In 1849, Dora Bentz Herter and her husband decide to leave their native Switzerland and start a new life in America, a journey of several thousand miles, which includes crossing an ocean in a ship designed for hauling cotton, not people.

After crossing the Atlantic, they must navigate two large rivers in crowded, precarious steamboats to reach their destination, the bustling port town of Weston, Missouri. After their arrival, Dora writes home and encourages the rest of her family to join them. The following year, two of Dora's unmarried sisters decide to undertake the trip, hoping they will find true love in Weston. The sisters are delighted to be reunited and discover that Weston does indeed provide many opportunities. Their main focus, however, is to persuade the rest of the family to come from Switzerland and join them.

Then in 1856, a cholera epidemic strikes the town, and their lives are turned upside down. The love and support the Bentz sisters provide for each other isn't enough to keep the family together. Impacted by the settling of Kansas across the river, the Oregon fever, and the Civil War, the Bentz family begin to scatter. Fifty years later, only two descendants remain in Weston who can recall the Bentz family's story of immigration and the challenges they faced. Will they be able to keep the memories from fading away forever?