LEVINE:

Today is October 22 nd , 1999. I'm here in the Ellis Island Oral History Studio with Jane Schlosberg Winslow, who was born here on Ellis Island on May 10 th , 1948. This is a unique story and I will be interested in learning about it as — as this tape goes on. This is Janet Levine for the National Park Service. Okay. I know you go by the name of Sam.

WINSLOW:

Right.

LEVINE:

But tell me your full name.

WINSLOW:

I've had many names in my life. My birth name was Scarlett and I learned this in 1984 when I received a letter that had been written for me by my birth grandfather and left in my records at the adoption agency. I was adopted, given up for adoption to the Louise Wise Agency. And I was adopted when I was five months old by really wonderful, wonderful people. And my mother just passed away two years ago. But we had always been told and they had always told me that at the adoption agency there was a letter for me that I could get any time I wanted. And when I got it in 1984, it was addressed to Scarlett. And it was from my birth grandfather, a letter of apology, saying that the reason I was given up for adoption was because he was incapable of taking care of himself in the New World. And his daughter couldn't do both, couldn't take care of him and raise a baby. And they thought it would be the best thing for me if they gave me up for adoption. And I probably don't know that that's absolutely true but I know that I've had a wonderful, wonderful life with, really, people who gave all their heart and soul to making me the best I could possibly be. So I have to say, it was probably — for me, I consider it a lucky choice in my life.

LEVINE:

Why don't you give the names of your adoptive parents?

WINSLOW:

Oh, my adoptive parents are Bea [PH] and Dick Schlosberg. Okay, and they were teachers and ran a summer camp for girls in Massachusetts. And I was very lucky. Although I was an only child, every summer I had 178 sisters. [laughter]

LEVINE:

Where did you live, besides in the summer?

WINSLOW:

We lived in New Rochelle, New York for many years. And my high school years were in Scarsdale, New York. Then I went off to George Washington University in Washington, DC where I met my husband. I've been married now for 28 years to a wonderful man from the Washington area. Today is his 50 th birthday, actually.

LEVINE:

And his name?

WINSLOW:

Alan [PH] Winslow. Alan Winslow. And his family is mostly English and Irish. So we have a real European blend, the two of us. I understand, from the letter I got from the Louise Wise Agency, that my birth mother w — and her family were Polish and my birth father and his family were of German descent. And they were Jewish, came through into Ellis Island after the war, after being in a — were they called reclamation camps?

LEVINE:

Ah —

WINSLOW:

I'm not sure. I forget — I forget the word they used. But it was — they'd been in a concentration camp and then when the allies freed Germany, they were —

LEVINE:

A ref — I — I [unclear] —

WINSLOW:

I don't know what it was called but something like that. And — and that's where she met a young man and fell in love and got pregnant, which was here, and then gave birth here and — and gave me up for adoption.

LEVINE:

Okay. Well, let me see if I can —

WINSLOW:

Okay.

LEVINE:

— make sure I understand. After the war, your mother, who was Polish, was in Germany in a refugee camp —

WINSLOW:

I — I don't know.

LEVINE:

Uh-huh.

WINSLOW:

This part I don't know. I know they all met up here. She met her father, who was the only other member of her family to survive the Holocaust, here on Ellis Island.

LEVINE:

Wow! So they were probably brought here from a refugee camp.

WINSLOW:

It's possible.

LEVINE:

It would seem, unless it was possible that they had been in this country and were rounded up?

WINSLOW:

I don't think so.

LEVINE:

No.

WINSLOW:

No.

LEVINE:

No, they wouldn't have been rounded up as German aliens because —

WINSLOW:

No.

LEVINE:

— they were Jewish coming from —

WINSLOW:

Yeah.

LEVINE:

Okay.

WINSLOW:

Yeah. So I think they came here. I think they may not have had any contacts here themselves so it may be that they spent a lot of time here, rather than moving right on into the country and into New York.

LEVINE:

And also, your grandfather was ill, which may be why —

WINSLOW:

Yes.

LEVINE:

— he was detained here.

WINSLOW:

Yes.

