Some few years ago some members of my family became interested in the family roots on my father's side, and began a genealogical study. Among the information they discovered was a will recorded with the county by Adam Bolch, a direct ancestor who had come to this country from Germany in the late 1700s. In his will Adam disposed of some of his property to his children and specified what these children should do for their mother in return during the remainder of her lifetime. Some of those things were the provision of shoes and certain foodstuffs. Also he provided for the disposal of a certain "dutch oven", which must have been very important to him to have included it so specifically in his will.

The information included in the will was very interesting, in that to me it provided some insight into the character of the man, and what was most important to him and probably to others of his generation, and how they attempted to cope with their problems. I thought to myself how nice it would have been if he could have recorded even more information as to his life and times: where he came from in Germany, what were his reasons for leaving, how many brothers and/or sisters did he leave there (he had one brother who came with him on the ship NEPTUNE which landed at Philadelphia), some of his impressions and emotions during his travels, where he planned to go and what he planned to do.

Since Adam, nor any other of my ancestors left any autobiographical material that I am aware of, I thought I might try to start a chain of such for those following me, as I believe individual personal history is infinitely more interesting to family members than the macro history presented in high school and would probably provide some counter balance to the views presented by professional historians. I am sure it would be more interesting to direct descendants than the accounts of professionals regarding national and world events.