Across the Miles and Forever: A Family Memoir

Across the Miles and Forever: A Family Memoir

This heartfelt memoir brings two very different sides of a colorful family to life. Rafael Santamaría and his son Luis sail to America in the hopes of building a better future than their small Spanish village can provide. Rafael returns to live out the rest of his life in Spain with his wife Lucía while their son Luis stays in America, earning a living for a time as a boxer and falling in love with Josephine Frye. Josephine is the great-granddaughter of George Bickerdike, whose prosperous career and life in bustling Chicago couldn’t be more different from the Santamarías’ simple existence. Yet the Bickerdikes, too, are a family with hopes for the future. George Bickerdike’s real estate ventures include donating a small park—still in use today—to the city of Chicago; Joseph Bickerdike, his son and Josephine’s grandfather, founds several entrepreneurial ventures before seeking his fortune among the rich mines of Baja California Sur. As Luis and Josephine marry, have two children, and build a life on their small vineyard property in California’s Napa Valley, they exemplify the same capacity for love, imagination and hard work as their forbears. Moving through the early and middle years of the 20th century and between places including a San Francisco boxing ring and a posada in Spain’s Alicante province, this poignant memoir will resonate for all of those whose families, like the author’s, unite memorable characters, challenging quests, and enduring dreams.