LEVINE:

And your — and your mother was taking care of him. So it may be that they had no place —

WINSLOW:

To go.

LEVINE:

— to go and so [unclear].

WINSLOW:

In the beginning, exactly. Exactly.

LEVINE:

And also, she was pregnant so that's another reason —

WINSLOW:

That she would stay.

LEVINE:

— that she didn't have a place to —

WINSLOW:

Yeah.

LEVINE:

— receive her.

WINSLOW:

Yeah. So I only have bits and pieces of the story. I, you know, was told the pregnancy was uneventful and — and so forth and so on. And I know that, from all the records — from what my parents were told when they saw me five months later when I was adopted —

LEVINE:

And maybe — what did your parents tell you about how they came to — to get you?

WINSLOW:

Well, my parents had been trying to have children for many years. And after 12 years, the same day they were told that they could look at a baby to adopt a child, my mother found out she had fibroid tumors and had to have a hysterectomy. So that, like, happened at exactly the same time. They — I don't know how they found out about the Louise Wise Agency, except that a family member was an attorney and may have had connections to the agency. And that's how they got connected with Louise Wise. They were told when they were sent in to see me the first time — they were told not to approach me because I had been poked and prodded by so many doctors in my five short months of life at that point that I was "not a very friendly child." So my — my father approached me — he'd had none of that, of course. My father approached me and stuck his pinkie out. And I grabbed it and never left go. So that when I was a teenager and we were going through typical teenage years he'd say to me, "You picked me as much as I picked you." [laughs]

LEVINE:

Well, now, why would you — why would you have been prodded so much? Were you a sickly baby?

WINSLOW:

I don't think so. They said — all I got that the birth was normal. Maybe it was a procedure that Louise Wise used for adopted children, for children up for adoption, babies up for adoption, put them through whatever rigorous medical testing or whatever. But no — and I had never had any major illnesses or anything like that at all, a few sprained ankles but that's about it. So I — I've been very healthy person all my life. So I think I must come from very good stock. [chuckles]

LEVINE:

Okay, well, now, did — did your adoptive parents — did Louise Wise, the Louise Wise Agency take you from a few days?

WINSLOW:

Yes, three days. They — they told me that when they — when they had a woman who wanted to give her child up for adoption, they took care of the birth and then they left baby and mother together for three d — for the first three days. And after that, if the mother still wanted to give the baby up for adoption, that's when the adoption actually — when they actually took the baby away and I don't know where I was taken from that point on. But that's what I had been — that's what I'd been told was that we were together for the first three days. And then it was sort of, if you can do that, then it's — and still give the baby up, then, okay, you know you're really going to do that. And of course, my — my adoptive parents had to wait then after they got me a whole year when they were constantly monitored and visited by social workers and people from the agency and everything, and government officials too. And then the adoption was made final. It was finalized and, from what I understand, the old birth certificate was torn up and thrown away, and the new one was made, because I have a birth certificate, okay, but it's got Jane Schlosberg Win — Jane Schlosberg on it, Jane Quint Schlosberg. I think, according to my Internet sources these days, that those rec — birth certificates were actually just attached to the new ones. And I was almost going to go to DOH yesterday — Department — I mean DOR, Department of Records, to see if perhaps it was — that was the case and I could then just look at the next page and get the name, because searching without a name, without a last name is almost impossible. And I respect — I mean, I think, bottom line is I've left a letter with Louise Wise Agency in my file. The same file they left me a letter in, I've left them one. I keep my address up to date so that if any of my family members want to find me, they can. I — I kind of have always felt that it's — it's their choice to make.

LEVINE:

Uh-huh.

WINSLOW:

I'm open to it but I would never interfere in another person's life. You know, if somebody gets on with their lives and goes — however, I'm — I'm well aware that people never stop thinking of these momentous changes in their lives. And I'm sure that was a momentous change in life. So I'll do everything I can to expose myself and open myself to it. And then it's up to my birth family to decide whether they want to find me or not.

LEVINE:

Do you think you were born in the hospital on the other side of the slip here at Ellis Island?

