Tahir Mansour and Leyla Mansour-Cole

00:03 Kate my name is Laila Mansour call. I'm 21 years old. Today is July 31st, 2010 and we are in Fort Wayne, Indiana and I am tires granddaughter.

00:21 I am tell her Mansour. I'm 74 years old and today's date is July 31 2010 and we are at the Fort Wayne Indiana location and my interview partner is my lovely daughter granddaughter Layla.

00:45 Do you know I want to start at the very beginning of your life. I think we were you born and who are your parents? I was born in Palestine. And when I when I was born into a family that already had three boys and and seven girls.

01:11 Who is your mom? My mom was her name was mezuzah which means endeared one and Arabic Ramen and she rides from another clan other than the monks or Clan, which is our last name sec.

01:35 Is her name anywhere in our family line as a matter of fact, I don't remember hearing that name to anybody else except my mother and all of my life.

01:50 Who's your father and my father was Mohamed Mohamed Mansour and he was from the village of Al Kabob but works in the railroad. Most of all of his working life and for my teenager to pay retired.

02:17 Where did you grow up and who lived in your house with you that I would I grew up in a way but there's four years spent in the in the middle of the Earth from their late teens and where I was away from home away in a different town than we are family is going to a school to boarding school where we not only went to school but where we at lodging and food and being taken care of it's a boy was a boarding school an American School located outside Jerusalem in Palestine that still exists and continues to function.

03:05 Oh and did you see your family very much during those four years. Did you visit home often? They would drop me off at the school, which is 3 hours away by car from home tomorrow for me or my family was labeled living and then I would go home for maybe a week around the end of the year the holiday the holiday Christmas holidays break the school had that and then the other will get a few days in the spring and of course we get in the summer vacation and doing there all of these times. I would go home at 2 where my family is because the school is not the open than that.

03:51 Yes.

03:54 Boarding school was that your first time ever being away from home? And how did your family react to you being away for that long? Yes. It was. The reason for my going to that school is my father or my father's vision and and the wisdom and belief in an education and that was and continues to be there the pops top school in that region and that the area now and he had already sent his eldest son to that school. My other than my oldest brother Ahmed my late brother Ahmed from what she

04:44 Moved on to higher education in Beirut American University of Beirut and med school there and actually finished his Med the medical schools in the unfortunately. He did not survive the catastrophe of 1948 Hospital East Indians. So my father who invested all his at least monetary me and still with educators of the Sun and now it's here. He has his youngest one was a good student. This is me and felt that he's worth sacrificing for and resistance Sun go up and up there had their their family and so that's how I was when I went to

05:44 It's cool. But his was I was Nineteen forty-nine 13 years old and had was strange. I did not know anybody but being a boarding student made made life very interesting and an easier for me than then one wouldn't might might think and made some lifelong friendships there in the door. And you know, one of them has lived in Flint for Falcon Fred Hayes girlfriend. Yeah. We were childhood friends from from 13 on Dell now. I got married you got married.

06:39 I'm very fitting. I was going to say it with you going to boarding school and 1949 and the catastrophe happening in 1948. What did you feel like you were separated from that obviously not because your brother did not survive. I was not I was so focused on and so excited that I was able to go back to school because I spend we spend time doing during the ethnic cleansing that we experienced and live through weird. I wasn't I would not going to school we had ended up in Jordan over a. Of several months of the displacement with my family went in and settled started settling in in Jordan outside. Man and I went back to go to the to that school if you

07:39 What's after that says made it to the school year was September 4th 49 and I was at that school for years.

07:49 Even though we were disrupting disrupted my education stopped at Parkland 6th grade has already gone through a few months at sixth grade before where you are around I would like to work totally disrupted and turned upside down probably looking in hindsight the lot of that stuff that I left my life included an experience because of age. I did not fear any what's an adult would anxiety fear of Sorrow. I was just we'll just exciting and the thing and enjoyed studies enjoy the results of doing good in school. And so it made it that made it easier for me to watch.

