Anthoula (Dontas) Rallis
I wish that I knew my grandmother, Anthoula (Dontas) Rallis. My family says that she was a woman, like many other Greek women, who was devoted to her husband, to her family and to their future. She used to work in the families’ fields, working the land for food, having many pregnancies to have a large family and being a loving mother and wife. She ended up having six children, but she had lost another six or so to miscarriages, both naturally and unnaturally.
Many times throughout my life I think about her and try to imagine what her life may have been like? What went through her mind when she thought about coming to America? What were her aspirations, her dreams, her wishes for her future and her kids’ future? When her father, Georgios Dontas, left a little village in Hios called Halandra to arrive at Ellis Island at 39 years old in 1916, she must have been so excited to think that someday she would come to the land of the many opportunities and dreams. Even though their future was unknown, they would hear stories from relatives about something better, something easier, something with a future.
Over many of the following years, after my great grandfather, Georgios, arrived in the United States, he began to help the family come to New York and Ohio, where the majority of them settled. The first one of his kids to come over, through, Ellis Island, was his son Nikolaos Dontas (my grandmother Anthoula’s younger brother) in 1921 when he was 13 years old. My grandmother was already married with kids when her father left in 1916. He tried to bring her and my grandfather over; however, my grandmother was always pregnant every time he would notify them that they could come. During this period of time, women that were pregnant were not allowed to come to the United States. The last time that he requested for her to come, she was once again pregnant. She couldn’t believe her luck and saw her chances to migrate to the States ending. She was pregnant with her third set of twins and ended up aborting them herself so that this time she would be able to make the journey.
The journey; however, never happened. She ended up losing so much blood from the self-inflicted abortion that she ended up dying; never seeing America, never seeing her six living kids grow up. We only knew my grandfather, Gregori. He had the task, by himself, of taking care of his six kids, the youngest only being a toddler, later finding suitable spouses for them and helping them migrate to the United States.
What did all of these immigrants think of when they thought of America? What made them want to come over so badly that they were willing to end a life or lives in my grandmother’s case? How much pain did they experience in their homeland that made them want to escape this much? When you think about a place without war, slaughter, plenty of work, I guess you can begin to understand some of their reasoning.
Today my grandmother Anthoula’s family is very close, loving and successful. I guess that her dream did come true!
