52 Ancestors Week 52: Future

 From Amy Johnson Crow: The theme for Week 52 is "Future." The end of the year has us looking back and looking forward. (Sounds like genealogy, doesn't it?!) Perhaps this week you write about an ancestor you hope to find in the coming year.

No one knows what the future holds. Still, we march forward.
Make it so.

        The past year brought me some very interesting finds on my genealogical adventure. I talked to new cousins in Europe who confirmed a story about how my great-grandfather, grandfather and grandmother went to Switzerland for a wedding. An act of senseless vandalism in a cemetery led me to find my 2nd great-grandmother Gertrude Stevens's grave. I took part in the WikiTree Year of Accuracy Challenge where we broke over 800 brick walls for many of the community's top genealogists. Yep. The last year was pretty impressive. As fun as it is to look back at past accomplishments, let's take a quick trip in the Tardis to see what exactly my future will hold and what I hope to find in the coming year! Be careful. The Tardis doesn't always take you to where you want to go. She takes you to where you're needed.

Soon.....

    While I didn't break through the brick wall that is my second great-grandmother, Domenica Gullo, I did chip away at it with laser-like precision. Sure I'd rather take a wrecking ball to it or the Kool-Aid Man. But, sometimes you need to work with what you got. Some things are better than nothing. And what exactly did I find that could help me break the brick wall? Well....

    1. I found that she married my second great-grandfather, Antonio Tedesco  on November 18th, 1899. Curiously, I got information about the marriage on November 18th, 2021. Coincidence? I THINK NOT!

    2. She was born Maria Domenica Gullo on January 25th, 1876 in the Italian town of San Pietro a Maida. It's interesting that everyone in her family called her Domenica and the name is even on her gravestone. And yet her name was Maria Domenica. Interesting, indeed.

    While I didn't find out the names of her parents, I am a little bit closer to finding their identities. Some time early next year, I intend to message the commune office in San Pietro with this complete list of facts and ask for  information on who her parents were. I will be concise and to the point. 

    

    Information on her parents may take a while to materialize. But, it's not like I don't have anything else going on.  While I am waiting for that info, I have asked several friends of mine from WikiTree's Italy Project to help me with another project of mine.

Getting ahead of the game!

    On WikiTree, I have a One Place Study where I focus on everyone who was ever born in San Pietro a Maida. It's not an easy task and I need a bit of help with it since my Italian isn't that great and it's a bit hard to read some of the documents as some text has faded with age. Don't get me wrong. I can make out some words. It just helps to have a second pair of eyes looking at a document and I am very appreciative of any and all help. Trust me! Plus we have a great time looking at the records!

    This week, I decided to go a bit more above and beyond the call of duty. My friends and I are basically cataloging everyone who was born in San Pietro from 1800 to 1861 on a spreadsheet. This will help me break through the brick wall! How? Well....

Domenico Gullo, huh? Interesting....

    By cataloging everyone who has ever lived in San Pietro a Maida, I can narrow down the list of potential parents for Domenica, build a tree on WikiTree and prepare myself for when that momentous e-mail finally arrives confirming who the parents are. All I would have to do is simply connect her parents to her and have a ready made tree ready to go. Efficient, yes? Also very time consuming. I'm not going to lie!

    I'm totally up to the task because WikiTree allows anyone to make an unconnected tree. It would just take time to get the floating branches to connect to the "main tree". I have a few floating branches on the website and this research will definitely speed up the process of breaking down the brick wall as I am building a tree downward. It's a good strategy and I don't know about you but I want to see this tree filled in:

I still see tumbleweeds. They'll be gone, soon!

    Researching everyone in San Pietro will also help me with another mission and that is to research the Ferraiolo, Coppola and Tedesco lines and hopefully connect people to DNA matches and even people in the Italians in Haverhill project I created in the past year. Yeah, I've been pretty busy haven't I? Keep in mind I've also been producing a webcomic at the same time! Many Italian immigrants in Haverhill came from that one small Italian town and it'd be interesting to see how they all connect because I've seen DNA matches for my great-aunt with names like "Serratore","Azzarito" and "Desando" in their trees. Where would they belong? By researching and connecting, I will be able to add more branches once I find that missing link. It's a lot of work. But, it'll be worth it.

