Pappa's Papers

About the Book

The memoirs are about ordinary people in extraordinary times. Their lives are seen through the eyes of a child, and through the letters and documents left behind by her father. The author describes her family life in the Netherlands in the first half of the twentieth century. Her earliest childhood memories were idyllic. Then came mobilization, the Second World War, the dangers and deprivations, and the difficult post-war economic recovery period. Faced with limited options for her future, she went to the United states to attend college. The memoirs end with her arrival in New York when she was eighteen.

About the Author

Josina van der Maas was born in the Netherlands in 1935 and moved to the United States in 1953 to study at Vassar College where she graduated with a major in Chemistry in 1955. She obtained a PhD in Physical Chemistry at the University of Minnesota in 1959. After postdoctoral studies at the University of Illinois, she had a long career in scientific research and computer software at Bell Telephone Laboratories and the IBM Corporation, among others. After retirement, she joined a memoirs workshop at her local library which inspired her to write down memories of her childhood in the Netherlands, resulting in her book Pappa’s Papers. Dutiful Daughter is the sequel, based on her letters home during the two years she was at Vassar College. In addition to her writing, she has many local responsibilities on committees and boards. She lives in a small town in Westchester County, New York half of the year and in southern Florida the other half.