WINSLOW:

I don't know. It didn't say.

LEVINE:

It didn't say. And the Louise Wise Agency, was that in Manhattan?

WINSLOW:

Yes.

LEVINE:

And it was — and — and did they have, like, a — an orphanage or did they have a —

WINSLOW:

I don't know. I know — my mother said that when they picked us up — picked me up, it was from a foster mother. It was from a foster family. And I had, I guess, been there since day four to five months.

LEVINE:

Do you know their name?

WINSLOW:

No. My mother was told — my mother tells it — told — used to tell me the story that she would — she said to the doctor that went along with them to pick me up, okay. The doctor took the baby from the foster mother's arm and the foster mother's crying and, oh, so sad. And my mother said she said to the foster mother, "Well, we'll bring her back for visits and you'll get to see her and everything." This is the kind of woman she was. And as they left, the doctor turned to her and said, "No, you won't. You will forget her name and you will never see this person again." So there was that — that cut off — that contact was — I mean, I guess in those days that's what foster parenting was. Well, it probably still is. You — you take babies in and then, hopefully, someone adopts them for real. And you get — give them to a real family. So — yeah, so that's all I know about the foster family. I don't — she didn't remember names or anything. She put it right out of her mind.

LEVINE:

I see. So that was when you were five months old.

WINSLOW:

Right.

LEVINE:

And then, that year of monitoring, you were with your — your adoptive family —

WINSLOW:

Right.

LEVINE:

— during that period —

WINSLOW:

Right.

LEVINE:

— when they would check on you.

WINSLOW:

And they would come in and check. Like, once a week there'd be a social worker in. Once a month, there'd be somebody from, I don't know, some, you know, agency or something. And then after that year, of course, you — I guess they lived on pins and needles that whole year. You know, was this going to work? Were they going to let them keep me? And how could they do all of this and — and then turn around and take me away and everything? So that was a really tense year and they — they looked forward to it being over. My mother used to tease me that most women are pregnant for nine months. She was pregnant for 13 years, because 12 before she got to have a baby and then that extra one before she could keep it and say, "Okay, this one's really — you know, this is going to stick." So — but I was — I am sort of between blond and redhead and about five, five. And my — my adoptive parents were both dark hair and dark eyes and much shorter than I grew up to be. So even if they had tried, which of course they didn't — but even if they had tried to keep her from me it wouldn't have lasted very long. And they took the road that this was a — I was a chosen child. This is a very special thing and made me feel very good about that fact that they had gone out of their way to choose. They could never say they were stuck with me, or I with them, because, you know, it was a free and open choice. And that made it a very special — so I've always had a good — I've met a lot of adopted children who have really horrible stigma from it. But I think it's wonderful.

LEVINE:

Wonderful.

WINSLOW:

You know.

LEVINE:

Now, were the — did the Schlos — Schlosbergs have any personal connection with Ellis Island or immigrants coming in their family that you know of?

WINSLOW:

More than likely. I think the Quints came through here, my mother's family.

LEVINE:

How do you see that?

WINSLOW:

Q-U-I-N-T.

LEVINE:

That was your —

WINSLOW:

My mother's maiden —

LEVINE:

— mother's maiden name.

WINSLOW:

— name.

LEVINE:

Uh-huh.

WINSLOW:

They live in — they're all Bostonians. So it may be that they just came through Boston. But I would imagine even anybody settling anywhere on the East Coast certainly came through Ellis Island at least to be processed.

LEVINE:

Well, less than 75 percent did, when Ellis Island was open, come through Ellis Island. So —

WINSLOW:

And I do know my mother — I found — actually, I didn't know all my life but when my mom passed away, I found a paper in there that she has been a member of Ellis Island Foundation for many years.

LEVINE:

So that means she contributed to the restoration or —

WINSLOW:

Yes.

LEVINE:

— she put someone's name on the Wall of Honor.

WINSLOW:

Yes.

LEVINE:

And that would be interesting for you to check by donor.

WINSLOW:

Oh, okay.