    The Italians in Haverhill book and other sources can help build trees and interconnect everyone in there. I can use that and traditional genealogy to find the connections. So far several connections, dates and other sources correlate with things such as that funeral list for Maria Tedesco and other clues. As Q from Star Trek: The Next Generation said:

 "The hall is rented, the orchestra engaged. It's now time to see if you can dance."--Q, Star Trek: The Next Generation "Q Who" First broadcast on 8 May 1989

    Once the brick wall is broken and connections have been made, where do I go from here? That's a very good question. I'll still have my one place study. That's not going away any time soon.  What I might do is confirm a few post-1861 births in San Pietro. We have the births for Concetta and Caterina Coppola. What about their brothers' births? I could ask for them. Would it be a moot point since DNA confirmed the relationships? Not to mention family knowledge. My great-aunt and cousin in Switzerland remembers those people. I suppose it couldn't hurt to ask. There are still many people I could ask about once I solve Domenica's puzzle. For now I am focused on that goal!

    So, that's my plan for the next year. Is it a good one? Yeah, I'd say so! It's always good to have genealogical goals ready for the new year and a plan once you have everything set in motion. I am definitely ready to break the brick wall now. Granted it's an ambitious project. But, there's strength in numbers and I have faith in my friends in the Italy project. We'll get the job done and we'll do it with style. I have all the tools needed to bring the wall down and I am ready. Let's do this. 

See you next year! Let's make it a good one! Make it so!

P.S. Thanks go out to the Italy Project! You all rock!

52 Ancestors Week 51: Holiday

 From Amy Johnson Crow: The theme for Week 51 is "Holiday." There are numerous holidays at the end of the year. Do any of them spark memories of an ancestor?

Wrapped and ready to go!

    Christmas 2021 is only two days away at the time of this blog's posting. What better time is there to talk about the Christmases of years gone by? I've already discussed how my family would have Christmas eve parties where large amounts of seafood was served and how my grandma Ollie and her sisters would come over and join in on the fun. We'd have squid served in a variety of ways, haddock, shrimp and so much more. This is normally called "The Feast of the Seven Fishes" in Italian-American households. It's a thing. Look it up!

Christmas 1986: The '80s is strong with this photo.

    What I didn't talk about much in the blogs was how my grandmother would stay overnight and celebrate Christmas with us the following day. We'd pick her up at her house in Haverhill and she would sleep in our den. My grandmother spent every Christmas with us ever since grandpa Marco passed away in 1983. So, as a result she was always over at our house up until she passed away in 2002.

   I remember one Christmas with her pretty well. It was the Christmas of 1986. The reason why I remember this so well is because of how much fun my brother and I had that morning. While the presents were awesome, we definitely enjoyed having our grandmother there as well as my mom's sister, Linda. Presents are cool and all. But, having family with us was pretty awesome, too!

    I woke up early as kids usually do on Christmas morning and snuck into my grandmother's room. I was seven years old that day and my eighth birthday was only two days away. Grandma was just stirring and I smiled when she saw me. I sat on the bed and we talked for a bit about Christmas when she was little before my brother came in to get me. He wanted me to go downstairs and see the presents! I looked at him like "Dude, they'll be there!" Ollie said to go on downstairs. She was getting up anyway. The noise probably woke my parents and my aunt up, too!

Celtic pride since 1976, eh, James?

    My brother made a fair point. There were a lot of great presents under the tree and he wanted to dig into them. I'm not going to lie. I also wanted to dive in and see what Transformers or other toys we received. Jim and I staked out our corners of the tree and prepared to dig in!

    Suddenly, my aunt Linda came downstairs to take the dogs out and there was an even bigger ruckus. Jim and I look at each other like we were busted. Ratted out by a Britanny who needed to go outside! Our dog at the time was Tux and I think I posted a picture of him here before. He was a good boy.

    My parents eventually came downstairs once the dog was taken care of. We ran up to them and asked if we could open our presents. We didn't make a noise going downstairs! We were just ratted out by forty pounds of liver and white fur.  Our parents said we could open presents AFTER we had our breakfast. That was just plain cruel and unusual punishment to seven and ten year old boys We eventually agreed and had our breakfast.

Christmas joy right there! 

     My mother took a picture of the tree with all of the presents under them and we dug in. Naturally our presents were various era toys such as Transformers, Go-Bots and the odd Lego set or two. Every once in a while there would be clothes. Those got opened LAST! One of the best presents my brother and I ever got that year was a giftset of five transforming planes called "Aerialbots" who transformed into a giant robot called "Superion". That was the height of cool in 1986. Quiet.

