Author Emily Rose grew up looking at two large oil portraits hanging above the fireplace mantel in her grandfather’s home. 

 
Her ancestors immigrated to the American Midwest from a south German village in 1857, and no one in her immediate family had any knowledge about the portraits. These rare paintings led Rose on a five-year journey to discover her heritage. She uncovered a rich trove of old documents, images, and stories that paint a vivid picture of daily life in the villages and small towns where over 90 percent of the south German Jews lived until the 1870s. The story of the Berlizheimer, Gundelfinger, and Kaz families is interwoven with the economic, political, and social changes of 18th and 19th centuries. While many books describe life in the shtetls and cities, this vibrant living history chronicles the experience of Jews who lived in the German countryside.
 

 
Map of Mühringen, 1735. (Private collection, Emily C. Rose.)

Click to enlarge