Friday, October 13, 2017

Memories of a Greta camp kid

From the Maitland Mercury report:
Paul Szumilas recons you’d be hard pressed to have a more enjoyable childhood than his.
Born at the Greta Migrant Camp to Polish immigrant parents, Paul can still vividly running around with a mob of kids, all fellow children of European migrants.
 “For a kid, life in the camp was fascinating,” he recalled.
“We ran around playing games. It was great for the kids. Most of us didn’t know what our parents had been through.”
Operating from 1949-1960, the Greta camp was the largest in Australia, with 100,000 migrants from across Europe settling there after fleeing their World War II-ravaged home continent.

Full article available at Maitland Mercury, 12 Oct 2017.