Prefatory Note

Authors

Leo Schelbert, University of Illinois at Chicago
Heinz K. Meier, Old Dominion University

Keywords

Frederick Joss, Emily Bigler Joss, Ruth Harbeck Jewett, Swiss literature, Swiss folklore

Abstract

"Grandmother Joss consented, one evening in 1943, to tell me the story of her earlier years," explains her granddaughter Ruth Harbecke Jewett in the Preface to The Swiss Connection, The Lives and Times of Frederick Joss and Emily Bigler Joss and Their Descendants. (Chicago: Privately printed, 1983), 116 pp. Over forty years ago Ms. Jewett had taken copious notes of those conversations, but then forgotten them; when she rediscovered her notes some years ago, Ms. Jewett decided to use them as the core for a loving portrait of six generations of the Joss-Bigler family. Ms. Jewett has given gracious permission to use a good part of her story for this issue of the SAHS Newsletter. The editors are pleased to present the life story of Emilie Joss-Bigler, a Swiss American woman, as reconstructed by her granddaughter.

Recommended Citation

Schelbert, Leo and Meier, Heinz K. (1985) "Prefatory Note," Swiss American Historical Society Newsletter: Vol. 21: Iss. 3, Article 3.
Available at: https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/sahs_newsletter/vol21/iss3/3