    I noticed another present under the tree and I thought it was for me. I grabbed it and my father told me to check the tag. I was like "Okay...."

   

 I looked at the tag and it was from my parents to my grandmother. I laughed and then the following pic happened.

   I guess I got too excited during my dive that I forgot I was supposed to also hand out presents to everyone as I went through the presents. Whoops. Lesson learned. Hand out presents to everyone while digging for your own stuff. That's a much better look isn't it? I was seven! Give me a break!

    I don't remember what she got. But, I always laugh at this picture. It makes me look like I'm reluctantly giving the present to her. I'm not! Honestly! I do wonder what was going on in my aunt and grandmother's head at the time. I've gotten much better and handing out presents!

Yeah, This didn't last...

    Watching Jim and I open presents was of course our grandmother who always had a smile on her face and maybe a glisten of a tear in her eye at the same time. I noticed it when I was a kid and thought nothing of it. Now that I'm older, I imagined she was thinking of her husband, our grandfather. She always thought of him and I remember her saying something to the effect of how much he'd have enjoyed seeing my brother and I opening stuff on Christmas morning. I could tell now that she probably missed him. I always gave her a hug on Christmas morning and I supposed that helped her a lot.

    And speaking of hugs we have this pic on the right. Nice hug between brothers at Christmastime, right? Joy to the world and all that. Five minutes after this photo was taken the two of us resumed the hostilities between two warring factions of sentient transforming robots. The fate of the planet Earth hung in the balance! I love my mom's smile in this picture. She knew full well the peace would not last and once again the heroic Autobots would be facing the evil Decepticons.

Thank God I'm out of that  yellow onesie....

        I will always associate Christmas with the fun times I shared with my family. Christmas is a time to make memories and I have a ton of great ones with grandma Ollie since she lived closer to us than our other grandparents.  She just seemed to enjoy watching my brother and I play with our toys and interact. There are many other pictures like these! Trust me!

    The Christmas of 1986 was special to me not because of the gifts and everything.  It was special to me because it's the first one I remember really well.  For whatever reason Christmases before that point are a haze. Call it old age! That's what my family calls it! Sure we spent other Christmases together before and after that date. But, when I think of Christmas with my family I think of that day. We were all together and that's what Christmas is all about. Being with family, having a great time and making memories. We had a great party with family and friends the night before and continued celebrating till New Years. That whole week was an event and we were so tired afterward. It was a good tired and I honestly wouldn't trade it for anything. But, I don't think anything comes close to the first one I remember so vividly and I'm so glad grandma Ollie was there to share it with us!

    Like I said. Christmas is about family and I'm forever grateful my grandmother was there to share the holidays with us. It just made the whole week from December 24th to New Years Day so much sweeter! 

See ya next time!

P.S. The Superion giftset goes for like 600 bucks on Ebay, now if it's mint in box. Wow. Imagine being stuck in a cardboard/Styrofoam prison since 1986. Let the toys be free!

52 Ancestors Week 50: Lines

 From Amy Johnson Crow: The theme for Week 50 is "Lines." We often talk about researching a family line, but that isn't the only kind of line you could write about. Telephone or telegraph lines. Railway lines. Fishing lines. "Drop me a line sometime." Let your imagination run free for this theme!

No "Blurred Lines" here. There's always The Weird Al parody!.

    It's been a while since I posted anything DNA-related. I can't really say when the last time I talked about it was. It must have been during the summer. I'm not sure. What do you say we revisit an old friend this week? You might remember this guy. His name is Thrulines. Not Trulines. Not Bylines. THRUlines. The tool comes courtesy of the fine folks at Ancestry.com and I think it's high time I take a deep dive into the wonderful world of Thrulines because there have been some changes in mine! Oh, yes. There have been some changes!

The great eight!

    For those who don't know, Thrulines is a tool on Ancestry where it connects you to a DNA match thanks to data pulled from other peoples' trees including yours. The results, of course, will vary depending on how good other peoples' trees are, how good your tree is, what sources back up the information etc. The quality depends on so many factors and so many variables. It makes your head spin! To get Thrulines all you need to do is get your DNA tested, create a tree and build it up to at least your grandparents and connect the tree to your DNA test. Wait about a day and you should get your Thrulines. YAY! You'll find them under the DNA tab on the top menu.

I have many Italian Thrulines like this!

