Alfred Asch­er was born in Smyr­na, now Izmir, Turkey in 1892 to Yakov and Rachel (Rosa) Ardit­ti Asch­er. He attend­ed the Alliance Israélite Uni­verselle school in Smyr­na, and, like his old­er broth­er, Albert, was a French cit­i­zen-dan­ger­ous in Turkey dur­ing World War I. They escaped from Turkey in 1915 to wait out the war in Greece, but even­tu­al­ly left for New York. There Alfred met and mar­ried Claire Elis­cu. They were blessed with two chil­dren, Lor­raine and Robert, and the fam­i­ly set­tled in Far Rock­away, NY. After serv­ing as head super­vi­sor for steamship com­pa­nies in New York, Alfred retired to St. Peters­burg, Flori­da. Claire died in 1949. Alfred’s sec­ond wife, Beat­rice Bre­an, died in or before 1978. In that year he moved to Worces­ter, Mass­a­chu­setts, near his daugh­ter. Alfred Asch­er died on Jan­u­ary, 26th, 1986, leav­ing a lega­cy of devo­tion, gen­eros­i­ty, courage, and fun.