Elizabeth Zillah Janes Novak

Shanghai Baby: The Adventures of an American Girl from the Far East to the Midwest Elizabeth Zillah Janes Novak

An Extraordinary Legacy:

Born in Shanghai, China, in an era between the World Wars, Zillah Janes inherited a natural spirit of adventure. Her father, an American businessman in the Far East, met and married in Tokyo her mother, a British governess who had escaped both Poland and Russia in the wake of war and revolution. Their two daughters grew up among Shanghai's international community, where Zillah became a keen observer of local culture. Her story features remarkable events:

- How she became the youngest American at the time to hold her own passport
- Traveling the world by steamship, including a voyage through the Suez Canal and Straits of Gibraltar
- Her family's evacuation of Shanghai under falling bombs and shrapnel
- Living as temporary refugees in Manila and Singapore before returning to Japanese-occupied Shanghai
- Summers in Java and Bali after her father's reassignment to the Dutch East Indies
- Leaving her Shanghai home behind as World War 2 loomed
- Reunion with her father after the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor while his ship convoy transited the Pacific
- How she adjusted to American culture: from Berkeley, California, to the suburbs of Chicago and the Midwest, to Hollywood and Southern CaliforniaOver 150 vintage photos and three maps illustrate this unique and personal reflection on a fascinating time in world history.