Voice/Vision Holocaust Survivor Oral History Archive

Alice Lang Rosen - August 5, 1991

Meeting Husband

Oh.

This old girlfriend of mine introduced me to him and uh, you know, we dated. And I just couldn't believe him and his family when he introduced me to his mother and his sisters--the different lifestyle. I wasn't used to the easiness and how they accepted me and how wonderful they were. I mean, his family was the tops. And Bill was so gentle and so easygoing and so nice. All I ever heard from home was--I always yelled at. My parents were yelling at--that's how, I mean that was what kept them going, yelling at each other, you know. I never did anything right, you know. And it was just wonderful, the calmness that was--that Bill had about him and that's just--that's what I was looking for I think. I found what I had been looking for. So, when I told them that we were going to get married, of course, I got a little, you know, they weren't always--not that happy right away about it either but--and uh, then they didn't want me to have a wedding. They didn't want to make a wedding for me. So Bill's sisters came and they said, "Look, we didn't have a wedding. All we had was a chuppah and a rabbi in our living room in Chicago. And Alice..." Oh, by that time my name was changed to Alice, I forgot about that.

Who cha...who changed it?

How did they change it? My mother changed it. We came to America and we got our first papers and they said, "We don't know how to spell or pronounce Freya you're going to have to give her another name." So my mother said, "We'll name her Alice because I have a friend Alice," and I resembled her friend, Alice. So they gave me Alice, so and when I became a citiz...I became a citizen, I was already married, and so I became Alice.


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