52 Ancestors Week 36: More than a Name

 From Amy Johnson Crow: Week 36:

The theme for Week 36 is “More Than a Name.” I’ve said for ages that our ancestors are more than names on a chart. They were real people with real lives. What is something you’ve found about an ancestor that really made them come alive for you?

RIP Peter Cullen

         I have to agree with Amy. You can add all the vital statistics you want into your family tree and you'd never find what made them special or real for that matter. That's why pictures are literally worth a thousand words. They tell you more things about someone than a birth record or a census would. Stories are another thing that make an ancestor come alive. Even if you have a picture of your ancestor, a story that goes along with it will transform your perception of that person. For example, if you have a picture of your ancestor and thought he/she was a decent person and then you hear a story where you find out that person isn't who you thought they were, it tends to add a little depth to them. 

    As readers of the blog know, many of my ancestors are more than just their names on my family tree. I've done my best to try and make them come alive because the stories need to be told and I definitely am not one to just say "Vincenzo Ferraiolo was born in San Pietro a Maida in 1894". There's so much more to my great-grandfather than that juicy nugget of information.  With that in mind, let's revisit my third great-grandfather Jeremiah Felker and learn about why his life was more than meets the eye. (I said what I said.)

Jeremiah and Elizabeth

    If you take a quick glance at Jeremiah Felker's page on WikiTree, you'd only get the basics. He was born in Raymond, NH in 1838 and passed away in Haverhill, Mass in 1918. He married Elizabeth Fellows and they had a family together. When I was starting my genealogical adventure back in the day, that was all I had.  As time went by, I gathered more information from descendants of his and from various records online. The more I learned about Jeremiah, the more I was able to fill in his biography and create a story that frankly should be a movie. 

    A few years ago I learned that Jeremiah was born out of wedlock to Elias Felker and Martha Smart. That wasn't the end of it. Nope. It turned out that her father Jeremiah and her sued Elias for custody of the child shortly after he was born. It is interesting that he was named after his grandfather, isn't it? Keep reading and make sure you have popcorn handy. Jeremiah's life has more twists and turns than a country road from here on out!  I actually recently sent an email to the courts in Raymond to see if they had anything more on that case. Let's hope they have some information for me.

    Time went by and his mother married Jonathan West in 1840 and had three children with him. She married Joseph Miles in 1846 and remained married to him until her death in 1875. Meanwhile, Jeremiah served with his half-brother George Mace in the American Civil War on the side of the Union. My third-great-grandfather was in the 1st New Hampshire Heavy Artillery and married Elizabeth Fellows in February of 1863. It's safe to say that the first thirty or so years of his life was full of one crazy thing after another. Sadly, this was just the beginning! Poor guy never really had the chance to settle down.

Wilfred (left) wishes he had swagger.

    Jeremiah's son Wilfred was born in 1871 and while the family was enjoying the sweet life in Haverhill, Massachusetts, young Wilfred met and married Gertrude Stevens of Wakefield, Mass in 1891. Within a year of their marriage, Gertrude was pregnant with my great-grandfather. Normally, this would have been a happy time but it seems that Wilfred took after his grandfather and also had a roaming eye.

    Wilfred met a woman named Mary Pierce in nearby Newburyport and got her pregnant while Gertrude was pregnant with their other son.  Austin was born a few months later and Wilfred and Gertrude got a divorce due to his infidelity.

    There was a bitter court battle over my great-grandfather Austin and once the dust was settled he was sent to live with his grandparents, Jeremiah and Elizabeth in Haverhill. Gertrude left town and stayed in touch with her son. Wilfred? He married the other woman and had a family with her! Sad thing is that those kids moved away from Haverhill the first chance they got. Rumor has it Wilfred was not a nice guy!

    Austin clearly broke the cycle of infidelity when he married Henrietta Legault in 1913 and stayed married to her until their deaths in the 1970s. Jeremiah passed away five years after Austin and Henrietta got married and I like to think that he was there for his grandson during that event. I would definitely love to see the guest list for that event. It should be noted that on his own death certificate, his wife Elizabeth put Jeremiah's grandfather Joseph Felker as his father. I think that made sense given how Elias died in 1844 and because of that Jeremiah likely never knew the man or had no memories of him.

Austin and Henrietta

   See what nine years of digging and talking to people about one man can dig up? And this was just a third-great-grandfather! I think I know more about him than any of my other third great-grandparents combined! Sure there are a lot of things about them online or in stories but the story here clearly needs to be a movie.

    All it took was me asking the right questions of people and seeing what information was available. The story, I will admit, isn't for the faint of heart. I do have to commend him and Elizabeth for taking in their grandson and giving him a great life. The cycle had to be broken and I think they did a great job from what my mother told me.

     As you can tell from this week's blog, there's definitely more to our ancestors than meets the eye. They had their faults, foibles and lives wrought with drama just like we do today. They're more than just names and dates. They were people. Sometimes you want to praise them for doing the right thing. Sometimes you wonder just what were they thinking. I think the story of Jeremiah proves what I've been saying this whole blog. You aren't done looking at an ancestor after you add their names and dates to your tree. There's always going to be more to their story!

See you next time!

P.S. I would have written about my grandfather Marco but since he died when I was four I really didn't want to pull at that thread!!!!

52 Ancestors Week 34: Long-Lasting

From Amy Johnson Crow: Week 34:

The theme for Week 34 is “Long-lasting.” It could be a marriage, a career, a document, an heirloom – feel free to be creative with the theme!

Fully charged and ready for a trip!

    When I look around my house, I see a lot of items that have been around a long time or have been passed down to us by a family member or a family friend. These items range from simple things like a coffee table or a candle stick. Some items are so old that they might as well be considered heirlooms at this point. I don't know if having a launch era Sega Genesis could be considered "long-lasting" if I don't even know if it would work on a modern television. I'm not about to experiment on it!! Fortunately Nintendo has ported several Genesis games in various compilations over the years. Personal items side, I do know some people who have had long-lasting marriages. 

