Autobiography, Memoir, Biography

Ball, Eric L. Sustained by Eating, Consumed by Eating Right: Reflections, Rhymes, Rants and Recipes. Albany: State University of New York Press, 2013.

When Eric L. Ball returned to his hometown in northern New York after a fifteen-year absence that included time in Greece, he began building his version of the good life, largely revolving around growing, foraging, and cooking safe and wholesome foods. Yet, surrounded by family and old memories, he found himself grappling with the loss of his unlikely Mediterranean past and struggling to navigate the interplay of intellectual convictions and emotional needs as he strived to construct a fulfilling ethical life in the unsustainable modern world. In Sustained by Eating, Consumed by Eating Right, Ball shares his experiences and explores questions about food and drink, including the relationship between recipes and learning, the significance of the Mediterranean diet, how to cook authentic Greek foods in the United States, and how to obtain safe and healthy food in a toxic world. Ultimately, Ball considers broader questions about the evolving significance of family, the nature of freedom, the future of the environment, and thinking that one can change the world. The result is a bittersweet story that ponders questions about living a decent and fulfilling life when it comes to food and family.

Bogdanos, Matthew and William Patrick. Thieves of Baghdad. One Man’s Passion to Recover the World’s Greatest Stolen Treasures. New York: Bloomsbury, 2005.

Chrissochoidis, Ilias. On the Trails of the American Dream: A Tale of Self-exile – A Voyage of No Return. Greek ed. Stanford: Brave World, 2011.

“The adventures and reflections of a young intellectual as he prepares to emigrate to America.”

Constant, Constance. Austin Lunch. Hillsdale, NJ: Cosmos, 2005.

Based on the author’s own memories, this book relates the story of a family living through the shock of immigration and the struggles of the Great Depression in Chicago. The mother goes against Greek convention by going to work in her husband’s West Side restaurant, thus helping to support her two children. As written on the cover of the book: “The restaurant with its parade of assorted inner city characters becomes a proving ground for the children to observe the energy, integrity and courage of their hard working parents during the rough thirties and early forties

Daniels, Elaine Makris. Growing Up Greek in South Bend: The Early Years 1926-1964. Gaithersburg: Tegea Press, 2001.

Doundoulakis, Helias. I Was Trained to be a Spy. Bloomington, IN: XLibris, 2008.

Helias Doundoulakis was born in the United States but grew up in Crete. In this memoir, he writes about his experiences during World War II as a resistance fighter and a spy. In 1941, when he was 18, the German elite paratroopers invaded his island. He joined a resistance group headed by his brother. When the group was uncovered, he and his brother avoided capture by the Gestapo by escaping to Egypt. There he joined OSS, trained as a spy, and performed underground missions in Greece. After the war, he settled in the United States, where he became a professional engineer and inventor.

Dukakis, Olympia. Ask Me Again Tomorrow: A Life in Progress. New York: HarperCollins, 2003

Eleftheriou, Joanna. “Black Stone.”Ergon: Greek American Arts and Letters. 25 August 2019.

Eleftheriou, Joanna. This Way Back. West Virginia University Press, 2020.

Fey, Tina. Bossypants. Reagan Arthur Books, 2011.

“She’s a comic genius, every woman’s imaginary best friend, and the thinking man’s sex symbol. Tina Fey didn’t get this far without pulling on her bossypants.

Before there was Liz Lemon, before there was “Sarah Palin,” before there was “Weekend Update”—there was a woman with a dream. A dream that one day she would write a book about how she got here. But she had to get there first.

On her way to becoming an award-winning superstar, Tina Fey struggled through some questionable haircuts, some after-school jobs, the rise of nachos as a cultural phenomenon, a normal childhood, a happy marriage and joyful motherhood. Her story must be told! Fey’s pursuit of the perfect beauty routine may actually give you laugh lines, and her depiction of her whirlwind tour of duty as the Other Sarah Palin on Saturday Night Live takes you behind the scenes of a comedy event that transfixed the nation. Now, Fey can reflect on what she’s learned: You’re no one until someone calls you bossy.” (Book description, Reagan Arthur Books website)

Gage, Eleni N. North of Ithaka: A Granddaughter Returns to Greece and Discovers Her Roots. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2004.

