LEVINE:

Today is July 23, 1997, and I am here in the Ellis Island Oral History Studio with Frank John Stefan.

STEFAN:

Yeah.

LEVINE:

Who came from Romania, with his mother, father, and sister.

STEFAN:

Eh-hmm.

LEVINE:

In 1938, at the age of eight years.

STEFAN:

Eh-hmm.

LEVINE:

They came on the Bremen. And at the time of this interview Mr. Stefan is sixty-six years of age. And this is Janet Levine for the National Park Service. Well, I'm delighted that you're here. And I'm sorry we're gonna go a little bit quickly, but I'm sure you have a lot to say. But we'll move as quickly as we can.

STEFAN:

Thank you.

LEVINE:

If you would say your birth date and where in Romania you were born.

STEFAN:

I was born on September the 26, 1938 in a place called Livada L-I-V-A-D-A, Romania -- near the city of Arad A-R-A-D.

LEVINE:

You were born in 1930. Right?

STEFAN:

Right, yeah.

LEVINE:

1930.

STEFAN:

Did I say? 193--

LEVINE:

Thirty-eight.

STEFAN:

i93--? You're gonna correct all of that? 1930, September 26, 1930.

LEVINE:

Great. And when you were born, um, you were the first child?

STEFAN:

I was.

LEVINE:

Is that correct?

STEFAN:

I was.

LEVINE:

Okay, and your father and mother's names.

STEFAN:

My father's name was Paul. And my mother's name is Elizabeth.

LEVINE:

And your mother's maiden name.

STEFAN:

Her maiden name was Steger, S-T-E-G-E-R.

LEVINE:

Now, did your mother and father, were they born in Romania or did they come to Romania from some place else?

STEFAN:

They were born in Romania.

LEVINE:

Okay. Now, at that time, you were there for your first eight years. Did you have grandparents there, too?

STEFAN:

Yes, I did.

LEVINE:

Do you have any memories of them?

STEFAN:

I have memories of my grandmother, from both grandmothers. From my father's side and from my mother's side. My mother, from my mother's side, she, we brought her out to Canada in 1951. 'Cause my father's – my -- my mother's father died in the First World War in 1914 with the Austria-Hungarians. And was missing in action and never -- they never found him again. And my grandmother never remarried. So we thought -- my mother and my Aunt Tot -- it was best to bring her out in 1951 to Montreal, Canada.

LEVINE:

Ah-huh. Would you have any memories as a child, as an eight year old or less of being with either one of your grandpar --- grandmothers in Romania?

STEFAN:

Yes, I do.

LEVINE:

What do you remember when you think of that?

STEFAN:

Mo-- I visited my grandmother from the mother's side, who I just said came to Canada in 1951. She didn't live too far from us, and we would visit her quite often because she was a widow.

LEVINE:

What kind of a lady was she?

STEFAN:

Oh, fine...

LEVINE:

What did you do with her?

STEFAN:

She was -- she was a -- she was a bit of loner, but very friendly with people. And she was very well known around town. It was in a small town, of about a thousand people. So everybody knew her.

LEVINE:

And wha-- how was she known? How, how, what was it that she?

STEFAN:

She was known as Aunt Elizabeth to every child and every, every grown person and that. She was well liked in the town, my grandmother from the mother's side.

LEVINE:

Yeah.

STEFAN:

From my father's side, she remarried. And we saw her not as often as from the mother's side.

LEVINE:

Okay. Okay, did you go to school at all?

STEFAN:

Yes, I went one year to school. And being ethnic Germans in the town, the first language was German. And I only went to school one year. It was all in German. And the second year, we would have had both languages. And we left for Canada.

LEVINE:

I see. Now did you speak German at home at all?

STEFAN:

Yes I did.

LEVINE:

You did.

STEFAN:

Yes.

LEVINE:

So that, so that at home you spoke German.

STEFAN:

Yes.

LEVINE:

And Romanian? Did...

STEFAN:

And Romanian would of come into -- into play because the town itself was ninety-five percent. We had a very small minority of Hungarians. And if I would have stayed there, automatically I would have become bilingual and probably trilingual without a doubt.

LEVINE:

Eh-hmm.

STEFAN:

Yes.

LEVINE:

Eh-hmm. Now when you say you were ethnic Germans, that means that originally it was part of Austria-Hungary and the language was German?

