severe depression. Her doctor suggested she take in another child to raise and, after meeting with her, Maria agreed to let her raise José. José came to consider the Millens and their children to be his second family. Maria bought a house and moved the Millens and José into it. Sarria did not have a relationship with his birth father, a man who showed no interest in him and failed to provide his family with financial support. Julio Sarria was eventually arrested for failure to pay child support. A judge ordered that he pay $5 to be released; this money was then turned over for Jose's care. Julio was arrested each month until he returned to Nicaragua in around 1926 or 1927; each time he paid the $5 and was released. Julio died in Nicaragua in 1945. Years later, José learned that his father had acknowledged him as his first-born. Sarria attended the Emerson School for kindergarten and then, because he spoke only Spanish, was sent to private schools until learning English. Sarria began dressing in female clothes at an early age and his family indulged him, allowing him occasionally to go on family outings dressed as a girl. In his youth, he studied ballet, tap dance, and singing. When Sarria was around ten years old, he asked his mother how much money they had in the bank. Maria, who gave her money to her employer Mr. Jost to invest, asked to see the books. She discovered that Jost had been embezzling from her and from the other women whom she had referred to him. Jost was arrested, convicted and deported. Maria sued Jost's corporate partners and received a settlement but never recovered the bulk of the money. Unable to afford her house payments, Maria moved José and the Millen family to Redwood City in 1932. As a teenager, Sarria enrolled in Commerce High School, where he took advanced classes in French and German. With his Spanish and English, these brought his total languages to four. His facility with languages led to his first serious relationship with another man. Sarria tutored Paul Kolish, an Austrian baron who fled to Switzerland when the Nazis invaded Austria. He brought with him his wife and son Jonathan, each of whom suffered from asthma and tuberculosis. When his wife died, he brought Jonathan to America. Kolish found himself falling in love with his tutor