52 Ancestors Week 40: A Moment of Courage

 From Amy Johnson Crow: Week 40:

The theme for Week 40 is “A Moment of Courage.” Mark Twain said, ““Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear, not absence of fear.” Think about something an ancestor faced with courage, whether it was something heroic, or the quiet courage of everyday life.

And there came a day.....

    I've honestly covered so many moments of courage in my family tree that it feels like I'm a descendant of Earth's mightiest heroes or something. I'm not. At least I don't think I am.  Let's do a quick headcount. Both grandfathers served in World War II. All of my great-grandfathers served in World War I. My grandfather Bob's brother Alfred was a firefighter and he has a memorial at Arlington National Cemetery. The ladies in my family also are no stranger to being courageous. Have you ever known any Italian woman to not be willing to smack someone with their shoe?! The same applies to the French-Canadians. My 2nd great-grandmothers Gertrude Stevens and Lucie Cadran even held their own in the face of divorce and the untimely death of a spouse in the early 1900s.

    Of course courage comes in all sizes and genders. However, there's one courageous event I would love to learn more about even if it cost the hero his own life. I'm talking about my great-grandfather Vincenzo's brother, Nicola. He may not have fought in a war or anything. He was still a hero in my book.

Vincenzo and Nicolina

    I first learned about Nicola when my cousin Caterina was telling me all about my great-grandfather's siblings and how one profile was missing on Wikitree. She told me how his brother Paolo ended up in Rome and that my great-aunt was named after his brother Nicola. I told her that was very sweet and she asked me if I knew the story of how that came to be. Naturally, I didn't. I love a good story and so I asked her for more details.

   Sometime in the 1910s, Nicola happened across a young man drowning in near San Pietro a Maida. He quickly realized the victim was his sister Caterina's boyfriend and so he dove into the raging waters in an attempt to save him.

    The current was too strong and both young men tragically lost their lives. I'm not sure who all witnessed the event. Though, I can safely say that the name "Nicola" was passed down throughout the family since that day and that even includes my great-aunt. Yes, I know her name was "Nicolina" but it still counts! Don't tell me it doesn't! Either way, the family honored him from that day forward by passing down the name through the generations.

    My eyes widened after I heard the story and right away I messaged my cousin Cathie to see if she heard the tale about how her mother got her name. She said she did and she thought I knew about it. I said "Nope". Apparently, everyone in the family knew but me. I guess that story must have slipped past me while I was eating some pasta e fagioli at grandma Ollie's or something. Once the dust settled, I wanted to learn more about Nicola because I wanted to create an awesome profile for him on WikiTree.

Caterina Ferraiolo

    In order to do that, I needed to ask my cousin Caterina some questions. The most obvious was "How old was he?" Uhh....apparently he was fourteen years old at the time of his death. I have no idea how old the boyfriend was or even what his name was. I do know that Caterina was in her early teens herself. So, this guy was very likely her first boyfriend. Ouch.....

    Since Nicola was around fourteen years old when he dove into the sea, you could say he was born around 1899. He was evidentially the youngest son born to Marco Ferraiolo and Caterina Coppola as his sisters Caterina, Rosa and Concetta were born in 1904, 1906 and 1912 respectively. The story has now taken a sweeter turn. The older brother was trying to save his younger sister's boyfriend. Sometimes real life can be just as compelling as any movie or television show. I honestly don't think anyone can make up a story like this. Sure it was tragic but at the same time it shows just how heroic Vincenzo's brother was. 

    Once I created the profile, I wanted to check something out on Google Earth. Where could the accident have taken place? I like geography and distant places have always fascinated me. When you look at the area around San Pietro a Maida on a map, you don't really see anything that remotely looks like a raging river nearby. There is, however, easy access to the Mediterranean since there are a few beaches nearby. This leads me to believe that there was an accident somewhere near the beaches or even a few kilometers out to sea. 

    Here's how Caterina tells the story:

" It's true, it's a shame that Nicola died so young, and then how he died. He threw himself into the sea, even though he didn't know how to swim, to save his sister's boyfriend, and they both died. It used to be the tradition to then name the children with the same name. Aunt Caterina had Nicola, Uncle Paolo had Nicola, Uncle Vincenzo Nicolina, and my mother named Marco Nicola, and maybe they all live apart from my brother. You see, the tradition is always passed down"

Profile is looking spiffy!

That's such a crazy story. The kid didn't even know how to swim and yet he tried to save his sister's boyfriend. I shook my head and finished up the profile. I really hope I did it justice. Of course, there's a few odds and ends I need to fill in like his exact birth date and all that. Those details will come out eventually. All I can do is have this little memorial for him on the Internet. It's really all anyone can do.

    I'll have to email the commune office to see if they know anything about Nicola. The problem is that it'd be difficult to get anything without any exact dates. That's always going to be the issue.

    In the end, Caterina married Lorenzo Astorino and like my cousin said they had a son named Nicola. I have told my cousin Meli this story since Caterina was her ancestor and everything and like me she had no idea what the name Nicola meant to the family. Some names game passed down because of a grandfather or another ancestor. In this case, it was passed down because a kid named Nicola died trying to be a hero. 

    I guess it's true what Rosemary Harris's Aunt May said in "Spider-Man 2". There really is a hero in all of us. Some of us find it quickly and some of us don't know what it is. The trick is to always be modest about it. No one likes a cocky face. No one.

    Nicola will always be remembered for what he did thanks to family carrying his name and of course that profile on Wikitree. It stands as a tribute and while I want to have more information about him, I don't know if it's really needed. The actions I talked about here and in the profile make speak for itself.

'Nuff said, true believers!

See ya next time!