52 Ancestors Week 25: Broken Branch

 From Amy Johnson Crow: Week 25

After the storms that blew through my area last week, it seems appropriate that this week's theme is "Broken Branch." Have you had to trim a branch from your family tree after you figured out it wasn't the right line? Are you researching a branch that it feels like there is nobody else in the world who is researching them? What about a collateral line that seems to have gotten lost?

Just another tree floating in the ether. For now....

   

     When you look at my family tree on Ancestry, what's the first thing that comes to your mind? If your first thought is "Wow! There's a lot of Italians and Quebecois here!", you're not wrong. At the time of this blog's posting, my tree on Ancestry is sitting at a hefty 10,184 people. Yeah, there's a lot of profiles to cover and don't worry I have a very, very good reason for having so many people both living and deceased in there. Most of them are sourced, too! At this point I should really be calling the tree "The Forest of the Dead". But, that's already taken and is a great episode of "Doctor Who".  Besides, I have living relatives in my tree so it really wouldn't fit. Maybe I should call it "All Roads Lead to Haverhill"?  It's not selling out if it's your brand!

    The real reason why my tree is so extensive is not just because there are large families in there and because I research descendants of various ancestors like my 4th great-grandparents, Jean-Baptiste Bibeau and Therese Laroche. I have several floating branches which I am trying to connect to the big tree.

       Floating trees are a good way to get the lay of the land when you don't know how a DNA match or a friend connects with you. For example, I created a floating tree for my distant cousin, genealogist Mary Kiselyk aka "GesualdoGenie" when I didn't know how she connected with me. When I looked at her tree, she told me that we connect in several ways because Gesualdo, like many other Italian towns, have people who intermarry and a tree becomes a forest quickly when that happens. Looking at you, Famiglietti family.

    Early in my genealogical adventure, I found one route from Mary which led to my 6th great-grandparents, Domenico Petruzzo and Veneranda Gentile. Mary told me that there were other paths via the Carrabs line and other lines in Gesualdo. I stuck with that one as it was the first one I found. I'm sentimental like that. =) 

    Mary is a distant DNA match for my dad and a couple of his cousins on the Carrabs side. She has actually been very helpful in sorting out the Carrabs branches as she and another distant cousin did a lot of work researching the family lines in Gesualdo. They purchased the films from the region of Avellino and took pictures of various documents you would not easily get on Antenati or any other website as they are church records. She and her husband spent hours taking photos of the films. Once the scans were made available online, she was ecstatic!

    It's no wonder she picked "GesualdoGenie" as a screen name. She's just that good and honestly she was my gateway to the exciting world of Italian genealogy.

    Finding my connection to Mary happened pretty quickly because when I was working on the tree, we didn't have "MyTreeTags" since they weren't available when I worked on the line in 2018. "MyTreeTags" are a fun way to keep track of people on your tree without having to search through your database. I use them because my tree is so extensive and the labels you create sort of turn your tree on Ancestry into a mini version of WikiTree. As you can imagine I created a label for floating trees because I have no idea where they go. For now. I usually reserve that specific tag for certain DNA matches these days because I REALLY want to know what the connection is and sometimes you have to take matters into your own hands when someone does not respond to a message.

      Speaking of WikiTree, you can create floating trees there as well if you follow these steps:

1. Go to Add.

2. Select New Person.

    That's basically all it takes to create a floating branch there. I've done it many times as I research the Gullo and Butruce family lines. It also comes in handy for the "Italians in Haverhill" subproject I'm working on since I'm probably connected to many people there as well. Keeping track of all those floating trees is easier on WikiTree as every user on the site has a list of profiles they can manage. It's pretty handy and I try to connect the profiles stuck in the ether to the "big tree" whenever we have a "Connect-a-Thon". Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. As far as the "Italians in Haverhill" subproject goes.....I think I've managed to make a few connections.

    To the left is a list of connections I have to people in the "Italians in Haverhill" category on WikiTree. Many of them are blood relatives and many more are just connected via a marriage. All of the connections started out as floating trees on the website. Are they connected to the world tree? Some might be. So far I have ninety-eight profiles in that category and I've been working hard to find their connection to me. Blood or otherwise. I mean I do have cousins who descend from people in that book.

