| Deciding that they didn’t want to be
too close to Richard Hahn (Marianne's brother), the
family moved to Oakland, California. Alex and Vera
had made good money overseas and converted it into
dollars. Still, they both had jobs within two days
of arriving. Alex worked in retail and Vera worked
as a bookkeeper/cashier for five years in a clothing
store.  In 1951, Alex was
drafted by the U.S. Army (as a registered legal alien,
one could be drafted) and was sent back over to
Europe. He was stationed in Germany of all places,
where he worked in the intelligence unit (although his
letters mention his work in the PX). In his Army
exams, he scored higher on tests than anyone had scored
before, so they asked him to go into officers training,
but he declined because he didn’t want to stay in
the Army for an additional year. Over in Europe, he
met a German girl and lo and behold decided he wanted to
extend his stay past 1953; however, Vera had his money
which she refused to send over because she wanted him to
come home. He returned to Oakland and, seeing anew
the American women, quickly reconsidered his decision.
Vera met Gene Siporen through friends in
Oakland in 1953, while Alex was in Germany. Alex
wasn’t thrilled with Gene. After his return,
Alex applied for the GI Bill right away to continue his
studies (1954). Although he only had a ninth grade
formal education, he easily passed the equivalency
exam. He enrolled at UC Berkeley and completed his
undergraduate degree in three years (finishing 6th out of
the graduating class). He was elected Phi Beta
Kappa as a junior and was honored as the outstanding Cal
student of year. He received nearly all A's and a
total of three B’s in college--in German, Golf and
Swimming.
Alex then
studied for his CPA. He worked as an accountant at
Haskins and Sells for two years after passing the
exam. Haskins & Sells had a training class for
newly hired CPAs where the first person to learn all of
their classmates names was presented with a monogrammed
briefcase--Alex earned the briefcase. During this
time, he was teaching Cal-Extension courses and realized
that he loved teaching, so he bypassed an MBA and went
directly into a PhD program. He received his
doctorate when his son Mark was two (1961).
|
