Search for Emma's Story: A Model for Humanities Detective Work
by Marian L. Martinello
Photography by Thomas H. Robinson 

This imaginative and lively book studies the life of a German-Texas farmwife near Fredericksburg in the first decades of the twentieth century and offers a clear model for those who would similarly reconstruct a life from the past. Four sign-post artifacts—a portrait, a wish list, a medicine bottle, and a Victorian-style house—lead to four chapters in Emma’s story—her wedding, her school days, her days as a young bride, and her joy as a young mother moving into the house of her dreams. Charming photographs, both old and new, illustrate every aspect of Emma’s story.

Martinello details the questions she asked, the places she found answers, the clear steps of her research. A helpful guide for everyone from high school students to genealogists and historians.  

MARIAN L. MARTINELLO, professor emerita of education at the University of Texas at San Antonio, became fascinated by Emma when she used her story as a model to assist young students in studying history from primary resources.