Riley's Journey

Florence Hoffman’s editor, Riley Allen, was made Siberian Commissioner for the American Red Cross. In that capacity, he oversaw the relief activities of over 600 Red Cross workers from the Urals to the Pacific. Beginning in July 1920, he led the amazing two-year journey (aided by volunteers like Burl Bramhall of Seattle and Hal Davison of Atlanta, who met his Russian wife Natalia while working for the Red Cross in Russia) around the world, from Vladivostok to Petrograd, of a ship carrying 781 Russian children rescued from the wilds of the Ural mountains. They had been sent from their homes in Petrograd to the countryside to escape the dangers and food shortages of WWI in the capital. But poor administration led them to near starvation in the mountainous region, where many ended up wandering the countryside, begging for food. The amazing story was first told by Floyd Miller in his 1965 book, Wild Children of the Urals. Last year, the story was told through a documentary film, The Children’s Ark, by Los Angeles filmmaker Alexander Ostroff. In it, Orloff even interviewed the last known living survivor of the childrens’ journey, two weeks before her death at the age of 98.