Blast from the past

Lena and Yolanda met 75 years ago on a ship sailing from Italy to Ellis Island, when they were nine and ten years old. Though the two lost touch soon after, they never forgot their "travel buddy" for the journey across the Atlantic. 

🔎 Needle in a haystack... Fast-forward to today, and Lena's son was able to find Yolanda after looking up a manifest of his mom's ship in the Ellis Island archives. 

The two women were soon reunited after discovering they only lived 2.5 hours away from each other. 

• “Yolanda was the face and name that was synonymous with my transition from one life to another,” Lena said. “For that reason alone, I could never forget her. Now that we’ve been reunited, I am even more grateful to call her my friend and to have had the chance to share our stories.”