LITMIR.BIZ

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little brown suitcases. The shiny golden locks glistened in the sun. Mutti carried keys that fit into holes in each lock. She kept the tiny keys in a little compartment in her pocket book. My suitcase was smaller than the other two but I still struggled to keep it from dragging on the ground.

      I remember a train and lots of walking. In a few days we were at a dock in Belgium. Here people spoke a language that was totally different from German. It seemed that after every train ride one had to learn a new language.

      In Antwerp, Mutti, Papa and I crowded into a small cabin on the Pennland. Papa announced with a grin, “We’re on our way to the land of milk and honey.”

      “Hooray,” I shouted as Papa lifted me high and danced around the tiny room.

      “I’m about to be sick,” moaned Mutti.

      First, two weeks in Holland, then several days in Belgium and now two weeks on a 600-foot ocean liner. It all seemed like a great adventure to me. This exodus reminded me of the story we tell at the Passover Seder about the flight out of Egypt, crossing the Red Sea and then spending forty years in the desert. Except I saw no desert. We were surrounded by water. Did the captain know how to get to the milk and honey without any landmarks? No streets, no buildings, no parks. Was God guiding the captain like He guided Moses?

      The Pennland was not a luxury cruise ship. Everything seemed cramped. But I was happy to be free of the Nazis—although I didn’t feel totally comfortable on a rocking boat with water on all sides.

      Our cabin had only beds. There may have been a dresser but I remember only beds. Papa lifted me onto the top bunk of a double-decker where I slept quite comfortably. Papa slept on the bottom bed and Mutti had her own little bed. We shared a tiny bathroom down the hall from our cabin with other adults. I didn’t see any children.

      Our little room had one little round window about the size of my face. Huge waves splashed against the window most of the time. Once we left port, I never saw anything but angry water. The slapping of the water against the ship didn’t keep me awake but Mutti complained that the noise gave her a headache.

      Rough seas during most of the two-week voyage meant that passengers rarely visited the dining room. Nor did they visit the deck, which was often covered with water as the boat tipped from side to side and the fierce wind and rain followed us across the ocean.

      I became the crew’s mascot, a healthy little boy who was always hungry. When all the other passengers were sick, I ate in the galley with the sailors. The food was much more plentiful than the rationed fare at home in Germany. I tried to eat as much as the crew members did, although they kept warning me that I was not quite tall enough to eat so much. Many of the crew spoke German and translated everything I needed to know. I learned English words like “chicken” and “fried potatoes” and “hamburger.” I ate corn and squash for the first time ever. While Mutti and Papa kept to their beds or were sick in our little toilet, I learned to say “please” and “thank you” in at least five languages.

      With great fanfare, my new friends presented me with a foot-long toy U.S. army truck which I “drove” everywhere—the conquering military hero. I imagined victorious American soldiers riding under the khaki colored canvas top that covered the back of my truck. Crew members taught me to read the “U.S. Army” logo on each side of the cab. They gave me paper and pencil and had me print “United States of America.”

      The body of my new truck was made of metal. The crew cautioned me to be careful of the sharp edges at the bottom of the truck. The doors of the cab were sealed shut but the tailgate was on a tiny hinge that allowed the back to open. I wished that I still had the lead soldiers I played with in Germany. They would fit into my truck and I could take them for rides. They surely would prefer riding to all the marching I had them do back in our Hannover apartment.

      The halls of the ship were mostly empty because the sick passengers rarely left their rooms. That left great highways for my truck to travel. Together we turned corners, climbed stairs and explored every corner of the ship. Sometimes I couldn’t find my way back to our cabin. Then I looked for a member of the crew, knowing he would pick me up and carry me “home”—often finding an extra peppermint in his pocket. I felt loved by as many papas as any boy could ever want.

      One day during lunch in the galley crowded with crew members, I reported that I was going to see the land of milk and honey. A few crew members warned me that I would not really find milk and honey on the streets—a huge disappointment because I believed everything my Papa told me. Nevertheless, they assured me that as long as I owned my American truck I would be safe and secure. They were quite correct.

      Papa and Mutti had an argument as we entered New York Harbor—the first of many disagreements in our new homeland. We passed the Statue of Liberty at 4 a.m. on the 15^th of November, 1939. My truck and I were sound asleep on my upper bunk bed. Papa insisted that he wake me to see the lady that welcomes all refugees. Mama said, “No, no. The boy needs his sleep.” Their quarrel woke me and Papa took me on deck.

      Papa held me up to see THE STATUE, the symbol of liberty. With tears in his eyes he whispered some words in Hebrew that I recognized from the Passover Seder, “… and God brought you out of the Land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.”

       VIII. WHAT’S IN A NAME?

      AS WE STEP OFF THE BOAT in New York harbor on that mid-November day in 1939, uniformed shepherds herd us into a cavernous warehouse. Frightened immigrants everywhere, confused and speaking their diverse European languages. A uniformed immigration official calls us to his desk to Americanize our names. We are to become a new breed, my father and I.

      “Name?” asks the Gestapo-looking man pointing at me.

      “Manfred Amram,” I whisper, looking up at Papa for protection.

      We Amrams have traced our ancestors all the way back to the late seventeenth century. But back then we weren’t Amrams yet. Most German Jews were not allowed surnames until Napoleon conquered much of Europe in the very early nineteenth century. Until then Jews registered births in the neighborhood synagogue with Hebrew names. For example, my great-great-great-great grandfather Rabbi Judah was born in Abterode, Germany. In 1720, his father registered the new baby in the local shul, the neighborhood synagogue, as Judah ben Moshe, Judah son of Moses. Rabbi Judah did not have a secular surname. Rabbi Judah named his son, born in 1745, Moses to honor his father. The rabbi’s son then was named Moshe ben Judah. Moshe became a cantor and shochet, a ritual slaughterer, in Felsberg, Germany.

      My Hebrew name is Moshe ben Menachem, Moses son of Menachem. My daughter’s name is Simcha bat Moshe, Joy daughter of Moses. Some modern Jewish families now also add the mother’s Hebrew name.

      In about 1802, Napoleon, having conquered much of Europe, noticed that most German Jews did not have surnames. Jews traditionally were called Rabbi Judah, Butcher Abraham or Uncle Nachum. Napoleon decreed that Jews were to be permitted to select surnames and instructed the bureaucracy to implement that policy.

      An official came to Cantor Moses ben Judah, my great-great-great grandfather, and declared, “The time has come for you to select a surname that your family can own forevermore. What shall it be?”

      Cantor Moses was a learned man. He knew that in Exodus we read of the famous sister of Moses, Miriam, who, as the story goes, shipped her baby brother off in a basket. We also read of the brother of Moses, Aaron, who became his spokesman and who ultimately led the Jewish people into the Promised Land. We learn that the mother of Moses was Joacheb and no less than six times is it written in the holy book that Amram was the father of the Biblical Moses. All this Cantor Moses knew and decided that he too would be Moses, the son of Amram. Cantor Moses Amram now had an official surname.

      Since that day, in every generation, the first born Amram son was given a name that begins with the letter “M” in honor of Cantor Moses Amram and in honor of the biblical Moses, son of Amram, who, it is written, led

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