Leopold Godowsky
Mercedes Dagmar Godowsky was born in Chicago, Illinois, on November 24, 1897, the daughter of Polish-Jewish composer Leopold Godowsky and Frederica "Frieda" Saxe (1870–1933), who was of German descent, although she later claimed she was born in Vilna, Russian Empire (present-day Vilnius, Lithuania) in her autobiography, "First Person Plural". She had an older sister, Vanita Hedwig (1892–1961), and two younger brothers, Leopold Godowsky Jr. and Gutram "Gordon" (1905–1932), who was born in Berlin. In November 1914, the family immigrated from Liverpool, England to Montreal, Quebec in Canada.