52 Ancestors Week 27: Extended Family

 From Amy Johnson Crow: The theme for Week 27 is "Extended Family." We often focus on those people from whom we descend. But what about their siblings, aunts, uncles, and cousins? They played a role in our ancestors' lives, just like those people play a role in our own lives. This is a good week to explore the lives of these other people in the family tree.

Never go against the family....

    Let's face it. Writing about my extended family would take a long, long time. I have eight first cousins. My mother has over fifty and my father has six. Yeah, we'd be here a while talking about everyone wouldn't we? Why don't we pare the list down some?  A few months ago, I wrote a blog about an adventure I had with my great-aunt Louise. For more details check the blog out! It's a fun read! 

    What do you say we now turn our attention to one of my other great-aunts? What do you say we talk about my grandpa Marco's sister, Nicolina Caterina Ferraiolo? She turned ninety-nine this year and so this is as good a time as any to write about her, right? Right! Spoilers: You're going to see the name "Caterina" a lot in this week's blog.

Nicolina's in front of her
dad.

    Nicolina was born in the Calabrian town of San Pietro a Maida to Vincenzo Ferraiolo and Maria Tedesco in 1923. She was named after a brother of Vincenzo's who tragically died while trying to save the boyfriend of one of his sisters. His name was Nicola Ferraiolo and I don't really know much about him save for a few odds and ends my cousin Caterina told me about. From what I've been told, the young man dove into a river trying to save the boyfriend and perished in the attempt. The event was so sad that many family members in San Pietro took the name "Nicola" to honor his memory.

    Fast forward to March of 1929 and Nicolina set sail to America with her younger brother, Marco and her mother aboard the Roma. A week or so later they arrived in New York and eventually they made their way to Haverhill, Massachusetts. Like my grandfather, she did okay in Haverhill as she had many of her cousins around and her great-aunt, Concetta, who she and Marco liked to call "Aunt Zia". Side note: You want to talk about an extended family? My great-aunt and grandfather had so many cousins I'm still trying to find them all! Many of them lived in Haverhill! They descend from Concetta and her brothers, Giovanni and Paolo.

        By the 1940s, things started to change. America plunged headlong into the second World War and while both grandfathers served their country, Aunt Nickie also served!

Agent Ferraiolo?

    I don't think she was anything like Agent Peggy Carter from the Marvel Cinematic Universe. However, she did serve in a veteran's hospital in Tennessee.  She worked in the orthopedic braces and artificial limbs department. Nicolina sewed the heavy fabric and the thick leather used at that time to make the braces for the veterans. That was where she met and eventually married a man named Walter Jans. He was the department's chief. The two were married July of 1945 and they ended up staying in Tennessee while the rest of the family was in the Bay State. 

    Walter and Nicole started a family there and she still strived to keep in contact with everyone via phone calls and letters. When I was growing up, I would often exchange letters with my great-aunt and talked to her on the phone. This was exceptionally helpful because grandpa Marco passed away when I was four and Aunt Nickie was really one of a few people who could tell me all about her brother. And man did I hear some interesting stories.

    One of the good ones involved this stranger coming to the door and Marco and Nicolina answered. They only spoke Italian and the guy was so surprised that he walked away, never to return. I have no idea what that one was all about. But, it just seemed so funny to me! He definitely went to the wrong house! Whoops!

    I loved getting letters from Aunt Nickie because they often had great stories like that in them. It was through her letters and phone calls that I got a better connection with her and her daughter, Cathie.  I just need to find them. I know I've kept them. They're probably in the black hole known as my desk. Yes, I can see you shaking your heads, fellow genealogists. I'll find them and put them in polybags. Will that make you happy?! Will it?!

Nicolina, Vincenzo and Cathie. The dog's name is
She She.

        Letters and everything were great and all.  However, it wasn't until the early 2000s when I actually got the chance to visit her in Tennessee. My parents and I made the trip in late 2005 and I remember my brother telling me I needed to be careful. Why? Well, Nicolina's business was the buying and selling of antiques and because of this she had a lot of fragile stuff laying around her house. There was enough to fill a warehouse!

