This year we are commemorating the centenary of the beginning of the migration of some 21,000 Mennonites from the Soviet Union to Canada. Across the country, Mennonites are memorializing this event that transformed the life trajectories of many families, forging new paths for our community. We remember to bear witness to pain experienced, to contemplate difficult decisions made, to acknowledge adversity weathered, to be thankful for unforeseen blessings bestowed. But to remember is only possible if we know our own history. This issue of Preservings tells stories of the Russlaender, as those 1920s immigrants to Canada came to be known.