This is the book of my family's history in this country, starting with Jacob Lemann, who arrived in New Orleans in the 1830s fleeing anti-Semitism in Germany, and ending in the 1960s around when my father and aunt were children. It tells the story of how my family raised itself up from dirt poor peddlers to become the owners of a general store, then finally ascended to the top of the Southern social ladder and became cotton planters. It compiles all the letters, diary entries, and financial records of the Lemann family into one comprehensive document. As an amateur historian, this book has been a godsend for me to do research about the life of my ancestors, and I've read through it countless times since my father first showed it to me when I was seven or eight. One day I hope to update it and include the stories of the new generation of Lemanns, and maybe find undiscovered documents that reveal more about our history. But even beyond my personal family interest, the book reveals an undeniable human truth that has been mostly ignored in my family, and is not touched upon in the book, which I wish to rectify. It shows how one can flee a place to escape persecution and oppression, and then persecute and oppress the bottom class of the new society they've entered. Now of course in 1965 my family would never have admitted what they did was oppression, but hopefully now I can add a little more perspective and wider scope into our history.

– Moses

Relationship:  Great-grandchild of im/migrant or more Great-grandchild of im/migrant or more