“As I reminisce,” says Langfelder, “I standin awe of my mother for accomplishing the almost impossible.”
Entering the U.S. through Canada and then on to New York City, he recalls his family being dazzled by what they saw.
“There was a store near Times Square that had a four-foot-by-four-foot cube of butter in a huge glass case. My eyes must have bulged out because I had only had bread spread with goose fat once a week. We were so used to everything being rationed, we hardly had any opportunity to even see butter.”
When Langfelder’s father got a job in Chicago, the family moved to the Midwest. “He became an oil salesman,” says Ossie. “Since his route was the whole state, my mother ran her finger over a map of Illinois and picked Springfield as our new home, thinking its central location would be helpful since we did not own a car.
“On the first day of my dad’s job, he walked five miles to the Illinois Soy Products company to sell them a single quart of oil. The owner was so impressed that my father, an immigrant, would do that to make a living. That night, my mother cooked us a full course meal to celebrate his success.”
The Langfelders received financial help from members of a local Jewish temple, and eventually they moved into a comfortable apartment near McClernand School. Ossie joined the Boy Scouts and worked hard at learning to speak English.
“I barely weighed a hundred pounds, so fitting in at Lanphier High School was difficult for me. I studied a lot
and three teachers were especially helpful to me. Maybe I was what they
call teacher’s pet. One of them, Mr. McGann, the mechanical drawing
teacher, put me in charge of the class when he left the room. It was
awful. The Saputo twins were big husky football players – how was I
going to keep everyone quiet and in their seats? They ended up hanging
me from a hook on the wall. When Mr. McGann came back, he wanted to know
who did it but I didn’t squeal. The Saputo twins must have admired that
I wasn’t a squealer because after that, they became my friends.”
continued on page 16
