The Spiraling Chains: Kowalski - Bellan Family Trees
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The Babies

9/30/2012

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If you've ever done genealogy research, you probably already know that one of the most emotionally heart-breaking records to come across is a baby's death certificate.  Even though it is not your child, even though you never knew the child or his parents or his grandparents, it still leaves you sad.

Earlier this year, a childhood friend of mine lost her 11 month old  baby girl to cancer.  Of course, her death left dozens, if not hundreds of people in the community heartbroken and in disbelief.  She had been treated at one of the best hospitals in the nation, if not the world. The doctors used the latest technology and drugs to monitor and fight the cancer, yet they were ultimately unsuccessful.  The death of a baby in today's era of modern medicine is rare and I think that is one of the reasons why it affects us so deeply.  But we forget that not long ago, when childbirth was rough, when there were no vaccinations or antibiotics, when nutrition was poor, and when living conditions were not as sanitary as they are today, the death of an infant was much more common.  In 1901, the infant mortality rate in the U.S. was about 136 deaths out of 1,000 live births. (And THAT number was  an improvement over the  200 - 300 rates per 1,000 estimated in the 19th century and earlier.)  By contrast, in 2010 the infant mortality rate in the U.S. was approximately 6.8 deaths per 1,000 live births.  

I came across a couple of newborn death certificates fairly early in my research into my own relatives.  I was searching historical documents online for the names of my great-grandparents, Michael and Sofia Bodziony.  (At this point, I didn't know my great-grandmother's maiden name - these death certificates gave me the answer.  It was kind of a "Eureka!/sigh of sadness" moment, if that makes sense.)   
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Source: Familysearch.org, "Ohio Deaths, 1908-1953"
Michael and Sofia had been married less than a year and this was their first child.  The cause of death is listed as 'anemia of brain' with difficult labor, breech presentation and cord compression.  These are the days before prenatal care and obstetricians.  Most women only had a local midwife to assist in births, and, in the days before c-sections, if things went wrong there was not much the local doctor could do for the mother or the infant.  After two successful pregnancies and births, Sofia had another difficult labor which resulted in a stillborn baby boy. (She went on to have three more daughters who lived into adulthood.) 

As I started researching Tony's side of the family, I found similar patterns all too often.  In the 19th century (and earlier), death certificates weren't routinely issued, so a gravestone may be the only proof of where and when a death occurred (and may be the only evidence that a person existed at all!)  Even if I can't find an actual record of an infant death, such as a death record or gravestone, it can be inferred by spacing of other children in the family.  The natural spacing of children for a couple with average fertility is about 18 months - 2 years.  So, if I see in a census schedule that the children are ages 2, 4, 8, 10, 11, then it's probably a good bet that the couple either suffered a late miscarriage or that a young child, who would have been about 6 yrs at the time of census, died.  However, I may never figure out the name or birthdate of that child.

Coming across records like these make me grateful to live in 2012, grateful to be blessed with the resources and knowledge to keep my children safe and healthy.  And just because the death of an infant was much more common in our ancestors' times, it doesn't mean that their families suffered from it any less than we do today.  Just like today, I'm sure a mother back then would have carried her grief of a lost child in her heart and mind until the day she died.


©2014, copyright Emily Kowalski Schroeder

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Foto Friday: A Tale of Two Tonys

9/28/2012

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Anthony Schroeder on Wedding Day May 1919
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Anthony Schroeder on Wedding Day July 2004
My husband, Tony, next to his Great-Grandfather, who was also named Anthony.  You can definitely see some family resemblance, can't you?  (Lots more hair gel in 2004 Tony's hair - me thinks a little too much? :)  Great-Grandfather Anthony was 24 when he was married in 1919; Tony was 26 when we were married in 2004. 

©2012, copyright Emily Kowalski Schroeder

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Map Monday: U.S. Immigration 1880 - 2000

9/24/2012

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I came across a very cool interactive 'Immigration Explorer' map that was created by the NY Times a few years ago.  Here is what the interface looks like:
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At the top of the map is a time bar on which you can move the little arrow to pick which decade's data you want to look at.  This feature is really neat if you are interested in looking at how immigration trended geographically over time.  Data is individualized by county, and if you hover over any county (for which there is data available), you can see foreign-born population as compared with total county population.  Of course, the colors represent different geographical regions across the globe from which people emigrated. (Oh, and you can zoom in to a particular state or region in order to better see the counties.)  If you click on "number of residents" in the upper-right corner, you get a different way to look at the data.  The larger the circle, the more foreign-born residents live in that county at that time:
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But what if you are interested in looking at immigrants from only one specific country?  There is a way to do that, too.  In the upper-left corner is an "All-Countries" pull-down menu.  Click on any of the nations or regions listed, and the map will show only data for that nationality.  For example, the second map below shows only data for Italy:
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It's definitely a fun interactive map to play around with, especially if you are interested in geographic immigration trends over time.  Check it out!

©2014, copyright Emily Kowalski Schroeder

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Foto Friday: A 1920s Wedding

9/21/2012

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Wedding Photo of Olga Bellan and Leonard Schaefer, September 1923. (Source: Personal collection of Jennifer Bellan Kowalski)
Not to sound too much like Cher in Clueless, but isn't this photo classic?  This is my Grand-Aunt Olga Bellan on her wedding day in 1923.  It's all so very F. Scott Fitzgerald, isn't it?  The flapper-style dresses, short wavy hair, and Greek goddess-like headpieces; I love it all.  Interesting, though, how you could put the men's fashions in a wedding today, and they would look completely normal.

