Hinckley Native Tells the Story of His Grandpa’s Arrival at Ellis Island in 1952

By Wally Huskonen

My paternal grandmother arrived from Finland at Ellis Island on 12 Aug 1903 with her four children after a ten-day voyage on the S.S Aurania. I have visited Ellis Island and have tried to imagine what their arrival experience might have been. But I never got a chance for a first-hand description of that experience.

Brian Elles, a native of Hinckley in Medina County, Ohio, was able to interview his grandfather Wilhelm Piller extensively about his arrival in America from Germany in 1952. That account is included in a new book published by Elles on 23 Apr 2025. The book’s title is Dandelion Soup. As you might guess, there is much more to the book, in fact it is mainly about Wilhelm’s life growing up in Germany and elsewhere in Europe during and immediately after WWII. We will explain the title in a bit.

Wilhelm arrived in New York with his father Jakob and mother Elizabeth and sister Erika on the USNS General C. H. Muir, a converted troop ship.

Elles writes in detail about what Wilhelm told him about the arrival experience. They were headed for Cleveland, Ohio, where they would live with Wilhelm’s Uncle Tony.