Does this make sense?

[ncaprio]

I want to email the Comune before I send away for copies of my Grandtaher's birth certificates to see what fee there is, if any, on the research. This is what I've come up with... but I want to make sure I don't embarrase myself!!

I signori cari,

Mi chiamo Nicholas Caprio e vivo in Los Angeles, California.

Faccio la ricerca nella mia famiglia - ed amerei richiedere una copia di certificato di nascita di mio Nonno. Prima che faccia la richiesta che ho voluta vedere se c'era un onorario coinvolto - in modo che potrei inviare un assegno con la richiesta.

Ringraziarla per il suo tempo.

Nicholas Caprio


Let me know what you think!

[maestra36]

You only need to send a self-addressed envelope, without a stamp, to request a birth record from Italy. There is no need, as far as I know, to send such a letter in advance. Most towns will send the copy for free. Did you use an internet translator rather than a form letter in writing the above? Internet translators are normally pretty bad grammatically. There are some form letters at the following websites:

http://www.angelfire.com/ok3/pearlsofwi ... tters.html

http://www.circolocalabrese.org/resourc ... /index.asp

[maestra36]

Be sure to include your grandfather's name plus his date of birth, if you know it. If you don't, you must include an approximate year of birth. I am finding that these towns will research within a 5 year period for a date, but if you give them a huge range, they'll come back and say they didn't find anything. Also, if you know the parents' names. you should include that info as well. There may be more than one person in the town with the same exact name as your ancestor, sometimes even born on the same exact day. So it's important to be as specific as you can when requesting information from Italy.