When Rachel Jacoba da Costa Senior was born on October 7, 1917, in Amsterdam, Noord-Holland, Netherlands, her father, Abraham, was 31, and her mother, Estella, was 30. She survived the war, married Kurt Hermann Weil before June 1945. They emigrated to Brazil and were both naturalized on 22 Jun 1945. She divorced Kurt Weil. She then married Maurice Alfus on August 20, 1948, in New York City, New York. She died on November 29, 2007, in New York, New York, at the age of 90.