    That's great and everything. But, what do you do when you DON'T have Thrulines for a certain ancestor? I don't have any for my 2nd great-grandfather, Marco Ferraiolo as you can see. Hmm. That is a bit of a problem. What's the reason for this? Well, there could be a lot of reasons why a Thruline won't appear for a certain ancestor.

    The first and most obvious reason could be because people who descended from him did not test or build a tree. That's one reason. Another reason could be that you have a misattributed parent in your tree and that's why a Thruline won't appear despite having many DNA matches from a certain branch of your tree.

    In my case, I don't have Thrulines for Marco Ferraiolo because Marco's other children either stayed in Europe or moved to Argentina as explained in several older blogs. This is why it's a good idea to employ the WANDER method and the Genealogical Proof Standard to find out if what you have is accurate and why you might not have Thrulines. 

E=MC found cousins squared!

    This is why it's a good idea to put your DNA on other vendors like MyHeritage. They have a tool which is similar to Thrulines called "Theory of Relativity". I wonder if Einstein's relatives know about that one....

    If you descend from a recent immigrant like I do, chances are good relatives not based in your country have tested. You could find close relatives around the world like I did. But, that's just what my experience tells me. Your experience will, of course, be different. I'm fortunate in that I knew I had relatives in Europe. I just didn't know where. DNA confirmation and paper trails proved the connection and created a "Theory of Relativity" for my connection with my cousin. Conversations with the DNA match also helped.

That's....a lot of potential Christmas card recipients.

    Over on my mother's side, Thrulines tend to be a bit more populated. Especially the ones for Jean Baptiste Bibeau and Therese Laroche, my 4th great-grandparents. Eighty-four DNA matches just for me! My mother has about one hundred! The paper trails confirmed them all and no I haven't put all of those people in the tree. Just a handful. Gotta love Quebec, right? Of course the reason for the sheer volume of matches is because of the number of people who tested and who all have well sourced trees.

     This isn't to say I don't have Italian Thrulines like this. I do. The Thrulines for Paolo Coppola and Rosa Suverato, my 3rd great-grandparents, have eight matches. The Thrulines for Vincenzo Carrabs and Maria Giovanna Capobianco have ten. It used to be nine. But, my dad's cousin just tested so the count increased. =D These are all again based on other peoples' trees. (Usually mine).  I have other cousins who descend from these lines and others who don't have trees or connected their tree to their DNA tests.  So, a Thruline may not appear because  of that reason. This is why it's a good idea to dig. I would like them all to build the trees up and have a forest of Thrulines (confirmed ones, mind you) appear. That could just be OCD talking.

One of the most lonely Thrulines I have.

    Unfortunately, there might be instances where no matter what you do, you might not ever get a Thruline for a specific ancestor. Take my second great-grandmother Gertrude Stevens' parents Austin Stevens and Evaline Augusta Fisher for example. She had one brother who lived to adulthood. I've talked about him before. His name was Arthur and he was buried with the Kimball family for some reason. See this blog for details. From all outward appearances, it seems he didn't have children. Whether this is true or not remains to be seen.

    The Thrulines pop back up for Evaline's parents, John Sargent Fisher and Frances Miranda Frothingham and yes I have quite a few distant matches who descend from their children. There are quite a few who descend from Evaline's sister, Emma. She even has a picture! Makes me wonder if a pic exists of Evaline somewhere out there. Paper trail confirmed the Thruline a long time ago and I have talked with the DNA matches. From here on out everything looks good. OR DO THEY?!

    I've been lucky with my Thrulines. Most of them have been backed up by paper trails, DNA confirmations and conversations I've had with various DNA matches. However, at the 5th great-grandparent level things tend to get a little wonky. I'm not saying they're inaccurate. However, sometimes things can be a bit skewed this far back.

    If you're fortunate enough to have built a tree this far back, you can build the tree downward and decide for yourself if the Thruline is accurate. That's what makes this tool so much fun to use. It wholly depends on your research and the research of someone else. It's almost like....a collaboration! Gee. Where have I heard that before? *Cough* WikiTree! *COUGH!*

    That's what Thrulines essentially is. It's technically Ancestry's way of getting users to collaborate on a tree via DNA matches. If you look at a Thruline and say "Hey, that person is connected to me?" You can message them and see how it all works out. The feature may have some flaws and in the end the pros tend to outweigh the cons. To get the most out of Thrulines what you need to do is make sure of these things.

