Erna’s family, the Ackermanns, stayed in Flehingen until 1936.
My father went to Israel
– Palestine at that time – in 1935.
When he came back he said,
“You go to Palestine and build me a house on Mt Carmel. That’s where I want to live.”
I said, “Not me. For me there is one country and that’s America.”
He said, “You go to America, we all go to America. But you go first.”
{Erna}
Erna’s cousin Otto Heumann went first in May 1935 – on the SS Europa from Bremen to New York – to prepare the way.
Erna’s uncle David Ackermann, who had lived in the US since the 1890’s, provided a $100,000 affidavit that facilitated an entrance visa to the US.
She then obtained a one-time German exit passport to the US, which limited the cash she could take out of Germany to $24. How to get around that?
First, she went on a buying spree, using German marks that she couldn’t take with her to buy custom furniture, silverware, china & fine clothes.
Then, she got the Nazi mayor, an old family friend, to sign export permits for all the items.
“Every time I came for another signature, he shouted, ‘Are you still here?’ He worried that I would not get out.” {Erna}
In March 1936, she and her cousin Arthur Heumann set sail from Hamburg on the SS Manhattan bound for New York.
Erna’s brother, Bruno, worked for an international real estate office owned by his uncle, Sam Ackermann.
They had lists of German-Americans who wanted to sell their homes in the US and return to Germany, immigration that was strongly encouraged by the Nazi regime.
Erna went thru the New York area properties until she found one she liked in Lynbrook on Long Island, owned by a Mr. Kreitmeyer.
Erna’s father, Berthold bought the villa on the Rhine that the Kreitmeyers wanted. He then traded the villa for the house in Lynbrook.
Erna also convinced the Kreitmeyers to swap cars: her 1935 Opel in Germany for their 1932 Studebaker in the US.
At the end of August 1936, Erna’s parents Berthold & Hedwig, and her siblings Bruno & Alice joined her in New York. They traveled via Le Havre, France on the SS Normandie with the remainder of the Heumann family – Max and Ida, and their son Siggy.
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Somehow, the Weisburgers in hiding in St Étienne in 1940 & 1941 were communicating with Erna in New York.
By this time, immigrating to the US was difficult because the American quota system made for long waits.
Erna found a lawyer who claimed he could get refugees out of Europe via Cuba for $500.
“I went to Brooklyn and I called a family meeting. I told them the story. I said we need the money to deposit now! Today! Not tomorrow! They all said, ‘The dictator of the family!’” {Erna}
The $500 got the Weisburgers an entrance visa to Cuba, which they picked up at the Cuban consulate in Marseilles.
They went back to St Étienne, packed up, and took the train via Lyon to the Spanish border.
Even though Germans manned the border crossings, they had no problem with their Cuban visa.
The lived in Bilbao, Spain for six weeks starting in October 1941.
In November, they boarded the Spanish ship Magallanes bound for Havana via Bermuda.
John befriended a Cuban official with a short-wave radio and they heard rumors on the BBC that the Germans were going to invade Britain.
They arrived in Havana on Dec 1, 1941.
Six days later, Japan bombed Pearl Harbor, the US entered the war, and passenger ships stopped running across the Atlantic.
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