Tuell.Net

Genealogy is such an adventure! And you never know where it will take you.  My paternal grandfather, Vincenzo DiMascio, came to the United States in 1904 from Pescina, a small village in L'Aquila, Abruzzo, Italy.  The story is that Vincenzo's father became widowed, remarried, and Vincenzo and his brother (who remains nameless to this day) left home - Vincenzo coming to the United States and his brother going to South America. There is virtually no information on his family. From time to time I would ask my father if any of his father's other family members ever came to the U.S. and he'd say no.

Then I found my grandfather and family in the 1930 census on Ancestry.com. A closer look showed a Joe and Anna DiMascio and family just down the road. People I'd never heard of. Too close to be a coincidence, I thought, so I said to my father on the phone next chance I got: "So, Dad, when you were living on the farm in Clarendon, Orleans County, New York, who were those DiMascio's who lived down the street? You know, Joe and Anna and ...?

"Oh", he says, "that was my father's cousin, Joe."  Hmmm ... if I could find out about them, perhaps they might have a bit more information. But, how do you approach people you've never met, and how do you find them?  Thank goodness for Google and the Internet. I searched for each child listed and came up discouraged — until I found Frank and Barbara, son and daughter-in-law of Joe and Anna, in California.

I sent a letter (explaining that I'm not a nut case, providing information about my family) and got an excited phone call in return. One thing led to another and I have family — Linda, daughter of Frank and Barbara — and we are sharing photos and information. (See her christening photo at left).

Then I saw a family tree on Ancestry.com — DeMascio — and met Dave, who is an even closer relative to Linda (and somewhere along the line the spelling of the last name changed!), and now Linda and I have another cousin! But wait, there's more! Dave's grandmother, Helen, is holding Linda in the photo!

My maternal fourth great grandmother is Delight Church (1783-1864), daughter of Samuel Church and Hannah "Polly" Rogers, and wife of John Rossiter Smith. Delight's next older sister was Dierdama Church, who married Daniel Smith (I suspect that Daniel and John Rossiter Smith are related, if not brothers — but that's another adventure). Daniel and Dierdama had a daughter, Phoebe, who married Isaac Dodge Bailey — and one of their descendents, Doug Bailey, answered a surname post I posted quite a while ago. He sent me wonderful photos of Dierdama and Phoebe — and now I have an idea of what Delight might have looked like. And I have a new cousin! It's just so darned exciting!

— Kathy Tuell