He had made a lot of friends here and he was a skier in Vienna and we were skiers here. We joined the Mazamas right away and I must say we had a good life. 

Turner: How many days were in you in Portland before you had a wedding? 
EGERT: About a week, I believe. I think about a week. He got a little room for me. Oh no, it was the old Multnomah Hotel.  Do you remember the old Multnomah Hotel? We had to make an application. Don’t you have to wait three days or something? See you are bringing things back. That is 47 years. 

Turner: How has it been for you here in Portland? 
EGERT: Very well Really wonderful.  And after seven years we had our first daughter. So everything goes in seven years with us. 

Turner: So after seven years of marriage you had a daughter? Were there other children? 
EGERT: No. No. I am sorry to say, I wish I had. 

Turner: Your daughter is grown up. 
EGERT: She is grown up. 

Turner: Do you have grandchildren? 
EGERT: No, she works as assistant professor in Berkeley. She is getting a PhD in anthropology. She has always been very studious. She doesn’t want any commitment. She has a boyfriend but they don’t want to commit themselves. I agree. I really would like grandchildren but on the other hand maybe it is better not to fill the world with too many children.

Turner: How would you describe your experiences in Vienna in pre-World War Two as affecting your life once you settled down here in Portland? 
EGERT: It affected me because I got a good education. We became music lovers. We were sports people; we loved to ski and ice skate. That really makes a very pleasant life and we like to read and we like to go to opera and theater. 

Turner: Did the experiences of the Nazi occupation the Anschluss, the Crystal Night, antisemitism has that changed your life in any way? 
EGERT: Certainly. 

Turner: In what ways? 
EGERT: Well, in dreams. Quite often in dreams it comes back. 

Turner: Could you give me an example? 
EGERT: I remember dreaming I saw my father. He came towards me and I said, “Where is Mother? Where is mother?” and he shook his head and I knew something had happened. Very often I still dream about when we were little and things. You cannot forget it. It is in everybody. 

Turner: Could you describe one of those dreams when you were little and somehow affected? 
EGERT: You mean before Hitler came? 

Turner: You said you still dream about the time of Hitler, or did I mistake?
EGERT: No, you dream. And sometimes in your dreams you see your parents or your friends connected with your present life. You wake up and wonder, “Why did I see them?” It is registered in your brain. You cannot forget it. It is a terrible experience and I hope nobody ever forgets it. 

Turner: Anything else you would like to add before I ask Ron – you can ask that. Ron has a question.
Ron: Is there any lesson that you would want to teach to any high school kid who might watch this video in the future? Any kind of lesson that you would want him to learn based on your experience during the war? 
EGERT: Well, to keep your mind open and do not believe hatemongers. Do not go with that and as to religion it seems to me we should all believe in one God. It doesn’t matter which way you worship him but there could only be one God. You should not hate each other because you have this or that upbringing. I think the most important thing is to have an open mind and to try to understand other peoples feeling and for them not to hate anybody. Because that is really what is the worst thing amongst human beings–always that hate. You hate this and you hate that and we cannot get together. 

Turner: I would think you have seen the powerful evidence of hate. 
EGERT: Yes. Yes. That is my message. Just don’t let anybody talk you into hating anybody else. 

Turner: Thank you very much. I appreciate your taking the time to talk to us about your experiences. 
EGERT: I didn’t realize what a life I had.