1. Your tree is built up and is as accurate as possible.

2. You have ironclad sources backing up your information.

3. You have patience to deal with DNA matches who may have altered a Thruline due to their own errors creeping into your Thruline.

4. There are going to be errors. If you find them, fix it. 

Keep all of these in mind and you'll find that Thrulines is a very handy tool!

See ya next time!

52 Ancestors Week 49: Homemade

 From Amy Johnson Crow: The theme for Week 49 is "Homemade." For many of our ancestors, "homemade vs store-bought" wasn't an option. Do you have an ancestor who was known for making things? (My great-grandmother was renowned for her pies.) Do you have something made by an ancestor? Who made it? Tell the story.

Nothing is more homemade than your grandma's needlepoint sampler, right?
Heh. Wait a bit....

 WARNING: The following blog may make you, the reader, very hungry. We here at "All Roads Lead to Haverhill" can not legally be held liable for the following actions: The licking of screens. The calls to Dominoes at 11 pm. And the subsequent rumbling of stomachs. If you feel yourself having any of these urges, feel free to navigate away from here and visit our sister site, Starbolt Productions. The adventures of the next generation of Earth's mightiest heroes should entertain you while you await your meal. Thank you and please enjoy the blog.

    I'm sure glad I got that out of the way! I don't want to be held liable for any mishaps or rumbling of stomachs. Our lawyers have insisted on a disclaimer after the last time I put Italian food in the blog. Poor guy ate his iPhone. It's okay. Apple released a new one the next year and you just know he bought one. Everyone is fine! We hope!

She made this for my parents! So cool!

    When it comes to homemade products, my family tends to go all out. My grandmother Natalie was very proficient in needlepoint and her afghans made for awesome forts I'm not going to lie. However, for every needlepoint and afghan she had there were these wool sweaters that were just hot and itchy. They didn't last long and I think I still have one buried in the depths of a drawer. I think it belongs in a museum!

    My mother's side has always excelled at crafting all kinds of things. For example, my aunt Linda makes doggie beds that can easily double for cat beds. My father's side has also made some great things! Rather than talk about that, we should talk about homemade Italian cooking. There's really nothing else like it in the world!

    

    You could go to any Italian restaurant on the planet and order one of their many savory dishes and it won't taste like homemade no matter what the advertisement on the menu says. The meals may come close to what your grandmother or other relatives may make but there's just something missing from the food. I say it's love. That's the missing ingredient! Homemade Italian food will always be beyond whatever I might have at my local Italian restaurant and trust me as I resident of the Merrimack valley there are a LOT OF THEM! Sigh...Even Olive Garden.

The vegetable prison, May 2020.

    The journey to fine homemade Italian cooking begins here at the garden. For as long as I can remember, we've had a garden where we'd plant everything from tomatoes, cucumbers, basil, green beans and cucumbers and turn them into the best tasting meals anyone ever had. The Salem High Cross Country team didn't have any complaints! We even have the tools of the trade handed down from master Italian chefs like my great-grandmother, Clementina Forgione. 

    Clementina was known for cooking many delectable meals that were hard to duplicate but easy to imitate according to grandma Ollie and her sisters. She would make homemade pasta with a very old rolling pin and make homemade ravioli as well using a special ravioli cutter. Both utensils are in the kitchen and we bring them out whenever we want to make something fresh. In fact, my father has used it to make his own homemade pizza! I think Clementina would be proud of him for that. Meanwhile a second cousin of mine has her eggplant parmesan recipe!

Hungry?

    Recently my parents went to a pizza making course at Tuscan Kitchen, which is an Italian restaurant in Salem. My father already had an idea how to make pizza as he's seen it done before. But, he wanted to go the extra mile by creating his own pizza complete with homemade mozzarella cheese and sauce. Making the sauce wasn't hard. It's old news to us. The trick was getting the dough to rise just right for this delectable Neapolitan-style pizza. You like? Of course you do. Moving on! This is just the primo corso!

    Only the freshest ingredients go into these dishes. My father insisted on everything being fresh. Why? Well, it makes sense. It wouldn't taste good otherwise!

     If you don't like marinara sauce, that's fine. My mother has you covered with pesto sauce. Wait, you say. My mother's not Italian. How could she possibly make such delectable goodies? You're right. She's not Italian. That doesn't mean she can't learn from the best. Re: My grandmother. Or learn all on her own. She does a great job and living with an Italian man like my father for fifty years probably helps a bit.

