knew this conversation was serious.
They had heard from Uncle Benno, Julius told his son. He explained to Günther that America was deep in a Depression, which meant that millions of people were out of work. The U.S. government required an affidavit of financial support for immigrants such as themselves, who had to leave their country with no money. But Uncle Benno had lost his full-time job and was picking up only part-time work, which meant he didn’t have the resources necessary to sign an affidavit for an immigrating family of five.
Günther’s father spread out a serious-looking document, several pages in length, on the table.
All this time, his mother had remained silent. Now at last she spoke up, her voice low and solemn. “Uncle Benno’s affidavit has come through for you alone,” she said, explaining that Günther would live with Uncle Benno and Aunt Ethel in St. Louis until the rest of the family could join him. “You have an appointment at the American consulate in Hamburg in a few weeks,” she added softly.
“Mutti, I am going alone to America?” asked a shocked Günther. He could not believe what he was hearing.
“Ja, Günther.”
Since Uncle Benno had been able to provide an affidavit for only one person, she explained, it had to be Günther. Neither she nor his father would go without the other; at nearly sixteen, Günther was the oldest of the children. They would keep trying to find a sponsor for the rest of the family and hoped to all reunite in America soon.
It was obvious to Günther that his mother was struggling with this decision as much as he was. He had never pictured this day, and she had never fathomed sending her teenage son away to a foreign country alone.
Perhaps once he got settled in the United States, she suggested, Günther could find someone there to help them. She said this was a serious, grown-up assignment to give him, but she and his father believed he was mature enough to handle it. Most important to her and his father, his mother said, was that Günther would be safe in America.
His father, always the practical businessman, began to describe the logistics of Günther’s trip to Hamburg, one hundred miles north of Hildesheim. He had already worked out a ride for him with a Jewish family who had an appointment at the consulate the day before Günther’s. After what would be the longest automobile ride of his life, Günther would spend the night at a students’ pension, then return home the next day with the local family.
Günther’s father had contacted a Jewish organization in Hanover, which was helping plan his emigration. An affiliated group based in New York, German Jewish Children’s Aid, was taking small groups of Jewish children out of Nazi Germany. Günther would be joining one of these groups. The organization would pay for his ocean passage, provide a chaperon, and make sure he reached his aunt and uncle in St. Louis safely. The group had already sent a social worker to interview Benno and Ethel Silberberg; the social worker, according to her report, had found them to be “kindly, wholesome people” eager to welcome their nephew into their home.
The prospect of leaving without his parents, his brother, and his little sister saddened Günther deeply. Other than visits to his grandparents and his bicycling trip, he had never been away from home for any length of time. Going to America was an opportunity to leave behind the upheaval, suppression, and violence consuming Germany, and visions from Herr Tittel’s colorful stories about America—the land of the free, of baseball and Hollywood movies and pizza!—danced in his mind. Yet, even as he began to dream of these things for himself, Günther was apprehensive about leaving the rest of his family behind. How and when would they reunite?
In early October 1937, Günther stood before a U.S. official who, unbeknownst to the youth, held his future if not his life in his bearlike hands. Vice Consul General Malcolm C. Burke, an impressive, barrel-chested man of fifty, had been in charge of administering immigration laws and regulations in Hamburg since 1924. Günther was lucky that his visa application had been assigned to Burke. Many other U.S. consuls, quick to find sworn affidavits inadequate, routinely denied visa requests. For example, in 1933, seventy-four German refugees had applied to the U.S. consulate in Rotterdam, but only sixteen visas were granted. All but one of the fifty-eight refusals were based primarily on the grounds that the would-be immigrants were likely to become public charges.
For a long time, Burke had been an outspoken critic of inconsistent interpretations of U.S. immigration law. Beyond that, he was a strong believer in having the resources of the friends and relatives who signed the affidavits investigated in the United States, at the place where their assets were located and their income earned, rather than by overseas officials making arbitrary judgment calls. Günther had another advantage in being assigned to Burke: unlike some of his less compassionate, even anti-Semitic colleagues in the U.S. State Department at home and abroad, Burke recognized that Jews were being persecuted by the Nazis and was willing to look for loopholes in the laws and regulations that would allow them to enter America.
Burke had in front of him Günther’s paperwork, including the affidavit signed by Benno Silverberg. The bank balance on the document had been swelled by short-term loans from coworkers and friends, whom Benno had repaid a week after receiving his bank statement. Burke had enough experience reviewing affidavits and financial statements to know when they’d been fudged, but if he harbored any suspicions about the St. Louis baker’s sizable bank balance, he did not raise them officially or voice them to Günther. He asked the boy, in German, for his full name, date of birth, and years of schooling. Then, inexplicably, he asked, “What is the sum of forty-eight plus fifty-two?”
“Einhundert,” Günther responded.
With that simple bit of mathematics, the consul stamped and signed Günther’s Jugendausweis (youth card). Günther Stern had been accepted by the U.S. State Department for entry into America.
Now that he had an approved visa, things moved quickly. Within a couple of weeks, the Sterns received word from the Jewish organization that they had a group of children leaving Germany on a ship to the United States in November, and that Günther could join them.
In late October, Günther’s friends gathered in the Sterns’ apartment for a boisterous farewell party. The event added to his growing excitement—and yet, the whispers of fear remained. Not a single non-Jew attended, not even Günther’s longtime classmate and one of his few remaining non-Jewish friends, Gerhard Ebeling. This fact did not escape Günther’s attention.
Gerhard, a gentile, couldn’t openly criticize the mistreatment of his Jewish classmates by pro-Nazi teachers and students. However, he would occasionally say something quietly to Günther about staying strong during these difficult times. Further complicating matters, Gerhard’s father was a customs official, the type of government job generally reserved in those days for Nazi Party members.
Customs officer Ebeling did something unusual the week before Günther was to depart, however. At that time, anyone preparing to leave the country had to show up in advance at the customs house to have his or her baggage inspected and sealed. Now Herr Ebeling telephoned Julius and offered to come to their apartment, saving the Sterns the labor of bringing in the heavy steamer trunk packed with clothes and family memorabilia Hedwig wanted to get out of Germany. That afternoon, Ebeling placed the official seal on the trunk without looking inside and wished Günther safe travels. In normal times, this would be a small gesture by a friendly official, but these were not normal times.
Günther Stern’s youth travel document, bearing two Third Reich stamps with swastikas, which he used to emigrate to America. (Family photograph)
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