Nationhood

Beginning with the statement of grievances generated in 1774 by the 1st Continental Congress and continuing through the War of 1812, concluded by the Treaty of Ghent signed in 1814, it took 40 years for America to move out of its formative revolutionary period and achieve nationhood.  For more than a century, young America had lay clustered along the Atlantic seaboard with eyes facing east to Great Britain, France and Spain.

It was during this interval that Hans Martin Auer and Anna Maria Surbeck, my great, great-grandfather and great, great-grandmother were born in the small, rural village of Oberhallau, Switzerland.