Harbor from the Holocaust

(gentle piano music) This was the diary that my father prepared for my bar mitzvah. Life in Shanghai was by far not easy for the newcomers from Europe, and all the refugees struggled hard to make a living in Shanghai. The Chinese people were very peace-loving. It sounded like a great haven for the Jews. I learned Shanghainese. I spoke German with my mother, I spoke English with my father, and Chinese with my friends. We played, for instance, a game called Shanghai Millionaire which a version of Monopoly. It was identical except it had Chinese streets and buildings. Through a lot of my life, I had minimum food, sicknesses were rampant, and it was a very difficult life. I appreciated, I think when I came to this country, I appreciated America much more than the average American who was born here. And then I went to work for Coleco. (soft guitar music) Nobody in Coleco had had any experience in doll manufacture or doll design except me. So I was Head of Engineering. But I spearheaded the Cabbage Patch program. 1983, these dolls were exhibited at a toy fair and became a huge hit. And the end of the year, we had sold 3.3 million dolls in the first year that we had made those. People had bought dolls in other countries and flew them back. There were people that were hurt, there were stampedes. I have newspaper articles to show you some of the crazy things that took place. That Cabbage Patch was a phenomenon. One of the dolls was an Oriental doll. There were just a couple that were made, and I had those dolls. Bok Choy Wawa which sort of means Chinese doll. To this day, I happen to have a strong bond with China. (gong ringing) Shanghai meant a lot to me. First of all and more important, it saved our lives. There were about 18,000 Jews that left and lived in Shanghai, but it's really a small number in comparison to the six million that were killed in Europe. So we were very fortunate, very lucky that we found out about Shanghai.