We Owned A Cow

Francesco, Maria and Giovanni

My mom and dad came from two very different classes of Italian society. Dad's mom came from a very aristocrat family and mom's came from farmers and agricultural workers. When my mom's parents came to the US, they left their oldest son Giovanni in the care of my maternal grandmother's parents. I heard two stories about this; the first was that they...

Continue reading
  4985 Hits

Cousins

Sorrentino-Biz My Great Uncle Richard Sorrentino with my uncle Achille with the women at the shop c 1922

I've made several cousin connections using ancestry.com. With many of them we will simply exchange an email here and there on ancestry.com and compare some notes. I find that most people go to ancestry.com mainly to have a DNA test, an aren't that interested in building a family tree, making connections, or sharing information.Occasionally, you hit...

Continue reading
  4888 Hits

The Prince and I

hotel-palazzo-caracciolo-napoli-mgallery-collection-npoles-037

One of the most fun things that I discovered in my research was finding my look alike ancestor, Prince Marino Caracciolo II. Don Marino descends from the Caracciolo Rossi family, one of the oldest families in Naples, that date back to 950 AD. He was born in Atripalda on 9-6-1587 and died in Naples on 4-11-1630. His father was Don Camillo Count of T...

Continue reading
  4323 Hits

Finding Noble Roots

Nicola-Piromallo

Ever since I was a little boy, my dad would show me my great grandfather's card, and tell me that he was a count in Italy. I was always intrigued by that, but never really thought about asking my grandmother questions, or anyone else for that matter. About ten years ago, as more and more information was coming available, and after doing my first DN...

Continue reading
  5598 Hits