We arrived in Columbus, Ohio, from West Germany, via the Port of New York, on Easter Sunday, 1952. Prior to that the only time within my memory that I had had enough to eat was on the ship sailing to America. There were many new and amazing things to experience in our new country. The abundance of food was a pleasant culture shock.
Excerpt from the book:
Our first visit to an American grocery store
I remember our first trip to an American grocery store, the A&P on Main Street, near the Capital University campus. It was a family affair with my Mom, Dad, my brother, and me. A nice American lady helped us with the shopping, a big help since everything was strange to us. We had just moved into our home on Mound Street, and we had no food in the house; the cupboards were bare.
The amount of food in the A&P was astounding. I had never seen such a so much food or such a wide selection. We filled a cart (smaller than today’s carts) full of groceries, which cost about $10. (That is about $88 in 2014 dollars.) I did not know someone could actually have enough food to fill such a huge basket. While amazed and pleased at the amount of food, it almost seemed wrong to buy that much. We had a refrigerator in the house for perishable food. Now that was amazing!