George, Harris. By George. Baltimore: BrickHouse Books, 2005.

The author writes about his childhood in the Greek community of Baltimore, his Navy years, and the challenges of practicing law. He says, “I’ve tried to capture my fondest memories of a happy life punctuated by special people and amusing predicaments in which I found myself.”

Giannaris, John (Yannis) and McKinley C. Olson. Yannis. Tarrytown, New York: Publishing Incorporated, 1988.

Describes the dangerous mission of the Greek Battalion, a group of Greek American soldiers who were trained by the OAS to sabotage the Germans.

Halo, Thea. Not Even My Name. New York: Picador, 2000.

Hayes, Philia Geotes. Twice My Child. From the Aegean to the American Midwest: The Stories of Five Generations of Island Mothers. N.p., 2010.

Heckinger, Maria. Beyond the Third Door: Based On a True Story. Bookbaby, 2019.

My book has three narrators: my birth mother, my adopted mother, and myself. It is the tale of two mothers and their connection to one child. One mother was shamed because she had a child and the other because she couldn’t. I am one of 3,500 Greek orphans adopted to the U.S. in the 1950s. Conceived in an act of violence, I was born to an unwed mother who was exiled from her island home for 44 years. Homeless and seven months pregnant in a large mainland city, she could not care for me and lost me to foreign adoption. Raised in California, I returned to Greece when I was 30 where, through a series of life-changing events, I reconnected with my birth mother. Finally, as the orphaned child, I tell my story. Based on documents and oral histories given by both mothers, and my experiences, it is a tale so miraculous it reads like fiction.

Janus, Christopher. The World of Christopher Xenopoulos Janus: The Very Best By And About Him. Stories, Interviews, And Scoops. Calligraphico Press, 2008

Harvard graduate, businessman, and author Christopher Janus presents short essays about his exploits, such as his purchase of Adolph Hitler’s car. Articles that have been written about him are also included.

Johnson, Michael S. Obscurity to Fame in the Oil Business. Self-published, 2012.

Petroleum geology Michael Johnson, the son of Greek immigrants, made the groundbreaking discovery of the Parshall Oil Field in North Dakota.

Kalafatas, Michael N. The Bellstone: The Greek Sponge Divers of the Aegean. Hanover: Brandeis UP, 2003.

Kacandes, Irene.  Daddy’s War: Greek American Stories.  A Paramemoir.  Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2009.

Kalfopoulou, Adrienne. Ruin: Life in Exilic Living, Pasadena: Red Hen Press, 2014.

Kalfopoulou, Adrianne.  Broken Greek:  A Language to Belong.  Austin: Plain View Press, 2006.

Kallinis, Katherine and Sophie Kallinis LaMontagne. Cupcake Diaries: Recipes and Memories from the Sisters of Georgetown Cupcakes. Harper Collins, 2011.

Cupcake Diaries, a combination of recipes, advice, and memoir, captures the two sisters’ philosophy of life and how they established a successful cupcake business in Georgetown.

Kapsalis, Paul “Whitey” and Ted Gregory. To Chase a Dream: A Soccer Championship, An Unlikely Hero and a Journey that Redefined Winning. Maindenhead, UK: Meyer and Meyer Sports Ltd., 2014.

Karalis, Eftihios. Ripples of Fate. Maryland: PublishAmerica, 2003.

In the aftermath of World War II, the small nation of Greece began the arduous task of rebuilding its ruined infrastructure. This frail effort was disrupted by rival factions whose power struggle culminated in a bloody civil war. The fragile peace that ensued was shattered by the wrath of nature. A series of destructive quakes leveled whatever was still standing, and many people perished. This story is about a young orphan’s struggle to carry on. The account is a composite of personal recollections and retold anecdotal episodes. The story carries a strong universal message of persevering determination in the face of adversity. The world has always been a hostile place and one can either blame his predicaments for failures or attribute them to successes in life. Eftihios chose to do the latter with quiet resolve. He narrates his bittersweet memories in hope that others can find their inner strength.

