Max takes ship to leave Europe for America.
MAX: Max, interviewed by Lisa or talking with other family members [The ship's name was] Kaiserin Augusta Victoria. It left Bremen, or maybe Hamburg, I'm not sure... It was in summertime. The regional train I boarded in Wysokie Litewskie! And then they brought me to a local point in a big city, where they sent me over to the boat!
LISA: Lisa, interviewing her grandfather, Max Did you have to wait long before you boarded?
MAX: I don't remember. It couldn't be long, maybe three, four days, six days.
LISA: Where did you stay when you were waiting?
MAX: There was room for everybody.
LISA: Do you have any memories of the trip itself?
MAX: Well, it's hard to remember. Don't forget, it's how many years?
LISA: Yeah, but it's wonderful that you have such clear memories of Wysokie Litewskie – when had you ever been on a boat before? You know what I'm saying? I just thought you might remember that clearly.
MAX: I remember one thing that we went on board with a lot of people, we went third class... And we didn't have meals a la carte, heh. We ate! Whatever we got, we ate! Mostly frankfurters. Which was real good. I liked frankfurters, I like them now.
LISA: Did your mother send any food with you?
MAX: No. She gave me a little bag... for the train, for the time being what you call until we were assigned to our wards.
NARRATOR: Lisa, backgrounding/commenting. Until the industry of immigration was regulated by the various governments involved, there was a good deal of exploitation of the immigrants during every part of the process. In addition the overcrowded conditions on the ships and in the ports were often intolerable and were the cause of diseases and malnutrition. Most of the immigrants spent their life savings to get passage, but this did not guarentee a safe or comfortable voyage.
As far as Max was concerned, however, the entire process was not a trauma of upheaval; it doesn't even seem to have been a great adventure to him.MAX: Do you got already enough stuff to put in the book? What do you want to know?
LISA: I want to know what it was like on the boat. Was it clean, was it crowded?
MAX: It was crowded, it was crowded.
LISA: How did you go, third class?
MAX: Yes, third class, steerage. Do you know what steerage is?
LISA: Yes, it's in the bottom. And you slept in one room with bunks?
MAX: Bunks, yeah.
LISA: Did they separate the men and the women?
MAX: Of course!
LISA: How long was the trip, about three weeks?
MAX: Yeah.
LISA: Did you get seasick?
MAX: I don't remember this. What does it amount to?
LISA: Just curious...
IMAGE: Immigrants at Ellis Island
IMAGE: Photo taken in 1976 of ferry boat that took immigrants
from their ships to Ellis Island
IMAGE: H.I.A.S. Warsaw, 1921
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