Table of Contents
Acknowledgments
Foreword
Preface
Introduction
Appendix

Frances' Story-Ch. 1
Four Sons-Ch. 2
ThreeDaughters-Ch. 3
Missionaries-Ch. 4
Deportation-Ch. 5
To America-Ch. 6
Leon's Story-Ch. 7






Table of Contents
Acknowledgments
Foreword
Preface
Introduction
Appendix

Frances' Story-Ch. 1
Four Sons-Ch. 2
ThreeDaughters-Ch. 3
Missionaries-Ch. 4
Deportation-Ch. 5
To America-Ch. 6
Leon's Story-Ch. 7

The horse was small, silver gray, and few boys in Sivas were fortunate to own one. At the age of seventeen, my father, after many objections from my mother, yielded to my pleas. I was the happiest I had ever been. Five feet, three inches, my mere 130 pounds was no strain; the horse and I became good friends.

My father, who worked as a civil architect for the Turkish government in Sivas, had a responsible position that paid well. We Armenians, who lived better than most, were always careful not to offend our poorer neighbors, Turkish or Armenian. This time was different. The first son, I enjoyed an indulging father, a grandfather and a grandmother who spoiled me. However, in her own way, my mother governed me with an iron hand. She insisted that I attend school and church regularly. While building a bridge in the small town of Tokat, north of Sivas, my father, Hovaness Franguelian, roomed with a prominent family in that community. Tall and slender, the niece, a schoolteacher, caught his interest. Haiganoush had graduated from Robert College, an American school in Turkey, and enjoyed returning to her hometown to teach languages in the local schools. Since both of her parents had died, she lived with her uncle who was a doctor. Marriage was not on her agenda, but Hovaness impressed her uncle. This suitor had a profession that paid far better than the local teachers with whom she now roamed the hills and countryside discussing poetry, philosophy and religion. The difference in their Christian religions might have been a problem. He and his family attended the Armenian Orthodox Church. She and her family observed the Evangelical, Protestant faith. In the end, the handsome young architect won his suit and took his beautiful, fair-skinned bride to live with his mother, father and four brothers. Always respectful of Hovaness' father and mother, she served the family dutifully, ran the household and was soon loved as the hars (bride) Hovaness brought to their home in the Mouradie Quartier de Sivas.

Within a year after the marriage, I was born. Soon afterwards came Rosa, Edward, Mary and Vahe. As a growing boy, I watched my mother rock her babies, singing Protestant hymns. She had studied music at school. We all enjoyed her alto voice. She encouraged us older children to join her. Then, the little ones would enter in.

Each of us attended the local school where we studied both the Armenian and Turkish languages, history and traditions. I elected English as a third language. My ability to grasp the new language impressed my instructor who encouraged me to read many articles and books to develop my growing vocabulary. To him, I will be eternally grateful. This ability to speak English proved a great help in adjusting to my adult life.

On Sundays, we, as a family, would dutifully attend the Armenian Apostolic Church. We learned and sang Sharagans, songs from the liturgy of the Armenian Church. At home, during the week, my mother taught us stories of the Old and New Testaments . . . all of them, as was the custom of the Protestant community.

I never felt very holy when I rode my horse. I knew that together we attracted attention. I wanted everyone in the city to notice how well we looked together. I rode up and down the streets, caring little if we splattered mud on the girls' skirts.

One day, my father came to me and said I must give my horse to the young son of one of my father's supervisors. My objections bore little weight against those of a Turkish citizen. Reluctantly, I was forced to give up the horse that had given me so much pleasure.

At that moment, I decided to leave Sivas. My uncle Michael was studying at Oberlin College in Ohio. I would go to America and live with him there. I wrote him many letters. In every reply, he discouraged me. However, several of my classmates had gone and settled in a small village called Lestershire in upstate New York. Uncle Yervant was there also. I would find a new home in a new country where I would not be enslaved to the whims of any Turkish boy. When my parents could not persuade me to change my mind, my father finally gave me a bag of gold and some provisions to start me on my new life. "After all, weren't the Turks making moves against the Armenians again? Perhaps, for his safety, sending him to Michael would be better. Let him get an education in America," my father reasoned. He is interested in photography. Already he was showing talent with his new Leica camera. Perhaps, he can become a photo-engraver. He could work on the new newspaper when he returned home.