Karnazes, Dean. Run 26.2: Stories of Blisters and Bliss. Rodale, 2011.

Champion Greek American marathon writer chronicles his exploits when running, sometimes in inhospitable places like the Australia Outback, Antarctica, and the Tenderloin District of San Francisco.

Kourvetaris, George. 2013. Sharing My Life’s Journey: A Memoir. Saline, MI: McNaughton & Gunn, 2013.

George Kourvetaris’s memoir covers the years from 1933 to 2010. It includes his formative years in Greece prior to his coming to Chicago in 1958 to continue his education. He received a Ph.D. from Northwestern University and became a professor of sociology at Northern Illinois University in DeKalb. Included in the 203-page book are photographs of himself and his family, a vita of his years at Northern Illinois University (1969-2006), and an article that was written about him by Elaine Thomopoulos for The National Herald.

Kulukundis, Elias. The Feasts of Memory: Stories of a Greek Family. 2nd ed. Portsmouth: Randall, 2003.

Lagos, Taso G. 86 Days in Greece: A Time of Crisis. English Hill Press, 2014.

“Here is an insider’s view into the social, political, economic, and cultural dimensions of the crisis in Greece. 86 Days in Greece provides us with a unique, impressionistic, and philosophical account of one of the most important moments in Europe today. Without the conventional structure of theoretical assumptions and academic rhetoric, this work brings us as close as we can come to the Greek people, their understandings, trials, and obstacles to future reforms. Taso Lagos has written a book in diary form that documents the crisis from a personal, interdisciplinary 360-degree perspective, and it should be required reading for all those interested in the European situation today.”

Matsakis, Aphrodite. Growing up Greek in St. Louis. Mount Pleasant, SC: Arcadia Publishing, 2002.

Through a series of vivid personal accounts, Matsakis explores the challenges faced by Greek-Americans as they sought to preserve a rich cultural heritage while assimilating to American ways. From a detailed account of her grandmothers’ struggles during the occupation of Greece during WWII and the Asia Minor Holocaust to the first hand experiences faced by Greek-American children in Greek school, the celebration of name days, and the ever-present “evil eye,” the book captures the sense of tradition, history, hospitality (philotimo), and community so vital to the Greek experience.

Mavrovitis, Jason C. Out of the Balkans. Pahh.com. Preservation of American Hellenic Heritage, 2003.
Can be accessed here.

Mossin, Andrew. From The Day After The Day After. Ergon: Greek American Arts and Letters. 4 August 2019.

Nashi, Stavro. Ithaka on the Horizon: A Greek-American Journey. Self-published, 2013. .

Orfanos, Spyros D. “So the Clerks Will Not Be Able to Fool You.” Journal of the Hellenic Diaspora.  Vol. 35, Issue 1 (2009): 105-110.

Pavellas, Ronald A. Dear Grandma: A Memoir and Family History, 2017.Peterson, Peter G. The Education of an American Dreamer: How a Son of Greek Immigrants Learned His Way from a Nebraska Diner to Washington, Wall Street, and Beyond.  New York: Twelve Publishing, 2009.

Pisanos, Steve N. The Flying Greek: An Immigrant Fighter Ace’s World War II Odyssey with the RAF, USAAF, and French Resistance. Washington, D.C.: Potomac Books, 2008.

The story of an undocumented Greek immigrant who jumps ship in 1938, with only eight dollars in his pocket. The only English he knows is “Ticket to New York.” In America, he achieves his childhood dream of becoming an aviator in the US military.

Pyrros, James G.  The Cyprus File: A Diary of the Cyprus Crisis in the Summer of 1974.  Washington, D.C.: Pella Publishing, 2010.