    These are just a few examples of the "broken branches" I have in my family tree. Hopefully, they get "mended" sooner or later. For now, they are best served as guides and research goals for when and if they will be added to the main tree. Broken branches doesn't always have to be a bad thing. No, they are just points of reference for your research. Sure they may make your tree seem bigger than it actually is. But, in the end it's fun to make them because you might find a way to make those "broken branches" fit with a little help from a friend or fellow friendly neighborhood Wikitreers.

See ya next time!

Addendum: My friend, Azure, just put this thread up on WikiTree where she talks about how to create an unconnected tree on FamilySearch: https://www.wikitree.com/g2g/1435441/familysearch-how-to-add-an-unconnected-person

52 Ancestors Week 24: Popular Name

 Week 24's theme is "Popular Name." Do you have an ancestor who had a name that was popular/trendy at the time? Is there a name that keeps getting used in your family tree? Do you have an ancestor named after someone famous?

I wonder if it's too late to buy "The Big Book of Baby Names".

    Certain names appear many times in family trees. I can't tell you how many times I've found a "Giuseppe" or a "Jacques" somewhere in my own family tree. We'd be here all week and still barely scratch the first few pages of the "Big Book of Baby Names". Our ancestors certainly had a thing for certain names because they were either passed down through each generation or they were the name of some fictional character. For example, a friend of mine named his son "Bruce Wayne". I'll give you one guess what that is a reference to. ;) I still wish he named his son "Gotham" just so he could say to his wife "Gotham needs you" when the kid starts crying.

      My own grandfather, Robert Hamel, even got in on the act as my uncle Bob and my cousin, Robbie, were both named after him. For details, I invite you all to check out this blog from 2019 where I discussed how generations of men in the family were named "Robert Eugene". In the end, I came to the conclusion that the  name "Eugene" was simply honoring my 2nd great-grandfather, Eugene Hamel.

    That was a pretty reasonable explanation, right? Like I said. Sometimes people like certain names and just want to keep the name going for centuries. Though, I have to wonder something. What are future generations going to make of children with the names of characters from "Game of Thrones"? Grandma Daenerys might have some stories for you. Right after she tends to the dragons, of course. I wonder if she went out with that nice Tyrion kid down the street. His family sends their regards. Kids with pop culture names are going to have very interesting stories to talk about. That's for sure! "No, seriously. My name really is Peter Parker!" Yeah. Tell that to the DMV.

    I guess now would be a good time to discuss popular names on the Italian side of the tree. It's only fair. I do have one name that pops up very frequently. The name is "Concetta" and I see it everywhere on the  Ferraiolo and Coppola side of the tree. It's almost as popular as the name "Paolo". Almost....

    I suppose the first time I ever saw the name Concetta was in relation to my 2nd great-grandmother, Caterina's sister. Concetta was born in 1882 and like her brothers Giovanni and Paolo, she moved to Haverhill, Massachusetts.  My great-aunt called her "Aunt Zia" and has many fond memories of her as they lived pretty close to each other.

    Concetta and her husband, Vincenzo Papatola, had a daughter with the same name as her mother. Unfortunately, she died barely a month after she was born. She was the last child born to that family. However, she wasn't the last "Concetta". Not by a longshot. When I discovered that Concetta, I initially thought nothing of it and moved on. Looking back, that was a rookie mistake! 

    I really should have known better. Concetta had two siblings who came to America around the same time. Did they have girls named "Concetta", too? Yes. Yes they did!

The Coppolas!

    Born in 1915 to Giovanni Coppola and Natalina Marinaro, Concetta Coppola, seen on the far right on this photo, married Guido Thomas Pitocchelli and lived in nearby Lawrence, Mass. She helped her husband run the Pitocchelli funeral home and lived a very long life as she passed away in September of 2007. I really wish I could have met her. I bet she had some amazing stories. Sadly, times change and families unfortunately drift apart. It's sad. But, it happens.

