Someone shouted, “Immigration, treha, run! They just came in. Hurry, this way.”

It was bedlam at Terrace View that hot Sunday in August. There were people shouting, young women wailing, young men running in all directions: left, right, up in the trees, out of the picnic grounds towards the George Washington Bridge, or scampering down the Palisades and jumping into the Hudson River.

My dad recalled, “Some devil musta called them, so he could get the fifty dollars. Last week they pulled in my nephew Gerasimo. He was runnin’ across the bridge. Sent him right back! If anybody did call Immigration, he should get cancer on his tongue and use the money for doctor bills. That’s blood money.”

In the mid forties, after the second world war, Terrace View in Fort Lee, New Jersey was a picnic area that was located on top of the Palisades, the hills that overlooked the Hudson River. Every Sunday in July and August Greek social or philanthropic organizations held picnics there. The picnics served as the summer nifopazaro or bride’s bazaar, in the same way that the Greek dances in hotels and church halls did during the winter months. Marriage and dowry arrangements were conducted while people danced to the strings of the bouzouki, mandolin, baglamadaki and guitar, which blended with the wail of the clarinet and the squealing of the accordion.

In the summer, Terrace View was the place where future marriages were arranged, and love matches, although discouraged, happened.  Here lathreyi, illegal aliens hoped to meet and marry a Greek American girl and thus obtain the precious green card which was issued to legal aliens and eventually even American citizenship.

During the forties and early fifties, the number of Greeks wanting to come to the United States far surpassed the quota for Greek immigration. The second world war had devastated Greece, and the subsequent Communist revolution had further led to economic chaos. The oldest son of a Greek family would often sign on a freight ship and work as a merchant seaman in order to support the family. The ultimate hope was that the ship would dock in the United States, the young sailor would jump ship, stay as an illegal immigrant, and work in the country where the streets were paved with gold.

These aliens or “greenhorns” all had a cousin, an uncle, or even a family friend from the same village who might provide food, shelter, and a job. Since these seamen were strong, ambitious, young men, they made a good work force for the Greek-Americans who owned restaurants, flower shops, and fur shops. No job was too hard or too menial and no hours too long, for these young men as they bussed, scrubbed, and cleaned. They worked, saved, and sent money to their families in Greece. They learned English and tried to assimilate, because their greatest fear was that they would be discovered by Immigration and deported.

The ultimate ambition of these young men was to attain American citizenship via marriage to a Greek-American girl through proxenia, matchmaking or through love. If necessary any American woman would do whether it be through love or a business arrangement involving a substantial amount of money that the “greenhorn” saved or borrowed. It made no difference how because after seven years of marriage the spouse would become an American citizen.

Most Greeks believed in charity for the lathreyi, but only to a point. Greek parents felt it was fine for the daughters to marry Greek doctors or lawyers who were here legally or even students who had come here on student visas, and there were plenty of both groups because of the economic situation in Greece. These new immigrants and students demanded and got sizeable dowries from the Greek-American families who were afraid that their daughters would marry outside the faith. The poor illegal immigrants, the merchant seamen, who would only be considered as prospective husbands, if the parents did not have or were not willing to give a dowry, or if the daughter was not too pretty or too bright or was older, and therefore her prospects for marriage were poor.

Unfortunately, because Greek-American children were Americanized, many problems ensued from these arranged marriages. Often the only things the women shared with their husbands were the Greek language and a common religion.  Stories circulated that in some instances young Greek women found themselves trapped or even locked in the house by some of the professional, but abusive husbands. The men who had jumped ship did not share that kind of luxury and behaved well because one phone call to the Department of Immigration could send them back to Greece.

Seven years of marriage was the magic number for divorces. After they got their citizenship papers, some husbands would institute divorce proceedings and then take off with the girlfriend they had all along. Certainly, if the illegal alien had paid the woman to marry him, as prearranged, they would divorce after citizenship was granted and without ever having consummated the marriage. The young Greek wives rarely felt that they had the option of leaving the marriage. After all what would people say?  The parents may have made the bed, but unfortunately the daughter had to lie in it.

In all fairness, there were many such unions which resulted in good marriages, and which still survive, both with the legal and illegal aliens, and many lathreyi did well in their adopted country. Some even became millionaires through their own hard work and not through marriage.

We Greeks in the states felt both privileged and guilty about spending the war years in a safe haven while the rest of our families suffered in Greece. We all took in illegal aliens and never viewed it as an illegal act but rather one of charity.

I remember when my cousin Gerasimo showed up at our door for the third time. As he came in, I remembered the first time when he was apprehended as he was running across the George Washington Bridge. Six months later he signed up for sea duty again, landed in New York, jumped ship, and was quickly apprehended.  Three months later, he again signed up, managed to get to New York and jump ship for the third time. He was a skinny, feisty nineteen-year old.

My dad, who felt enough was enough, said that Jerry, as he was now known, would have to get married if he wanted to stay in the United States.

Jerry said, “But thio Vaggeli I am not ready to get married. I’m too young.”

My dad said, “You’re getting married if you want to stay here. I don’t care if you’re ready or if you’re not. I’m tired of paying lawyers every time you get caught. My friend in Ohio has a daughter, Vasiliki. She’s eighteen. She’s a nice girl…a virgin.”

When Jerry met Vasiliki, he blanched. After she left he wailed, “Look at her, she’s at least three times my size, and she isn’t even pretty.”

My dad said, “She’s a nice girl and she’s a virgin.  She is not that bad looking. Look at the nice skin she has.”          

Jerry wailed, “Yes, she has nice skin but look what it covers.”

My dad would not be deterred and the wedding was arranged. My cousin and Vasiliki were married. They even had two daughters. The first two years, Jerry worked hard as a painter and eventually was able to establish his own paint and construction business. He never loved Vasiliki, and no one was surprised when they finally did divorce, but everybody was pleasantly surprised at the six-figure divorce settlement. Jerry’s paint and construction business had become a million-dollar operation. One of his contracts had been to paint the bridge he tried to race across, the one where the Immigration officers had caught him the first time he jumped ship.

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