    I've already discussed my grandparents Bob and Natalie Hamel's 50th wedding anniversary in this blog from 2023. I've talked about my great-grandparents Austin and Henrietta's 50th wedding anniversary in 2024.  What do you say we go a little closer to home this week? My parents' wedding anniversary is coming up in a few days at the time of this blog's posting. So, let's talk about my parents' long-lasting marriage as they celebrate their fifty-fifth year of marriage.

    Being married to someone for over fifty years is no small feat and yet my parents Dr. James Ferraiolo and Diane Hamel made it work. They were married on August 28th, 1971 and by some amazing cosmic coincidence that was also my dad's great-grandmother Caterina Coppola's birthday. Did they know? Probably not. Then again I bet my grandfather Marco had a good chuckle when he saw the date on the invitation. He knew. He had to have known.

    To make a long story short, their wedding was held in Newburyport, Mass and the reception was held in Haverhill. All four grandparents made sure everyone was there from both sides of the family. I don't mean just a few people. EVERYONE!  To list them all would take forever and a day and yes I have that list on a spreadsheet somewhere just in case I need to tell a DNA match  their ancestor was at my parents' wedding. That HAS happened. I'm surprised it doesn't freak them out.

    I think I've discussed their wedding before. For the new readers out there:  I'm connected to almost everyone who attended their wedding via blood or marriage. My grandparents made a concerted effort to include everyone they could. Some people could make it and some couldn't. It is honestly very cool that I'm connected to a lot of people who were there or were invited and couldn't make it. Life happens and you just deal with it.

    My brother Jim was born the same year the house I grew up in was built and I was born two years later.  The rest of the story pretty much writes itself. However, the question is what is the secret to a long-lasting marriage like theirs? That's something a lot of people have asked them.

Don't let those innocent looks fool you.

    There has been much debate over what the secret to a long-lasting marriage is and their consensus has always been: communication and shared values. That makes sense. When I was little they always talked out whatever problem they were having and whenever my brother and I would have a problem, we'd talk things out. It was nothing like one of those '80s family sitcoms we saw on television or anything. We'd just discuss things and share our opinions.

    Of course the shenanigans my brother and I got into during that time probably didn't help matters. We were good kids! HONEST!

    In the end, I think that's all you really need for a successful marriage. If you communicate with your significant other what your problems are or any issue you have, then you can get anything accomplished. Failure to talk can lead to problems down the road. As for shared values? I think that goes without saying. If someone likes "X" and your significant other likes "y", there's going to be a problem if "x" and "y" are completely different from each other!

Happy 50th!! Put your masks on.....

    My parents had their 50th wedding anniversary during the height of Covid in 2021. It wasn't as glamourous as their wedding but we still had a great time at Tuscan Kitchen in Salem. My parents reminisced about their wedding, talked about old friends and even gave my brother and his wife some sage advice about long-lasting marriages. That was cool of them.

    Their fiftieth was still fine like I said. Was it ideal? No. Not at all. We still made the most of it and went home with plenty of leftovers. It's an Italian restaurant. You're going to leave with leftovers whether you like it or not!

    
    Next Friday will be their 55th anniversary and I know for a fact we're likely going to go out to one of my parents' favorite restaurants. My parents' advice for a long-lasting marriage is very sound. It's worked this long and there hasn't been any complaints. So, to my parents I say Happy 55th Anniversary! Here's to many more!! 'Nuff said!

See ya next time!

52 Ancestors Week 33: Multiples

 From Amy Johnson Crow: The theme for Week 33 is “Multiples.” There are lots of ways you could interpret this theme: multiple marriages, multiple children, twins (or more), or even someone who shows up in multiple records. Have fun with this prompt!

More people than you can shake a stick at!

    According to my archive I've talked about multiple children twice. I've discussed my 2nd great-grandmother Gertrude and her multiple husbands and children in 2021. I've talked about the Carrabs family just last year. These things come in threes and since I have a plethora of large families in my tree it's only fair to talk about one of them. I've already talked about the children of my 2nd great-grandparents Antoine Legault and Lucie Cadran. But! Did you know he had a brother named Felix? And did you know that one of Felix's descendants owned the marina my parents had their boat in for several decades. Before you can start singing "It's a Small World" let's dig into the life of Felix Legault!

Felix, Matilde and Evelyn in the middle.

    Felix Napoleon Legault was just four years younger than Antoine and like his brother he also lived in Haverhill. Also like his brother he too had a dozen children. I'm willing to bet that the cousins all knew each other only because they were in the same general area and if you have cousins in the same city you usually hang out with them unless there was a family feud or something.

    And yes his middle name was Napoleon. You see that a lot with French-Canadians. Some people name their kids after US presidents. French-Canadians name their kids after generals who slid down waterslides and traveled through time.

    We could be here all day naming every single child Felix and Matilde had. They had twelve of them between 1875 and 1900. Oh and to make things ever so slightly confusing Felix named one of his daughters after one of Antoine and Lucie's daughter, Delphine. This makes sense to me because Delphine was the name of Antonie and Felix's mother. Like in Italian families, the names repeat over and over in French-Canadian lines. You're going to come across many Jacques or Maries. You just need to be careful because one Jacques might not be the one you need. Oh and it doesn't help that Legault is a very common last name in Canada. Sacré bleu! 

    One of their daughters was a woman named Matilda Vina Legault. Not to be confused with her cousin WITH THE SAME NAME! That Matilda went to Connecticut the first chance she got and married a Rowell. This one in the picture was born in 1892 in Haverhill and spent all of her life there. She passed away in 1993 and was one of the first centenarians I ever discovered in my tree. All I can say is good for her. Give her a round of applause, everyone. She won at life. I wonder what her secret was. 