    Meanwhile, Concetta's sister, Angelina, married a man named Giovanni Procopio and as you might have guessed they had a daughter named Concetta  who was born in 1920. Getting tired of all the Concettas yet? We still have a few more to go! There's a reasonable explanation for all of this and the answer won't surprise you if you're familiar with Italian naming conventions.

I wonder how many times I've
used this pic.....

    For a while I thought Paolo was the odd man out. He had sixteen children with two wives. Did he have a daughter named Concetta, too? Yes, he did! She was born in 1931 and she's actually the only one I know the least about. This is due to the fact that at the time of this blog's posting, Concetta could still be very much alive and in her early '90s.

    For privacy reasons, I'm not including a link to her profile on WikiTree. She is on my tree on Ancestry and I have very little information on her save for the following tidbits:

1. She married a man named Roger Powers who passed away in 1996.

2. They had at least one son who unfortunately passed away in 1982.

    That's about it. I'm making a point to ask my Coppola cousins if they know anything about Concetta or her whereabouts. I'd love to talk to her. Fingers crossed, everyone!

    That just about does it for America. Let's head back to Europe where things are about to go full circle.

Healthy living in Switzerland. Can't beat that!

    Say hello to Concetta Ferraiolo, daughter of Marco Ferraiolo and Caterina Coppola. She was born in San Pietro a Maida on October 9th, 1912 and lived a very long life. Longevity seems to run in the family because she passed away in March of 2005! Can you imagine all the things she has seen?! It boggles the mind thinking about it. I think about her life and Billy Joel's "We Didn't Start the Fire" pops in my head.

    My cousin Caterina told me about her mother and how she married a man named Giuseppe Aleardi before leaving for Switzerland. Concetta also made it a point to keep in touch with various family members near and far. My great-grandfather Vincenzo went to her daughter's wedding in 1969 and that ended up being his last trip to Europe. She even kept in contact with her sister, Caterina, who had moved to Buenos Aires with her husband, Lorenzo Astorino. Family was clearly very important to her and I wonder if she knew about the many Concettas in America. Spoilers: She probably did.

   At long last I bet you're all wondering where the name Concetta came from in my family. It just so happens to be the first name of my fourth great-grandmother, Concetta Nistico who was born in San Pietro a Maida around 1814. I don't really know much about her save for the fact that she married a man named Giuseppe Suverato and had at least four children including my third great-grandmother, Rosa. More research is clearly needed.

    Judging by all the Concettas in the tree, you can safely say that this is a textbook case of following the Italian naming conventions. Here's how it works. Concetta Nistico was the great-grandmother of Caterina, Paolo, Giovanni and Concetta. There is no disputing that fact and while Paolo, Giovanni and Concetta did their own thing when it comes to naming their children, it's really Marco and Caterina who really stuck with it like so:

* The first male is named after his paternal grandfather. (Vincenzo.)

* The second male is named after his maternal grandfather. (Paolo)

* The first female is named after her paternal grandmother. (Caterina)

* The second female is named after her maternal grandmother. (Rosa)

    Concetta appears to be the odd name out. How did the name enter into the equation if naming conventions are that strict? Well, here's the thing. After so many children are born, names of various other relatives would be used. The parents would end up naming their children after saints, characters in literature or even other ancestors. That's likely what happened here. I could be wrong, though. Maybe they just liked the name? It is a pretty solid Italian name.

    I have so many names in my tree that are just as popular as "Concetta". Paolo is one. What's really interesting is how I have "Anthony" on both sides of my tree and in different languages: French and Italian. I think that should be a topic for another blog. And both are at the second great-grandparent level!! Weird. In the mean time, I think I am going to talk to my Coppola cousins about the Concettas and see if they know anything. It's a popular name. I hope I covered them all!

See ya next time!

Editor's note: In April of 2023, I found that Giovanni Coppola was not the brother of Paolo, Caterina and Concetta Coppola. He is likely a first cousin of the three. Look for details in a future blog post.

