Travels of Mary Seiter and Pat Hagan
Our journey to Europe
March 15 to June 30, 1961
My dear friend Pat Hagan and I were nurses at Veterans Hospital on Superior Street in Chicago. We were young – just 25 – and in-between jobs. Pat’s father, a prominent banker in Champaign, Illinois, encouraged us to see Europe. His friend another prominent banker suggested the itinerary we followed.
We made a great arc through the west of Europe. In all the cities we stayed in the small pensiones, which were inexpensive and clean.
We had the time of our lives!
Our journey
To begin, we flew to New York and boarded the ship SS France. After a five-day journey from New York to Portsmouth, we travelled by ferry to Le Havre. There, we rented a car, a little green Citroën, and drove to Paris.
From Paris we went to Versailles, we drove south through France to Orleans, the French Riviera and on to Monaco. We drove into Switzerland, to Geneva, to Lucerne, and we saw the Matterhorn and the Jungfrau mountains in the Alps.
We went to little Lichtenstein then down to Italy. We went to Como, Milan, Padua, and Assisi. We saw Florence, Sienna and Rome. We drove along the Adriatic coast to Venice.
Then to Austria, we visited Innsbruck, Salzburg and Vienna. We drove across upper Austria to Munich, to Nuremburg, and the beautiful town Rothenburg in Germany. We went to Passau on the Danube, to Dachau, Garmish, and Stuttgart.
We drove through the Black Forest to Baden Baden. We went to Frankfurt, Cologne, Dusseldorf and Hamburg. We went north to Lubec where we parked the car and boarded a ferry to Scandinavia.
We saw Copenhagen, Stockholm, and Oslo all by train. We loved them all. Then back to get the car in Lubec. We drove to The Netherlands, to Amsterdam and The Hague. We went to Belgium to Bruges, to Brussels, then on to France to leave the Citroën.
We went back to Britain, to London and finally back to Southampton to see Pat off on the ship SS Liberté to return to the States.
I remained for another month. I travelled by train and returned to Munich where I stayed with a girlfriend from Chicago. She worked at the consulate in Munich, I cannot recall her name. After a month with her I boarded a train, returned to Southampton and returned home on the same ship the SS France.
Back home after three months of travels, I began my job at Childrens Memorial Hospital in Chicago. I really loved working at Childrens. Soon I met Bill and a year later we were married.
Highlights
In Paris, we saw the new president John Kennedy and first lady Jacqueline in a long parade. In President Kennedy’s address he introduced himself as the man who came to Paris with Jackie. All the Parisians adored her were all shouting her name.
I will always remember being in Rome during Easter 1961. Mr. Hagan (Pat’s father) was a friend of the Bishop of Springfield, Ill., who helped him to arrange an audience with Pope John XXIII. The papal audience was for a group of American servicemen who were in Rome for Easter and Mr. Hagan put us in that group.
What an honor! I remember Pope John was very friendly, short and chubby, he smiled and greeted us in English with a strong Italian accent although I don’t recall what else he said.
We stayed in all the cities for a few days, sometimes longer. We visited the Louvre, the Rijksmuseum and all the famous museums. We saw Cologne Cathedral and all the great cathedrals. There was so much to see. We really enjoyed Munich and Vienna where we loved the coffee shops! And I remember in Norway the whole day was light.
Each place left an impression and memories with me.
I remember visiting Passau on the Danube, which is the home of my mother’s family the Neumanns. And I remember visiting Baden by the Rhine, home of the Seiter family my father’s ancestors. We could not visit Berlin as the Berlin Wall was being built that same year. We could not visit the eastern countries across the iron curtain.
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