08:47 How to handle even though did you feel a lot of pressure from your parents to succeed at school? I didn't I didn't feel the pressure but I was very very keen keenly aware of the importance of the day of the grades at least to me on the face of it because I was either the first the top student in a class with a small class. I need somebody who's going to be the number one really have much time to think of besides side things there besides being a boarding student minor the school was well equipped for

09:47 Taking care of and and providing for these boarding students. There's about 40 or 50 of us something from the school of population of 200. We're boarding students and we had some good life. I look at those for years that I spent and that in that school in the town that you everyday at Melissa's lately with hear the name of that town grimala remodel outside. It's about the 6-7 miles outside Jerusalem, and that's where the Palestinian Authority day off today is located and is not a very big town.

10:35 After you after you left boarding school, where did you go next the Stars by the end of the second one in my life that I look at my first 12 and 13 years being born and raised spoiled going to have a great school and ending with with the catastrophe of of being dispossessed and the my brother gets killed my mother gets despondent. So on so that the first 12 13 at 13, I care for a. Of 40 years ago. I left for my family and Jordan of came into this boarding school that I didn't comment on my own but my my father had the the vision of love my sexy thing and then and then you're not being helpful today.

11:35 Family those for years and it is the second stage. The third stage is coming to America which which game are also and feed right after I finished with a boarding school. And this was in 1953 and 49 in the school and the school 53 leaving in the summer and coming to Michigan and be able to come and eventually a citizen of the country.

12:17 I want to I want to do you resent at all that the first. Of your life as he described it was cut off by 48 the catastrophe play through the through the physical process of the catastrophe, but I was very young. I remember being excited because we families tend to congregate even more they have nuclear families and the old world ways. But but different tire of times they become closer and gather more so there I could not get to see my favorite and because we were all in one location, you know ended up in one location and so I didn't have the the feeling that that grew later as I look back at the defect of the catastrophe on me and

13:17 My family as well as my people that the mean mean something to me and also came to understand what what really has happened because before that I didn't fully absorbed through young. Yes, and I wasn't scared even though they're shooting another things going on and then people lost cousin then the brother and and and as a direct result accuracy of that catastrophe, I lost my mother.

13:59 Because she what she didn't know what befell her and my dad was food for her was too much. My Dad episode was able to absorb it and start rebuilding for his with his family. She could not emotionally she broke even though she was a very strong woman and she lived two years after that.

14:26 Yeah, she didn't survive. Don't go through Yoshi.

14:31 She wasn't she was there but not there and if there ever was a case of people dying from heartbreak literally that is so very clear example that that does happen.

14:50 I know.

14:52 Yeah, this is news for you to

14:56 What what about the rest of your siblings they were all older and so in fact that some of them had children that are that are older than me what you were ordered to show respect to their uncle and they took by calling me Uncle even though we were children and I was younger and yet the urim you're watching what you call Anthony Sr. And Canada, she's really not you're not your aunt your aunt and plus you as my sister but she's the same age as I am, but she's my niece nice are the ages of my siblings that side of my my life and there is one nephew.

15:56 Several years older than I am and he still surviving there in Jordan tastrophe in everything that happened in your childhood. Do you have a worst memory from your childhood? Well, this is why I have the memory of man and of the probably the worst time of my life something that happened. It's the dick that's if he has something to do with it the condition of my mother while she was sick obviously for those three years after and

16:41 She passed away.

16:46 Two years after and I was I was at Endermologie time when she passed away and

16:57 She thinks my father was sacrificing a lot. The whole family was sacrificed for me to to go to school. There are some expenses that had to be paid to that school to that boarding school. It wasn't free and yet so I can sense the family participated in and helping me go to that school and from which there is some electric anyway.

17:25 My mother passed away Buchan from her illness or whatever and it was about two weeks before the school the end of the school year.

17:38 I didn't I did not communicate regularly with my with my parents. No phone didn't have any phones anywhere in stop. My father ordered all the relative. No one is due in any way shape or form to inform me.

17:57 He wanted me to my school. You're not not to be disturbed. Remember me to take the from the exams of that year while he was practical very practical man in the Sensen and I know it what that must have hurt him badly on that to do to take that stance.

18:16 I made a good and he did not want anything to do to get in the way of my studies. And so at the end of the month after after that Comes the Sun by the summer vacation and then I go home and there's no mama.

18:37 So that's that's about the end. That's me all kind of connected to some of the life events that preceded that

18:49 We or you angry at your father know I always appreciated appreciated him his decisions. He was the Elder of the family. He himself has sacrificed his life for educating. He had he had he had an excellent job on the Railroad and the mat in and doing the met the British Mandate of Palestine. From from the end of World War 1 telecaster, and he he was getting paid good money.

