Hidden Riches

The second edition of Hidden Riches hit the market last week. Here it is.

This was my first book, originally published in 1983. There were five printings before it went out of print three years ago. The main reason I wanted to let it go out of print was because new information was discovered in the 1990s which proved the story we had always been told about our Burkholder immigrant ancestors was not true. They never lived in Germany but immigrated directly from Switzerland. The parents' names were not Christian and Elizabeth but Ulrich and Barbara. The Burkholder widow and her six children settled at Bowmansville, not Groffdale.

After the book was out of print I kept getting calls from people asking where they can buy it. Early this year Faith Builders called asking if there was any way the book could be reprinted so they can incorporate it into the curriculum they are developing. I passed the request on to Christian Light and they decided to revive the book.

We decided to leave the story as it was written because making it historically accurate would have required rewriting the entire story. It didn't seem logical to me to print two different versions of the same story. So I wrote a new Preface for the book giving the accurate information and copies of some of the supporting documents. I ended by saying that although the story as it was written is not historically accurate for this particular family, the book can be read as historical fiction for it is typical of the experiences of many Mennonite immigrant families in colonial days.

Yesterday Leroy and I serviced the book racks in Cumberland County for Lantern Books and placed some copies of this book on each rack. It will be interesting to see next month how well it sold. Hidden Riches is now in its sixth printing and second edition. After I thought it was dead, it got a second chance at life.