52 Ancestors Week 42: Friends

 From Amy Johnson Crow: Week 42

The theme for Week 42 is "Friends." We all get by with a little (or a lot) of help from our friends. What about the friends of your ancestors? What about a friend who has helped you with your genealogy?

So no one told you life was going to be this way....

    Having been on the Internet since the 1990s, I've met all sorts of people I'm proud to call friends. From the message boards where I discussed comics with fans of various comic books to fellow video producers who have been gracious enough to provide tips and even a friendly ear from time to time. Friends are amazing and no one can tell me "online friends" aren't just as good as friends in person. Sure you can't do many of the things friends can do face to face if they are online. However, it doesn't mean they can't help you out of a jam.

Is that a tree or an atomical model?

    On the genealogy front, I've made some great friends over at WikiTree. You can't help but be a part of the larger community over there. As I've discussed many times before, people on that site are always happy to help with any genealogical problem you might have. It's a great place and I honestly can't say I've had an unpleasant experience there. As someone who has been around the Internet for a long time, I've seen my fair share of drama. Still, WikiTree isn't the only place you'll find genealogy friends. Sometimes one or two might show up where you least expect it.

    I've also been a user of the website, Familysearch and from time to time I've had to lock horns with people who for some reason or another could never see the forest for the trees no matter how hard you tried to explain things to them. Let's just say I've had to deal with some very strange people.  At least one person on Familysearch has been nice to me and now I call her one of my best genealogy friends. Though, it didn't quite start out that way.

    Back in July of 2017, I added this Francesco Tedesco to my tree and created a profile on WikiTree for him. I assumed he was an ancestor or a relative of my great-grandmother, Maria Tedesco. I let things simmer for a couple days and went about my business when suddenly I got a message on Familysearch about that profile! 

    A woman named Trish messaged me stating that there was no way Francesco was a relative of Maria since she was born in San Pietro a Maida and he was born in Santa Caterina dello Ionio. The two towns are a good hour away from each other on opposite sides of Calabria! I was a little confused. Thankfully, she was the calmer of the two of us!

    We exchanged messages back and forth and it turned out that Francesco was one of her ancestors. I was shocked to say the least and apologized profusely. I never meant anything by connecting him to my tree.  This is why it's hard to research anyone with the last name "Tedesco". It's a VERY common Italian name. It's basically Italy's version of "Smith"! Other Italian names like "Coppola" come in at a close second.

1850 birth of Tommaso Tedesco.

    Trish assured me that it was no big deal and no harm was done. Mistakes happen all the time while you're working on a collaborative tree and like I said Tedesco is a common last name. I laughed and agreed with her. One time someone had seriously messed up my second great-grandparents Antoine Legault and Lucie Cadran and made a HUGE mess on Familysearch. Somehow Antoine became the son of his father-in-law.

    I explained that I was trying to research the Italian town of San Pietro a Maida and I thought Francesco was a connection. Trish then offered to help me research the town since at the time I had no way of actually looking at the records. San Pietro's records are locked behind a firewall where you can only see them if you're at a FS affiliate library and they are currently not on Antenati. To make matters worse, it's hard for me to get to an affiliate library or a Familycenter since they are pretty far away from here. I think the closest is in Boston!

       Anyway, I gave Trish my blessing to see what she could find in San Pietro. I didn't expect much. I figured I'd get one or two documents and she'd be tired of helping me. At worst, I felt like maybe she'd give me one document and say the next five would cost me. You can't blame me for being skeptical! I've had to deal with shady characters online. One guy even told me to "pick a Tedesco to be your ancestor" on a genealogy forum. Shady, much? Eh, I've seen shadier and thankfully Trish proved me wrong! So very wrong!

1843 birth of Rosa Suverato.

    Not only did Trish research and email me various documents concerning my direct Ferraiolo line, she researched and found documents for the Tedesco family, Coppolas and countless other profiles. She single-handedly pushed my Ferraiolo line back to the late 1700s in San Pietro and provided much needed sources for almost all of the San Pietro lines and their extended families.

    THAT was a lot of work and I was impressed, for sure. I have to admit her work inspired me to create the San Pietro a Maida One Place Study! As you can imagine, I was beyond grateful for all of her help and I was glad that one user on Familysearch wasn't a jerk. 

    Our friendship didn't end there, though. To this day we talk back and forth about various discoveries we've made and some personal stuff. We update each other on what we've been doing and every once in a while she would dive back into the San Pietro records for me and come back with another juicy nugget of information I would have never found.

    She was actually the one who discovered Francesco Coppola for me and that discovery eventually led to a huge brick wall coming down. Francesco was the son of Giovanni Coppola and the brother of the Giovanni Coppola who went to Haverhill, Mass. To make a long story short, that Francesco's grandfather, Francesco turned out to be my 4th great-grandfather! Without her help, I probably wouldn't have found out about him until much later.

1812 birth of Marcantonio Ferraiolo

    I could tell you more about what Trish found. But, the results speak for themselves. She has been a tremendous help at a time when I was honestly skeptical of some of the help I was getting at the time. I was just restarting my genealogical adventure when I met her and I already crossed paths with some strange people. I didn't know what to expect and I for one am glad Trish showed up when she did because chances are I'd have been more than a little jaded about working with others on a project!

    She can't take all of the credit. People on WikiTree were nice to me as well and still are. My experience elsewhere on the Internet may have altered my perceptions on certain people. However, I've found that for the most part the genealogy community online has been pretty decent. Like Mr. Rogers says "Look for the helpers."

    I'm forever grateful that she jumpstarted my research in San Pietro because not only did she give me documents, she imparted some very good words of wisdom and hey she appreciates my sene of humor, too. So, that's a plus!

    Finding good friends on the Internet is hard sometimes and thankfully I've found many who have been kind, made me laugh and offered advice. They never judge and have always been there. Good friends can be found all over the world. You just need to find them and a group of people who you can connect with. They're out there! And who knows? Maybe someone you once crossed paths with while making a huge mistake will one day become one of your good friends. Hopefully!

See ya next time!