    She sadly outlived three of her children. Evelyn passed away in 1976 and is in the picture with her grandparents. Two others passed away in the 1960s and in the 1980s. It's very sad. But at least she looks happy in this photograph.  She seems like she was a nice lady. And for some reason I really want some of that cake.

    Moving on Felix and Mathilde had a son named Felix who was born in 1875 and no his middle name was NOT Napoleon. Nope. His middle name was Joseph. Hey. Let's give the Legaults a little bit a credit, huh? I think they realized the name "Napoleon" wasn't going to fly in America. Granted he was born in Quebec. Felix is the ancestor of the Corbins who owned Rings Island Marina.

Bowling? What?!

        Felix married a woman by the name of Albina Lefebvre. Lefebvre is another one of those last names you need to watch out for. It's extremely common and yes I have that one in my tree, too. Of course I do.

    According to this article I found on Felix junior, he and his brothers were into bowling. Keep in mind that the bowling in the Merrimack valley isn't the one people usually think of when they think of bowling. They probably bowled candlepin style.  I wonder how a a family that bowled went into boating. Actually, no. Wait. I take that back. I do know. My family did it. Everyone has hobbies!

    Felix and Alvina had a daughter Irene who married Phillip Corbin and they had a son named James. The rest as they say is history. Family history, that is. When I found that connection laughed so hard and told my mother about it. She smiled at me and said she already knew about the connection for years. I said to her "Why didn't you tell me?!" I mean....Jim Corbin was a nice guy. VERY nice. He bought coffee and donuts for everyone at the marina every Sunday morning. I guess I was on a need to know basis and I didn't need to know right away. Let's not forget I was the kid who asked a million questions. My parents probably figured I'd find out soon enough. And I did. It really is a small world after all.

    Jim Corbin unfortunately passed away in 2008 before I could talk to him about his family history. It was certainly surprising that I had that connection. Then again Felix's family was pretty large. It stood to reason that I'd be connected to other people in the valley like that. I expected it with my Italian side because everyone was in close vicinity with one another. I didn't really expect it with my French-Canadian side to be honest. I guess I really should. You never know when the French-Canadian cousins are going to pop out of the woodwork.

    Large families tend to create more connection possibilities. You fill in a tree and you end up finding cousins you either never heard of or cousins you knew about and never thought you had a connection with them. It's really exciting to think about when you're looking stuff up. Though, you still have to watch out for the common names out there. You'll have to research the family lines carefully because one Jacques may not be your Jacques. Keep that in mind!

Now I have this urge to go watch "Bill and Ted". Be excellent to each other. And party on, dudes!

52 Ancestors Week 32: Neighbors and Community

 From Amy Johnson Crow:Week 32:

The theme for Week 32 is “Neighbors and Community.” Our ancestors didn’t live in a vacuum. They were part of neighborhoods, congregations, social groups, and more. (Bonus: Those neighbors might be extended family!) This week, explore an ancestor’s neighbors or a group that they belonged to. What do they reveal about your ancestor?

This looks like a friendly neighborhood!

    I kind of like this week's header. I just wish I was able to find a free image of one of those Italian neighborhoods in New York or Boston to use that didn't have a watermark on them. Some of them were pure gold! When I saw those, I kept picturing there was some lady screaming for "Anthony Joseph Marco" in there!  Just thinking about it gives me 'Nam-like flashbacks. In my experience, you were dead meat if someone used your full name when they were calling for you and if your name is as long as mine is you had better pray whatever God you believe in has mercy on your soul.

    With that in mind, I think we all know where this blog is going to go. I've written about the Italian community in Haverhill, Massachusetts a million times and I'll write about it a million more times. Why? Because it's fun to talk about and this is my blog. I can do whatever I want! It's that and I don't really know much about the French-Canadian community in Newburyport except that it existed, they had a church and there were some festivities thrown in there. Moving on!

Makin' my way downtown....

    As readers of the blog are aware, the area around Washington Street in Haverhill was basically the Italian neighborhood in the city and was just as influential as Little Italy in places like Boston and New York. Why? Well, everyone and their brother lived either on Washington Street or on one of the side streets that came off that road. There were grocery stores nearby like the one owned by Giovanni Coppola, Loconte's and others in the area. Banks were close by as well. Churches, restaurants, tailors and schools were there, too! It was basically a community within a community and it was pretty special.

     My grandmother Ollie lived on Washington Street in a house that once belonged to my great-grandfather Vincenzo. She grew up just around the corner on Bartlett Street where her parents' house was. Her friends and family were always nearby and it was especially true for her parents and my grandfather Marco's parents. Everyone knew what everyone else was doing every minute of every day and from what my father tells me it was a little chaotic but in a fun way. 

    I can understand why. There'd be little to no privacy because everyone talked and everyone knew each other. In order to get a real understanding of what the Italian community was like, I suggest checking out the Italians in Haverhill book by the late, great Patricia Trainor O'Malley. I actually tried to contact her a few times since my family is in the book. I found out she passed away a couple years ago and that was pretty upsetting. I really wish I could have talked to her.

    However, the show must go on. Her book is a great starting point when it comes to understanding the Italian neighborhood in the city and this blog will serve as my take on everything! Okay, that's a bit much. Still, it's only fitting.

    Anyway, Trainor never really discussed all of the Italian families in Haverhill like the Ferraiolos or the Carrabs. She apparently reached out to my great-aunt Louise when she was working on the book and my great-aunt said she didn't want to take part in for some reason. I never knew why. She was still mentioned because her husband's family, the Villanuccis, are in the book! Talk about a loophole.

    I think I got a little sidetracked. Now that we know that there was an Italian neighborhood in Haverhill we can talk about the groups they belonged to. Many Italians in the area joined the Sons of Italy Victor Emmanuel II lodge. That was a fraternity of Italian men who looked after each other, played cards in smoke filled back rooms (Not joking. It was a thing.) and just socialized with their paisanos in a strange new land. 

