Most of these photos and old negatives belonged to Magdalene Merck Rosera, youngest child of Joseph Merck and Catherine Eberle Merck. Over the years they were stored in Catherine Merck's oak bench, seen in photos #48 on page 4 and #106 on page 8.

People in all the photos, but not the negatives, were identified by Magdalene during the 1970's and recorded by her daughter Marilyn Rosera Bruya, who inherited the bench and contents.

This document was compiled by Marilyn following a trip in 2007 to the villages where these ancestors were born in Ukraine. The trip was organized and sponsored by Dan Whalen, grandson of Anthony Merck. Anthony Merck's son Ed Merck, following the same trip, printed a Merck family genealogy document which he had been organizing over many years. While people in the old photos had been identified, their birth order and relationship to Catherine Eberle Merck was not clear before Ed compiled his document and posted information on his website.

Descendants of Felix and Jack Merck loaned photos to be copied and included here. Felix' son Alex sent a photo of himself as an infant, tied into a kitchen chair, with his brothers Joe and John standing next to him. Seeing that photo helped identify a series of negatives found in one of Magdalene's old photo books, where the negative of Alex' photo was among others of Felix and his young family. Other negatives were of Tony and Margaret and Tony's sister Lucy and their children. Additional photos were loaned by Bill and Mary Jo Merck.

Thanks to Ed Merck for making these photos available online. They are numbered according to their original sequence in an 11" x 14" photo album, accompanied by an identification document. In the album some photos appear twice - once in their original size and then enlarged for easier viewing (as are the photos of John Merck on p. 8 and other portraits of Tony). Online, others appear out of sequence, as photo #9 on page 1, which was grouped in the album with photos of Felix Eberle and Mary Magdalene Grau, after Tecla and her family.

Anyone wishing to make prints can contact me and I'll send CDs for printing, or can make prints for you. Prints were scanned and sized in Photoshop in four sizes @ 300dpi. There are 6 photos 8" x 10", 20 are 5" x 7" and the remaining 92 are 4" x 6".