“The Cyprus File is a story with many layers. It played out in the hot summer of 1974, at a time of a grave constitutional crisis in the United States the impending impeachment of the President over the Watergate scandal. Folded within this story was the drama bursting out on the island of Cyprus. First, the coup against Archbishop Makarios, followed shortly by the Turkish invasion, terror and destruction on the island, the fall of the Greek junta, the return of Karamanlis, the survival of Makarios, and the tragic dismemberment of Cyprus. The Nixon White House, the Kissinger State Department, the U.S. Congress, the governments of Greece, Cyprus, and Turkey, and many public and private figures played a role. ‘Every day,’ says Jim Pyrros, the author, ‘we felt we were walking with history. It was an incredibly eventful time.”

Rassogianis, Alexander. Return to Glenlord: Memories of Michigan Summers. Bloomington, IN: Xlibris, 2013.

With humor, the author captures adventures with family and friends in Stevensville, Michigan during the 1950s. He describes being part of the vibrant and loving Greek community that journeyed from Chicago to spend their summers in this area of old-fashioned resorts, quaint cottage and sandy beaches. Included are vintage photos.

Rizopoulos, Perry Giuseppe and William A. Meis. Wheat Songs: A Greek-American Journey. Academic Studies Press, 2018.

Sarrinikolaou, George. Facing Athens: Encounters with the Modern City. New York: North Point, 2004.

Savas, Georgianna. Eyes on Stamos: A Sister’s Memoir – A Brother’s Wishes. Georgianna Savas, 2005.

The author writes about her brother, the Greek American artist, Theodoros Stamos.

Sikélianòs, Eleni. The Book of Jon. San Francisco: City Lights, 2004

Spanos, William V. In the Neighborhood of Zero: A World War II Memoir. Lincoln and London: University of Nebraska Press, 2010.

The haunting recollection of living through the British and American fire-bombing of Dresden as prisoner of war in a Nazi camp is the focal point of this memoir by William Spanos, Professor of English and comparative literature at Binghamton University and an esteemed Heideggerian literary critic and founding editor of boundary 2. The author’s motto: “Did you ever return to Dresden, Professor Spanos?” “I never left there.” Critical to the narration are the first words of the first chapter: “I am a Greek American”
(1). Note that Spanos comes from a working class immigrant family that became highly educated and prominent, with one brother a politician in N.H. and Massachusetts. In his early years in Newport, N.H. Spanos recalls running away from his ethnic self in response to treatment as a second-class citizen. His “conflicted experience” of his unit’s probable betrayal in the Battle of the Bulge and “American’s destructive power in the world” in the Dresden bombing, and the forced labor he endured picking up corpses and enduring spittings by Germans who survived the attack, functions to draw out “the silent hyphen between my Greek and American selves”
(2). Spanos’s memories, unspoken for decades, the act of narrating the unbelievable story of his disappearance for 5 months and return to his family in Newport NH as if from the dead become grist to his intellectual mill. The Dresden firebombing is the ground zero of his intellectual skepticism with respect to American institutions and ideals. (Artemis Leontis)

Spyratos, Kristalenia. Erica’s Amerika: 20 Essays Documenting a Greek Family’s Adventures and Adaptation in America. Peterborough, England: Fastprint Publishing, 2014.

Stamatiades, Lambros J. Journey of My Life. Trans. Peter Demopoulos. Los Angeles: Hellenic University Club of Southern California, 2013. <https://www.huc.org/publications/Stamatiades_The_Journey_of_my_Life.htm>

Lambros J. Stamatiades (1897-1993) wrote his memoir in Greek for his “close circle of relatives, fellow villagers, and friends from Karpathos in the Dodecanese Islands.” It is now available in both Greek (106 pages) and English (104 pages) through the Internet. Stamatiades, who grew up in Karpathos, immigrated to the United States in 1912. He returned to Greece in 1921 and got married, but because of restrictive immigration policy, he could not return to the United States until 1925. He left his wife and daughters behind, and they joined him in 1934. Stamatiades writes about growing up in Greece and immigrating to the United State. He includes anecdotes about the Italian occupation of the island in the 1920s, his role in organizing the OMONIA of Karpathian Aperians in the United States, and his activities in the labor movement. Because of the latter, he was jailed and blacklisted. Stamatiades worked as a waiter in New York for 55 years. He and his wife raised three daughters and two sons. The book is not the traditional memoir. It includes not only stories about his life, but a short biography of his wife Marigo, his thoughts about the universe and society, adages of how to live, several nostalgic poems by him and fellow patrioti from Karpathos, correspondence received from friends and relatives, two maps, and eight photos

Stratakis, Christopher. Appointment with Yesterday. Bloomfield, NJ.: Idie Reader Publishing Services, 2016.