STEFAN:

Yes. Our forefathers immigrated from – from Bavaria and then the Schwarzwald, the Black Forest, in the seventeenth -- eighteenth century. And we settled there, as farmers, in the Banat B-A-N-A-T. That was the area. It was very good farming land. And they started to settle in there after the Turks had been driven out -- little history on that. And many stayed there. And then we decided to -- my aunt was -- my mother's sister -- immigrated in 1930 to Canada. And we thought it was time to move out, too. And we moved out. Thanks God we did, we avoided the war.

LEVINE:

Hmm. So it was your mother's sister that was the first of the family...

STEFAN:

To immigrate.

LEVINE:

...to immigrate. And then you...

STEFAN:

I could tell you a little bit more if you have the time for my father's side. My father -- my father's father immigrated to Chicago in 19-- after the First World War. And he - and in those days -- from my father's side -- his father -- they immigrated and they -- those days the men immigrated mostly to the U.S.A. And the plan was to stay there for three, four years; five years at the most, make money and come back to buy land.

LEVINE:

Oh.

STEFAN:

And was a sad if you care to want a little bit more...

LEVINE:

Yes.

STEFAN:

... from my father's side. He came home and had an unfortunate death. My father was twelve years of age. He was out in Chicago for four years. And he was a farmer prior to leaving, came back and they had bought a new horse for the farm. And they told him, "Be careful about it, it's a bit wild." And he forgot himself, whatever happened. And the horse reared back and kicked him. And kicked him right on the head, and died instantly. So that was the sad side of it. But. So they were, they immigrated. My father's aunt immigrated (she's in one hundred years of age, she's still in Chicago) in 1906. She's going be a eighth on September the 8 th . She's gonna be one hundred on September the 8 th .

LEVINE:

That's wonderful.

STEFAN:

So that's a little story there.

LEVINE:

Yeah.

STEFAN:

You could cut a little bit if you want but...

LEVINE:

No...

STEFAN:

...that's the story.

LEVINE:

...no. Any stories are always good. Okay, so tell me about -- so your father, your father was working as a farmer as a very young man.

STEFAN:

Yeah, in Romania.

LEVINE:

In Romania.

STEFAN:

He also learned a trade to be a furrier because at those days, my father was--. His gran-- his father had died. So the mother was wise enough (he had two sisters) to send him to trade school -- into the vi-- into the town -- into town. And he became a furrier. So he -- he was farming and also had a trade, which came to – to his aid when we immigrated.

LEVINE:

Did he ever practice his furrier in Romania?

STEFAN:

He practiced it. Not in Romania, he went to school there. But he practiced it in – in Montreal for a short period of time. And then it got slack in the winter and during the spring. And then he went into the tile making, eventually became a coal dealer for a while, and then a trucker. I had him in the moving business 'til he became of age, to become older.

LEVINE:

Ah.

STEFAN:

It's a little story on him, yeah.

LEVINE:

Well now. Were, were your families religious at all, in Romania?

STEFAN:

Well, we -- . In those towns the church there, just about everybody went to church on Sunday. Men -- and even they had nice choirs. And the cultural side was – was very active.

LEVINE:

What church was that?

STEFAN:

It was Roman Catholic Church.

LEVINE:

Ah-huh.

STEFAN:

Yeah.

LEVINE:

And so, did you, do you remember any ceremonies...

STEFAN:

Well, sure.

LEVINE:

...or observances of the Catholic religion?

STEFAN:

Sure. Well, the Catholic religion, first communion was (while I didn't make my first communion -- I made my first -- I was too young) I made my first communion in Canada in 1940. First communion was a big thing. The church holiday, on certain time of the year. Ours was -- that was the day when the church was supposed to have been founded in 1875. And they always held it in October. There was a – first, a religious affair in the morning. In the afternoon there was a big dance. Weddings were – were two days long.

LEVINE:

Tell me like what,

STEFAN:

So it was fine.

LEVINE:

...what like, like that – that church celebration or wedding--

STEFAN:

Okay,

LEVINE:

...what would happen?

STEFAN:

Okay, the religious side would be -- being Roman Catholic. The, the young couples (there was maybe ten or twenty couples ma-- ) young women -- young girls and young men, between fifteen up. They would dress up in the local custom. And then they would get blessed in church. It would be, the choir would sing up there. And then after, in the afternoon, they would have a dance where polkas and waltzes would be played. And a brass band was always there. So that's what happened there. And you said something else?

LEVINE:

How about, how about foods? Are there any Romanian...

STEFAN:

No, we...

