Title: A Polish son in the motherland : an American's journey home /
Authors: Kniffel, Leonard
Publisher: Texas A & M University Press,
Year: 2005
Subjects: Kniffel, Leonard Travel Poland.; Poland Description and travel
Abstract: "Searching for the remnants of his family, Leonard Kniffel left Chicago in 2000 to live in Poland. A Polish Son in the Motherland is the story of a search for roots and for the reasons why one family's ties were severed more than fifty years ago. Along the way, we see what half a century of communism did to Poland and how the residue of World War II lingers....Poles who emigrated to America, the author concludes, must have been particularly good at assimilating into American culture. Less than fifty years after his maternal grandparents arrived in the United States, barely a trace of their Polishness existed in their grandchildren. Through his grandparents' struggles, their children became American and created a new world for themselves and their descendants."--Jacket flap.
Contents: Back in the old country -- Her father's child -- After the first people in the world -- The four corners of Sugajno -- The sign of the cross -- Mothers and sons -- Like Grandma in the back seat -- Last train -- Chiseled in stone -- Castles in the air -- Pieces of change -- The land they love -- To market -- Holy days -- Followed by water -- The best days begin in ordinary ways -- Property -- The priest and the ledger -- Temporary blindness -- All those good-byes -- The body of Christ -- At night by the river -- Dinner with Madame and her son -- In the dark without the son -- The underside of a mushroom -- The hunt for hidden treasure -- Women dancing in their slips -- To Grandmother's house we go -- What used to be Polish -- Little mysteries unraveling -- What took you so long? -- A young man and his needlepoint -- Pilgrims -- The Nowe Miasto hillbillies -- The other side of the family -- A father and his daughter -- Waiting -- The vigil -- Whether or not it's time -- The last act -- Epilogue.