New York City thought it was again under a terrorist attack as on 9.11. But no, it was the blast of one building, initiated by its owner; a wealthy medical doctor decided he preferred to turn his property into pieces than sell it to raise the money for settling a divorce dispute. New York City thought it was again under a terrorist attack as on 9.11.
But no, it was the blast of one building, initiated by its owner; a wealthy medical doctor decided he preferred to turn his property into pieces than sell it to raise the money for settling a divorce dispute.
Nicholas Bartha, born in Rosia Montana, Romania, made headlines in the United States, while his familyâs story in Romania leads one to believe in the curse of the gold fortunes haunting their owners.
Maria Toderas, 67, is one of the few Rosia Montana dwellers who new the Barthas and certainly the only one who claims to have been a friend to Barthaâs mother, Ethel.
Ethel, or Aunty Etus as she was called in Hungarian, or Aunty Eta, in Romanian, died age 79, in the summer of 1997, in Rosia Montana, where she had come from New York to claim back the family fortune, nationalized by the communists in 1947.
"The Barthas were very rich; nobody really knew the size of their wealth, but they were the second richest family in Rosia Montana⦠By all accounts they owned gold mines and a casino, and had businesses running in the billions," remembers Toderas.
She met the Barthas in 1958, after Ethel and husband Ianos, plus their two sons, Nicholas and Atilla, moved to Cluj, in central Romania.
"Aunty Etus was an extremely beautiful woman. She was 40 at the time, and I was stunned at her beauty and elegance and style. In the â60s she left with her two boys for Italy. They stayed there seven years, till they completed their medical studies. After that they came back to Cluj and o