52 Ancestors Week 23: Mistake

 From Amy Johnson Crow: Week 23

Mistakes. We all make them — and that includes us and our ancestors. What's a mistake that an ancestor made? What's a mistake that you've made in your research?

Oh, that'll just come right out.....

    It's time to once again talk about one of my greatest hits! Who doesn't love a blog that doesn't involve self-deprecation in some form? That is why you're all here, right? Hey. If you're on the Internet, you'll find a lot of self-deprecation out there. In fact, some people on YouTube make good money poking fun at themselves. (Shout-out to my friends, Lewis "Linkara" Lovhaug of "Atop the Fourth Wall", Brian "The Last Angry Geek" Heinz of "Comic Book Issues" and Mathew "Film Brain" Buck of "Bad Movie Beatdown/Projector". If you like comics and movies, check their stuff out!) And those are just some of the YouTubers I'm friends with. 

    If you're a genealogist, you make tons of mistakes. Fess up. We've all been there. We've all put in a Peter Parker when he should have been Pietro Perrelli. Mistakes happen and thankfully people in the genealogy community are generally okay with them for the most part. Just don't make a habit of it or else they'll spam your inbox! Nah. I'm kidding. Maybe. 

Paolo and Lena.

    I actually had a pretty big mistake cleared up yesterday thanks to the help of my 4th cousin, Cynthia. Cynthia descends from my 2nd great-grandmother's brother, Paolo and she is a user on Familysearch. We ran into each other on the site when she saw that I was working on the Coppolas. She was very grateful for all the information I put in about Paolo, his parents, the many children and all of the cousins. We exchanged e-mails and I sent her the file our cousin Jeannine had sent me so that she and I would be on the same page. Makes sense, right? I like sharing information and helping people. Why would I hoard it all to myself? That's just ridiculous! Information like this needs to be free!

    I had every intention to write this week's blog about some lame mistake I made concerning the Tedesco line. But, I think this one follows the same vein. You need to be very, very careful when dealing with a common last name--Especially ones as common as Tedesco and Coppola. Those are probably the two most common last names in all of Italy. Check Cognomix if you don't believe me!

    I was about to write my epic blog when suddenly I got a private message alert. I checked Familysearch and saw a message from Cynthia. I hadn't talked to her in a while and wanted to see what was going on. She said she was working on a few odds and ends on the tree and has been trying to make the tree as accurate as possible. She'd be great at WikiTree. I really should invite her to join us. We don't bite. 

Mmmm. Chewed up paper. Yummy.

    Cynthia messaged me to tell me that she had to disconnect Paolo and Lena's supposed daughter May from the tree because of a mistake on the birth document. She asked me if that was okay. I said it was fine. I appreciate the honesty. I had added her as a daughter back in 2020. I have no problem with any edits. I just needed to know one thing. "Why?" I don't get mad if someone edits something I've worked on. I work with an editor for my comics and I've had help with my videos from time to time. So, working with someone on a problem is not anything new for me. I just wanted to know why the change had to be made.

    As it turns out, I didn't pay too close attention to the ACTUAL document when I attached the source back in 2020. Look at the corner! It's ripped, mangled, chewed and just messed up. Why didn't I see that before? Well, Cynthia believed it was a mistake on Familysearch's part and no one else's. There's a surprise. They're usually pretty good about errors.

Good thing I can edit these....

    If you look at the initial hint, you will see that Paul Coppola and Lena King were listed as May's parents. In 2020, I had thought that was enough to justify adding her as a child for Paolo and Lena. I created the profile on Familysearch and on WikiTree. After that, I just went about my business. I saw the document. Don't get me wrong. But, I didn't see how badly mangled it was until yesterday.

    My cousin planned on messaging Familysearch about the error in the transcription since it looks like there were several births conflated into one person. She believes that the birth was supposed to be intended for Rosie May Coppola. Rosie unfortunately died young in 1911. I accepted the facts and then asked her how she came to these conclusions as I set out to edit my trees on Ancestry and WikiTree.

