Stories of freedom

Seventy-seven-year-old Winnie Christensen remembered the first time she saw the Statue of Liberty.

Just two years before, she had been studying at a British boarding school in China while her parents, who were missionaries, were traveling in other parts of the country.

But the Japanese took over the region and captured the girls from the school. She and about 100 others were kept captive in a single-family home for 21 months without any contact with the outside world.

"My biggest problem was loneliness because my family was not there," Christensen said. "I didn't know if I'd ever see them again."

Finally, she was let go. She was put on a boat from China for 10 weeks, unsure that she'd ever get home.

"When I saw the statue, I knew I was finally free," she said.

Christensen and two others told their stories Monday to a roomful of residents at Friendship Village in Schaumburg.

In a program, called Monument and Moments of Patriotic Memory, the group observed Veterans Day together with songs, stories and remembrances.

Kay Schmidt, who was born in Berlin, talked about what is was like to see the statue at age 10 as she and her family arrived in the United States for the first time.

Wells Farnsworth, 86, recalled how he saw it in 1945 at age 24, as he returned from Europe. He had served as an Army medic in France, taking care of wounded soldiers.

The war in Europe was over by then, but now major U.S. war efforts were turning to its other front. So, he was heading back home to train for the war in the Pacific against the Japanese.

"This was before we dropped the bomb, you understand," he told his audience.

Farnsworth, a biochemistry professor who retired from Northwestern University last year, told the group that it was Labor Day of that year when his boat arrived in the New York harbor.

That's when he saw, "the lady," he said.

"Our boat nearly turned over as everyone flocked to starboard to see the welcoming sign on Governor's Island, 'Welcome Home. Great Job. Well done.'

"For all of us, it was a joyous, but also tearful time."