LEVINE:

...types of food that you'd,

STEFAN:

...we practiced --. Romanians, like I said, we would have gotten -- that, we practiced well to the local customs. In our -- that we inherit from the forefathers. So there was -- the food was excellent. All kinds of noodles and all kinds of meats were prepared. In the winter, pigs would be slaughtered and you made sausages. And we were not far from wine country, so there was always some celebrations to be done. There was never a lack of good food, never. 'Cause we had good land. And I want to mention the name of Banat, B-A-N-A-T. That was a very, very agricultural. And it, it was just about the breadbasket of that section of Romania.

LEVINE:

Oh, ah-huh.

STEFAN:

You check that out B-A-N-A-T.

LEVINE:

Okay.

STEFAN:

And you'll find it, in any encyclopedia.

LEVINE:

Ah-huh. Okay, now you mentioned that it was your mother's sister who had come.

STEFAN:

Yes.

LEVINE:

And then, did they write to your mother and father?

STEFAN:

Yeah, I tell, if you have more time...

LEVINE:

Go ahead.

STEFAN:

I could even tell you. I know --

LEVINE:

Yeah, good.

STEFAN:

...what happened in here after my, my grandfather had died in the First War (missing, missing in action) and my grandmother... And he had a couple of brothers. And there was, I don't know quite all the that-- . There was an inheritance affair. And my fa -- my grandfather and my grandmother from my mother's side -- there was only my mother and my aunt, who went then to Canada. They started to have a, you know, a family disagreement with -- with the inheritance. With -- from -- from the father's brother's side. Did they get greedy? I know the whole story and I don't know the whole side of it. But it did, it turned a little nasty at time. And he was a schoolteacher. He was well educated, and we were farmers. So. What I hear, it went on and on. So my -- my mother's sister was six years older. He had and she (her husband was quite a business-oriented individual). They decided it was time to pack it up and go to Canada. They wanted U.S., but U.S. would not accept them anymore. They, they close the borders. And Canada started in thirty--. Up to and in the twenties, the Americans, like I told you, they – they -- . Then they close. And then we w — we would have gone to the States but it was...So they went in 1930, and we carried on this affair, this sad affair. We lost the case, cost a lot of money. And we decided, my aunt wrote us, "Why don't you come up?" And we did. And it turned out okay. [Chuckles]

LEVINE:

Eh-hmm. I see. Okay, and do you remember getting ready to leave?

STEFAN:

Yes, I do.

LEVINE:

What do you remember of that?

STEFAN:

Well, I remember this -- going for passports. And I remember the last day. This was September. We left around the 22 nd , the 23 rd of September. My sister and I went to the school and said goodbye to our -- my sister did not go to school yet. You only started school at age seven, so I had just completed the year before one year. But I met friends. We were all in one room, first to grade five, [laughs] all in one room. So anyway, we went over there and the teacher introduced us. We knew one another, said that's our last day, we're going to America. They didn't know Canada, we always said America.

LEVINE:

And, and did, what did you know? Or what did the other children know? What did they think, about a child leaving for America?

STEFAN:

Well they were...

LEVINE:

What did you think?

STEFAN:

...they were sad. They wouldn't, they were just sad. Maybe some thought, later on that, especially when the things happened with the war and that, then we hear from them later when we visit. And when they went to Germany, after they fled Romania and so on and so forth. They said we were the lucky ones, to leave.

LEVINE:

Eh-hmm.

STEFAN:

'Cause they didn't think that, you know, in the small towns you wouldn't think things like that would have happened. Maybe God was good to us. We lost a case, but won.

LEVINE:

Right.

STEFAN:

Yeah.

LEVINE:

Were there Jewish people in your town that,

STEFAN:

No, no.

LEVINE:

...you recall?

STEFAN:

They were in Arad. And there was no problem with them. There was, Romanians, one thing about the Romanians were always good to the, to their minorities. And we got along with them; we learned one, each other's languages. And there were Hungarians there. History of that, I could tell you. My father being three, grade three in school, spoke three languages, German, the mother tongue, Romanian, and Hungarian. We learned Hungarian from the minority in the village. [Laughs] So there was no problem with languages, and no problem with Jews or anybody, nothing at all. It never even entered our minds.

LEVINE:

Eh-hmm. So when you left, do you recall anything that you, yourself or your sister or your mother or father, took with them from the old country to bring here?

STEFAN:

How do you mean that in, in culturally? Or...

LEVINE:

Any, or any, any objects. Any,

STEFAN:

Well, we, for that I don't recollect. You mean like clothes and things like...

