Photo Albums from our Ancestors!
Laura Magdalen Lawrence & Pius Peter Smith's Album
Background
It all started with the immigration of Moritz (Lorentz) Lawrence and many others to Philadelphia from Alsace, a German speaking area of now modern-day France.
Their journey and ancestors are well documented by Marion C. Bale and Diane M. Lawrence Krumrine in “The Life and Times of Moritz Lorentz, His Ancestors And His Descendants”. This book is now out of print since the John Timon Reily Historical Society closed in 2023. Resale copies are some-times available from Amazon and eBay. Copies maybe be available for viewing at the Pennsylvania Hanover Public Library or the York and Gettysburg Historical Society’s.
Legacy
We have hundreds of old family Lawrence, Smith, Jeffcoat, Kuhn, Saltzgiver, Stich photographs, all passed down from a few generations of our Adams, Cambria & York County relatives. We wanted to figure out document, share and pay tribute to our great ancestors.
It’s like one huge puzzle so please provide feedback and any help is greatly appreciated.
The more you learn the more inquisitive one becomes when doing ancestry research.
I hope you enjoy the Galleries and short stories.
We are all related!
Philadelphia was the major USA immigration entry point in the early 1700’s for German speaking Europeans. Their surnames were often misspelled and changed to fit the English overseer’s. Most were farmers who spoke only German, a trend which continued for a few generations.
Lorentz became Lawrence, Schmidt’s to Smith, Graf’s to Groft and so on… These Germans intermarried as well as mixing with the few English, Scotts and Irish settlers all moving from Philadelphia through Burks, Lancaster, York and Adams Counties. Many of the British paid German Hessian Revolutionary mercenaries stayed in the area, versus going home to Germany.
Even into the 1900’s Adams & York County Pennsylvania residents spoke a form of German while English was slow in becoming the main language. During the Second World War many German POW’s were sent to this area. It wasn’t uncommon that these Germans stayed, married and raised families in the area.
Lawrence Stich & Company
Adam Francis Smith
1935-37 multi Family Reunion
Hot Summer Day
