Anna Luben
She called me Raymisu, and I called her Grand Ma.
She grew up in Moscow. I hear as a teenager she was a radical. Someone warned her father, "I think you better get Anna out of the country!" She was about to be arrested for demonstrating.
She was protesting against the Czar, of course...
Her father put her on a boat to America. This photo was taken soon after she arrived.
Before being admitted to the United States, someone had to come down to Ellis Island to certify that you had a job and place to stay. The sponsor and fellow garment worker took off work that day to meet Anna.
That day she arrived there was a fire at the factory and almost everyone (except the woman who took off work to met her) was killed! I can't say for sure (well, yes I could have) but this may have been the Triangle Fire (look up your American Labor History).
I do know she told a similar story. In the historic Triangle Factory Fire, the bosses had kept the doors and windows of the clothing factory locked from the outside. It was the reception of this catastrophe that initiated my grandmother's career as a seamstress, and supporter of the labor movement.
