Tag #135711 - Interview #78511 (Vasile Grunea)

My grandparents in Bethlen were quite well off for some time, but when the store burnt down at the end of the 1880s, their financial situation became worse and worse. They moved to Kolozsvar and rented a smaller store, and they were a little better off financially. Grandfather was turned out of the store after 1918 and a Romanian took over the store. Later part of their apartment was confiscated, so their material situation was gradually getting worse again. I think that it must have been their material circumstances that made them all decide to go abroad. After 1918 the siblings, both the boys and the girls, even though most of them had graduated from a gymnasium or lyceum, started to learn a trade to make sure that they would be able to find a job when they went to America.