19:31 1 compared to wages there and that that that that time but he he spent all of it on the education of his eldest son which included going on to college today to University there UV and getting his medical degree, but he has need never practiced one day and and there's like four take his life and died. So I know I appreciate it with my father did then he said he wasn't he wasn't done. Maybe he was quite a bit older than my mother and

20:14 My coming to the states email that's another example of sacrifice and and in Pursuit Of Education and and family and so on so I don't recall having I need it'll feeling towards my mother for you. If you talked a lot about how much your father thought you'd education. Where do you think he got that from? It is hard telling you because he never went to one day to school.

20:56 He talked himself out there than right, then became he was in charge of the line conditioner railroad line condition of the whole of Palestine. And in the in the British mandate the British were there until May 15th? 1948. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, we we we had our home and in the village that we are forever from North on the railroad line. So he he he was supplied with a heart with a housing and and and service services and offer up keep by the by the government in the British mandate government in Pakistan and good sir. Good wages.

21:53 And we lived in the in the village where our land our home and our land was and wishing I had to share crap. And so that was enough to fit for the family to live comfortably without needing help you with any of his wages.

22:11 How

22:13 I want to I want to kind of switch into when you came to America. But first I want to ask what did you want to be when you were a child education? Yes. I did in the nnn that than that their societies and Old World ways you are you are good in school.

22:37 And I noticed up really good then then you're channeled just by the word of mouth of those who are around you from your family and so on that you're going to go there either the doctor or engineer one of the two you have nothing to say about the other stuff. And so

23:00 I thought you were going to be an engineer and so

23:06 But but until I came to the state actually came to the states physically. That wasn't never never thought of going to school going to college because it cost money. And here we have we were totally dispossessed the family in a couple of years before that and they just no way there a college for the rich people but there's another story to that's another part part of my life that is pretty significant and the American the American way and the American involvement. If I go to that school had a lot to do with the front of the completion of my growing and gross.

24:01 How did you get the opportunity and when I say opportunity I kind of need money to get to America by repeating the story the school that I went through. It was an American as I said American school and we had always had one or two or maybe three young American teachers. I forgot to mention that the school is a Quaker School.

24:33 And with with roots in Indiana and Terre Haute, Indiana, and anyway, that would have these teachers and they're coming and certain serve and but also see the holy land and guy and they have a nice place to deliver the school Dorman and then there housing for them. And one of these teachers are there when I was in the third my third year there or walk 22nd year, he came here and his name is Graham Leonard from Knoxville, Tennessee. He was class advisor that you're for me and he was interested in my case. He knew that I was one of the refugees nothing but not very many there probably by the handful and he's got the whole school the rest were all their families or intact.

25:33 After the catastrophe anyway, he asked me what do you plan to do when you're finished here because I was a good student and very often the school would pick from the top students and the I have them teach them teachers a year or two there and that was good enough education to do that. Anyway, I said when I'm finished here, I'll do just like other kids go and work and help my family. He says that's what the what about college and I said, yeah, I'd love to go to college but that's for you know for rich people will know and we know because my family is my late brother and there and he said if you can get to the states

26:30 You can go to school.

26:34 Without needing Define substantial financial help from anybody hear from your family. They don't have the money for leaving. You can work it out go to school and I will help you with it. If you really want to go out and we started the project of getting the grade together making up a packet. Then I started writing to the to the universities here in colleges wondering if scholarship and

27:12 I did not get the the first response was from Eastern Michigan University in Ypsilanti. And the doctor Marshall was the dean of admission at the time. And so that that they were arrested in the balance that my father had to scrounge and I borrow and some again for me to get going and then and that's how I came as a student with full intensity going back, but you never know what life has in-store for you on the other side of time.

27:46 How did you physically get to America that time that it was the beginning of the flights a commercial passenger air fly a airplane that turbo Jetts actually, but it took care about 3-4 days to hear your girl you go from one place to another and you waited a day or two today for parties headed straight to get the closer. I think I left your Salem airport to go into the Beirut Lebanon Lebanon for two days and then to Amsterdam for two nights and I think of Staten Island that we could hire a closer and then finally into New York a fluent fluent to Newark International at the time. They took the bus.

