Got it! Grazie!

John

So I got my Italian passport three years ago (and profuse thanks again to all the people on the board who helped me), and I paid the fee and the tax for a year, and then I took a trip to Italy and used my new passport and it was very cool.

Now a few years have gone by and I've saved up for a trip ...

If your grandfather immigrated after 1906, then there is no problem. Write a letter to the USCIS asking for a record search and explaining that he was never naturalized. Include a copy of his birth certificate and an FOIA form. The address is:
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services
Attn: Records ...

wldspirit wrote:Try this search site

http//www.jewishgen.org/databases/EIDB/ellisgold.html

wldspirit

Wow! What a great site. Thanks, wildspirit.

Is it possible to find a ship's manifest by date of arrival?

I have a petition for naturalization (under age) for Sabino Petruzzi, which gives his arrival as 24 Dec 1893 at the port of New York, and his age as 21 in Oct 1904 -- making him 9 years old when he arrived.

I'd like to cross check this ...

Success -- the first step!

My sister just emailed me a birth certificate -- Sabino Petruzzo, son of Andrea Petruzzo and Filomena Verdi, born in Gesualdo 13 March 1880. So he's older than we expected but it's got to be him -- what are the odds that the parents names would match like that?

And on to ...

Hi Anthony. It sounds like Gesualdo is the place to look. I've entered all the information into an Excel spreadsheet. Should I email it to you? You can look it over and see if there's anything you can use, and if you find a connection, please let me know.

Valerie, I really appreciate all the help ...

Mom says Sabino's sister was named Rose Saldutti. My aunt says she was named Mary. Salvatore Petruzzi's draft card says he was employed by P. Saldutti's Sons. He lived on Downing St. and was employed on Jackson St.

My mother's birth certificate spells her name Maria Carmine Petruzzi. Father was ...

Damn! On Sabino's marriage license, Mary's mother is given as Carmenia Robertilo. But in my mother's photo album, Mary's mother is given as Carmella Sorde. I'll query this tomorrow.

My God, what a mess!

And to make things more difficult, Aunt Philomena says:
Salvatore and Vincenzo were brothers, but she thinks they were cousins to Sabino. They had a soda business. Mom doesn't remember a Vincenzo (or James). There were other relatives living on Downing Street in Newark.

On ...

Oops, sorry. They moved in with her maternal grandparents, Michael Torsiello and Carmenia Robertilo Torsiello (b. abt. 1868 d. 1941). They were both born in Italy. She thinks Reggio, Calabria but we have no evidence for this.

Why do you think Filomena and Andrea Petruzzo may have been in Newark ...

VJ, you are amazing!

My sister volunteered to lead the search for a birth certificate in Gesualdo, because she has a daughter who is majoring in languages and plans to study in Italy.

My mother says she now remembers an uncle named Salvatore, but I am dubious about this, because last week she didn ...

Wow!. I am super impressed, VJ. It will be bad news for my mother if it turns out her father was naturalized, so I'm not going to tell her at this point. Anyway, I just called her and got some additional information.

Sabino and Mary Petruzzi had three children:
Marie Carmen Petruzzi (my mother) b ...

Hi. I am trying to help my mother get Italian citizenship. We need her father's birth certificate, and to search for that we need to know the town he came from. My mother was 7 years old when he died and doesn't remember him much, except that he was sometimes called Sam.

Her father, Sabino ...

Okay, Valeri, I'll do that.

Thanks,

John