Find A Distant Relative

Gracyn Tighe

When I look back now, I can almost remember what the inside of the apartment looked like. The walls were covered with unframed black and white photos of small children and their parents. An unfamiliar flag was tacked onto a door, one which I now understand to be from Lithuania. Everything appeared to be sprinkled with light layers of dust—the lamps, tables, chairs, even the sofa.

At the time, I had no idea whose apartment I was in, or even what state I was in. The only thing I knew at the time was that I spent what had seemed like 10 hours in my Oma and Opa’s minivan, driving through farms, and I was being introduced to a man I had never seen before.

I didn’t know how, but he already knew who I was. His name was Sam Sherron, and my mom told me I could call him Uncle Sam which confused me because I knew he wasn’t my mom or dad’s brother. As soon as we got out of the car, I remember wanting to leave right away. His place smelled like “old people,” as my mom recently told me I had termed it. After we ate lunch at his dusty table, we left and drove back home to our house in New Jersey. I was nine years old then, and that was the last—and only—time I had seen him.

Apart from the occasional birthday card, I had never really thought about him until now. His name had come up a few times in conversations between my mom and my Oma (her mother) that I would overhear, but I usually didn’t pay any attention to what was being said about him. It wasn’t until a few days ago that my mom had mentioned him on the phone to me, because my Oma was planning on taking a trip to Harrisburg (where I now realize his apartment was) to visit him.

After some research and phone calls, I found information about Sam—a man whom I knew almost nothing about—that seemed to come straight from a history textbook or movie. I was able to get his home phone number from my mom, and I was hoping to gather enough strength to call him without feeling awkward about the conversation we would have. Instead of blindly asking him to tell me about his life, I tried to get a brief background on him so I had some sort of direction to follow when we would talk. From what I was told, he was a survivor of the Holocaust, lost all of his immediate family during that time, and was the estranged father of my mom’s cousin, Herbert.

While this gave me something to go on, I was still clueless as to what to actually ask him. I didn’t want to rehash any negative memories or make him feel uncomfortable, but I was sure that his story would be amazingly interesting. I decided that I would call and explain my assignment in hopes that it would make the whole situation a little less tense (for me, at least). Plus, my mom said he would really appreciate me calling, seeing as he hasn’t heard from me in over a decade.

When I called, the phone rang once and never went to a voicemail. I waited for about an hour and tried again—one ring and no voicemail. After the fourth try, I knew I probably wouldn’t get any further.

I decided to continue to question my mom and Oma, and even though their answers lacked some details and a timeframe, I still managed to find out many interesting facts about his life. My Oma had only met him a year or two before I had when he visited her at her home in Virginia. As I mentioned, Sam is the estranged father of my mom’s cousin, Herbert. Oma had found papers belonging to Herbert’s mother, Tante (which means aunt, in German) Mausi and her husband, Heinz, which contained information on Sam that no one had seen before. The papers documented his home address and social security number, so she contacted him immediately.

She had learned that he was born in Lithuania, and remained there until his house was seized by Nazis during the Holocaust and turned into a hospital. Most of his immediate family was killed then, and he was put in a prison camp where his prison number was permanently tattooed onto his arm. Amazingly, Sam escaped from the camp, and it was around that time when he had met Tante Mausi. He later came to the U.S. and lived in New York, where he ended up changing his name from Max to Sam in order to sound “more americanized” [I wasn’t able to find his original last name].

Sam started a children’s clothing factory in New York, when he met and married his wife. They had three children, and after a few years, he wanted to move to Harrisburg. His wife, however, did not, so they ended up getting a divorce. Sam has lived in Harrisburg ever since, and has never re-married. His son grew up to be a tennis player and instructor; one of his daughters works for the government, and the other became a school teacher.

After I had learned about his incredible story, I decided to try to search for Sam online. I found out that he has spoken at several colleges about his experience during the Holocaust, has written a 50 page memoir about his life during those years, and a book-on-tape has been released called Holocaust Testimony of Sam Sherron: Transcript of Audio-Taped Interview (1983). His name was also mentioned in a letter from Governor Ed Rendell on April 23, 2004, in which Sam was acknowledged for his participation in the lighting of candles for Pennsylvania’s annual observance of Holocaust Memorial Day.

I was surprised to learn so much about Sam from my mom and Oma, and now I can begin to make sense of those few things that I had seen in his apartment when I was nine. The conditions he was forced to live through must have made him such a strong person, and even though I didn’t get to speak to him, I respect him a lot. I had no idea that Sam had led such an incredible life, and hopefully I will get to hear more about it from him in the near future.