    I would recommend putting the sauce on tortellini or on various other pasta. Do not use it as a spread. A special type of pesto is usually used for that. It's good for bread dipping, by the way! I would have that with some hard provolone and some cured meat like soppressata.

    The last time we made pesto, one of my cousins who lives in Rome suggested we also cook small courgette or a potato cut into small pieces and put it into the sauce. The do it in Liguria and it sounds so good! I'll have to try it sometime!

    The secondo corso is a tried and true favorite in my house. It's my mother's lasagna! I don't remember when she started making it and I'm a bit sketchy on why she started making it. I didn't care. It's a delectable dish that my grandma Ollie was impressed with. It's a meal she made all by herself using the finest Barilla noodles and it turned out so good. We usually have this dish every Thanksgiving to go along with our usual turkey and all the fixings. It's good and will definitely put you into a food coma. Don't worry. You'll happily go there. It's just that good. My brother requests it every Thanksgiving and his wife, who is also half Italian, has tried to duplicate the meal herself. She's had some success! It just takes time and practice!

    The ingredients are simple. Homemade sauce + noodles + basil + different types of cheese (Ricotta, Mozzarella and Parmesan)= a meal fit for a king. Okay. I hope you have room for dessert! Normally, I go for gelato (Italian ice cream) or a cannoli. But, for Thanksgiving 2020 my father made a dish that caused our cousins in Italy to drool. I'm not kidding. I thought they would leap through the computer and nab a piece because it looked so good. AND IT WAS! Unfortunately the pandemic ruined many plans. We finally were able to go visit my brother and his family for just this past Thanksgiving. Get yourselves vaccinated!

    On Facebook, another Italian cousin chimed in and asked if I ever had Calabrian-style lasagna and I had to tell him "no". He said I should try it sometime because it's pretty good. I've looked at pictures and it looks really heavy! Check it out! Different areas of Italy have different ways of preparing their many dishes. There's no "wrong" way to do it. Much like America, Italy has different regions that specialize in different food and alter certain recipes. Arancini (rice balls) in the north is going to be different than in the south. It's the same in every country you go to because each area specializes in a certain variation of the same dish.

You won't get this at the Cheesecake Factory!

    Il dolce is a mascarpone cannoli cheesecake. My father had been making dessert for years on Christmas eve and consisted of lady fingers, strawberries, blueberries, pudding, whipped cream and other fruits. However, he wanted to try his hand at making a cheesecake for Thanksgiving 2020. The dish came courtesy of the Food Network and Giada de Laurentis. You can see the recipe here.

    The results speak for themselves. It was so good! For a special topping we used special imported berries and juice to give it just the right amount of sweetness. The dessert went over well and I hope my father makes it again sometime in the not too distant future!

Giuseppe Carrabs and Clementina Forgione

    Italian cooking will always have a special place in my heart. It's half of my heritage and let's be honest the food is VERY good. I've learned to make some of my own dishes. I can whip up some quick pesto using dried basil, garlic and olive oil in a pinch. 

    As for my other half? My mother doesn't really have any French-Canadian recipes. I think she may have had a pea soup recipe passed down and she and her siblings didn't care for it too much. Growing up I mostly had Italian cuisine and my mother was always more than happy to prepare it for us. Italian recipes, like recipes from cultures all over the world, are passed down through the generations and I'm grateful to have had some of Clementina's cooking that was passed down to her daughters and her grandchildren. Now that's a legacy I can sink my teeth into!

Vincenzo Ferraiolo and Maria Tedesco

    Part of me always wondered what dishes Maria Tedesco made. My other Italian great-grandmother passed away four years before my father was born. Naturally, my great-aunt Nicolina told me about the various Calabrian dishes she would make and she did cook for us when we visited her.

    I suppose I'll never know. But, we still have Clementina's recipes and the tools she used to make fine Italian cooking at home. And in the end that's what matters. Every culture has their own style of cooking and it's good to see it passed down from generation to generation.

See ya next time!

 

52 Ancestors Week 48: Strength

 From Amy Johnson Crow: The theme for Week 48 is "Strength." Strength comes in many forms. It can be physical, but it can also be emotional or spiritual. What ancestor has demonstrated strength?

This week's banner is quite incredible.