   The Italian community tended to take care of one another whenever there was a problem. It didn't matter if your ancestors came from Sicily, Calabria or Campania. You needed help, they'd give you the shirt off their back. It is funny, though. Most of the Sicilian Italian immigrants in the Merrimack valley went to Lawrence rather than Haverhill. No idea why. Maybe the mills up the river paid them more? I'll have to ask my friends from Lawrence.

il famiglia di Ferraiolo

    I would have loved it if Vincenzo, Maria, my great-aunt and my grandfather were mentioned in the Italians in Haverhill book. We'd have sent in that picture and it would have wrapped up the San Pietro a Maida section of O'Malley's book with a neat little bow. Seriously, she spent at least a dozen pages talking about the people who came from San Pietro to Haverhill and several of those people I am related to! She should have looked up my father since there were no Ferraiolos in Haverhill when she published the book in 2001.

    It's all good. At least I know people are in the book and that I'm connected to them either genetically or through marriage. 

     Sadly, none of my ancestors were part of that Victor Emmanuel II lodge. My great-grandfather Giuseppe Carrabs was a president of the Italian American Credit Union and that was mentioned in the book and my family had family who were members of the lodge. I'm not sure why they never joined. Maybe they just never saw the need to join since the community was already well connected? Perhaps.

    Overall, I think the best part of the Italian community in Haverhill is how close they were to the North End of Boston. The North End is the Italian neighborhood in Boston and it's where a lot of people go to get authentic Italian food if the shops in Haverhill didn't carry it or if you can't afford a plane ticket to Italy. Haverhill is about a half an hour from the big city and it is considered to be a fringe suburb of Boston. This meant that people could go to the North End, get some food, bring it to Haverhill and no one would complain. After all, there were paisanos there.

    The Italian neighborhood in Haverhill was born from immigrants who worked in the mills along the Merrimack River. The community still thrives today with some notable changes, of course. The famous Saint Rita's Parish is now part of All Saints Church for example. Saint Rita's was were all the Italians worshiped and all the Catholic churches in Haverhill eventually became one church.  Despite its many changes, there is one thing that will forever be constant in Italian neighborhoods. It's that lady screaming for you to come home and if she uses your full name---RUN!

See you next time!!!!!!!

The map of Washington street is property of Google Earth.

52 Ancestors Week 31: A Day in the Life

 From Amy Johnson Crow: Week 31:

The theme for Week 31 is “A Day in the Life.” Our ancestors were more than just names and dates. This week, explore an ancestor whose daily life you know something about (or that you wish you knew something about).

Eagle eyes should spot that that's the 1996 calendar.

    It's just another day in the life, huh? I was fortunate to know what my grandparents were up to almost every day since they either lived close by or they'd call my parents telling us what they were doing and what they did that day. This was before texting and everything so phone calls were usually the norm! I honestly can't picture either grandmother texting someone using a modern iPhone! It would have been funny to see at least! 

    My grandfather Bob was no stranger to Red Lobster. When he and my grandmother moved to Florida, they would often frequent the local Red Lobster, order a lobster dinner and talk about how it wasn't nearly as good as the lobsters back in New England when they talked to my mother. You can take the man out of New England. But you certainly can't take New England out of a man! He talked about going to Red Lobster quite often despite his complaints!

    Closer to home, a day in my grandma Ollie's life was a little different. This week, I'm going to talk about what Ollie did every Friday for as long as I can remember. For the stake of nostalgia, I'm going to pick a Friday in the summer. Why? You'll see by the end of the blog! With all that in mind, let's go back in time to a random Friday in the summer of 1996.

Totally not a real blond!

   On that Friday morning Ollie wakes up in her house on Washington Street in Haverhill. She has a full day planned with loads of fun things to do. After showering and getting dressed, a car pulls into the driveway driven by her brother-in-law Arnold and with him are her sisters, Louise and Ellie.

    After talking for a little bit, Arnold took the sisters down the road to their hair salon where they would spend hours catching up on the latest gossip and of course making themselves look great. Fun fact. I've never known Ollie, Louise or Ellie with the dark hair they were born with. I was blown away when I saw them with dark hair in a photograph. I never asked why she colored her hair. I suspect that she didn't want to and that was her call.

    At least she looked good and that's all that matters. I've never known her with any other hair color so I never judged!

    It was also amazing that they were all the same shade of blonde!

    Once they were finished, the three would go to lunch at the nearest restaurant and go all the way to Salem to shop at Macy's. They liked to go to the malls in the Salem area because of the lack of sale's tax in New Hampshire. This is a big reason why the Mall at Rockingham Park in Salem, which opened in 1991, became the dominant mall in the greater Merrimack valley. The mall, unlike others in the United States, is still operational because it's right on the border and people like my grandmother spend cash and look for great deals in New Hampshire. Yay, Capitalism? 

    At the end of the day, the sisters would return to either Ollie's house on Washington Street or Louise's house on Bartlett street and have dinner. Here is where my family and I would come in. In the summertime, we would sometimes go to Ollie's house on the way to the marina that Friday.  We would sometimes enter the house and catch the sisters in mid conversation. It often took my parents a few minutes to catch up to whatever topic was being discussed that day.

    Our visits were often a surprise and yet somehow Ollie always had a bowl of fresh pasta e fagioli waiting for me. It was as if the universe told her we were coming by for a quick visit.  The visits were short as my father always wanted to hit the road. But it was nice catching up with my grandmother and all the gossip she heard that day.

    Arnold was always cracking jokes whenever the sisters talked when he saw me, he'd call me "Superman" because of the DC character and I guess his favorite superhero was "Superman". Little did he know my favorite was Marvel's web-swinging wonder, the "Amazing Spider-Man".  Actually, he knew. He just liked to call me "Superman". I suppose there's worse names to be called.

