 1906 - 1999 (92 years)
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| Name |
Cornelia (Nellie) Grossman |
| Born |
2 Nov 1906 |
Budapest, Hungary  |
| Gender |
Female |
| Biography |
Cornelia (Nellie) Balan
My mother was born in Budapest in 1906, an only child. Her parents were Leo Grossman and Theresa Nagel.
Little is known to me about her childhood. I know there were friends and cousins to play with. As a child they moved several times, and when I went to Budapest in the 90s I brought her back photos of the buildings she had lived in, which pleased her very much.
In 1918 the Allies dismantled the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and Hungary was created. There followed political turmoil, with party succeeding party in governing. One of them was the Communist Party. When they fell out of favor, popular sentiment in Hungary lumped the Jews together with the Communists.
To escape the disfavor of the populace, Leo had himself and the family baptized in 1918. They then moved to Bratislava in the newly created Czech Republic, were Leo thought he would have better business opportunities. (He had served in the Empire’s army in WWI).
In 1920, shortly after this move, my mother says that Leo came home and stated that he was very ill, dying very shortly (almost immediately) thereafter. They found numerous medications in the briefcase he carried, but I know of no cause of death.
At 16 my mother became a debutante, and there are beautiful pictures of her during this time period.
My father, then Alexander “Sandor” Braun (name changed to Balan in 1946), began to court my mother at around this time. As far as I know it was a very proper courtship for the time, but my mother was not ready. Instead, she fell into a relationship with her first cousin, Imre Eisler from Vienna, and married him in her early twenties.
I believe that the marriage was not a success. Imre, like Leo, had difficulty in establishing himself in business. They traveled over much of Western Europe, but he could not find anything appropriate. The marriage did not last long, and left my mother fending for herself.
She spent some time working in England, and then moved to Germany, only to witness the rise of the Nazis. In the very early 30s she returned to Bratislava, renewed her relationship with Sandor, and they married in 1933.
I was born in 1934. My father hired a German woman to be my nanny and a Slovak peasant girl to nurse me. With foresight, we applied for immigration to the United States, through the embassy in Prague.
On a trip to Prague, my mother caught a cold which developed into a complicated case of pneumonia. She was bed ridden for two years. Our application to come to the US came and went. We do not know if this is the real reason, but the doctor who finally cured her was a homeopath.
After Hitler occupied Bohemia and Moravia in 1938, and later Slovakia in 1944, the family went into hiding. In early 1945 the family separated, and my mother spent the rest of the war in a tuberculosis sanatorium, incognito, in Eastern Slovakia.
Nellie and Sandor and I were reunited in a small village just a few days after the Red Army passed. My mother was the first to be liberated, as she was the furthest East. Her parents had been killed in Auschwitz in October 1944, they had not been in hiding. (Theresa had remarried after the death of Leo, to an attorney by the name of Kornel Pollak, whom I recall as my real grandfather, as I never knew Leo).
After the war my mother worked as a hat maker. My father’s business had been taken away by the Nazis, and he now worked for UNRRA. This provided for some travel, and helped in renewing the efforts to come to America. The family arrived in New York in April 1948.
My mother, who was apparently very skilled with her hands, immediately got a position with a concession at Saks Fifth Avenue, making ladies under garments. We first lived in a rental apartment in the suburbs, and in 1958 my parents bought their first home. It was a two family house, and the idea was that there would be rooms to rent. In the event my father predeceased my mother, she would live from the income produced by the house.
And that is indeed what happened, after my father died in 1967. My mother frequently referred to the years she spent with my father in that house as the happiest years of her life.
But the house became too difficult for her to manage as she grew older, and the neighborhood was deteriorating as well. In 1991, at the age of 85, my mother joined us in a building in New York City, where we had purchased a nice one bedroom apartment for her.
She had a bout with breast cancer, and then was diagnosed with multiple myeloma. She chose not to be treated for the latter. As she grew older, she seemed to lose interest in many things, including her friends and relatives. She was alone much of the time. There was a caretaker.
As so often happens, I blame myself for not providing her with greater company during this time. However, she had a great relationship with my life partner, Ann, and I think that in the end she might have been closer to her than to me.
One day in July 1999 she fell out of bed, we were not at home, and was taken to a nearby hospital. Even though she had “do not resuscitate” orders posted everywhere, the hospital did just that. When we arrived at the hospital later that day, we had the intubation removed.
She was conscious the next morning, but did not speak or open her eyes. She did respond to my whispering in her ear. I asked her whether she wanted to have anything done for her. She emphatically shook her head “no” to all my questions. I remember asking one question which required a “yes”, just to make sure she was not simply saying “no” to everything, and she responded appropriately.
We consequently had all life support removed, and my mother, Nellie, died peacefully within hours. That is definitely what she wanted.
She was a good mother to me, had gone through some tough times, illnesses, the war, and she was a marvelous wife to my father.
by John Balan, 16 February 2009 |
| Hebrew Birth |
14 Che 5667 |
| Residence |
1906-1919 |
Budapest, Hungary |
| Residence |
1919-1948 |
Bratislava, Slovakia |
| Immigration |
23 Apr 1948 |
New York, NY, USA [1] |
| Residence |
1948-1999 |
New York, NY, USA |
| Hebrew Death |
7 Ab 5759 |
| Social Security Number |
106-24-6845- |
| Died |
20 Jul 1999 |
New York, NY, USA |
| Person ID |
I8261 |
Blank Family |
| Last Modified |
12 Aug 2009 |
| Father |
Leo Grossman, b. 1875, Budapest, Hungary , d. 1 Aug 1920, Bratislava, Slovakia (Age 45 years) |
| Mother |
Therese (Terka) Nagel, b. 21 Dec 1881, Hlohovec, Slovakia , d. 5 Oct 1944, Auschwitz CC (Age 62 years) |
| Family ID |
F5859 |
Group Sheet | Family Chart |
| Family 2 |
Shandor Alexander Balan, b. 29 Sep 1894, Bratislava, Slovakia , d. 24 Apr 1967, Queens, NY, USA (Age 72 years) |
| Married |
29 Sep 1933 |
Bratislava, Slovakia |
| Children |
| | 1. Jan John Balan, b. 29 Nov 1934, Bratislava, Slovakia , d. 31 Jan 2013, New York, NY, USA (Age 78 years) |
|
| Family ID |
F5862 |
Group Sheet | Family Chart |
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| Event Map |
|
 | Born - 2 Nov 1906 - Budapest, Hungary |
 |
 | Residence - 1906-1919 - Budapest, Hungary |
|
 | Married - 29 Sep 1933 - Bratislava, Slovakia |
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 | Residence - 1919-1948 - Bratislava, Slovakia |
|
 | Immigration - 23 Apr 1948 - New York, NY, USA |
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 | Residence - 1948-1999 - New York, NY, USA |
|
 | Died - 20 Jul 1999 - New York, NY, USA |
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| Pin Legend |
 : Address
 : Location
 : City/Town
 : County/Shire
 : State/Province
 : Country
 : Not Set |
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| Sources |
- [S171] New York Passenger Lists, 1820-1957 , Ancestry, SS Veendam from Rotterdam.
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