Strongylis, Cleopas. Dean James A. Coucouzes as a Model of Priesthood. Archbishop Iakovos’ Ministry at the Annunciation Cathedral of New England (1942-1954). Brookline, MA: Holy Cross Orthodox Press, 2012.

Taltsidis, Christos. Fur and Leather Matters. Chicago, 2014.

The cover of this memoir shows Christos Taltsidis dressed in an all leather black jacket and pants of his own creation. Taltsidis tells of growing up in a small village near Kastoria and how he worked hard to achieve the dream he has had since he was 12 years old — of becoming a master fur artist. He meticulously describes the process that is required to create a fur design and the many years of apprenticeship and working under other fur artists in Greece and the United States prior to his opening his own shop in Westchester, Illinois. His passion, philosophy of life, and importance of family seeps into this down-to-earth little book.

Tatooles, James E. Heartbeats. Chicago: Open Books, 2014.

Heartbeats is the memoir of one of the pioneers in modern cardiac surgery, Constantine ‘Dino’ Tatooles, M.D., as told to his brother James E. Tatooles.

Thomopoulos, Nick T. 100 Years: From Greece to Chicago and Back. Bloomington: Xlibris, 2011.

Growing up in Chicago during the 1930s, ’40s and ’50s was a life rich in tradition, family and memories. Nick Thomopoulos in 100 Years chronicles the vibrant life of the neighborhood surrounding the St. George Greek Orthodox Church.  He tells of the tragic death of his father and the difficulties and joys his immigrant mother faced in raising five young children in an emerging metropolis unlike Zakynthos, Greece. Because of the Great Depression, World War II, the Greek Civil War and the hardships in Greece, Marie received only an occasional letter from her siblings. In 1962, Marie, with Nick, returned to Greece 42 years after she left. Three of her five siblings did not know she was coming, and her husband’s lone sister did not know the family was even alive.  The story describes the excitement of reuniting with the family.

Vavaroutsos, Thomas I. The Odyssey of an Immigrant. Self-published 2013.

The memoir of an immigrant from Sparta who came to the United States when he was 18. He recounts his experiences as a young child during the Nazi occupation during WWII and the Greek Civil War, and the challenges he faced in America.

Vardalos, Nia. Instant Mom. New York: HarperOne, 2013.

Memoir by the creator and actress of My Big Fat Greek Wedding. The “Instant Mom” in the title refers to the experience she had in adopting a three-year old daughter.

Vidalis, Orestis E. Confronting the Greek Dictatorship in the U.S.: Years of Exile: A Personal Diary (1968-1975). Pella Publishing, 2009.

“This historical diary reveals unknown events and provides evidence related to the author’s fight in the United States for the restoration of Greek democracy.”

Vlanton, Jennie C. 761 Aubert Avenue: My Greek American Sanctuary. Lincoln: iUniverse, 2007.

Walsh, Efthalia Makris. Beloved Sister: Biography of a Greek-American Family, Letters From the Homeland. Bethesda, MD: Tegea Press, 1998

b) Autobiographies, Memoirs, Biography – Scholarship

Anagnostou, Yiorgos. “Against Cultural Loss: Immigration, Life History, and the Enduring Vernacular.” Hellenisms: Culture, Identity, and Ethnicity from Antiquity to Modernity. Ed. Katerina Zacharia. London: Ashgate, 2008. 335+.

