Sowada Lydia Dorothea Sieg Melanie

Lydia was born in White Russia. As a young girl, she worked as a domestic and eventually ended up in Chorzow. She married Felix Sowada and they had three Children Dorothea, Siegmund and Melanie. Felix was killed as a member of the Polish Army at the time of the Nazi invasion.

Lydia did a wonderful job of raising the children, even though she was a single mother and on welfare. She never dwelt on her relative poverty and set an example of pride in the children and their surroundings. She was very generous and set the example of caring for others, especially those who were less well off than themselves.

Lydia was of German descent, spoke seven languages, and never went to school a day in her life. Until the invasion, the children spoke German and Polish. Abruptly, German was the only language allowed and the kids eventually lost the use of Polish.

At war’s end, trying to stay ahead of the Russians, Lydia and the kids trekked from Chorzow, through Czechoslovakia and into Germany, eventually settling in Nossen, which was by then part of East Germany.

They lived in Nossen from 1945 until 1950 when they escaped to the West, settling in Gifhorn. Dorothea, who had trained and worked on the railroad before escaping, worked for the Canadian Christian Council. In 1952, sailing on the Beaverbrae and landing in Quebec City, the family immigrated to Canada, where they joined Lydia’s sisters and other relatives, who had immigrated to Wadena, Saskatchewan, in the 20’s.

Within a very short time and, in spite of not speaking English, Dorothea, the eldest, found work. She worked first at the bakery then the hotel and finally the Wadena hospital where she worked in the laundry until she married Ron Fisher, on December 31, 1953. Sig and Melanie went to school, in Wadena. Lydia, who now also worked at the Wadena Hospital, bought a house and made a comfortable home.

Sig went on to train as an automotive mechanic but first worked in a jet engine repair shop in Vancouver until it shut down. He did practice his trade in Northern BC but spent most of his working life in the mechanical workings of the oil industry, retiring from a very responsible management position with Amoco Corp., in Slave Lake Alberta.

Melanie now lives in Vancouver BC but spent considerable time in Kamloops where she raised her family of five girls and one boy. She did some wonderful work with mentally and physically handicapped people, being a loving and caring foster parent to several who had been abandoned by their natural parents.

Ron, Dorothea’s husband, did many different things, causing the family to live a rather nomadic life for the first thirteen years. In 1966 they settled in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, with their five children and have lived there ever since. Both are retired now and, having gotten hooked on hiking, spending summers, from May to September, camping and hiking across Canada. They alternate between East and West. Dorothea worked for 26 years with the T. Eaton Co. and retired in 1993 at which time she was group sales manager of several departments in Saskatoon, Regina and Prince Albert.