I shall endeavor to present to you at this reunion some of the facts and thoughts which you might find interesting to listen to, things you might like to know, and maybe a suggestion I may make may arouse in someone's mind an item of family history and tradition. I'll be glad to have you tell me any thing you know anytime. I want you to feel at home with me and ask whatever you would like to know. If the opportunity is not taken advantage of, we may forget and lose sight of data that will make our research and search for family items of interest so much harder.

First, we are always glad to come to this Yoder farm. I say "Yoder", because it was that colonial family which found the crystal spring water, and thought this an ideal place to found a family whose influence has been most actually felt in Oley, Berks, and Pennsylvania history. Here they cleared the land of forest trees; maybe they saw an occasional redman, for they were here. They left the relics of tools, weapons, and implements that they used. While as a boy, I picked up in one of the fields of the Yoder estate, a very fine flint arrowpoint. All this time, I had never been a relic hunter. Those who made a practice of searching for those things have found lots at the foot of these hills which make part of the Kettle Rim of the Oley Valley.

In the hills from which this free flowing spring water flows, is found an excellent grade of iron ore, indicating that other industry for which this Oley Valley became known in colonial and revolutionary history. I need not do more then point out to you these few facts and you will immediately think of such interesting history of Oley and its hills. These old settlers came here to find a living, and we are a family whose ancestors came here to struggle. Talk about depression, being out of work, not being able to sell your crops at a profit, your farm values down in the slump; but take a moment to think how our common ancestors fared when they started here in a wilderness from which the Indians were withdrawing, because they felt their happy hunting grounds being cleared of the game that they killed for food, clothing and utensils. Do you realize that these people had come across 3000 miles of water (the Atlantic Ocean), over night voyages extended from 6 weeks to more than 6 months. We, traveling now, can reach Europe in a week; and we travel in ships with oil burners. While we are at sea, we are safer and better cared for than we are in our own homes.

Our family ancestors came over from that section of Germany and France now referred to as Alsace Lorraine and the Palatinate. Some agent, sent from England by William Penn, had gone down into that country where the people were dissatisfied with a depression and a panic. The result of a series of wars and a ruling oppression that did not set well. This agent told of the wonderful resources in the new land of Pennsylvania. The first settlers had only come about thirty years ago. He was an excellent salesman when you consider the prospects he worked on, and the results he attained. He did not sell any tickets; but he led a sorely distressed people to believe that if they would only start for Pennsylvania, their life would be enjoyable and happy, with an opportunity to work out an existence under circumstances most favorable as far as the ruling authorities were concerned. It was a fine story, some Reider or Reiders, together with Yoders, Folks, Graeffs, Greisemers, Bowers, Neins, Derrs, Mosers, Fuchs, Shumachers, Wagners, Herbeins, and other families, got to discussing what the agent had promised. He had promised what they wanted. They argued in both the villages and the towns. Farmers argued with ropemakers, butchers with weavers; they argued back and forth among themselves, just like some ill fated ex-service men did a few months ago about forms of compensation. These ex-service men gathered together in sizable groups at the Capital at Washington, D. C. I need not refer to how they lived, how they got to Washington, or how they tried to get them to go home. Just keep that picture in mind, and listen to what happened to some who came over with our families' ancestors about 1725 to 1750. First, if they had property, they had to close it out (try to sell it). They took what they could get for their real estate. Very few of those who owned real estate, left. But all had beds, furniture, a change or two of bedding, animals, and some had a little money. What they felt they could not carry with them, they sold or gave to friends and neighbors who slyly laughed at the bargains they had secured., They lived inland approximately as far as the border of Switzerland, near the town of Schweiry. And on foot and then aboard little river boats, they headed for the seacoast, mostly to the old city of Rotterdam. Now that's easy to tell you, but their hardships were many. In coming to Rotterdam, they had to pass a large number of little principalities; some only as large as Berks County, and everyone had a soldier guard, customs officer, king's representative, and all kinds of racketeers. Languages sometimes were different, and what a time they had buying their way there. Someone would whisper, "Don't go this way. They will hold you for a month to look you over. Come along with us over around and up through so and so." What money they had, had to be spent meagerly for living, along the way. They were not foreseers who got free handouts along the way. We could not find the stories of their troubles. I read in a book, not so long ago, written by a prominent German who visited America about 1750, that as many as 15 customs duties had been paid, largely in goods that they had decided to leave rather than carry through all the difficulties. When they reached Rotterdam, they had to hustle around, and sometimes waited for months before they found a vessel that would bring them to Philadelphia. And when some couldn't find transportation, they were induced to go to England through the kindness of William Penn's agents and Queen Anne's representatives. There, too, they had to wait; wait without a job and without a resource to fall back on. Once they had started, they were the victims of times conditions, the like of which cannot be found, and our depression and our present so-called hard times.

