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Yours Truly
About One Year Old |
Grammy called them Romanies, the Travelers, and told us they came from Romania. Most farmers referred to them as "The Gypsies". I remember seeing them only two or three times during my early childhood. That was probably at the end of an era when hundreds of thousands of gypsies emigrated from Russia and Eastern Europe during World War II. Hitler dislike gypsies almost as much as he did the Jews and persecuted them mercilessly. Nearly 500,000 were killed or starved in concentration camps. Many fled from Europe to other parts of the world to avoid incarceration in death camps.
The gypsies were shrouded in mystery and carried historical baggage that followed them everywhere they went. Grammy obviously had heard all the stories. Daddy and Mommy had lived the previous years in New York and New England, respectively, and had little first-hand knowledge of the Romanies, but I remember them both being silent but a bit grim during the infrequent visitations.