    Ollie's weekly outings with her sister shows just how strong the bonds were between the sisters. They lived close by and were always talking to one another at each other's homes. They even talked on the phone all the time despite being a few miles away!  Ollie was never in a nursing home or in an assisted living facility. She and her sisters lived life on their own terms and by their own rules. They were always great to talk to and yes I have to say it once again. They were all definitely like Sophia from "The Golden Girls"!

See ya next time!

52 Ancestors Week 29: A Source I Want to Understand Better

 From Amy Johnson Crow: Week 29:

The theme for Week 29 is “A Source I Want to Understand Better.” Some sources that we use are fairly straightforward. Others… not so much. This week, explore a source that you don’t quite understand and the ancestor that it pertains to.

Just some light reading.

    When you're out on your genealogical adventure, you're bound to find a ton of sources and many of them will be easy to understand. A census can tell you where a person lived and who their neighbors were. A birth/death record can tell you all about their parents and give you important dates in their lives. A word of caution. Do not look up certain causes of death on WebMD. Just trust me on this one. I never should have looked up black lung. There's a reason why I never became a doctor.

    Now, those sources are pretty easy to figure out, right? You look at the information, add them to a family tree and walk away. Some sources, though, tend to confuse me a little bit. My friend and fellow genealogist Melanie McComb thought I should write about finding aids and books like the Great Migration Directory. While those are great resources, it got me thinking about other books I could talk about that used to confuse me quite a bit back in the day and frankly still make me give it a second look.

    In the late 19th century there was a bit of a fad in America. And no I'm not just talking about women wearing tight corsets and men wearing monocles and ridiculous top hats. People were looking up their family histories left and right in an attempt to either connect themselves with royalty or someone who came over on the Mayflower. It was a thing and as a result hundreds and hundreds of genealogy books were published showcasing who was related to who based on the records people found. You might be saying "Wow! That's great!" and you'd be right. It does sound great.....on paper.

    Sadly, a lot of those books miss their mark. My friend Erica Howton, a genealogist on Geni.com, used to tell me how people just made stuff up and published a book in the hope that no one would notice. This was in the era of "yellow journalism" so it doesn't surprise me that some of the books were not worth the paper they were printed on. Those poor trees sacrificed their lives for something that amounts to fanfiction. I wish I was kidding. Erica showed me a few of the books and they were just horrible. Lie after lie.

    What does all this have to do with me? Well, I do have ancestors who are in these books that were published in the 1890s to 1900s. My second great-grandparents, Wilfred Felker and Gertrude Stevens were basically my links to colonial New England. Their trees include several soldiers of the American Revolution and several people who were featured in Anderson's "Great Migration Begins". Naturally, I'd have ancestors who were featured in their own family genealogy books. These weren't family Bibles or anything. They were just books with people in them with facts and short biographies. Some even had town histories.  As a result, the books seemed like an early version of Wikipedia.

    Erica first showed me the book "Sargent genealogy : Hugh Sargent, of Courteenhall, Northamptonshire and his descendants in England" when I traced Gertrude Steven's line to my 4th great-grandfather John Sargent Fisher. She suggested I look for books on Archive.org that had the Fishers and the Sargents in them. This was back in 2017 or so and back then I knew Archive.org to be a place where someone could look up very old websites on the Internet. I've done that from time to time considering how long I've been a user of the web. I remember when eBay was not even close to how big it is now. Yeah, I was there when Strong Bad checked his first e-mail. That's how long I've been here.

Hi, 12th, great-grandfather. What up?

    On it's surface, the book seems pretty straightforward. It tells you all the facts you need to know about a person's life and if you're lucky you might even get a profession or two. These were people who lived a very, very long time ago and any information about their lives is priceless to me and every genealogist out there. 

    I'm lucky in that this book and the various other genealogy books I've found on Archive.org have gelled with records in Massachusetts and New Hampshire. There hasn't been anything that gave me real pause and I'm not sure why. Were the people writing these books that meticulous? Were they under the gun by some members of the various families they were reporting on? The world may never know. But it is fun to think about why these books are so accurate whereas others are not that great.

    Okay. So, now that I've introduced the book I bet you're wondering why I want to understand it better. Well, the only thing I am often curious about is why they never bothered to cover the ladies in the book very well. They just covered the men. I mean I know the reason WHY in the general sense. They wanted to focus on the male bloodlines and all of that. It just strikes me as a missed opportunity from the perspective of someone living in the 21st century. Wouldn't it have made sense to include a daughter of Joe Jones and her children?  I'm fortunate that several generations of people are mentioned in the books.  However, the second one of the ladies in my tree are mentioned, there's zero information about her and I'd have to rely on town records.

And there's my 5th great-grandmother, Sarah.

    For the Sargent family I can get to the children of Amos Sargent, my 6th great-grandfather. He was one of my dozen or so soldiers of the American Revolution and was a privateer! Not bad. 

    My 5th great-grandmother was his fourth child, Sarah and as you can see Sarah married a Fisher and as a result there'd be no mention of her descendants. She obviously had children. They just aren't mentioned in this book. You might be wondering "Was there a Fisher genealogy book, Chris?"

        Oh, yes. There definitely was a Fisher genealogy book. I'm glad you asked! That book thankfully picked up where the Sargent book left off. Unfortunately, it was more of the same. Don't get me wrong. Everything gelled with the records in Massachusetts. It just was annoying how the women were all sidelined. I know I should have accepted that reality. But it's just something to think about and it's a sharp contrast to how records were kept in Italy and in Quebec at the same time! The ladies and their families were all documented there! Maybe it was just a culture thing.

    The Fisher genealogy book is more of the same. I guess all of the authors got together and wanted to have the same format for all of these books. Makes sense if the families were intertwined like this. What's annoying is that if you published one book and your ancestor is in another book, you'd have to buy two of the books! Yay, capitalism!

