Descendants of History
One of the joys of writing history for homeschoolers is getting to meet descendants of people whose stories we have told. America the Beautiful has a lesson about Italian, Jewish, and Polish immigrants in the early 1900s. At the homeschool convention at St. Charles, Missouri, last weekend, I got to meet a fairly recent immigrant from Poland, along with her teenage daughter. The mama met her husband when he came to Poland from America on a short term mission trip. He later returned as a full-time missionary. Sometime later they were married. When they found out their daughter was on the way, he brought his wife to America.
One of my favorite photos in America the Beautiful is one of a Polish couple who were farmers in Connecticut. Except for the nationality resemblance, they don’t look at all like the beautiful mother and daughter I met last weekend, but I love this happy moment a photographer captured in September of 1940. I’d love to know the backstory of her hearty laugh.
I also met the granddaughter of an Italian immigrant who came to America in 1910. He told his family that he left Italy for America because he “couldn’t farm rocks.” His granddaughter (I’ll call her Greta) and her family recently went to Europe. During the trip, they went to Italy to visit distant relatives whom they had never met.
These Italian relatives are descendants of Greta’s grandfather’s sister. Her grandfather’s generation is gone, but Greta and her family were able to meet her great aunt’s child (I have forgotten if it was a son or a daughter), the child’s spouse, and two of their children and their families. Greta’s longlost cousins greeted her family with hugs and welcomed them into their homes as overnight guests.
Greta’s cousins run a family cheese-making business which is based on family land where three generations live in their own homes. In Greta’s words, “they learned how to do something with the rocks.” She loved seeing the two younger generations running the business and having a close relationship with their parents.
God’s Word teaches that loving from one generation to another is high on the priority list of our life responsibilities. As you live with your children and train them day by day, you are a living example of how to do that. It is another wonderful benefit of homeschooling.
Honor your father and mother
(which is the first commandment with a promise),
so that it may be well with you,
and that you may live long on the earth.
Ephesians 6:1-3