Polacheck, I Came A Stranger - The Story Of A Hull-House Girl

Abstract

A ten year old Polish Jewish girl, Hilda Satt, moved with her family to Chicago. Her diary is the most complete chronicle yet uncovered of a "Hull House girl," and represents a clear window through which we can observe immigrant life in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Hilda arrived in Chicago in time for the 1893 World's Fair, where her mother refused to let Hilda eat a banana she bought because it looked like a sickly yellowed sausage. After a preface by a Chicago social historian and introduction by Hilda's relative who rediscovered the diary, the chapters are divided into five parts: the years in Poland, the voyage to America, the Hull-House Years 1895-1912, Life in Milwaukee, and return for "final" years in Chicago. An afterword, a time line, and a list of Hilda's writings (including work commissioned by Hull House and by the Federal Writers Project) provide helpful appendices.