LEVINE:

Well, or maybe an instrument, or maybe...

STEFAN:

No, there was not -- nothing that particular brought. Well nobody in the family play — played a --. My father -- my grandfather from the mother's side (the one I told you fell) he was a musician. He played the accordion, the one who died in -- missing in 1914. My fa — my fa-- my gran-- my mother's father. When my mother was a year old, he was the only one. He was a musician, part-time. He was a farmer. But we didn't, we just took the clothes on our backs we took, and a little bit of money.

LEVINE:

Eh-hmm. Okay, and then when you left, Lividia?

STEFAN:

Livada, L-I-V-A-D-A. You'll find it, and that's the name,

LEVINE:

Livada.

STEFAN:

...that's the, the city. And it's an industrial city, seven kilometers from us. We could -- the people walked there to -- to bring in their groceries, and sell on -- watermelons. [Laughs] We – we had a lot of watermelons. They would sell it on the market and so on.

LEVINE:

Gee, could you remember a day at the market?

STEFAN:

Yes. I remem--[Laughs] remem--

LEVINE:

Good, describe that.

STEFAN:

I could remember the day. I remember my father, we used to bring, we had a lot of watermelons. We grew them, not far from...and one thing about the farms. Were not -- you had to go to -- the, in the village there were not the farms. You had gardens. But the land was -- was distributed. It was you had one land that -- one piece of land maybe three, five kilometers away -- that would grow corn. The other one where they had the vineyards, and the other one would – would be watermelons. Here we found that strange. That the land, the farms were all around the farmer. Which was not the case. You went where the -- where it grew best. And you didn't have those huge pieces of land like here. So we had a nice piece, with watermelons. We used to take them in. I remember I went in the morning; I would sit with my father up front. And the two horses would pull, and we'd take the watermelons and go to the market in Arad. And local people -- the Romanians, Jewish people, Hungarians, whoever was -- wanted to buy a watermelon. We'd come back empty; you know, we have the load gone. And then we'd buy, would buy, grow -- or not grow --things that we needed. And so on. Maybe you needed new things for the horses and things like that -- saddles, whatever. It was always; I always liked that, when we went out there.

LEVINE:

I see by your face it must have been a fun time.

STEFAN:

[Laughs] I still think about it, alright. I – sorry. I went out, last time I was home, was in 1995. But a lot of them had, had left it. In '75 we were the first time home since 1930. And I took my three children home and myself, and my wife. Most of the people were still in the village. And then after Ceausescu fell – a little history for you there. The dictator of Romania, he made a deal with the West German government. Coal. If, at a certain price, he can buy the -- the ethnic Germans out of there. And they bought them out and they left and paid the Romanian government so much money. And the Rom — and the -- our ethnic Germans. It was not a forcible; they could stay. A lot of them went to West Germany. And that's where they are now, by Nürnberg.

LEVINE:

Oh.

STEFAN:

But the – the village is still doing fine. We were back home in '93, and most Romanians in that village are, stayed pretty good. They're trades people and they work in Arad, which is only seven kilometers away. So the village hasn't changed much. It has not been downtrodden. It has been, it looks still good.

LEVINE:

Good, good. Now tell me when you left Livada, where, how did you travel,

STEFAN:

Okay.

LEVINE:

...to get to,

STEFAN:

I'm going to tell you. Okay. We, I'm glad you asked now. The memories is good, I enjoy it. Is this. We went by, somebody took us by horse and wagons, the seven kilometers. We took the train -- in the, in the railroad station at Arad – further. And then we went to Budapest. That was the -- the Budapest, that quite a big city. From Budapest we went to Vienna. From Vienna we went to Bremen, where the ship Bremen, was in Bremerhaven, the Bremen port. The city of Bremen has -- is the city and the port is about fifteen miles away or ten miles away, where the ship was waiting to come back from New York. We boarded the Bremen. We stayed about five, six days in Bremen 'til the Bremen came back from New York City to load us up. And then we went to -- to Bremen -- to New York on -- and arrived there on October the 12 th .

LEVINE:

When you, when you were aboard the Bremen, do you have any?--

STEFAN:

Yes, I do. I got sick one day. [Laughs] God, that was a beautiful ship. Third class but were no steerage or anything like, not over there. And the food was excellent. But one day I got sick there and I even, you know, vomited a bit on the ship. But I remember this sailor cleaned it up. But the next day I was fine.

LEVINE:

Eh-hmm.

STEFAN:

And then we arrived in New York on October the 12 th .

