Interest Groups

Book notes | Caste

Event Date: May 21, 2021, at 2:00 PM

Author Isabel Wilkerson weaves her experiences and those of others with fact and history to help the reader grasp the extensive impact the caste system has had, and continues to have, in India and the United States.

John Anderson

Using information gathered from family members I have put together a document about my paternal grandfather's family consisting of names, spouse names, progeny and birth dates that includes more than a hundred persons.

Book notes | Red Pill

Event Date: April 23, 2021, at 2:00 PM

There is plenty to deal with for the unnamed narrator of this contemporary novel, from ghosts and mystical rhetoric to politics.

Family History—preserving letters

Event Date: April 28, 2021, at 11:00 AM

The UMRA Family History Interest Group meeting on April 28, 2021 focused on Family Letters.

Book notes | The Color of Water

Event Date: April 16, 2021, at 2:00 PM

The Color of Water is James McBride’s tribute to his remarkable mother. He skillfully alternates chapters relating his life story growing up in New York City projects with chapters conveying his mother’s life, told in her voice.

Ron Matross

I wanted to share with my descendants my memories of growing up on the edge of Yellowstone Park.

April 6, 2021 -- Muir Trail & Amazon Rainforest

Event Date: April 6, 2021, at 11:00 AM

We had two fabulous presentations. Craig Swan, economics professor emeritus from the University of Minnesota Twin Cities, presented on the John Muir Trail. We traveled with him and his family 211 miles along the trail from the Yosemite Valley to the top of Mt. Whitney, from 4,000 to 14,500 feet. Her presentation was in three parts: the Huaorani Ecolodge, the Kichwa Añangu community, and a “toxic tour” of oil exploration sites in the region. 

Book notes | A Gentleman in Moscow

Event Date: March 26, 2021, at 2:00 PM

This novel by Amor Towles was a good read for a pandemic, given that the story takes place while the protagonist is living under house arrest.

Jim Lewis

My husband and I helped my mother write her autobiography.

Book notes | The Year of Magical Thinking

Event Date: March 19, 2021, at 2:00 PM

In what is considered a classic book about mourning, author Joan Didion describes her experiences with grief after the death of her husband, including several instances of magical thinking.

Karen LaBat

I have letters my father wrote to his parents during World War II. He served in the Cannon Company, 7th Infantry Regiment, 3rd Infantry Division.

Gary Engstrand

My parents’ albums, dating from the early 1900s to the 1960s, were falling apart and the pages were yellowing. I put everything on acid-free paper/plastic so I could at least preserve the photos.

Book notes | The Vanishing Half

Event Date: February 26, 2021, at 2:00 PM

The (Fourth Friday) UMRA Book Club II met on February 26 to discuss The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett, a story of twin sisters from a Black Louisiana town during Jim Crow.

Book notes | The Night Watchman

Event Date: February 19, 2021, at 2:00 PM

The16th novel by Minnesota author Louise Erdrich, discussed by UMRA Book Club I at its February meeting, is a stellar depiction of reservation life and the consequences of relocation in the mid 1950s.

Will Craig

…how I've organized photos for my family.