LEVINE:

And see if she put a name on there because it may be that there was —

WINSLOW:

Yeah, yeah.

LEVINE:

— someone in her family that actually —

WINSLOW:

Yeah.

LEVINE:

Because — and the other thing is that you do not necessarily have to have come through Ellis Island in order to have your name on the Wall of Honor. It's really for all immigrants to this country. So —

WINSLOW:

Sure.

LEVINE:

— it's kind of —

WINSLOW:

It may be. Yeah, yeah. That'd be interesting.

LEVINE:

That might be an interesting —

WINSLOW:

That'd be interesting.

LEVINE:

Okay. So the Scarlett name, you think came because you had such red hair?

WINSLOW:

Yes, yes. That's what I was told. I had bright red hair when I was born and that they — they named me Scarlett. And the letter from my birth grandfather was addressed to Scarlett, spelled the way I did, S-C-A-R-L-E-T-T. And he wrote her name, my birth mother's name, in the letter. But it was scratched out so that, honestly, even holding up to a light, you can't — you can't tell, no etchings or anything like that could you tell, except that it's four letters, I think. So that's all I've been able to discern so far. And, you know, like I said, I think that people make decisions based on — on sane issues at the time. And I think she obviously must be a very well grounded, practical and honest person to make a decision, knowing full well that there was no way she could possibly make it. To — to make the choices she made were probably very wise. And I — and I'm grateful in many ways because I'm sure that was very difficult decision to make, but made with a very clear and level head. And I — I guess I'm — my husband says I'm kind of the practical one in the family anyway, even though he's the engineer. I've always had two feet on the ground. You have to make it every single day.

LEVINE:

You think — you think that — that — that capacity or that trait of yours, groundedness, comes through this —

WINSLOW:

I — could be. I have no idea. You know how it is when you — when you recognize habits that you have and you don't know where you got them from? And you look around, the people around you and you go, "I certainly didn't come away from this with this attitude." So sometimes, yeah, you do. You know, your — you realize that something deep down inside must come from someplace else. It's something intrinsic somewhere along the way. And I — I — I suspect, given the same situation, I've made the same choice.

LEVINE:

And how about the Louise Wise Agency? Have you investigated that? Have you tried to find out anything in their records that might give you some more clues?

WINSLOW:

All I have — what — I think I have everything they have — they feel they are allowed to give me. I've registered. I'm part of their registry. There's a registry going on for health reasons in New York where you register. I think it costs $20 and they research your birth family to see if there's any medical issues you should know. And if there are, they'll let you know. So I did that. I got a letter from Louise Wise saying that if I wanted to, I could do that. And then if there was any contact or any need for any contact because of health issues — need a kidney or something along those lines, for example, that then there is a registry of adoptees and birth families. But I don't know more than what I just told you because I never heard — I haven't heard anything else.

LEVINE:

So that that would imply that they have the information.

WINSLOW:

Yeah, that would imply they have the information. Yeah. And like I say, I've left a letter in my record. They know my address. My husband and I move quite a bit. And whenever we do move, he — he works for an international semiconductor manufacturer — so whenever we do move, I always send Louise Wise —

LEVINE:

[unclear]

WINSLOW:

— and update my address and say, "Keep this on record. Anybody wants to find me, here I am." It's the most logical way. You know, and they've been very good about that. They've been very good. And they — I — the first time I called — I used to be a radio disk jockey for many years. So this is a familiar room.

LEVINE:

[chuckles]

WINSLOW:

The first day, they — the first time I called them I said [clears throat], "My name is Jane Schlosberg Winslow. I was adopted out of your agency and I understand, and have always been told, that there is a letter for me from my birth grandfather. Could you send it to me, please?" And the woman at the other end of the line sort of stopped for a second and went, "Well, let me look in your records. Just a moment, please." [chuckles] And she came back and says, "Yes, there is and I'll send it to you right away." It was that easy.

LEVINE:

And say anything more about what was [unclear] in that letter.

