Abstract

Margaret (Gretl) May Rein and her brother Leonhard May were born in Velimirovac, an area of Croatia and Slovenia which was in the former Yugoslavia. Leonhard was born in 1940 and Margaret in 1941. Their journey west began in this western part of the Osijek-Barnaja County, near the town of Nasice. Their father, Emanuel, as a German speaker, volunteered with the German army after serving in the Serbian army. They journeyed west by wagon with their mother and grandparents to the town of Pecs in Hungary, through Silesia and Seifersdorff, then south to Hirschberg, staying in the homes of farmers along the way. Once they reached Austria, the family was able to stay until the end of the war in Enns and Wartberg with assistance from The Church of the Brethren. They eventually immigrated, settling in the town of Creston, Ohio. Leonhard May was a business owner and president of the German Central at the time of this interview.

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Interviewee

May Rein, Gretl (interviewee); May, Leonhard (interviewee)

Interviewer

Franklin, Bill (interviewer)

Project

Cleveland German-American Oral History Project

Date

5-5-2021

Document Type

Oral History

Duration

85 minutes

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 License.

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