Passage One The HeroMy mother’s parents came from Hungary, but my grandfather could trace his origin to Germany and also he was educated in Germany. Although he was able to hold a conversation in nine languages, he was most comfortable in German. Every morning, before going to his office, he read the German language newspaper, which was American owned and published in New York.My grandfather was the only one in his family to come to the United States with his wife and children. He still had relatives living in Europe. When the first world war broke out, he lamented the fact that if my uncle, his only son had to go, it would be cousin fighting against cousin. In the early days of the war, my grandmother begged him to stop taking the German newspaper and to take an English language newspaper, instead. He scoffed at the idea, explaining that the fact it was in German did not make it a German newspaper, but only an American newspaper, printed in German. But my grandmother insisted, for fear that the neighbors may see him read it and think he was German. So, he finally gave up the German newspaper.One day, the inevitable happened and my uncle Milton received notice to join the army. My grandparents were very upset, but my mother, his little sister, was excited. Now she could boast about her soldier brother going off to war. She was ten years old at the time, and my uncle, realizing how he was regarded by his little sister and her friends, went out and bought them all service pins, which meant that they had a loved one in the service. All the little girls were delighted. When the day came for him to leave, his whole regiment, in their uniforms, left together from the sam...
