Coming Together: Portrait of a Family

This book tells the story of howit was that the author's ancestors, coming from a variety of countries andcreeds and at different times, met in the northwest corner of Ohioand how it was that finally this movement across time and space would bring twopeople from widely differing backgrounds, her parents, together. Before northwest Ohio wasofficially opened to settlement by non-Indians, the author's paternal ancestorsmoved onto these lands, which in 1817 had been legally set aside as areservation "in perpetuity" for the Shawnee Indian Tribe. As time passed, thesesettlers worked out satisfactory lives with their Indian neighbors and friendsuntil the Shawnee were forciblyremoved to Kansas in 1832. The author's maternal ancestors emigrated into the same area in the 1840s. Northwest Ohio would soon be populated by small towns and villages andcleared landscapes dotted by tidy farms. Slowly and regrettably, memories ofthe Shawnee and other tribes whohad once inhabited this land faded as all thoughts were focused on the future. Maps and photos and acomprehensive Pedigree Chart, which traces the Kunz/Lauseancestry from its earliest known date in Americain 1640 to the marriage of Viola Lause and FrederickKunz in 1929, accompany the book's narrative.¿The book's index contains 31 surnames related to this bloodline.