"Against the Odds"

Document | Not Digitized | Accession Number: 2007.394

Overview

Description: Consists of one memoir, 79 pages, entitled "Against the Odds," written in 1998 by Greta Grossman Lake, originally of Mikulov (Nikolsburg), Czechoslovakia. She describes her childhood in Mikulov, her family life, her memories of World War I, and her marriage in 1932 to George Lakenbacher. Despite difficulty, the couple, who were converted Catholics, along with Greta's brother Joe and his family, were able to immigrate to France in 1938. In 1942, after the first waves of arrests in the Langeac area, George escaped to Spain, but was arrested across the border and interned at the Miranda del Ebro internment camp. He was soon released and spent the rest of the war in Madrid. Meanwhile, Greta gave birth to a daughter, Eve Suzanne, at the end of September 1942. Greta acquired false papers and arranged for her daughter to be taken in by a family and cared for while Greta tried to evade arrest. After the war, the family was reunited and emigrated to the United States in November 1945, where they changed their last name from "Lakenbacher" to "Lake."
Date: 1998

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Holder of Originals: United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
Legal Status: Permanent Collection
Provenance: Suzanne Geoghegan donated her late mother's memoir to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum on Oct. 15, 2007.