The UMKC History Department is delighted to announce the publication of a new edited collection authored collaboratively by an international team of graduate students from universities in Hamburg, Kansas City, St. Louis, Vienna, and Wrocław.
The newest addition to the series German Migration to Missouri, From Langenbrück to Kansas City: The Kiefer-Scholz Family, explores the experiences of a rural working-class family as they migrated from Upper Silesia in the early twentieth century, adapted to life in the United States, and maintained many of their transatlantic relationships. It is based on the Kiefer-Scholz family's private collection of holy cards, letters, photographs, and postcards.
In 2020, the Robert J. Kiefer and Thekla E. Scholz Collection became the primary focus of a collaborative international online research seminar and project involving four faculty members and more than thirty graduate students in art history, ethnography, history, and public history. German Migration to Missouri 2.0 consists of student-authored microhistories focusing on this one German-American family. It offers rare glimpses into the experience of German-American migration and acculturation through the lens of a fascinating working-class woman.
Thank you to Bob Kiefer and his extended family for sharing the private documents of their fascinating family, and congratulations to the students and faculty who produced this work, including UMKC Professor of History Andrew Stuart Bergerson, one of the editors of the collection, and UMKC graduate students Emily Bucher, Kathleen Foster, Zoe Honeck, Alexandra Kern, Gary C. Sharp, Robert Swearengin, and Michele Valentine.
The collection is available now as an eBook; a print version is forthcoming.
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