By Bela “Bill” Suhayda
We crossed over the Austrian/Hungarian border having successfully evaded Soviet border guards, snipers, and land mines a little more than a month before our arrival into New York harbor January 7, 1957.
We traveled two weeks crossing over the small pond called the Atlantic, a body of water insulating America from a very troubled Europe and the revolution we escaped in our homeland of Hungary.
We gazed upon the Statue of Liberty as we floated into New York Harbor and I could see from the smiles on my parent’s faces they finally felt safe. At age seven, I could only marvel at the magnificence of The Statue of Liberty. Our parents told my brothers and me: “She represents freedom.”
The immensity of the space we were entering (New York harbor) kept all eyes on board in an awestruck perpetual gaze of huge ships and a Manhattan skyline we couldn’t get enough of seeing. Then as we left ship, some kissed the ground showing their gratitude for solid land under their feet. After two weeks of pitch, roll, and sway on a very angry sea, we all became “landlubbers.” Others, understanding where they had arrived and the tyranny they had fled, kissed the ground for the freedom that was now returned to them.
The stories of this land had preceded our arrival. The skyscrapers we first saw from the harbor convinced us of the magnificence of this country. Most of these Hungarian refugees, with whom we had just traveled across the Atlantic, came from small villages with rural agricultural routines and simple lives. Here in New York, we were looking at buildings 50 to 80 stories high. Even in major cities of Europe, such as Budapest, Vienna, or London, buildings rarely reached past 10 stories. We craned our necks to see the very tops of the buildings as we walked next to them. The cars, shops, buildings, and airplanes in the sky were ubiquitous. None of us had ever seen anything close to what we were seeing here. Those on board our ship, the U.S.S. General Haan, showed their joy and gratitude for our arrival with broad smiling faces as we boarded military buses for Camp Kilmer New Jersey where we were to be processed as legal residents of the U.S..
These were our first impressions of this magical land called America. Here we would learn of telephones, washer/dryers, garbage disposals, gas stoves, central heat, and air conditioning. Water came from a faucet not a well in the back yard. We had indoor plumbing and television featuring Joe Dimagio, Mickey Mouse and Superman, who could leap tall buildings in a single bound. This was a different and amazing world. This was America.
This was the land of opportunity. My brothers and I would learn if we studied, worked hard, and were honest…we could make it here. And make it we did.
This was true for our parents as well who had come to the U.S. with only three suitcases and three energetic little boys. Our parents understood dependence on government, as we had it under communism, limited and controlled all who lived under its collectivist tyranny. God given, not government given freedom to act in one’s own self interest is the most productive and humane system of government man has ever devised.
The American people are a generous people. The most generous people in the world reside here in these United States. And it was because of their generosity that they sponsored us as legal immigrants, setting us up for the success, we enjoy to this day.