The known line of descent of the Rehm family in Lottstetten goes back at least as far as the 1600s, but it undoubtedly has far earlier roots there. Jumping to the more recent past, Lorenz Rehm was born in 1799, the son of Josephus Rehm and Mary Ann Meister.. He had several brothers including one named Matthias. All of these given names will be passed down to future generations.
Beginning on a geological time scale, receding glaciers from the last ice age—the Würmian, ending about 15 millennia ago — scoured away the landscape of the High Rhine region, leaving behind a thick seam of gravel across the region, including a a great stone field in the German village of Lottstetten. This is the stone that built the Balm fortress that protected the feudal estates of the 14th century. It is also the source of the Rehm family wealth and influence in Lottstetten and the wider region.
Matthew was the founder of the Rehm line in America, having emigrated to New York from Lottstetten, Germany, in 1865.
The Rehm family and related branches have been present in the High Rhine region since at least the 1600s, and remain prominent there today.
Click here to view the Rehm Research family tree on Ancestry.com.
The more inclusive definition of the word "descendant" in Article 116 of the German Basic Law, by which we expect Walter and Dan will now qualify for German renaturalization, was derived from a legal challenge by an out-of-wedlock child of a German Jewish man who had been deprived of his citizenship.
Going through the papers that Joanne had assembled in 2012 for her German citizenship application, I came across Walter's original 1961 passport, also including Daniel and Joanne as minors.
I can't remember having seen this image of the three of us that was taken in March 1961.
Walter has gotten me motivated to follow through and refile for my own German naturalization under Article 116, which we believe will be approved now following the 2020 change in German law.