October 6, 2024

By Arthur H. Gunther III

thecolumnrule.com

There is a new book for all seasons titled “The Olden Days: My Mother’s Family History 1594-1997,” written by Beverly Schultz Csordas, ancestor of Nicholas Concklin, the fellow who began his fruit farm in 1711 in what became Pomona, Rockland County, N.Y.

The book, professionally put together from the author’s years of meticulous research and offered through Amazon and Barnes & Noble, is much more than a tribute to both Margaret Concklin Schultz, Beverly’s mother, and her ancestor Nicholas as well as those who followed him. It is also a look at family genealogy, destiny spirit in early America, the life of farmers, the growth of what is now a suburban county and the vignettes of family living over centuries.

You don’t have to know Beverly’s family, her ancestors, farming, Rockland County or personal details to relate to your own genealogy, to what helps make you tick, to how this nation has grown if you want to connect with this book.

“Olden Days” is also valuable reference for lower Hudson River Valley history, indeed the nation’s story. The determination shown by Nicholas Concklin 313 years ago with his arrival in what is now Rockland, his purchase of 400 acres and the hardscrabble work he and his successors undertook in establishing and making the orchards survive mimic the story of what has become the United States. We can all step into pioneering Nicholas’ boots as we recall American history and that of our own forebears.

When Beverly Schultz began her years of research, she thought, as she told me, that she would gather records for present and future Concklins, Schultzes and others in the extended family to honor her mother and recall the stories her mom told her as a child. Yes, done deal, but the author has accomplished much more than adding to the family album. Just as Nicholas began a fruit farm from the first planting, Beverly, his decedent, has brought to blossom genealogy, American history, the farming life, moving family stories and trials and tribulations to the present and toward the future.

Nicholas planted a tree, and from it came an orchard still producing more than 300 years later. Beverly has also planted – words that so many can relate to and expand upon. She, too, is a grower, that of the human experience.

The writer is a retired newspaperman.

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