    She said that the information did not line up with everything I had gathered. Paolo and Lena were living in Beverly, Mass at the time and the town has sixteen miles between it and Andover. This had to have been some other child or a combination of children born in the same area. While courting distance is a thing, so are places where you could deliver a baby. In 1905, home births were still pretty common and I HIGHLY doubt a woman in labor would go sixteen miles to give birth in another town in 1906! That isn't done! Not unless you have Seabiscuit working for you or something.

Umm...You're not May.

    Curiosity got the better of me and whilst I was talking to my cousin, I decided to check out the births in Andover that weren't indexed. Someone HAD to have been born on March 27th, 1905 in Andover, right? Right?! Well, someone WAS born on that date. Someone who was definitely not Italian. 

    Her name was Louise Doherty and she was born on that date to Edward and Margaret Doherty. They were of Irish descent and worked in mills. Oh and she was a twin, too! All of that just made me go "HUH!" 

    At that point I just shrugged my shoulders. This slight mistake was no skin off my nose. If you come across a mistake like this, it's best to just take it all in stride and edit it. There's literally nothing else you can do to change the facts to fit your narrative. And just to be sure I checked to see if there were any other girls born on that day. Nope. Louise was the only one. "Huh.", indeed.

    With nothing else to do, I just decided to edit everything. What else could I do? This was a pretty big mistake. I had given someone a kid who probably wasn't theirs and since Paolo and Lena couldn't tell me without the aid of a Ouija board I had to take matters into my own hands.

Before

    Over at WikiTree, we pride ourselves on trying to be more accurate than any other world tree on the Internet. If there's a problem and there is a source backing it up, we spring into action and correct the problem as quickly as possible. With that said, I ended up disconnecting "May" from her parents and deleted her on Ancestry. I know it sounds cold. But, I have my reasons.

    The reasons why I so readily accepted the deletion of the profile is pretty simple. Aside from that one source on her page, I was never able to find any other source for a "May Coppola" in Haverhill or anywhere else in the Merrimack valley for that matter. She never appeared in the censuses. I assumed she just died young or in between census years. However, there would have been a death certificate or a hint in the death index in that case. Nope. There was never any hint which indicated a date of death. So, I did the only sensible thing. She had to go.

And After

    I edited "May"'s profile since we can't really delete profiles on WikiTree. Instead of using a proper name, I gave her the unfortunate name of "Unknown". I hate doing that. Unfortunately, in the genealogy business you need to do that from time to time. It happens. You deal with it and move on until you happen to find the actual name. 

     Even though the source was ripped, it still counts as a source and so I left that in place. There was a Coppola born in 1905. We just don't know who.

    If I look closer at the ripped section of the page, I can see that the "Coppola" was on one page and "May" was on another with Paolo Coppola and Lena King. This lends credence to the belief that this was intended to be Rosie May Coppola and not May. Oddly enough the preceding and following pages did not show the contents of the page. They may have been lost to time. As a result, "May's" page on WikiTree now has her as an unknown Coppola. She was a child born in 1905. There's no question there. We just don't know who.

    You might be wondering why I didn't just convert her profile into one for Louise Doherty. That required a lot of work and I really didn't want to leave her profile floating in the ether of Wikitree, unconnected and just sitting there collecting dust. I know the same will happen to the May Coppola page. But, I might merge it into Rosie May's profile. We'll see. I'm not entirely sure what I am going to do with the profile, yet. However, you might be interested in learning that Louise did live a nice, long life as far as I can tell as I've found her in the 1950 census in Peabody. That's pretty cool! I just hope it's the same one.

    Situations like this illustrate why you have to be careful with certain last names. Common names can cause some errors in your tree. Not just the Italian ones. If you come across a "Smith" or "Jones", may whatever deity you believe in have mercy on your soul. Common names are tricky to research. What I've learned from this is that you need to focus on the "Smith" or "Jones" in your general area. That's how I managed to research all of the Haverhill Coppolas. In all of Haverhill, there was only one Coppola family who wasn't connected to Paolo, Giovanni or Concetta.  That was pretty amazing and a stroke of luck because that last name is incredibly common.

