For years, the carpenter Tillmann Rutenschneider has moved around. In 1932, at the age of thirty, he returns to his village in the Mark Brandenburg with a foreign wife. He builds a house and starts a family. It wasn't long before he became a victim of the new racial laws. His house is set on fire, his wife and child burn to death in the flames. He himself is sent to a concentration camp. After liberation, he returned to his home village, started a new family and built a new house. He joins forces with resettlers to form a cooperative, enforcing the land reform in his very own way. Tillmann falls into debt, gets into trouble and ends up in prison. He has to sell his house to pay off his debts. Released from prison, Tillmann Rutenschneider makes his way back to his village.