28:41 From from New York all the way from New York to Terre Haute Indiana to the car quicker contact to Michigan Ypsilanti English what I was excellent in English because of being in that school. That's what the store unique and the fact that they use English as the language of instruction. So so freshman English was nothing to me. I mean, I knew it backwards forwards for years to wait. We were immersed in them and English language of the professor at least in the English Professor. So what needs to start is it from 8000 Miles Away

29:41 Study for us language was totally a non-issue.

30:03 Yes, the first person in Michigan I meant was there just Rory make me a ticket at the bus station. Dr. Marshall and his wife we have taken off from Terre Haute can go out there today ID by bus Which reached down at midnight and and I get off the bus at to get dizzy. And is it a gentleman and he's kind of short and he's looking for the passengers come down and looking down then fine. As I stepped down is it you must be mr. Mansour fast and his matter stalking and I'm never commercial and this is my wife Helen and the show me show me your your back.

31:03 Bag and then you put it in his car and went to the to the campus which was just a few blocks away and midnight and knock the door at mrs. And mr. Smith was the house mother. She can I talk to you about him. Please help him with the room and we'll talk about his seat to my financial situation tomorrow and so on and they took tomorrow off. So the next day I will go to the doctor offices where you go have breakfast first go to the cafeteria and I and then let them come back. We will talk about things and I will go to the cafeteria and the ladies are this is the dorm cafeteria between Brown and Brown amundson Hall there and two ladies that are serving behind this team are watching this good student.

32:03 Dorm students go to come through and one of them said he made a marriage. I was 17. Yeah, and so they know did they notice me and Dylan did she know that 10 minutes after that? I went around and do the other the office of the cafeteria that The dietitian vs. Tomball. I will send 250 and the Dogwood Dr. Marshall. She said, yes I said, yes, and she send me to the dishwasher dishwasher room and I got a I got a job making $0.75 an hour.

32:57 And I met Jane that morning. That was Jane and Mary Jane doll and Mary Bishop serving and noticed me and became co-workers immediately and she got the idea for Jane and Bob her late husband didn't have any kids. You wouldn't even talk to the time about this kid that she started a few weeks after that then buy me to their house and and stuff. I had a sort of took me in and and I took them and in my heart that was

33:36 In 1953 September and continues effects of that bond that was built. I got lived today, even though she's gone. Bob is gone and we have Russell and I am I making making it up to Janet Bob through Russell.

34:04 Fan

34:08 Really quickly. I want to ask you when you went into school. What did you major in? But what did you end up to have coarse them? I did not want medicine and Eastern did not did not send us not to have an engineering school college there. So I C U of M. What would be the next 2 years and call the math physics physics professors at the

34:50 What are you going to be doing? I said I have to since there's no Angier have to transfer out there. Then I'll be there Michigan or or somewhere where they're going to he said talk to you. Can you can do this one with physics? Do you stay with him by us?

35:09 I know right? So that the third year I went to the doctor. In fact there go to the Michigan and that was my third my third College year and was Indian to hear school there. But but I found I didn't like it either and I got behind financially because I did not have the scholarship that I had to take him back to the fourth years to watch to Easton and I graduated in physics and math majors.

35:41 Do you have a favorite memory of college? It was very busy cuz I was working a lot and studying a lot working a lot did not did not really have much.

35:55 Much Play Time play time I will call it in and so that's what I intended on going back to Palestine. And what prevented you were. I know you've gone back over to visit relatives and Jordan Jordan. Yes. Yes. I do not subscribe to hate. I have some very bitter continuously better part of my insides. That does not leave and

36:34 Certain aspect of the catastrophe and and the life that caused the trash does not lie does not leave me either but you you are my Offspring You're my granddaughter and your mom is my daughter. I never set you down or set any of my three children down to transfer my feelings set the kitchen to to not to like or hate somebody but I still have I have very difficult time to to forgive I cannot I will not forgive but if a phone leave for because they continue their the the same thing that I lived through.

37:31 Today's children in Palestine are living through as much or worse. And so there's some some bitterness in there that that the sun will will will stay with me unless a miracle happens and these people are from Europe and end up going back to Eastern Europe, but that's not going to happen in my lifetime. That is

38:03 I've been thinking about it a quote from Mario surrounds the the old people died way and the young people will forget and one of the reasons I wanted you to project with you is I really hope that recordings like these and taking down your life history will help us not forget. Thank you very much for doing this record.