Arapoglou, Eleftheria. “Enacting an Identity by Re-creating a Home: Eleni Gage’s North of Ithaca.” Identity, Diaspora and Return in American Literature. Ed. Maria Antònia Oliver-Rotger. New York and London: Routledge (Routledge Transnational Perspectives on American Literature), 2015. 118–132.

Gemelos, Michele. “Greek American Autobiography.” The Greenwood Encyclopedia of Multiethnic American Literature, Volume Two: D–H. Ed. Emmanuel S. Nelson. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press. 2005. 870–873.

Xinos, Ilana. “Narrating Captivity and Identity: Christophorus Castanis’ The Greek Exile and the Genesis of the Greek-American.” Transcultural Localisms: Responding to Ethnicity in a Globalized World. Eds. Yiorgos Kalogeras, Eleftheria Arapoglou and Linda Manney. Heidelberg: Universitätsverlag Winter, 2006. 203-20.

c) Autobiographies, Memoirs, Biography – Reviews

Alexiou, Nicholas. Rev. of My Detroit: Growing up Greek and American in Motor City, by Dan Georgakas. Journal of Modern Greek Studies 30.1 (2012): 147-9.

Contis, Angelike. “Tina Fey’s Greek Gags – Uh, It’s Complicated For a Greek Thinker.” The National Herald Online. September 1 (2011).

“Is she Greek? Isn’t she? Does she feel Greek? Doesn’t she? While the general U.S. public may have focused on Tina Fey’s uncanny Sarah Palin impersonation or her television show 30 Rock, Greek Americans have wondered for a while how Emmy-winning writer/actress Fey – perhaps our highest profile pop culture figure after Jennifer Aniston at the moment- feels about her Greek heritage.”

Georgakas, Dan.  Review of The Cyprus File: A Diary of the Cyprus Crisis in the Summer of 1974.  The National Herald Online (2010): 10.

“The Cyprus File is an engrossing chronicle of the anti-Makarios coup organized by the Greek junta that triggered the Turkish invasion of Cyprus. It is the work of James G. Pyrros, then in the midst of a 20-year career as an aide to Democratic Congressman Lucien Nedzi of Michigan. While not in the policy level of government, Pyrros had an inside-the- beltway view of Washington’s reaction to the crisis. In addition to being a Congressional aide, he also had long been part of an informal group seeking to educate American politicians and mass media about the junta that had seized power in Greece in 1967. That involvement provided Pyrros with considerable insights into the agonies of the summer of 1974. The Cyprus File is not an academic study. It is a segment of a larger diary Pyrros began to write in 1943 after reading William Shirer’s bestselling Berlin Diary. Pyrros also wanted to write of events immediately as they occurred. This perspective became especially critical when… it came time for me to play a political role as participant and observer. The resulting diary is exciting reading that accurately records the shocks, fears, and hopes generated by events as they unfolded not only day-to-day, but also hour-to-hour and even minute-to-minute. Although most readers will know the ultimate out-come of events, The Cyprus File is a page-turner in the very best sense of the word.”

Georgakas, Dan.  Review of Broken Greek: A Language to Belong.  Journal of the Hellenic Diaspora. Vol. 35, Issue 1 (2009): 121-127.

Klironomos, Martha. Review of Broken Greek: A Language to Belong.  Journal of Modern Greek Studies.  Vol. 27, Issue 2 (2009): 439-442.

Klironomos, Martha.  Review of North of Ithaka: A Granddaughter Returns to Greece and Discovers Her Roots.  Journal of Modern Greek Studies.  Vol. 26, Issue 2 (2008): 491-494.

Leontis, Artemis. Eva Palmer Sikelianos: A Life in Ruins. Princeton University Press, 2019.

