Most Amer­i­can Jew­ish fam­i­lies were immi­grants, leav­ing behind their ances­tral homes in search of a bet­ter life some­where else. What did a bet­ter life mean? Per­haps more eco­nom­ic oppor­tu­ni­ties or upward mobil­i­ty. Our Jew­ish ances­tors left their homes to escape pover­ty, war­fare, pogroms, or geno­cide. What did they do when they arrived in their new home? How did they inte­grate into a new soci­ety, learn a new lan­guage, and adapt to cul­tur­al and reli­gious changes? This book explores what hap­pened to four Jew­ish fam­i­lies who left Europe between the 1890s and the 1920s and set­tled in the Unit­ed States. They left rel­a­tives behind who suf­fered through two world wars, count­less bor­der changes, and geno­cide. Main­tain­ing famil­ial ties with those who remained in Europe but also with those who scat­tered through­out the world posed chal­lenges for their descen­dants. This book inte­grates dis­cus­sions of the author’s jour­ney to find her fam­i­ly with how read­ers can do their own genealog­i­cal research.