Olga Willner interview and transcript, June 1, 1995

Olga Willner (1920-2005) was born in Vienna, daughter of Franziska Hillebrand Willner and Dr. Leo Willner (1881-1947). She grew up in Sankt Pölten, where she attended the Englisches Fräulein school. After her father was arrested in the wake of Kristallnacht, the family sailed to Shanghai in early 1939, where they stayed just a few weeks. Her father was able to get a position at a Catholic mission hospital in Shandong province. After an accident, he was no longer able to work and the family moved to Beijing, where she studied medicine for a year at Fu Jen University. To support her family, she worked as a secretary and taught German. After the war ended, her parents left for Europe in 1947, but her father died on the ship. She worked as the secretary for the president of Yenching University in Beijing, then for the Economic Cooperation Administration in Shanghai. She left Shanghai in 1949, sailed to San Francisco, was transported on a sealed train across the US, and sent further to Naples, and then back to Austria. She spent six years in the US 1951-1957, then returned to Vienna, where she worked for the International Atomic Energy Organization until retirement in 1981.