A lovingly handmade rocking chair is passed down through generations with each carving the word WELCOME, in a different language, into the headrest of the chair. The book was inspired by the Statue of Liberty’s :”Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free” and some of Rosemary Wells’ own family history.

The story travels from Germany in the 1800s, to Brooklyn, NY, to Wisconsin, back to New York, and to New Jersey for a final stop in 2016. WELCOME is first carved in German, then Hebrew, English, Irish, Spanish, Haitian, and finally in Syrian. The families’ histories, who sat in this chair, is shared along the way.