LEVINE:

Ah-huh. And when you arrived in New York, did you see The Statue?

STEFAN:

I'm sure my parents saw it. I don't remember The Statue that much. But what I -- Ellis Island, I have a faint memory. But what I, what I remember most in the rooming house (we stayed in New York for two days, 'til our papers were ready) --. And I remember going down on the, down the stairs in that street (don't know the name of the street). And the kids the children -- were there, they were playing tennis. They struck a net across the street and they wouldn't let the cars pass. [Laughs] I remember as if it were yesterday. And then on the 14 th we left to go to Canada, by train.

LEVINE:

Now how did you come by that rooming house? Do you know how?

STEFAN:

I -- that, somebody, -- my parents, or, or the travel agent must have arranged that for us to stay.

LEVINE:

Did you have Traveler's Aid, do you remember? There was like an organization.

STEFAN:

Yeah. You see, you see here. I got this right here. These people might have made arrangements. See this is -- see they had offices all over the world.

LEVINE:

Oh, I see.

STEFAN:

That shipping line.

LEVINE:

I see, North German shipping line, ah-huh.

STEFAN:

See they in Chicago, yeah, yeah. So they might -- our travel agent in, in, in Arad might have made the arrangements. There must of have been. Otherwise, we couldn't speak the language. So somebody must have done that for us. Otherwise we couldn't do it.

LEVINE:

Now why were you staying two days in the rooming house?

STEFAN:

I — I -- I figure be-- 'til, like you, like they say over here, we must have had – had to go to Ellis Island to get examined. Because from the 12 th to the 14 th (if you look in the records here) we left -- we arrived on the 12 th and left on the 14 th to go to Montreal. And there's a side story with that. We were supposed to go to Winnipeg.

LEVINE:

What happened?

STEFAN:

We were supposed to go to Winnipeg. And it shows here-- if you look in the passport -- Winnipeg, Manitoba. I'll tell you a little story about that one.

LEVINE:

Okay.

STEFAN:

We laid down -- the papers are not here. I would have brought to New York or forward to you. I found in my father's papers when he died and I keep them -- keepsake them because I like things. And it -- we had laid down a thousand dollars through London, England. Because we came through CNR, which the CNR railway that arranged all this. And we were the -- Canada had a rule that time, you were supposed to go to the farm, work on the farm for about a year. And the receipt is still there. We gave them one thousand dollars through London, England (the bank) at it --as a deposit. And if we don't keep our word, the thousand dollars are gone. So when we came to Canada, my uncle said (who came in '30) says, "What do you wanna go on the farm for, you just came from the farm. Forget about it, I'll find you a job." [Laughs] And that was the end. So we stayed.

LEVINE:

And you lost your thousand?

STEFAN:

[Laugh] Sure, we lost a thousand, but it worked out fine.

LEVINE:

[Laughs] Okay.

STEFAN:

A real, same thing, I'll even show you -- forward you a copy of it. It's true.

LEVINE:

Oh, that, good.

STEFAN:

That's a fact.

LEVINE:

Oh, we talked about that,

STEFAN:

Yeah, sure. No sweat.

LEVINE:

Now, what I want to say is, those first few days, those first few weeks when you got to New York. You were in the rooming house.

STEFAN:

Yes, yes, yeah.

LEVINE:

You took the train. You went to,

STEFAN:

To Montreal.

LEVINE:

...to Montreal. Were there things that struck you as new and different?

STEFAN:

I'll tell you, I tell you one. Well, we nearly had a bad accident because we were in an ethnic -- there were Jewish people there -- in the ethnic section, like the ghetto.

LEVINE:

In Montreal?

STEFAN:

In Montreal. There were Germans, there were Jews, Hungarians, Romanians, everything, what have you. You all got along. The first day we got out my -- we stayed with my aunt and their name was Keller, by the way. Any way and, down in that, and it was, it's a busy city. Montreal was still the boom capital of Canada. It's not no longer, but it was then. And we -- my sister and I were running back. We saw (in our town we never had any automobile. We – we didn't see automobile, or I don't remember in Arad, but I probably did. But I remember in Bremen, because we stayed six days, only in a big city. So you saw, or in New York.) So we were running back and forth crossing the street, and my sister nearly got run over. One fellow had to brake quite quickly because we --this was something new to us, in a big city playing around. So that was one of the things that happened.

STEFAN:

And we stayed there with our -- 'til about 19-- late '39. Then we moved to the next street and we got our own apartment. But to say that we lived four of us in one room for over a year.