WINSLOW:

About — I understood that my birth grandfather was a city official in Warsaw before the war. And the family was split up. According to the story that the agency got during its association with my birth mother — I think this is the time frame — that — that the family was split up into different concentration camps and they totally had lost track of each other. And when she got here, she thought she was the only survivor. She met her father here on Ellis Island and, at that point, also found herself pregnant and decided, I'm sure, over a period of time that — that that was a decision that she would make, to take care of him, to be able to take care of him and to give me up because both were going to be an impossible situation.

LEVINE:

Now, you — I think you said before the tape was on that your grandfather had been disabled —

WINSLOW:

Yes.

LEVINE:

— during the war.

WINSLOW:

Yes. He even wrote in the letter — he said, "We're doing this because I" — he says, "I — it is my inability to care for myself that is causing this. It's my" — he was taking the blame. "It's my fault that she's giving you up because I am incapable of taking care of myself." But there's no elaboration at all, whether it was a physical incapability or just a —

LEVINE:

It doesn't [unclear] —

WINSLOW:

— psychological one.

LEVINE:

— because, I mean, he certainly had his feet on the ground —

WINSLOW:

Yeah, yeah.

LEVINE:

— to do this.

WINSLOW:

Yeah, to even write this letter. And — and that the rest of it was that she never told the young man that got her pregnant that she was pregnant, because he had connections. According to Louise Wise, what she told them was that he had connections in the U.S. And she didn't want him — to hold him back and saddle him with child, wife and father-in-law in the New World. She liked him that much that she wanted him to get ahead. So she never told him.

LEVINE:

And that came in the letter too?

WINSLOW:

Well, no. That came in what Louise Wise sent me along with the letter from my birth grandfather. They sent me some information, how much I weighed at birth, that it was a normal pregnancy, that the man was from Germany and — and my birth mother was from Poland originally and all the bit about a city official and everything. And that was in the letter from Louise Wise. And then all his letter really said was, "It's a very honorable thing that your mother is doing. You know, she's giving you up to take care of me and I'm sorry she has to do it that way. But we think it's for your best. It's the best thing for you." So that was — that's really —

LEVINE:

What a sacrifice all the way around.

WINSLOW:

Yeah, yeah. And, you know, it was — I remember when the book, "Sophie's Choice," came out. I read it about 40 times, you know, going, "I understand the sacrifice. I do." You know, just because I knew that I had been adopted from Holocaust survivors. I mean, I think, no matter what the choice is, there are choices there that people had to make that are just beyond imagination. Beyond imagination, that people could do that to other people, to me. You know, that's the most amazing thing about the whole era. One interesting story, I lived in Japan for four years. And one of my close friends in Japan took me to see her parents. And as we were driving around, her father said to me, "I was so surprised when my daughter came home and said that her best friend was an American." He says, "You know, I fought in the war and I have very deep feelings about Americans." And I thought, 'What do I — what do you say? What do you say to that?' And I thought for a moment and I — I asked my friend, who spoke very good English, to translate for me. And I said, "You know, war affects everybody." And I told him that I was an adopted child because my birth parents had survived the war but were incapable of caring for me. And the man did not say one more thing to me. I mean, he was like — then we ended the conversation, "Yes, I know war is hard. I understand your feelings but I have feelings too about war, the same war." Okay. And we didn't say anymore about it. We let it go. And the next day, we took them out. I — my husband and I took them out for a sushi lunch. And when they came into the room he gave me the bow that you only give to someone who has taught you wisdom. He bowed really, really low. And I was really embarrassed but I understood it completely. We didn't need words. I taught him that he wasn't the only one affected by World War II. And that — that's the last thing, I think, people need to understand that it goes beyond just the survivors. The survivors have survivors. And they have — they have feelings about it too, you know, and it's important to talk about it, you know.

LEVINE:

Now, is Louise Wise an agency just for Jewish people?

WINSLOW:

Well, you'd think so.

LEVINE:

Were your adoptive parents —

WINSLOW:

Yes.

LEVINE:

— also Jewish?

WINSLOW:

Yes, yes.

LEVINE:

Uh-huh.

WINSLOW:

Yeah. I think so. I'm not sure whether they are still today or what but I think so.