    It's a good thing Cynthia pointed out the mistake when she did and I thank her for helping me out. Mistakes happen all the time in genealogy. If you say you've never made a mistake, you're only kidding yourself. Own up to the mistakes, correct them and some day you'll be laughing about it with your friends and coworkers.

See ya next time!

P.S. Go check out Brian, Lewis and Mathew's stuff. They're good people! 

Editor's note: In April of 2023, I found that Giovanni Coppola was not the brother of Paolo, Caterina and Concetta Coppola. He is likely a first cousin of the three. Look for details in a future blog post.

    

52 Ancestors Week 22: Conflict

 From Amy Johnson Crow: Week 22

Conflict seems to be part of human nature, and it can be an unpleasant thing to examine in our family history. (On the positive side, it can create records for us to use.) What ancestor was involved in a conflict, whether it was a war, a feud, or a legal matter?

A banner so good I used it twice.

        It goes without saying that conflicts happens a lot online. You can be a fan of something like "Star Trek" and there'd be a fight over whether or not Captain Janeway should have let Tuvix die in the classic "Star Trek: Voyager" episode, "Tuvix".  The episode aired over twenty years ago and people STILL debate over that one season two episode thanks to streaming services like Paramount +.

    Even in the genealogy community conflicts tend to happen from time to time. If you're a member of a site like WikiTree, you might find yourself at odds with a user who says that Jane Foster married Scott Summers. However, you're Jane's great-grandson and she really married a guy named Donald Blake. Scott married Jean Grey in another city! When that happens, you can take the issue to the Genealogist to Genealogist forum. If you post there, users can help sort out the problem you might be having. That's cool and everything. But, what happens when there's a conflict with someone who isn't on WikiTree? That's a good question and it's happened to me more than once. In two instances, the conflicts resulted in amazing friendships and led to some great discoveries! Let's talk about one of them!

    Not only am I a user at WikiTree, Geni and Ancestry. I also use Find a Grave as a resource. At the time of this blog's posting, I've added forty-eight memorials and manage eighty-four profiles. It's not a lot compared to some other users' work on the site. Then again I really just prefer to take care of the profiles connected to me in some way and whose final resting place is within driving distance. 

    In 2019, I came across a Find a Grave entry for Mariarosa Stella and submitted some corrections to her profile based on her appearance in the book, "Italians in Haverhill". The user who created the profile accepted the changes and all was well with the world. I went about my business and I later got a message on Ancestry from user named Rhonda who saw the changes to Mariarosa's profile on Find a Grave and was confused by my edits since I had her as a daughter of Paolo Coppola and Rosa Suverato on my OWN tree on WikiTree and on Find a Grave. I later found out that the information was completely incorrect! Whoops!!

The source of the problem was the dreaded
semicolon! =O

        Rhonda was never really THAT upset with me and I thought that was nice. You often get a lot of attitude online when someone makes a mistake or does something someone else doesn't like.  It's happened to me many, many times. Take it from a recovering YouTuber. It's not pleasant confronting someone over some minor issue in a video. You really need to pick your battles in those instances. If worse comes to worse, the "block" button becomes your best friend.

    Rhonda began her first message to me with the following statement: She wished she could have contacted me sooner. I sat back in my chair. Had she been watching my genealogical adventure from afar like some sort of genealogical ninja?! No. As it turned out, she found my tree and had been checking to see if I had correct information. She had intended to contact me and just never found the time. No genealogical ninjas. Sigh.... (I still think they exist. Prove me wrong!)

    She then asked where I got the information from. I mentioned the Italians in Haverhill book and that I was a DNA match to people who descended from Concetta Coppola, my 2nd great-grandmother's sister. Rhonda then explained that I shouldn't accept information from an online tree without first looking at the facts. That goes without saying! I then showed her the picture above as the book can be seen on Google Books. Thanks to some bad editing, I assumed Mariarosa was a Coppola because I thought there was a comma by her last name under the picture instead of a semicolon. I even looked at my physical copy and saw the same mark. The book didn't make things clear at all. I saw my mistake and winced. All of my problems were brought on by an error in the punctuation. 

