German - birth Judaic couple Hans and Margret Rey were starting to feel flighty in the dip of 1939 . The Nazis were flummox uncomfortably close to their take over hometown of Paris , where they had moved four years earlier to work on tike ’s books . Rather than tempt fate , the Reys flee their Paris apartment for a chateau in the countryside .
Although friend had lent them the chateau , authorities chop-chop turn up to investigate the German - accented strangers . Han assured the police officer that he and Margret were simply write children ’s books . As proof , he picture the military officer sketches of one of their creations : The Adventures of Fifi , a story about the travail of an inquisitive monkey . quenched that the Reys were n’t sleeper agents , the officers departed .
The Reys ’ public security would testify to be short - lived , though . The couple soon recognise that it would be near to flee the continent whole and returned to Paris to start the mass of paperwork required to leave wartime France . As fellow refugees flood into the city , the Reys could only cross their fingers that the necessary documents would go far before it was too recent .
Luckily for the Reys , they had a secret arm : the same rascal who had already bail them out once . Despite the political turmoil in Paris , the duet sell the holograph forFifi . The publisher ’s advance was enough to fund their escape . Han dynasty spent the combining weight of a calendar month ’s rent on a jumble of bicycle component part and managed to cobblestone together two bikes . In their hoop , the Reys carried the absolute essentials : bread , cheese , water , and five of their priceless ms , includingFifi . The Reys left Paris in former morning rainwater on June 12 , 1940 . Two days later , the Nazis captured the city .
The brace pedal 35 Admiralty mile to the city of Étampes , where they found safety in a farmhouse . They rode another 17 miles to Acquebouille the undermentioned twenty-four hour period and slept in a b . By June 14 , they were 75 miles from Paris in the town of Orléans , where they finally institute a track train that would get them secretive to the Spanish edge . Again , the Reys had incredibly prosperous timing . As they depend on the train that night , bombs fell on Étampes and Orléans .
Having already saved the Reys doubly , Fificame through for them one last time . On the gear from France to Spain , functionary began to mistrust them to be undercover agent . One officer hypothecate that the German couple was smuggling government secrets and asked Hans to unveil the contents of his briefcase . Once again , Hans handed over the manuscripts and aver a tacit thank - you to the lilliputian rascal .
Over the next four month , the Reys ’ odyssey took them from Spain to Portugal to Brazil and lastly to a fresh home in New York . After just a few weeks in the city , they were offer a four - book contract . The publisher recommended that Fifi ’s name be deepen to something more masculine . Today , you know him as Curious George .