LEVINE:

Uh-huh. Uh-huh.

WINSLOW:

I don't know that much about them at all, you know, except that they have been very good with their — and very straightforward with their contacts with me. They have not give me any, you know, problems at all about the information I can have or can't have. They're very, right down the line, open and upfront about everything, which I appreciate.

LEVINE:

Uh-huh. Yeah.

WINSLOW:

You know, that's one of those things.

LEVINE:

Yeah. Have you, personally, had feelings a — about Ellis Island? I mean, is there —

WINSLOW:

Well, I've always — I mean, I think I came here as a little kid on maybe a school trip or something like that. But I always said, "If I get back to New York City I really need to go out." And then when I found out that my mother had been donating all the time, that one of the organizations that she gave money to, which I didn't know until she passed away, was Ellis Island Foundation. I knew I really wanted to — even more so, I wanted to come and — and be able to look and research and see, because, clearly, she knew at least that much.

LEVINE:

I was going to say, her donations may have actually been in response to you —

WINSLOW:

Yeah.

LEVINE:

— rather than —

WINSLOW:

Yeah.

LEVINE:

— a family member who came through —

WINSLOW:

Yeah.

LEVINE:

— or, you know, something like that.

WINSLOW:

I — I don't know. Yeah, could be.

LEVINE:

It would be interesting for you to look and see —

WINSLOW:

Yes, yes.

LEVINE:

— [unclear].

WINSLOW:

I'm going to have to go and look in that.

LEVINE:

[chuckles]

WINSLOW:

Well, actually, I was starting to look at that wall when the woman at the information desk down there asked me, you know, about the names. And I said, "I don't know what the name is. I was born — you know, I was born here and I don't know my name." And that's when she said I had to come upstairs and — and speak with you.

LEVINE:

Yeah. I'm really glad you did because —

WINSLOW:

Me too. Me too.

LEVINE:

— if — if someone were to hear this tape and be able to —

WINSLOW:

Connect.

LEVINE:

— remember any kind of [unclear] —

WINSLOW:

And that's how the connections happen, isn't it?

LEVINE:

I think so.

WINSLOW:

I was in — in 1996, I was in Sydney, Australia and I went to the Holocaust Museum there, which is just magnificent. I — if you can use such a word to describe such a horror, it's so well laid out. And survivors man it.

LEVINE:

Oh.

WINSLOW:

So you meet people who were there when you go in there. And it is just intense. And their research librarian — I — I was speaking with her. And she said to me — she says, "You know how it'll happen? You'll be sitting at a dinner table somewhere and you'll tell this story about being — your first name was Scarlett. And someone will say, 'I know someone who' — or, you know, the six degrees of separation, you'll run into." And that's how most of these stories have come out is that people who have run into other people. And they tell the story and they meet and the connections are made. So that's why I started the search. I thought, 'I'm going to put myself out there. And that way, if there's any interest at all or any possibility of any crossing at all with family members, they can at least know where I am.'

LEVINE:

Okay. Well, now, is there anything else that you can think of relevant to — to the story, that you —

WINSLOW:

To the story.

LEVINE:

— might want somebody listening to this to be aware of?

WINSLOW:

Not really that I can think of. I think I've said everything I know. [chuckles] At this point, everything that I've had access to, information wise.

LEVINE:

Well, it does seem — I mean, just to me, an [chuckles] objective, outside —

WINSLOW:

[laughs]

LEVINE:

— person, that you — you really did fare very well.

WINSLOW:

Absolutely.

LEVINE:

And — and that your mother — certainly, there was no blame to be assigned.

WINSLOW:

None whatsoever. None whatsoever.

LEVINE:

And now —

WINSLOW:

It's just miraculous that the information got passed along.

LEVINE:

Yes.

WINSLOW:

That they — that everyone had the consciousness to keep saying, "I've got this information so that I could get to it." I mean, to me, that's the miracle. I think there probably are a lot of people who don't have access to even what I have had access to. You know, maybe some have names and so forth but I have — I have that story. As a little child, when I didn't have that story, the fantasy, you can imagine, went from the illegitimate daughter of the Queen of England all the way [chuckles] down to a pauper left by a gypsy in a little camp. You know, so it really helps to have whatever information you have. I think it just helps you to fill in that imagination gap and put it on a — on the right rail, you know, and get — and not be so wild about the fantasy and be a little more realistic.