LEVINE:

Hmm.

STEFAN:

At my aunt's place.

LEVINE:

Did you ever want to go back?

STEFAN:

For a visit, yes. But not to live there, no.

LEVINE:

Not to live.

STEFAN:

To visit, yes.

LEVINE:

Did you feel like an outsider at first?

STEFAN:

No I didn't – a little bit in school. We got a little bit taunted but nothing serious. You know how children are.

LEVINE:

Green horn.

STEFAN:

A little green horn job, yeah. [Laughs] Sure.

LEVINE:

Okay, and then,

STEFAN:

But I took it pretty good.

LEVINE:

When you look back on it now, the fact of coming here as an eight-year old, and changing your life and living out your life here, do you think being an immigrant, immigrating to a new country had an effect on you as a person, as a personality? As a, that it left a mark on the way you perceive the world?

STEFAN:

You know what? You -- good question. I, I've always gotten along with people. And I think it was the best move that ever happened. And I look back to nostalgia. Like I, I miss the old times in certain things. But I think it opened my mind to, to grow more culture. Though in Europe there -- in other words -- I'm not saying hatred, but you only mi-- lived amongst yourself. And it opened, when I went to school here. You got, like I say, you live with so many different cultures. One common language that was basic then was English. But you still kept your cultural things. You know, your ethnic foods and that. But once you were out in the streets you were part of them and you learn from one another. I think that's what, what made me an even better person, I think.

LEVINE:

How do you, how do you balance your Romanian ethnic, German heritage and being an American? Or being --

STEFAN:

Canadian.

LEVINE:

...I should say Canadian.

STEFAN:

Canadian. How do I balance it? I balance it. I — I -- I like my part of my heritage, so I balance that out. And even I want the children to keep some part of it. You can't, you can't force that culture on, on anybody. But it -- I always think being more like we have in Quebec, with both languages, you know (French and so on). And I feel, when, when a person has a little more, more languages with him that it opens your eyes. And opens the world to more things. And so many things you could do, and still be friends with the ones who don't. But you always have that little edge and that extra knowledge. And traveling is a great thing.

LEVINE:

Eh-hmm. Okay before we close, I just want to ask you, your wife's name and your children's names?

STEFAN:

Okay, sure, okay. My wife's is Hildegard.

LEVINE:

And her maiden name?

STEFAN:

N-E-S-S, like Elliot Ness. [Laughs] Sure.

LEVINE:

Okay, Hildegard. And your children's names?

STEFAN:

You ha — Why ,we have three. So there's Rosemarie, M-A-R-I-E. She's married. She has two children. And then there's Robert. He's a musician, R-O-B-E-R-T. He's -- you want there dates of birth?

LEVINE:

No, that's okay.

STEFAN:

Okay, and then there's Frank Junior.

LEVINE:

Ah-huh. Okay.

STEFAN:

He came ten years after the second one for, for, just for a laugh.

LEVINE:

Oh. [Laughs]

STEFAN:

It was an accident.

LEVINE:

Okay, well maybe -- just, is there anything else you'd like to say before we close?

STEFAN:

No, I – I -- sure. I want to -- I hope I didn't keep you too long.

LEVINE:

Not at all.

STEFAN:

And I'm glad you asked me these questions. I -- it came from the heart --

LEVINE:

Well,

STEFAN:

...with what I answered you. And I thought about this, Ellis Island, for a number of years. But for the last two, three years it's really bothered me. I said it was time, after we contributed here. I said it's time to, to go. And I said to my wife Hilda, I said, "This is the year, I'm not getting any younger, we've got to do it." And we're glad we came."

LEVINE:

And you saw your name on the Wall of Honor?

STEFAN:

Yes.

LEVINE:

Your family name. Well ,it's been a real pleasure.

STEFAN:

Same here.

LEVINE:

Thank you very much.

STEFAN:

And thank you for inviting me.

LEVINE:

You're very welcome, and this is Janet Levine for the National...

STEFAN:

Thank you.

LEVINE:

...Park Service.

STEFAN:

Is it L-E-V-I-N-E?

LEVINE:

Yes it is.

STEFAN:

Good, fine.

LEVINE:

[Laughs] And, this, I'm speaking with Frank,

STEFAN:

Can I have your card?

LEVINE:

...John Stefan.

STEFAN:

Sure, yes.

LEVINE:

And it's July 23, 1997. And I'm signing off for the National Park Service. END OF INTERVIEW