52 Ancestors Week 52: Looking Ahead

 From Amy Johnson Crow: Week 52

This week's theme is "Looking Ahead." Who do you want to find more about in 2023? Now would be a good time to write up what you know (or what you think you know!) and consider what your next steps are. (Of course, feel free to interpret the theme in other ways!)

Not sure what I was going for with this spray paint font.

"This year a lot of things of come to pass. Raise a glass. Raise a glass."-- New Lang Syne by Jim's Big Ego.

    Another year has come and gone and as 2022 winds down, I can't help but reflect on the amazing discoveries I've made in my genealogical adventure. I can honestly say it's given me new hope in finding the answers to various questions that have been nagging me for some time. What will I find in 2023? I'm not sure. But, I can tell you what I HOPE to find next year. When I do make those discoveries, you can bet I'll be reporting them here as I always do.

1950: The year of the beatnik art.

    Since April 2022, we've been able to finally look at the genealogical gold mine that is the 1950 census. Inside, I've managed to find my parents and various other relatives like my 2nd great-grandmother's brother, Paolo Coppola. His daughter Beatrice unknowingly confirmed his birthplace as San Pietro a Maida in the "additional questions" section of the page. This may not seem like much to people reading but this is huge because you don't usually see an Italian town listed on the census page. Usually people just write "Italy" for the birth place and were done with it.

    The timing of the discovery couldn't have been any better because my cousin in Switzerland told me about how her grandmother would talk about her brothers and sister in Haverhill. I would think that she missed them and I honestly hope there were letters back and forth. Sigh....Wouldn't that be a cool discovery? Focus, Chris. One thing at a time! Right. Where was I? Confirming where Paolo was born gave me a brilliant idea. I could ask the commune office in San Pietro for his birth record.

    However, it might be easier for me to get his death record at Haverhill City Hall. You might recall my successful adventure there a few months ago. You KNOW I am going to go there again. They were so nice and helpful. I just wish they'd let me into the back where the magic happens.

    In 2022, I found out you could fight City Hall. Well, if you ask politely, I guess. What do I hope to find in my second trip? This time around I plan on asking for:

1. The death certificate for Caterina and Paolo's brother, Giovanni whose grave I found this year, too.

2. The death certificate for Lucie Cadran-Legault.

3. The death certificate for my dad's cousins Joe and Dennis's paternal grandfather, Florindo Villanucci.

    That's a tall order isn't it? Not to mention a bit macabre. Asking for a bunch of death records? Really, Chris? Well, yeah. Haha. Most of the birth records I have thanks to finding them on Familysearch, asking the commune office or in our own storage. I know it sounds grim. But, every story has an ending and regardless of how sad it makes you feel, closure is a part of life. We make our ancestors come back to life on WikiTree and various other pages. Why not see how things ended?

2023 will also be their 110th wedding 
anniversary.

    Not everything has to be doom and gloom of course. In genealogy, one must take the good with the bad. In the coming year, I'm looking forward to potentially solving a few DNA related puzzles which had been vexing me for some time. To do that, I need help and a 2nd cousin on the Legault side is going to take an AncestryDNA test. 

    When she told me she was planning to take it, I was excited! Who wouldn't be? I love seeing established family members show up as DNA matches. Naturally, I told her about the DNA match I had been having issues figuring out. Solving the puzzle isn't the reason why she's taking it of course. She's legitimately curious to see how she and her daughter connect with me and practically all of the Legaults that are on Ancestry. I still need a scorecard to keep them all straight!!

    In 2023, I also plan on returning to the Haverhill public library to not only look up newspaper articles but to check out some cemetery records. I'm hoping to find the records for St. James Cemetery so that I can find Antoine Legault's final resting place.

   I also plan on continuing my work on the various one place studies I have under my belt. Currently I have these three projects:

1, San Pietro a Maida

2. Haverhill, Massachusetts

3. Gesualdo

    Next year, I think I'll be adding a fourth One Place Study for Newburyport. Why not? I have two One Place Studies for my dad's side of the tree. Why not add a second for my mother's side? Creating one on WikiTree is pretty simple. Just announce your intention, create a space page and boom. You're all set. The cool thing is that these One Place Studies all get added to the official directory!

    I do have that other project that isn't really a one place study per se. But, it links to the Haverhill one so it counts. I am of course referring to the Italians in Haverhill study I've been working on. So many more people left to add from that book. That's what "Connect-a-Thons" are for!

    Speaking of books, I got "Haverhill's Immigrants at the Turn of the Century" for Christmas. It's a book that's basically along the same lines as the "Italians in Haverhill" book I have and it's a great companion piece. While it has obviously has some Italians in it, there are also many French-Canadians, Lithuanians and other cultures represented in pictures. 

    This book should be very helpful in the One Place Study and I'll be sure to usr that to the best of my ability. Once I look through it and see if I can find anyone I recognize. I haven't found anyone, yet. But, you never know. Something might just leap off the page and get my attention, you know.

    At this point I should probably get the rest of the "Images of America" books about Haverhill. I think I'm missing a couple. They do go a long way to helping me flesh out the old one place study and of course the pictures add faces to the names. That is so important to me and to genealogy in general!

    It looks like 2023 is going to be a busy year for me. Not only will I have these projects to work on. I also have my webcomic over at Starbolt Productions and I'll be helping WikiTree with whatever project they need me to work on. The new year represents endless possibilities. It's up to all of us to make it a good one. I will say this about 2022. Thank God it's over! Chapter 2022 is about to draw to a close. Let's look forward to the future together.

See ya next year!

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.