Hidden Worlds: Revisiting the Mennonite Migrants of the 1870s

Jaroslaw Zurowsky is a translator and editor in Winnipeg, Manitoba.

The five essays in this collection, which have their genesis in the
Menno Simons Lectures that took place at Bethel College, Kansas, in
1999, offer a fresh perspective on the Mennonites who emigrated from
Imperial Russia to the North American interior in the 1870s. The aim is
not to write a history of Mennonites in North America, but rather to
provide insights into how the migration was perceived by ordinary
people.

The essays discuss life in Imperial Russia, daily life within the
Mennonite community both in Imperial Russia and in North America,
inheritance and land issues, the role of women, and the changes to the
agricultural way of life in North America. Important issues that the
book does not address include the pressure of assimilation within the
Russian Empire, the Mennonite’s pacifistic message in the context of a
serf-owning society, and relations between the Mennonites and other
groups such as the Hutterites and the Amish. Still, Hidden Worlds would
be a welcome addition to the collections of most university libraries
and other libraries and cultural institutions that deal with immigration
to North America.