    Strength comes in many forms. When people think of "strength" they usually think about the strong muscular guy as the de-facto image of what strength could be. It's usually someone like the Hulk or your favorite body builder. While that is true, there is also inner strength aka the ability to persevere despite incredible odds. That's strength of character and it's often hidden even if the person does not look particularly imposing like a seven foot tall jade giant with breathtaking anger issues. Real strength has to come from within and that's definitely the case for several women in my family.

    That's right. I said women. I like strong women and several of my favorite fictional characters have been very strong from Marvel's She-Hulk and Black Widow to Kira Nerys from "Star Trek: Deep Space Nine". There's also a reason why many people in my age group preferred She-Ra over He-Man. The stories were just BETTER.  And I'd be lying if I said I wasn't looking forward to seeing "She-Hulk" on Disney+ next year. That is going to be sensational!
 

 Now let's go back to a blog from a few weeks ago where I talked about stormy weather that occurred after the death of my 2nd great-grandfather, Antoine Legault. In the blog, I talked about how Lucie was widowed in 1901 and after I posted the blog I got to thinking about her quite a bit because several things crossed my mind and it made me realize Lucie was probably pretty strong. I wouldn't want to mess with her! In fact, she's probably the reason why my mother and my aunt Linda always play the "Don't mess with the mom" card. Not that I EVER got a dirty look from them....Ever.....MOVING ON!

 

Livin' it up on Lewis St.

    Now, why would she be considered strong? Well, look at the 1910 census in Haverhill. Here she is living with her teenage daughters, Henrietta and Clara. Blanche was eleven at the time and Oliver was eight. She was raising four children by herself in the nine years since Antoine passed away. In the early 1900s, single mothers were often looked down upon even if they were a widow. Yes, Lucie was in her fifties. But, can you imagine the states she must have gotten walking down the street with little Oliver? I'm not sure if it happened exactly like that. However, it's something to think about when you see a single mother in a census. Sure she had lodgers living with her. I don't really know much about them to really judge. I do hope they were at least decent guys who paid their rent on time and didn't listen to loud music while people were trying to sleep.

Austin and Henrietta

    At the very least, I'm sure Henrietta helped her mother take care of her siblings. This was probably where my grandmother got her strength from because I remember her telling me Henrietta was pretty tough and yet caring. My mother, of course, later confirmed the stories. There was just something really strong about the Legault ladies and I honestly suspect Lucie is the reason why they turned out the way they did.

    Lucie remained single until 1917 when she married Paul Lahaye. What brought that on? I have no idea. Maybe she was tired of being alone? That's probably it because most of the children were out of the house at that point. Henrietta was married to Austin Felker for four years by that point.  All I can think of is that she was probably tired of being alone and Paul came around and swept her off her feet. That's my theory anyway.  I'd need a time machine to see what really happened. Who can say? 

    I can just tell that Lucie was probably a very strong woman even how Henrietta turned out and how generations after her were pretty strong in their own right. I really want to see if she was maybe a suffragette. Women got the right to vote during her lifetime and I'd love to see if she was one of the first women who voted. It's just fun to think about.

    Strength does indeed come in many forms. In life you really don't have to be this strong guy who works out and doesn't skip leg day. You can be strong just by taking care of a bunch of unruly teenagers and an eight year old by yourself. There's no doubt in my mind that Lucie was strong enough to take on that task. Come on. She managed for a very long time before even thinking about getting married again. That's just hearsay, I know. Who knows what was really going through her mind? Does it matter? The unspoken evidence speaks for itself. Keep in mind that the 1910 census only captures that moment in time forever locked in that instant when the enumerator wrote the names on that piece of paper. It's a 

    She raised several children BY HERSELF and though she had help from her older daughters and various adult children who had lives of their own she still managed to keep them all in line and they grew up to be functioning adults themselves. My great-grandmother, my grandmother and my own mother are proof of that upbringing. They were never pushovers and though they can be tough, they can still be caring at the same time.

Natalie Felker in high school.

    I suppose you could say that Lucie's strength is the legacy Lucie passed down to her children, grandchildren and beyond.  Even now her 2nd great-granddaughters run their own businesses whether it's breeding dogs or working as a nurse. 

    It takes a lot of strength and patience to work in any of those professions. I've asked my cousins how they do it and they shrugged it off saying that it comes naturally to them. Makes sense. But, after seeing the census and learning more and more about the Legaults lives after Antoine passed away, I'm beginning to wonder if she started the trend of strong women in the family.

You never know and it's definitely fun to think about!

See ya next time!