Mrs. Roemerfeld - 1982?
Education
You mean the private school was strictly sponsored by Jews.
No, the public school.
The school you went to.
Yes, public school.
Not the school that the non-Jews went to.
No, oh no, we weren't allowed to go on the street either.
You weren't allowed to go on the street.
No, no.
How soon before the war was that, that you weren't allowed to go on the street?
Ever since I recall, since I was little.
What--do you remember an age?
Well, we started school in Europe the same as here, I guess five. And, of course you know, the classes there were much more advanced, as I hear now, you know. Because I only had five grades of public schooling and uh, as you can tell from my voice, I, I'm not doing so poorly in English. So uh, when I was in Germany I was doing pretty well too in languages, you know. But uh, I was interrupted because in 1939 the Germans came in and uh, uh, that's when everything stopped. And uh, they formed right away an open ghetto, which is uh, known to all European Jews. And uh, because they were not organized uh, the Germans, with all their powers and everything, so they left it open. But we were segregated you know, in one uh, one part of the city. And uh, then in '41 they closed off the ghetto and we weren't allowed to even cross the street.
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