An interview with
Elizabeth Lenci-Downs

Elizabeth, how did you come to write this book?
I met Louise Gerig at a luncheon in Paradise Valley, Arizona. We became close friends and began walking three miles a day over the paths of a nearby parkway called the greenbelt. It was obvious that we had much in common. Then one day Louise turned to me and said, "Elizabeth, I heard my people cry and I will never forget." I was stunned. I knew immediately those words would change my life. When Louise agreed to tell me her story we spent all summer putting her words onto tapes. My original intention was to give her a written memoir.

What inspired you?
I Heard My People Cry, One Family's Escape From Russia is not a memoir. It is the history of a whole clan of people from the 1700s through 1950 to the escape of one cousin in 1998. Louise's grandfather told her she, "had to live to tell the world what happened to her people." I decided to make that possible.

How did you proceed?
I first wrote about Louise's childhood and the village of Tchongraw because they so touched me. Then I wrote chapters from Elizabeth Koop Huebert's secreted diaries in Taganrog and Ukraine. My life in northern Minnesota helped me find the words to describe those winters and the land. The last chapter was written first. with Louise's love for Walter fresh in my mind. That was a good decision. I didn't write the first chapter until the end.

Were you confident about Louise's story?
Considering such a human drama as this when time was foreshortened and everyone was treated so brutally, I knew other diaries and memoirs would include some of the same experiences. However, when I was matching dates of events to Louise's words I was astounded at the accuracy of her memory-even to time and weather. This gave me confidence in her history. It is also true that by 1929 every non-Russian who could possibly pay to get out of Russia had fled while the borders were still open. Louise's people were trapped by Stalin. Many of her experiences have never been exposed before. This book adds to the literature of her people.

Do you consider your book is anthropological?
One reviewer considers it anthropological. This book includes generations of people whose lives are woven into the bloodied history of their adopted land, how they were chosen, how they are interrelated and pioneered, how the events of Russian history affected their lives. In the fore are individuals of Louise's family and Louise herself. There is beauty, there is love and uplifting spiritual strengths. There is Lenin's rule, Stalin's purges and people verschlept. I Heard My People Cry can be considered an epic.

What is verschlept?
Imprisoned, tortured, disappeared. This is what happened to Louise's father.

When did you realize the importance of this book?
There is much in I Heard My People Cry, One Family's Escape From Russia for all of us.

It opened my heart and mind to the realization of what can happen when a whole nation of people are so subjugated they do not take responsibility for their freedoms.

I have friends who have lived in Russia and others who have traveled there recently. Several helped with valuable research. Citizens of the former Soviet Union have been denied their history for generations. In her foreword Nancy K. Splain writes, "For it is the nature of tyrants to deny people their history." Louise's words speak to the average reader of all generations. This makes my book unbelievably moving and very valuable.

Who is Elizabeth Koop Huebert?
She is Louise's mother. She is 94 years old in 2003 and living in Canada. Elizabeth Koop Huebert is one of the most incredible heroines to ever have come out of Russia. She deserves to have her story told. Elizabeth empowered her husband's Mennonite people and she empowers me. Count Tolstoy wrote of such a heroine and so did Boris Pasternak, especially through his poetry.

Did she ever re-marry?
No. Nikolai was the love of her life. She expresses her love for him so eloquently in her diary I gasped. When they were trapped in Moscow Nikolai urged a pregnant Elizabeth to leave Russia without him, but she refused. She took Louise with her to the ancient Tatar prison to say goodbye to him.

Did you use parallels between your lives when you wrote?
Oh yes. They began when all our grandparents fled their countries ahead of W.W.I. Some parallels influenced my writing more than others. One was the importance of our paternal grandfathers. Also we were very close to our fathers. There was our mothers' Christian faith and a large number of aunts and uncles who played an important role in our lives.

The parallel that influenced me the most was the similarity of our environments. Louise in Crimea and myself in northern Minnesota lived at approximately the same latitude-between the 45th and 48th parallels. Bodies of water and mountains affected both our climates. Ukraine can have winters like northern Minnesota. Minnesota summers are similar to the climate Louise live in year-round in Crimea.

In the 1930's and '40's Winters in northern Minnesota, Russia and Europe were brutal. Living through Minnesota's winters gave me important insights into Elizabeth's survival in Ukraine. Instantly, and intensely I related to the fear in her diary. I remember snow up to my waist and wind-driven ice storms. Winters meant hearing the "boom" of nails popping out of frozen walls-like gunshots in the night. They meant frost bitten flesh.

But, our summers were glorious. In the southern Crimea Louise grew up surrounded by woods, meadows, rolling hills and the ancient mountains of the black sea. Northern Minnesota is very much like this. I lived my summers in woodlands on a small lake walking country roads, picking wildflowers, learning to cut hay with a scythe. When Louise talks about her childhood I envision mine.

What was different?
Tsars, Lenin and finally Stalin. Louise grew up under the worst tyrant the world has ever seen. I lived in freedom.

What Happened During W.W.II?
My years during W.W.II were of the greatest importance in writing this book. When Louise describes fleeing through Poland in "blackouts" with screaming air raid sirens, shades over windows, men walking with shuttered lanterns--that's how I remember those years too. Wardens walked our streets. Every room had blackout shades. I studied under candlelight.

I will never forget winter cloud layers that covered the moon and spread an eerie

blue-blackness across the snow. Nothing moved until my town's all-clear sirens sounded. Louise found herself in such "blackouts" under the same frightening cloud layers that deadened all sound.

Hundreds of allied bombers thundered over her shaking the ground before she could see them. They flew over my parent's house too, on their way to Europe or Alaska. Drills in my classrooms had we children standing in hallways against the walls, our heads wrapped in our arms. Bombers gave me a feeling of hope. Louise too.

Did this affect you as a child?
Very much so. We had food stamps like Louise did in Poland. My family lived in town during the seven winters of that war. Virginia's iron ore mines made our town a critical area for the war effort. As early as 1939 the mournful horns of huge Malley engines sounded day and night and I went to sleep every night with that sound. It was like the haunting call of the Great Loon. I used this experience to write about the sirens of Moscow.

Those Malleys pulled long trains of iron ore cars from the deep mines at the edge of our town to the Duluth harbor summer and winter to be shipped to steel mills. Two of my uncles were train engineers. This helped me write about Louise's escape so vividly.

Just as these experiences shaped our lives, they led both Louise and I down unusual paths.

How is this?
In Canada Louise became a photographer. The Canadian Professional Photographers Association honored her as an "Outstanding Photographer of People". An honor I have received means much to me because it came from my peers and reflects my heritage.

Was that being honored as Woman of the Year?
Yes. I was honored by the YWCA of Maricopa County, Arizona for mentoring women and working to prevent racial discrimination. I worked with foreign students in college and as a teacher. It was nice being recognized for something you believe in so much.

Did anything about this book surprise you?
An awesome thought came to me the day I wrote the last word of this book: "My little city of Virginia in far northern Minnesota provided the iron ore for the bombs that freed my friend Louise." I thought about this for a long time.

Did you self-publish?
Yes-first in Arizona and now we are publishers and distributors in both Arizona and Canada with our own company, Lenci Studios, Inc.

We pay a print-on-demand company, Trafford Publishing in Victoria, BC Canada to produce and help distribute our books.

Hundreds of readers tell me I Heard My People Cry, One Family's Escape From Russia would be a powerful movie.