No coincidences!

I've written multiple times about coincidences and serendipity, which frankly, I don't believe in. I know these wonderful events happen for a reason - a glance in just the right direction, opening a book to just the right place, a person in the right place at the right time. That happened during my recent fall break, when I went with my friend Sue to Massachusetts, where we wallowed in history, including some family history. We drove down to Plymouth to find the final resting place of her ancestor the Reverend Chandler Robbins (1738-1799), who was interred with his wife Jane (Prince) in Plymouth's Burial Hill Cemetery. The cemetery itself is chock full of history - it was the location of the first fort the Pilgrims built, as it gives a spectacular prospect out over Plymouth in every direction.

As we drove up the hill to the cemetery, we noticed a beautiful stone church adjacent to the cemetery. Sue wondered aloud if we could take a peek inside, and I hoped so too!

As we turned right to find a parking place, Sue decided to drive around the block behind the cemetery, but as it was a one way street, we had to just drive around the other way and come in by the church again. As we parked in front of an old black pickup truck, Sue went to conquer the parking meter app and I looked around. A gentleman came running up from the church shouting "You're not going to give me a ticket, ah ya?" (accent included). No, I reassured him, we weren't the meter maids, we were just trying to take care of paying the meter. He and I got to chatting, and I mentioned my grandmother was born in Plymouth, her name was Mary Guidetti. "Oh," he said, "she must have worked for the Plymouth Cordage Company!" Impressed by his knowledge of Plymouth history, I told him that she didn't, but her father and uncles did. Then he told us he had been a firefighter in Dedham, Mass. Dedham? Well, didn't I have several generations of family who lived in Dedham? I told him so and mentioned Wenz and Vautrinot. His jaw dropped and he grabbed my arm. "Mary Wenz?!? I LOVED Mary Wenz! She WAS the American Legion!!" Mary Wenz was my Mom's first cousin - their fathers were brothers. And after speaking for a few minutes, he had me talked into donating Mary's father's photo album to the Dedham Historical Society.

Philip Wenz fought in World War One and was invited back by the town in France they had liberated. Phil was a photographer and labeled the photographs very carefully. I have always wanted it to go to a good home where it can do some good.

As it turns out, Nick is also involved in the refurbishing of the beautiful old stone church, the First Parish Church. The building we saw is the fifth church built on the site, the first constructed in 1648 (the original fort on Burial Hill was also their first gathering place for church services). So, we not only got that peek, we got the cook's tour!

Inside the foyer was a plaque commemorating the ministers of the First Parish Church from 1606 to 1922. Included in the list was Sue's ancestor Chandler Robbins!

Coincidence? Serendipity? You be the judge...

Unintended Consequences

 I've said it before - there are no coincidences in family history! So here is part one of a continuing saga of my Italian ancestors:

A few years ago, as I was serving in our church's temple in Atlanta, Georgia, I felt, rather than heard, my late grandmother say: "What have you done for my people?" (And that's exactly how she would have said that!) Well, Italian research is not easy. Although Italian culture stretches back thousands of years, Italy as a nation was not unified until 1861. Before that time, records are primarily found in the Catholic Church. I did have a great deal of success back in the late 1970s by writing to the local mayor in Cento, in the Province of Ferrara. But beyond that, I haven't researched much more than that. On paper, my surnames from Italy are: Guidetti, Fortini, Tassinari, Campana and Tosi. So I set that thought on the back burner and continued research on the other branches of our family's tree.

Just after last Christmas last year, I came across an envelope of my Gramie's newspaper clippings. As I sorted through them to determine their genealogical value, I found the obituary of her first cousin's husband, Humbert Pirani. He married Lucy Guidetti, daughter of Umberto and Louisa (Ardizzoni) Guidetti. 

I added Humbert to my familysearch tree, and as I usually do with new relatives, added him to my ancestry tree as well. Boy, did that make the green leaves bloom! I finally created a separate tree in ancestry just for Humbert and his family. Now I have over 2,000 names in that tree!

A few interesting developments have come from building Humbert's family tree:

• There are many other surnames in my DNA match list beyond the names on my paper tree, and many appear in the Pirani tree: Balboni, Breveglieri, Tangerini, Cavicchi, Gallerani, Ferrari, Pacheco and Barbieri. 
• One of my great-grandmother's brother came to Massachusetts, a previously unknown fact.
• Often on pages of documents relating to the Pirani tree, I would find names from my own tree. Now to connect the dots and see how they relate to me.
• One of my best friends in high school was Donna Marzilli. That name shows up in the Pirani tree.
• I have a good friend whose last name is St. Onge. He's from Haverhill, MA. Some of Humbert's relatives married St. Onges.
• Recently I was given the wedding guest book of my great-aunt's wedding in 1937. Helen Dorothy Smith was my grandfather Edmund Smith's sister. She married Amerigo James Guidetti. His sister Mary married Edmund. Confused yet? But in the wedding guest book I found more linked surnames from the Pirani tree: Gallerani, Ferrari, Baldi, Malaguti, Alberghini and Bergonzoni.
• I've always known that Ferruccio Lamborghini was also born in Cento. Now the Lamborghini name appears in the Pirani tree ten times!

One of the best things about this research has been learning more about my own Italian ancestors. It seems that the vast majority of the Italian immigrants who came to Plymouth as my great-grandparents did worked for the Plymouth Cordage Company. I was able to visit the museum at the former building while we were in Massachusetts last summer. I learned how it was that so many of the people from the Province of Ferrara came to Plymouth. 

So like Forrest Gump's box of chocolates, you never know what you're going to get! Stay tuned...