My mother packed two new suits that my Uncle Gabriel, a well known tailor, made for me on his Singer Sewing Machine, the first one in Sivas at the time. She baked fresh paghach, added a tin of cheese and a box of sweets. It is hard to judge the pain she felt in her heart as she watched her first born, at the age of seventeen, travel across the land and seas to a new country. Rosa, Edward, Mary and Vahe stood with my parents at the gate and wondered as their oldest brother walked down the road to the train. I received my passport on May 9, 1909 and boarded the ship in Constantinople. When I reached New York City, I discovered that my Uncle Michael had already departed to London.

New York was everything I could imagine . . . the lights, the city, the entertainment. With Uncle Yervant's help, the gold father had given me soon disappeared. I had to send for more. After a few months, I obviously needed a job. I joined a group of five other young men from Sivas who had rented the upstairs of a house in Lestershire, now Johnson City, NY. We all found work in the Endicott-Johnson Shoe factory, a company that gave work to immigrants from most of Europe. At that time, the factory was flourishing. My English was better than that of many of my house mates and I was busy interpreting and getting jobs for many of the Armenian men.

World War I broke out and the news from my family which had been minimal, ceased. News of the devastation of Sivas reached us and the papers ran issue after issue about the persecution of the Armenians in Turkey. Since I could not return to Sivas to help, I joined the United States Army. My experience in the Army was an education that I can never repay. Irving Berlin, who was in our platoon, would try out his new songs on us. I made many friends.

The name that my parents gave me at birth was Levon Hovaness Franguelian, a very long name to print, copy and reprint on government forms. Invariably, the name was misspelled. Throughout my service, the army was clarifying my records. As a result, they never sent me overseas. Frustrated, I could never fight the enemy. One commanding officer finally decided to
change my name to Leon H. Frank, a name much easier to spell.
I enjoyed my life in the service. I learned to dance, date American women, and feel very American. I tried to encourage my roommates to do the same, but, they felt very uncomfortable with the language. One by one, they were beginning to marry young refugees who had escaped from Turkish Armenia. Every month the Armenian community celebrated a wedding. Having dated American women, who were happy and full of life, I was not terribly interested in the thin, shabby women refugees who seem to have lost the joy of living.

My roommate, Hamazasb Parounagian heard that his sister, Iskouhi, was alive and wished to come to America. Together, we completed the paper work. We decided that she could stay with cousin Lucig Chookasian in New York City. Lucig and her husband could house her and get work for her to earn her keep by making laces and embroidering with beadwork.

Iskouhi reached the United States in November 1920. By January 1921, cousin Lucig's husband's relatives arrived. Iskouhi was forced, again, to sleep on the floor. Not only was there no room, Lucig had stretched the rice pilaf as far as she could. There was not enough money to feed everybody. She wrote Hamasasb, "You must come to get Iskouhi. We have no room. Please find a husband for her."

Keroppe and Ovsanna Ketchoyan, who had emigrated earlier, invited Iskouhi to their home where I met her. Iskouhi was very quiet, but we talked about our experiences in Sivas. We did not know each other there, because she was so much younger than I. However, she told me about her school and her dreams of going to the teachers' college. Soon we realized we knew many of the same people. We wept together when we talked about Uncle Michael and all who had been victims of the massacre.

By now, I realized that the Turks had killed all the members of my family. I missed them very much. Perhaps, this would be a good time to begin a family of my own.

After two meetings, Iskouhi and Levon decided to marry. . . .she, because she had known and respected his family in Sivas. His sister, Rosa, and she were in the same class in their high school. . . . he, because he liked this young woman who was the sister of his friend.

They never dated. They never talked privately.

Keroppe and Ovsanna witnessed their marriage and became godparents to their family.

Their marriage that began on March 12, 1921 in Trinity Church in Binghamton, New York, lasted for sixty-one years.

Leon Sr. died on Easter Sunday, April 11, 1982. Frances died the following year on a sunny spring day, June 5, 1983.