Growing up in a foster home and an aunt’s house in Boston

George: Oh, all right. Well, when my parents died in 1928—and my sister—I was put in a foster home. They were relatives of the family, and that's where I was when my aunt was looking for me. She got a lawyer because she was my father's sister, and she wanted me to grow up in her house. The only trouble was that she was blind. She had children, a daughter living at home, and she had a nice big house. My uncle had a variety store. 

Before that, they had a restaurant, and he was an Italian pastry baker. He owned his own shop, and they were doing good until the Spanish Influenza came. Nobody was coming to the restaurant, so they had to give it up.

Interviewer 2: How old were you at this point?

George: I was four years old, going on five. I was in this foster home, and they treated me good. They had a daughter, and I remember that. Then, my aunt came and got me. The following year, I went to live with my aunt, and that was in Chelsea, Massachusetts. My parents had a house in East Boston on London street, and they lost everything, I guess. When I went to live with my aunt, she had a big house with roomers and boarders, because that's what people did in those days. They couldn't pay rent, so they bought it out, and people were happy to get a room to live in.

So it was the ‘30s then, and things were tough. The only help the government gave was, once a week, we waited in line to get a bag of groceries. I had to stand in line in the morning to get milk before school, and that's how we lived in those days.