13th October 2019

As I grow older, I spend a lot of time thinking about the past. Recently I gave a book talk where I recounted why my aunt moved to the US at the age of 17 and how she managed to overcome the immense differences between the old English culture and the go-getting American style. She was born in 1906 Birmingham. The family was poor so she was wearing charity boots and clothes until 1924 when she was one of the ‘huddled masses’ arriving at Ellis Island, as described by Emma Lazarus on the plaque at the base of the Statue of Liberty. In NY she coped with the burgeoning Wall St Crash until slowly, slowly her life improved. An important thing she learned about her new life in the US: no-one was going to help you there. If you were fit and healthy, it was up to you to improve your life, no-one else. That’s something we in the UK need to re-learn today.