    At least the books are now digitized and on the Internet for people to look at. The Fisher book also comes with a history of Malden, Massachusetts where the Sargents and Fishers all lived. That is pretty awesome. I still wish the ladies got their due in these books. I know. I know. I need to stop thinking like someone born in the 20th Century. Look. I can't help it. French-Canadian and Italian records spoiled me! They documented everybody!

    I will say this for the Fisher book. The biographies are more fleshed out than the Sargent one. I've seen some interesting stories on here that would more than flesh out any profile on your favorite genealogy program. There's a lot of great information that could be put to good use. Sadly, the problem is still there when it comes to the ladies. At least the history is still there and the information gels with records I have found. I've found several people who lived in Haverhill but they were few and far between. Having more of them would have been the icing on the genealogy cake.

    The really weird thing about this book is that it should have provided a number for readers for certain people in the family. Ideally, my fifth great-grandfather Lewis Fisher should have had an entry in the book. He should be entry number 473 instead of Salem.  I guess if you bought the Fisher book hoping to find the rest of Sarah Sargent's line you'd have been out of luck. It's just really weird how the author never went into details on Lewis's line.

    This is just another thing that really confuses me about the books. While the information is undoubtedly correct, some people are omitted for one reason or another. My guess is that they didn't have the tools we have today. Genealogy in those days meant you had to lug around heavy books and spend hours looking through them hoping to find that juicy nugget of information.

    The weird thing is that I thought I once saw my 4th great-grandfather mentioned in the book. It's like the Mandela effect where you think something was one way when in fact it's another. Maybe he was mentioned in another book? Perhaps. It's just as well. I really shouldn't look a gift horse in the mouth. These genealogy books are a treasure trove of information and while it does bother me that the ladies aren't covered as well as the men it does go into exhaustive detail on the history of various towns in Massachusetts.

    I've been told that I'm extremely lucky that these books were well researched. I haven't really found anything wrong with them unlike some of the other books out there. Were the Massachusetts ones better? Or were records in Massachusetts just that easier to come by. Even genealogy books documenting New Hampshire were pretty decent. I guess with a little care and some digging some books were better than others. And unfortunately history repeats itself. These books were basically printed Wikipedia articles for your ancestors. Take them with a grain of salt the size of Rhode Island. You might be lucky with them like I was or you might find something that's wrong on so many levels.

See ya next time!

*  "Sargent genealogy : Hugh Sargent, of Courteenhall, Northamptonshire and his descendants in England" by Sargent, Aaron, 1822-1913; Sargent, John S., 1839- is property of Google.

*"The Fisher Genealogy: A Record of the Descendants of Joshua, Anthony, and Cornelius Fisher"

by Philip A Fisher is property of Google.

52 Ancestors Week 28: Leisure Time

 Week 28:

The theme for Week 28 is “Leisure Time.” Sure, our ancestors were hardworking people, but they also would enjoy themselves from time to time. What is a leisure activity that an ancestor did? Have any of those been passed down to you?

Farming or fishing. Let's let fate decide.

    As we all know our ancestors worked hard for their money. So hard for their money. As a result they've had to set aside some time to relax and take their minds off of everything. Here in the Merrimack valley you have a wide variety of options to choose from. You could either fish in the river/open ocean, golf, mess around in a garden or take part in any other activity your heart desired. There is literally nothing you can't do around here! This message has been brought to you by the greater Merrimack Valley Tourism Board. Where's my check?

    In all seriousness, there is one constant among everyone in my family tree who has lived in the Merrimack valley. You know it. I know it. I've written about it loads of times. Virtually everyone at one time or another has either gardened in their time off, went out on the ocean or hit the beach. What else can you do when the sun is blazing overhead? It does get warm here in the summer and the cool sea breeze does wonders to sooth the nerves. Aye, there's noting quite like the siren's call of the open ocean. Or is that just somebody telling someone else to turn down the music? It's honestly hard to say.

    This picture of my 2nd great-grandparents Joseph Laplante and Georgianna Ross is quite possibly one of the earliest pictures I have of an ancestor at the beach. It was taken during the mid 1920s and as you can see they all looked pretty stylish in their '20s era beachwear. Believe it or not this picture is exactly one hundred years old. I wonder if it was taken one hundred years ago this week!  It's very possible! I know the date because my grandfather or my grandmother labeled the picture themselves. I just cut off where they wrote notes. They did that a lot with old photos. Relax. I have a copy of original with the notes. I just cropped it out for easy viewing!

    I wish I knew what beach they were hanging out at on was. The Laplantes lived in Newburyport and there were three beaches you could cool off at during the summer.. Salisbury Beach, Plum Island and Cranes Beach were all a quick drive from the city. The safest bet is that this is Salisbury beach. Back in the day the town center was hopping with activity and people came from all over to have fun at the local arcade. Yes, they had arcades back then. Just no Street Fighter or Mortal Kombat. Oh, wow. Can you imagine?!

    Many people even had beach houses on Plum Island that are still standing today. In fact, whenever we visited my mother would point out her grandparents' Austin and Henrietta's beach house. My mother visited them there quite frequently and Austin would teach her and her siblings how to fish. The funny thing is that he never told the grandkids about the time their skiff hit a Coast Guard cutter in the mid 1930s The boat capsized and the sailors had to fish three people out of a very polluted river. Obviously they survived. It would have made for a great story. When I found the article in the Newburyport archives, I had to show my aunts and uncles what happened. To say everyone laughed is a bit of an understatement. They never heard the story and I guess they never expected their descendants would find out about their adventure.

    Naturally, the Italians also went to the beaches.  I'm pretty sure there are Carrabs sisters in this picture. My father and I spent a considerable amount of time trying to figure out who was who. I swear the lady in the back in the sort of bikini is my great-aunt Louise. I'm not sure who the rest are, My grandmother cold be sitting on the ground front and center for all I know!