This is the first biography to tell the fascinating story of Eva Palmer Sikelianos (1874–1952), an American actor, director, composer, and weaver best known for reviving the Delphic Festivals. Yet, as Artemis Leontis reveals, Palmer’s most spectacular performance was her daily revival of ancient Greek life. For almost half a century, dressed in handmade Greek tunics and sandals, she sought to make modern life freer and more beautiful through a creative engagement with the ancients. Along the way, she crossed paths with other seminal modern artists such as Natalie Clifford Barney, Renée Vivien, Isadora Duncan, Susan Glaspell, George Cram Cook, Richard Strauss, Dimitri Mitropoulos, Nikos Kazantzakis, George Seferis, Henry Miller, Paul Robeson, and Ted Shawn. Brilliant and gorgeous, with floor-length auburn hair, Palmer was a wealthy New York debutante who studied Greek at Bryn Mawr College before turning her back on conventional society to live a lesbian life in Paris. She later followed Raymond Duncan (brother of Isadora) and his wife to Greece and married the Greek poet Angelos Sikelianos in 1907. With single-minded purpose, Palmer re-created ancient art forms, staging Greek tragedy with her own choreography, costumes, and even music. Having exhausted her inheritance, she returned to the United States in 1933, was blacklisted for criticizing American imperialism during the Cold War, and was barred from returning to Greece until just before her death. Drawing on hundreds of newly discovered letters and featuring many previously unpublished photographs, this biography vividly re-creates the unforgettable story of a remarkable nonconformist whom one contemporary described as “the only ancient Greek I ever knew.”

Panourgiá, Neni. “Effacing Athens.” Rev. of Facing Athens: Encounters with the Modern City, by George Sarrinikolaou. The National Herald, May 26, 2007. 16-7.

Sutton, Dan. Rev. of The Bellstone: The Greek Sponge Divers of the Aegean by Michael N. Kalafatas. Journal of Modern Greek Studies 21.2 (2003): 294-97.

Reveals the history of how 3,000 Greek children were shipped to the United States for adoption in the postwar period. This book presents a committed quest to unravel and document the postwar adoption networks that placed more than 3,000 Greek children in the United States, in a movement accelerated by the aftermath of the Greek Civil War and by the new conditions of the global Cold War. Greek-to-American adoptions and, regrettably, also their transactions and transgressions, provided the blueprint for the first large-scale international adoptions, well before these became a mass phenomenon typically associated with Asian children. The story of these Greek postwar and Cold War adoptions, whose procedures ranged from legal to highly irregular, has never been told or analyzed before. Adoption, Memory, and Cold War Greece answers the important questions: How did these adoptions from Greece happen? Was there any money involved? Humanitarian rescue or kid pro quo? Or both? With sympathy and perseverance, Gonda Van Steen has filled a decades-long gap in our understanding, also for the hundreds of adoptees and their descendants, whose lives are still affected today.

Bibliographies

Anagnostou, Yiorgos and Fevronia K. Soumakis. “Bibliography on Greek America (2018).” Ergon: Greek American Arts and Letters. 28 January 2019.

Frangos, Steve. “Suggested Readings about the Greek American Experience.” The National Herald 2 Dec. 2006, Books Special Ed.: 22, 23. In pdf format.

Patsis, Louiza. “Cultural Greek American Archive.” 18 Dec 2004.  Informational Organization Management (DIS 826), New York University, student paper, https://www.researchgate.net/publication/319479329_Greek-American_Archives.

Many immigrant groups have come to the United States.  Often, their cultures have “melted” into American culture.  In other cases, or sometimes simultaneously, they keep their traditions, and assimilate American culture into their own.  Often, many documents and artifacts of their history are lost, especially if there is no effort to archive, organize and keep them in a safe place. Many Greek American cultural artifacts are being lost.  Hardships and accomplishments of ancestors may be forgotten forever.  This is an exploratory, qualitative research of Greek-American archives in the United States.  This is a preliminary report, which includes interviews of people involved in the effort to archive Greek American cultural documents and artifacts.  The purpose of the interviews is to see if there is an organized national effort to collect and maintain Greek American archives, and to explore the reasons why there is or is not such an effort.  A small comparison of Greek-American and other ethnic groups’ archival efforts will be presented.  This research includes efforts of Greek Americans to archive their own history in this country, and excludes efforts of archiving information on Greek cultural or of solely religious material.