A new book by Nancy Bieber!
Ancestors in the Attic
There’s a place
in my house I try to avoid.
I hear voices there:
They rise from the shelves,
from the old dusty trunk
and the boxes on the floor.
Long ago voices
whispering to me.
Can you hear us?
Will you listen to our stories?
They are your stories, too, you know.
And I began to listen. . .
Nancy Bieber wrote the lines above to describe how she began to explore her family history, an exploration that led to her newest book, Those Who Came Before (Masthof, 2024).
Here she has written the stories she discovered about her ancestors, particularly stories of farming, church involvement, and education. She tells of turning land granted by William Penn into a viable farm, of teaching in a one-room school or a brand new college, and of the challenges and rewards of her family’s commitment to church life. These accounts of life in rural Pennsylvania through the last 300 years are stories of joy, and grief, faithfulness and fulfillment.