    Yeah, I know. I'm a bad grandson for not being able to pick out my grandmother in a lineup. Cut me some slack! I've never known her with dark hair. For as long as I could remember her hair was blond (dyed, of course). I didn't know she and her sisters had black hair until most of them passed away. Do you honestly think five little old Italian ladies would tell me that their hair color wasn't natural?!  No. I rest my case! One day I'll figure out who all those people are. And the guy in the middle with a ton of swagger, too.

    Judging by the two pictures here it's clear that life has always been a beach for ancestors of mine who made their home in the Merrimack valley. People from both Haverhill and Newburyport flocked to the sandy beaches when the weather got hot. Generations later my parents did the same thing. We'd go to Salisbury beach, Cranes and Plum Island many times. We even went to where ye olde arcades used to be and play all kinds of games. The area is still abuzz with activity and every time I visit I get a little nostalgic about days gone by. As for my ancestors? Well, I'm sure they felt the same way. When you live near a beach, the experiences you have there can last a lifetime.

Just don't swim in the Merrimack. Trust me, bro.

See ya next time!

52 Ancestors Week 27: A Record I Read Differently Now

 From Amy Johnson Crow: Week 27:

The theme for Week 27 is “A Record I Read Differently Now.” Genealogy isn’t just reading a record once and being done with it. (At least, it shouldn’t be!) What is a record that you found some time ago that has a different meaning for you now? It could be because you understand that record better or maybe you’ve since learned something about your ancestor that makes that record appear in a new light. 

Nothing like going back and saying "Huh. I didn't see that before."

    Believe it or not I've actually gone back to look at several documents I've collected over the years if I'm bored or there's not much going on. Call me crazy but I do like checking stuff out in case I missed a clue that's been tapdancing in front of my face the whole time. See Jeremiah Felker's death record for details.  His grandfather was listed as his father instead of Elias, his actual father. I still don't know if that was a mistake on the part of the informant (His wife Elizabeth) or if there was some bad blood between father and son. To be honest, I kind of don't want to know. Clearly there was some drama and sometimes you don't want to pull the band-aid off. Check the profiles on WikiTree or read some of my blogs with him in it and you'll see what I mean. 

    Aside from the American records, sometimes I look back at Italian records and see if I missed anything there. For a long time I couldn't really read Italian and now that I can I can read them a lot differently. See what I did there? Huh? Huh? Yeah, I didn't think that joke was funny, either.

    The marriage record for my great-grandparents Giuseppe Carrabs and Clementina Forgione is probably one of the first Italian records I ever found. Back in 2006, I decided to put a tree up on Ancestry for fun. I put a tree up and added what I knew about my grandparents, my great-grandparents and a few second great grandparents. It was not the best looking tree on the website and really needed polishing. I still don't understand how it automatically added a line that went to 1000 AD on me. When it was proven wrong, I had *SO* much fun deleting all those people. I was honestly happy to get rid of them. Someone was worried that I'd be mad. Why should I be? If it's erroneous, they need to go!

    Anyway, the marriage record was one of the first Italian records I found. I didn't know about Antenati back then. All I got on my Italian side were records scanned by a lady named Gesualdogenie. Gesualdogenie aka Mary scanned the entire town of Gesualdo with some help and her tree is a big help for anyone who has roots in Gesualdo.

    In 2006, I really couldn't read Italian at all. Back then my experience with the Italian language was basically just the words "ciao" and maybe a few curse words. I'm not going to repeat them here! This is quite literally a family blog!  Naturally, I wanted to make sure that these records were accurate before attaching them to my tree. I sent a message to Gesualdogenie and she assured me it was one hundred percent accurate. She told me how she got the records and even translated a few for me. I didn't just get Giuseppe and Clementina's marriage record. I got their birth records and several generations of records in the span of one weekend. Like I said. Mary spent a lot of time working on Gesualdo and this was before Antenati was a thing! Her help was incredibly invaluable. At that time I wish I knew Italian.

    As time went by I eventually learned some Italian thanks to a few friends and figuring stuff out on me own. I decided to go back and read the documents Mary sent me back in the day. It wasn't that I doubted her by any means. No, no. I knew she was correct. She's a pro genealogist and while sometimes even pros make mistakes I just knew Mary was right about the Gesualdo documents. I'm not sure why. Call it a gut feeling. Sometimes those work.

    I looked at the records again and to the surprise of no one she was correct. The record clearly stated that they were married on March 11th, 1905. Both sets of parents were listed along with their jobs and living status at the time. What the record doesn't tell me is how the witnesses were connected to the happy couple.

    I suppose I should pick my battles, right? Right. I'm likely not going to get information on every single person on one marriage record. It would be nice. But it's not necessary. If anything the people listed were probably cousins of the bride and groom. I just wanted to see the information for myself since I was starting to get better at reading Italian and of course that depended on how well the document was scanned and how legible the handwriting is. Let's face it. Some of the clerks out there had pretty bad handwriting. Not gonna lie.

    After twenty years working on my family history, I guess I can say that I can read Italian records differently now. And by that I mean I can actually READ them. All it took was a little time, patience and some help from some very cool people. Does this mean I can carry on a conversation with someone in Italian? No. Of course not! Don't be silly. I can tell you what a record says as long as the scan is decent.  I'm just glad that I can read the records better now than I did before. It was hard in the beginning asking people if they could translate something. I'm sure it was a little annoying. But I got through it and now I help people with their Italian records. The Circle of Life continues.

See ya next time!

52 Ancestors Week 26: A Hard Choice

 From Amy Johnson Crow: Week 26:

The theme for Week 26 is “A Hard Choice.” We usually don’t know exactly what an ancestor thought about a choice they faced, but when you remember that they were human, it isn’t hard to imagine. For instance, imagine how it would feel to contemplate moving to the other side of the country – or the other side of the world.