What happened when they finally got passage? The very worst happened. Their pains had just begun. First, those who were without funds made agreements with the shipmaster to pay for passage by years and years of work. Once paid, they had friends in Philadelphia who would foot the bill, and there would be mortgages. All the possessions some had were a bag and some clothing.. A familiar question was: "Would you let us ride on your boat?" Finally, when the vessel was ready to sail, how they looked forward to sailing. But, my friends, they no sooner got out of the English Channel, then they saw the high rollers of the coast of France. If all went well, within two weeks maybe they would be in Delaware Bay. But it was luck indeed to make passage that soon. Some ships floundered in the storms, and many were delayed week after week, waiting for weather. And then, when the winds blew to fill the sails, storms usually followed; and how they were jostled. As we know, when four or five hundred people are together under unsanitary conditions, with salt meat, often filled with vermin, and water-soaked, moldy boards on which to make meals, someone gets sick, and there were no doctors, no drug stores. In some families, birth had to be given to children. Shipmasters were tough old roosters who didn't care for anyone. They were brutal in their treatment of their own sailing crews in those days. What they must have been to their passengers, cattle, etc.; many of whom had given only a promise to pay.

It was a common thing among the shipmasters that when a woman gave birth to a baby during passage, that the mother and child were thrown overboard, rather than attempt treatment and care. If the passage was rough, and the very, very sick were about to die, they hardly waited to make the sea burial. Oh, yes, there were kindly captains and good ones too; but they were rare. And there were voyagers of wealth, who came over seeing all this occurring under their very noses. And, when they anchored off Market St. in Philadelphia, they were soon off to see Penn's agents and they were not long in finding their way to the provinces' land. But the families who worked their passage and who had friends here to pay their board, had to find some friendly rich man who would try to find the friend. They stayed on board the ship until their security was satisfactory to the shipmaster, or his agents, if there were any in port. They spent weeks hoping and waiting in sight of land in a narrow river. Whenever they could not get endorsers, and it was time for the ship to sail once more, they were turned loose, but only after they had signed themselves and their families to long indentures.

I outline these horrors to you for only one reason. If your or our family ancestors were rich and fortunate, we do not know that they were, they had seen sights, felt feelings, and were so glad to be here. If they were poor or comparatively so, they suffered miserably and left us a heritage that is priceless. And, if they so preferred and got here through it all, let us fall back on the family trait which they surely possessed, and for today, the day of the reunion of those now living, enjoy the picnic, the fine beauties of nature surrounding us, and forget, just for today, the depression and so-called hard times.

Now, I did not start out to preach a sermon. There is one of two things about this reunion that is remarkable. We come together peaceably, and freely. Those of us having a little more to eat than the rest, bring a little more. Even though there are so many in a family as this, there always seems to be food left. Some of us furnish transportation to those who can't come easily. We do everything in a large family way. We don't spend money for things we don't need. We don't electioneer at this party. We don't sell anything for money. And we want to keep it so. We want to keep it a grand old visitation to the old farm.

Now, maybe, a little history might prove interesting. In 1728, on June 15th, a ship by the name of James Goodwill, Captained by David Crockett, sailed from Rotterdam, Holland. It touched at Deal, England, and finally docked at Philadelphia on Sept. 11, 1728, just 200 years ago. On that ship in the list of passengers appears the name of Hans Michael Rider. The list includes 90 name's of heads of families. If Hans Michael was a head of a family, we may be safe in assuming that he had reached manhood.

Now, the next important fact worth knowing, is that in the census of 1790, when Hans Michael would have been in this country 62 years, had he lived that long, which is likely, there are recorded these names:

Michael Reider family of 10 Amity Township

George Reider family of 6 Rockland Township

Frederick Reider family of 4 Union Township

John Reitter family of 7 Oley Township

Laurence Reiter family of 10 Amity Township

After this, Michael Reider had been here 31 years. In 1759 his name appears on the tax list and he must have had real estate. If he was not the original Michael who arrived in 1728 on the ship James Goodwill then it was surely the son. But if he was a young man when he left the Palatinate assuming about 30 years, or less, he was not too old at 60 or more to have been living in Amity Township. If his eldest son was called Michael, he was just old enough to have counted a family of ten, (this means, not children only; they might have had a servant). The census was taken in 1790. Also in that year, there appears the name of John Reiter, family of 7 in Oley, who was Johannes Reider who married Susanna Weidner, born in 1765 and died in 1828 at the age of 63. In his will he mentioned his wife's name and his son Jacob.

Johannes lived in a stone house, now occupied by Oscar Diehl. It was built in 1826, just 2 years before he died. According to the original deed, the plot was 13 acres. Whether he lived on the same tract prior to that, I very much doubt. I feel that he was a farmer who had desired to retire to smaller acres for the waning years of his life. Now he may not have been a farmer at all; his house was near the Oley Furnace, and he may have made his living cutting wood for charcoal, teamster hauling of charcoal and wood, or even worked at the iron works.

Their first born, whom he mentioned in his will, was Jacob, born 1786, when he the father was 21. The second was Johan, born in 1788; and the third, Daniel, born in 1790. That makes 5 in the immediate family when the census was taken in 1790. As these 3 were born within a period of 4 years, there must have been a knecht (hired man), an uncle, a sister-in-law, or somebody like that, living with his family.

Johannes.... born..1788.....died.1881 ....buried at Friedensburg

Jacob...........born..1786.....died.1851.....buried at Friedensburg

Daniel......... born..1790 ... died.1886.....buried at Pricetown

Speech written by Isaac R. Reiff and given at the 1932 Reider reunion. Initially typed from the hand written pages by Judith Cleaver in 1962. Scanned and placed into a computer file by Guy Bierman in 2002 with minor punctuation and spelling corrections. No attempt has been made to correct any of the family data expressed within the speech.