Esther Grant Savin’s wonderful account of the journey of Bela Kransky to America, to San Francisco, and to her awakening as woman and as a labor organizer. Loosely based on the experiences of her own mother, Bela’s Journey captures the soul of the Jewish immigrant community of San Francisco in the early 20th century. Bela arrives in San Francisco as a teenager, prematurely thrust into a very adult role as surrogate parent to her younger half siblings. As she matures in a rapidly changing world of a great earthquake, of a World War, and of the early struggle for worker’s rights, she becomes a remarkably complete young woman. This is a story of personal growth, of love, and of the power of the individual to change her own world.