Where do all these free sign post images come from?!

    Life is all about hard choices and our ancestors are no stranger to making difficult ones over the course of their lives. Earlier this year I wrote a blog about how hard it must have been for my great-grandmother Maria Tedesco to leave San Pietro a Maida for Haverhill knowing she might not ever see that Calabrian town ever again. Sadly, she never did. It's a risk you had to take when traveling across the ocean. However, immigrants didn't always travel by sea. They traveled by land as well. I know I don't talk about it a lot but can you imagine the hard choices a French-Canadian immigrant had to make when they went south to the United States? I'm not talking about just their toppings for French fries. Poutine does sound good, by the way.

     Like the Italians, they had to contend with a language barrier because they spoke a different language than most of the people in America.  French was not spoken in New England like it is in Canada. There's no doubt about it. French-Canadians had to make hard choices like the ones their Italian friends had to make.

    Now picture another hard choice. Imagine being a French-Canadian woman living in Haverhill in 1901. Your husband unexpectedly passed away at the age of forty-nine leaving you with several small children including an infant. You two had been through a lot together. You and your husband lived with your parents in a very crowded house and moved out when it was financially possible. Do you attempt to raise the kids by yourself or do you try and find a husband who could help you raise your many children?

    Enter my 2nd great-grandmother Lucie Cadran. She was just forty-six years old when her husband Antoine Legault fell ill and unexpectedly passed away. When he died their oldest child Lucy was in her mid twenties and their youngest Oliver was an infant. In between those two she had young adults, teens or young children to look after and keep in mind there were a lot of them! People say Italians have large families....

    When he passed away, Lucie had to make some pretty hard choices and at the turn of the century there weren't a lot of options available for her.

    The most logical choice we in the twenty-first century would say would be "Lucie should get a job!" Uhh...that would be pretty difficult. I would imagine it'd be pretty hard for her to find a job in 1901. Women like Lucie didn't even have the right to vote until the 1920s. The right to work was still in its infancy. She still needed someone to help with the children.

    In the 1910 census in Haverhill, she was living with her children Blanche, my great-grandmother Henrietta, Clara and Oliver. This was the first census without Antoine being present and from the looks of things they were living a decent life. The children's' ages at that point ranged from eight to 17 and I'd like to think that seventeen year old Henrietta was helping her dear mother with the rest of the motley crew.

Austin Felker and Henrietta Legault

    Eventually, Henrietta moved out since she married Austin Felker just three years after the census was enumerated. She and Austin still lived in Haverhill and chances are she still helped her mother with the kids whenever she could. 

    After Henrietta and Austin got married, Lucie was still likely feeling pressure. She was raising quite a few children by herself and most of her children were married by the 1910s.They were living their lives and grandchildren were being born at the time so time with the family and with their mother became a bit of a balancing act.  She still needed help with her children after spending more than a decade as a single mother.

    In those days, being a single mother was a bit of a taboo topic. Though, I think a widowed mother might have been less of a hot topic. Regardless of age, single motherhood was probably looked upon with pity and maybe a little scorn. Once Henrietta was out of the house and living her own life, she had a choice to make. Should she stay a single/widowed mother and raise Blanche, Clara and Oliver by herself? Or should she find herself a husband. 

    From a 21st century perspective she seemed to be doing alright for herself. I didn't see a job listed but she did have plenty of help. Though, I understand the need to find someone. She might have been lonely and wanted someone to help with the children. And that's where Paul LaHaye came in. I don't really know how he met Lucie. Chances are they met in church or something. However, I do know that they were married in 1917. That was four years after Austin and Henrietta got married.

Blanche and family (Not her grandkids.)

  How the children reacted to the new man in their mother's life is anyone's guess. Was he a good stepfather? I honestly have no idea. I assume he was but then again it's hard to say. By the 1920 census, the only child living with them was Blanche and her first husband Frank Paradis.

    Blanche had changed her last name to "Lahaye" and everyone else was scattered by that point. Some of the Legault siblings obviously still lived in Haverhill. Matilda was living in Connecticut and I'm not sure where Oliver was living. I suspect he was living in Falmouth, Mass. since he married a woman there. I'm not entirely sure about that. 

    I do know that in the end Lucie may have made the best decision for her. Sadly, Paul passed away sometime in 1932. This meant that he and Lucie had a good twenty years together before he passed away. At least we can say she wasn't lonely.

    Lucie passed away in 1937 and for some reason she's not buried with her second husband. I'm not sure why. She's buried with her daughter Mary , her husband Oliver Gariepy and her family in Saint Joseph's cemetery in Haverhill. To date I have not been able to find Paul's final resting place. He may be buried with them. I'm not sure and I'm not in any real rush to try and find him. Finding him is not as important as finding Antoine's final resting place to me. As of this blog I still haven't been able to find his grave! It's so annoying!

    Anyway, Lucie clearly had to make a hard choice. She chose to be a single mother for over a decade before marrying Paul. In those days, being a single mother was extremely hard, and possibly looked at as a less-than-desirable situation. One has to wonder if she felt pressure to find a husband after Antoine passed away. Some widows do not waste any time and get remarried right away. Some remained single and in the end it was really her decision to get married again. I don't like putting words in peoples' mouths. But I do know she likely made the right decision for her family. She had over a dozen children and while they likely helped when they could. Of course they had lives of their own and she more than likely respected her children's lives. Though, she probably would have accepted help. It takes a village and she had that for a good while before Paul came along.

    In the end, it was a tough call getting married after so many years being a single mother. In those days it was not an easy thing to do and one has to respect her hard choices. I like to think that the kids all turned out okay despite their mother's choices. Were they happy with Paul? Who knows? All I know is that it happened and Lucie had to do what she could. She likely didn't want to be alone and they seemed to have a nice life together. What more could anyone ask for after losing your first husband at a relatively young age?

See ya next time.