    I asked Rhonda if we could move our discussion to e-mail because I felt more comfortable there than messaging on Ancestry. She complied and we exchanged e-mails. It was also easier to share images that way!

La famigilia di Coppola

    It turned out that she knew Mariarosa Stella and was thankful that I had made a profile for her on Wikitree. She just needed to let me know that there were some things that needed to be changed. I asked "What kinds of changes?" I said that my great-aunt had to be connected to the family because Mariarosa's daughter Mary Rose married man named Domenic Pallaria and their son is a DNA match with her at like 96 centimorgans. DNA doesn't lie. Especially at that range!

    She agreed with me that DNA does not lie. I just needed to rearrange the tree a little bit. But, not too much. I was confused. What did she mean? If she agreed that DNA didn't lie, then she probably accepted the match as it was. The truth was that apparently Rosamaria and her sister Marianna were in fact first cousins of Giovanni, Paolo, Concetta and Caterina Coppola. I had their first cousin as a sibling! I laugh at it now. But, I was floored when she told me! This conflict was turning into a comedy.

Caterina was named after
her aunt?!

    Rhonda explained how she had been researching the Giampa line for some time and found that Marianna and Mariarosa's parents were Pasquale Stella and Caterina Coppola. My spider-sense began to buzz. That was my second great-grandmother's name! What was going on here?!

    As it turns out, the elder Caterina and my 3rd great-grandfather, Paolo, were in fact brother and sister. Their parents would be the common ancestors for the Pallaria DNA matches I have on the match list. Rhonda pointed me toward the evidence of this--Marianna's marriage to Antonio DeFazio in 1906 listed all four parents.

    That was great and all. But, I still missed one connection. Where did the connection with the Haverhill Coppolas come in? She mentioned Giovanni quite a bit in the e-mails. As it turns out, Giovanni paid for the sisters' passage to America and on the manifest, they listed the man as a cousin. A....first cousin. That sealed the deal right there and I apologized for being skeptical and everything. Rhonda said it was okay and we became pretty close after that incident.

    Ever since that week in 2019, I made an effort to e-mail her with discoveries I've made here and there concerning the family. She's a genealogist herself and as everyone knows; many genealogists have next to no time researching their own trees. Some of the things I've found for her include:

1. Mariarosa's birth certificate in San Pietro a Maida. (I asked for it as I was a little curious.)

2. Giovanni Coppola's grave in Saint Patrick's Cemetery in Haverhill. (I still can't believe it was only two stones down from my grandparents' after all this time and I never thought to LOOK!)

3. An article concerning the final fate of Giuseppe Giampa.  (That was a hard one for her to find.)

4. Marianna Stella's Naturalization Papers

    With all the work I've done. she thanked me for all the hard work and said that I was pretty good at genealogy. That was a great compliment coming from her! I just wish things didn't start out rocky. But, it is what it is and it turned out well in the end.

Been there for years and I never thought
to look two "doors" down?!

    I also took pictures of other Giampa graves and put them on Find a Grave for her since she had long since moved away from New England. If she ever needed my help finding something in the cemeteries in Haverhill, all she has to do is ask and I'd get right on it.

    Oddly enough, it turns out we are probably distantly related via the Hamel line as she has a line that goes to Quebec like I do. We're not DNA matches but we likely have a paper trail that connects as both. I'll have to dig into that next!

    So, I guess you could say this conflict had a happy ending. I made a great new friend who has helped me clean up a pretty big mistake. Hopefully, the mistake hasn't spread to other trees like a virus. That would be awful! Rhonda also helped me by filling in some blanks on an unexplored branch of the tree and told me some interesting stories about the Coppola line. In turn, I helped her find some much needed information. We still e-mail each other with news and if we just wanted to talk. If only all conflicts ended this peacefully. If it did, the world would be a MUCH better place.

See ya next time! 

Editor's note: In April of 2023, I found that Giovanni Coppola was not the brother of Paolo, Caterina and Concetta Coppola. He is likely a first cousin of the three. Look for details in a future blog post.