LEVINE:

On the other hand, think [unclear] imagination —

WINSLOW:

[laughs] Well, I was —

LEVINE:

— [chuckles] the basis for developing a child's imagination [unclear].

WINSLOW:

Absolutely. Absolutely. And — and they raised me on — one of the books that was always a staple in my life was, "And to Think that I Saw It on Mulberry Street," by Dr. Seuss. They — [END OF TAPE 1, SIDE A] [BEGIN TAPE 1, SIDE B]

WINSLOW:

This — they don't even let that book out now because it's really — nowadays, it's interpreted as being about lying.

LEVINE:

Oh.

WINSLOW:

Because the story is, every day the boy goes home from school and he says — and Grandpa says to him, "And what did you see today?" And he says, "Oh, I saw a — a milkman drawing — driving his horse down the road. You know, the milk car." "No, no, no. What if that was a magician?" And "What if that was a circus coming down the road?" So it's sort of teaching you to make this little plain thing into something really imaginary. And that's not how we teach today. We teach imagination down to reality so that's not the most popular — it's hard to find that book. But, yeah, I — I was raised with a lively imagination.

LEVINE:

Uh-huh. When you were being raised, were you amongst immigrant children?

WINSLOW:

No.

LEVINE:

No.

WINSLOW:

But New Rochelle was a — when I was growing up in New Rochelle, New Rochelle was a bedroom community for the United Nations. So I went to a very international elementary school. I met children from all over the world and from lots of different situations all over the world. But, no, we never — I never was in a — a strictly immigrant situation — you know, neighborhood or anything like that. They — my grandfather was a — an English teacher at New Rochelle High School. And my father taught stenography and prac — they called them practical arts at that time, typing, stenography and that kind of — that kind of course. And then they ran a — a summer camp in — during the summer months. So we spent most of the year in — in New York and summers in Massachusetts. And I went to — I — I grew up with Leonard Bernstein Young People's Concerts and all of the advantages anyone could possibly want in this world. Yesterday, we were in the Metropolitan Museum of Art and there were all these school kids. And our friends from California that were here — to show them the East Coast for the first time. And I said, "Can you imagine? This is how I grew up. I grew up with this at my back door. And going here and doing this and all of these things that, you know, other children in other parts of the world have no access to, no idea about." It's such a special place to grow up. New York is. It's just marvelous.

LEVINE:

And how about your association with Holocaust survivors, or your adoptive parents? Did — were there connections that they had or —

WINSLOW:

Not that I know of.

LEVINE:

— that you, particularly, had?

WINSLOW:

No, no. Not that I know of. I — I didn't — I think, in my religious school classes, there may have been other children in the same situation, adopted children who were survivors. But I don't really remember any of them specifically. It was just that time. And you didn't talk about it that much. You know, it was like my parents told me because they knew — they thought, if they didn't they knew it would come from another kid and then it would be traumatic. So if I knew about it, then when the kids said, "I know where you came from," you know, I could say, "Yeah, so do I." You know. [chuckles] "So what's the big deal?" So it — it was approached from that angle.

LEVINE:

Yeah.

WINSLOW:

You know, the —

LEVINE:

Okay. Well, I think — I think we've pretty much covered it. And I'll be very curious to see if the name Scarlett is on that Wall [unclear].

WINSLOW:

I know. I know.

LEVINE:

And if it isn't, maybe it should be. [laughter] You know? Anyway, I'm speaking with Jane Schlosberg Winslow, who was born on Ellis Island and remained here for three days with her birth mother and would be interested in any information —

WINSLOW:

Absolutely.

LEVINE:

— that connects with this story. Okay. It's [clears throat] October 22 nd , 1999. This is Janet Levine, for the National Park Service, signing off. [END OF INTERVIEW]