    I kept that in mind and reminded him both of our grandmothers had antiques, too. I didn't think that helped my case. In fact, it more or less made my brother's case to be careful around there. It's unfortunate that he never made the trip. That was okay. He had me to relay any messages, well wishes and all that fun stuff.

        The plane ride was pretty uneventful. I do remember when we arrived at Memphis International, that we had trouble finding Nicolina and Cathie. It turned out they were right behind the same kiosk in the "Arrivals" area as we were. We just didn't look around the MASSIVE sign. After a good laugh, many hugs were had and we made our way to her house. I made a comment about the Baptist churches on every corner and she replied saying "Yeah. It's a southern thing." We did drive by Graceland on the way to her house. That was pretty cool.

This was taken the same day
as the other pic. Kinda obvious!

    Over the course of our visit, I made sure to never touch the antiques. They were precious and kind of smelled funny. We did have our customary Italian dishes for dinner and we talked for hours while I looked at various photographs. Some of which have been included in this week's blog. =)

    While I wasn't looking at the pictures, I was entranced by all of the stories she told us which would be confirmed many years later. These stories include:

1. Her various trips back to San Pietro a Maida in the '60s to '80s.

2. The famous story involving her father, grandpa Marco and grandma Ollie going to Switzerland for a wedding.

3. Many stories involving the Tedescos who lived in Woburn, Massachusetts.

And that's just the tip of the iceberg!

    Needless to say, that was a lot of information to absorb in just one visit. I needed to do something so I did what anyone in my place would have done. I wrote what I could in a notebook that I used for my stories and that was that. I made a makeshift family tree and that became the basis for my eventual genealogical adventure I started in 2006. My only regret is not asking about Domenica Gullo's parents at the time. Whoops. I know I eventually found out who her parents were but it would have saved me a bunch of time and aggravation. Hindsight is indeed 20/20.

Marco, Caterina and Adriana

    All wasn't completely lost. She told me all about her grandfather, Marco and his wife Caterina and how the family was quite literally spread out all over the world. She told us about their daughter Caterina who moved to Argentina and she told us about the family in Europe. In fact, she said to me to try and get in contact with her aunt Caterina Tedesco's descendants. That didn't happen until 2017 and I didn't find my Swiss family members until 2020. I think I might have been playing the long game here.

    Before we left for New Hampshire, I made a point to exchange e-mail addresses with my cousin Cathie so that we'd have another means to communicate. Plus it'd save money on calling Tennessee every month or so. Ever since then we've been in touch even though I changed e-mail providers twice since 2005. We also exchanged numbers in order to text one another. This way we'd always be in touch with family no matter where they were in the world! Hmm....I may have made that sentence sound more creepy than it needed to be! =D

    Overall I enjoyed my trip to Tennessee. To date it was the furthest west I've ever gone and it seemed nice there. My father had visited his aunt when he was younger. But, that's a story for another time. 

  

    I think it was this visit that finally got me interested in genealogy because it wasn't long after that I started a family tree on Ancestry. I had all of my notes on my father's side and info from my mother's side. I had to put it all somewhere. The next logical step was to create a tree and the rest as they say is history. (Family history, even. Ugh. That was corny.)

    I have to thank my great-aunt for inspiring me to finally get started on genealogy because the idea had been cooking in my head since I was born. I needed to find out if the stories were all true and for the most part they were. No one ever really stretched the truth. Certain events certainly happened as I described in other blog entries. I guess you could say that this was where my genealogical adventure got started. Here's hoping Nicolina gets to celebrate her one hundredth birthday next year!

And, yes, I still keep in touch with her, Cathie and everyone! 

See you next time!

Edit: I have been informed that the dog's name was "She-She" and was a Pekingese. It's always a good idea to e-mail relatives about these things. 

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.