Eldorado

My Childhood During the Great Depression

This is the story of my childhood, approximately from 1928 to 1943, which is also the time frame of the Great Depression. My parents came to America with my sister and me from Germany to find a better life. At first they did. Everything was wonderful and they had great success, but this was promptly replaced by failure, due to the unavailability of employment after the Crash of 1929. A whole new revision of our lives was necessary. My father purchased a very small farm on the eastern shore of Maryland, as a life-saving back-up. We could grow our own food and always have something to eat! This is the story of the life on this farm as seen through the eyes of a child. Many things were new and strange to my parents and me. Especially to me, because to a six-year old, everything is new and strange! This is the story of those six years, and the subsequent years when we had returned to New York and had come back to city living. Some of these experiences were sad and others were kind of funny. I have tried to stress the humorous aspects. I hope I have succeeded.