I was a late gift to my parents. My father was born in 1899, my mom in 1907 or 1911. Her father was taken away in the night, dressed only in his pajamas. The Turkish soldiers returned to give the blood-stained pajamas to his wife. My mother and her family were sent out into the night, with only the clothes on their backs. Some of their Turkish neighbors went after them to bring them a few personal items.

My mother escaped to Greece and they built a ramshackle shelter of scrap wood to live in. Then she and her family went to Marseille, France. Dad also ended up in Marseille, but he didn’t marry my mother until they reached Havana, Cuba in 1929. His older brothers had already moved the USA – they fought with the American forces in World War I. Both of them got help from missionaries in Greece and France.

Not all of my family escaped: my Aunt Alice and her young son were on a Turkish ship on the Euphrates. The soldiers assaulted her in front of her child; they both threw themselves in the water.

My parents came to the United States with nothing and became leaders in their community and their example has guided my brothers and me throughout our lives. Both my brothers served with the US Marines in Korea and Vietnam. One of my brothers spent 25 years pushing for the State of Maine to acknowledge the Armenian Genocide. Both of us served as public housing commissioners in Portland, Maine.