Olga was born in 1901, so she was 22 yrs old in this photo.  Unfortunately, four and a half years later, she died of complications related to tuberculosis.  (Her younger sister, Mary, died of TB four months prior to Olga's death.)  My mom said that her dad, who was the second-youngest child in the family, never talked about his older siblings who passed away before their time (a brother, John, died in 1922 at age 16 of rheumatic fever).  Either he didn't remember much, or those times were just so painful for the family that he didn't want to bring it up.  I'm glad this photo has survived, though.  I think Olga's eyes look just like mine, both in shape and color. I've got the Bellan eyes.


©2014, copyright Emily Kowalski Schroeder

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Adele

9/19/2012

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PictureAdele Licciardi, 1944
No, not THAT Adele; not the sassy, soulful British-born singer-songwriter.  This post is about the person with whom I associate the name, my Great-Grandmother, Adele.

She was born Adele Parrazzini in 1895 in the northern Italian city of Milan.  We don't know much about her childhood or upbringing.  My uncle has told me that she met my great-grandfather, Luigi Licciardi, when he was on business in Milan; he was originially from Palermo, Sicily, and back then there was not a whole lot of intermingling between the north and the south.  They were married in 1913 and my grandmother, Dina, and her sister, Yola, were born in 1914 and 1915, respectively.  Luigi (Louis) became a captain in the Italian army during WWI.

I don't think anyone in the family knows why they decided to immigrate to the United States.  Like many other European nations, there was a post-war recession and civil unrest in Italy, so perhaps they had good reason to leave.  Or perhaps they had heard about what America had to offer from friends and their adventurous spirit won out.  Louis arrived at Ellis Island in October 1920.  As was the common practice among immigrants at the time, he made the journey ahead of the rest of the family in order to secure a job, make connections, and find a place in which to live.  Well, apparently Adele got tired of waiting for her husband to send word to come over, because she sold some of her jewelry and bought passage tickets for her and her two young daughters.  Below is her ship manifest.  The fact that she declared her MAIDEN name may have had something to do with the fact that she wasn't too happy with her husband at the time.  My uncle told me that the first thing Louis said to her when he met them in NYC was, "Where's your hat?"  Ah, the romance :)  They arrived in New York City on May 12, 1921.

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Ship Manifest for Adele, Dina, and Yola Licciardi.
Once they were settled in Cleveland, both of my great-grandparents became very involved in the Italian-American community.  Great-grandpa was a member of Italian societies and served on influential committees that were active in hosting events when Italian consuls visited Cleveland.  (My mom was looking at my grandmother's wedding photos a few months ago and said something to the effect of "Who knows?  One of these guys (in the photos) could be Chef Boyardee!," because Louis loved hobnobbing with the top notch Italian-Americans of the city.)  Adele was just as active as her husband.  Here is a 1934 Cleveland Plain Dealer photo of her with a group of Italian students who she helped greet with some of her local Italian neighbors and friends:
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Source: The Cleveland Plain Dealer
One of the interesting things I learned about Adele during my research is that she ran into some snags when she applied for citizenship.  Louis was granted full citizenship in 1927, but Adele didn't begin her petition for citizenship until 1942.  (I found this to be the case with my Polish immigrant great-grandparents as well; the husband applied for and was granted citizenship long before the wife.  I don't know why, but it may have had something to do with being able to work.)  Shortly after she filed her petition, Adele received this letter:
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Adele, the ENEMY ALIEN!  It's hard to imagine my short, little old great-grandmother as a threat to anybody.  But it was World War II; Italy was an enemy.  According to the Nationality Act of 1940,
 
"An alien who is a native, citizen, subject, or denizen of any country, state, or sovereignty with which the United States is at war MAY be naturalized as a citizen of the United States IF such alien's declaration of intention was made not less than two years prior to the beginning of the state of war..." 

Adele did NOT make her declaration of intention two years before the U.S. went to war with Italy, so that explains this letter.  Of course, her classification did not last forever, and she became a full cititzen of the U.S. on June 15, 1945.

What do I remember about my great-grandmother?  She had an apartment in the only high-rise apartment building in our suburb.  She had lived there by herself since great-grandpa died in 1974.  My mom and grandma would sometimes take me and my brother to visit her on Sundays after morning mass.  We loved going out onto her balcony and looking down at the street.  She always had a tin of these butter cookies for us to eat.  We always thought they were so fancy!
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She would give us milk to drink in little colored depression-era glasses.  She hated to cook so her freezer had microwave dinners in it.  She spoke English very well, but there was the hint of an Italian accent to some of her words.  Oh, and I'll never forget that she had these borderline scary-looking glass clown figurines placed around the apartment for decoration.  I'm sure that they were antiques and probably worth some money, but that doesn't matter when you are eight years old and you feel like they are following your every move. 

Adele lived until 1990, when she was 95 years old, and she lived by herself that whole time.  She liked being independant; even during her last days, she didn't want to be in the hospital.  She just talked about going back to her apartment.  I feel like I was fortunate to be able to get to know her a little.  I look at this photo of myself and am amazed to think "This is ME, with someone who was born in the 19th century!"  Maybe this is one of the reasons I am so fascinated by learning my family's history; I have real memories of a person in our family who made the decision to start a life in America, and who is, subsequently, one of the people with whom I can credit for making ME an American.
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My brother and I with our Great-Grandma Adele on my First Communion Day, 1987.
©2014, copyright Emily Kowalski Schroeder

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On the Practicality of Marriage

9/16/2012

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Earlier this past week, I read an article on NPR.org entitled "Can Marriage Save Single Mothers From Poverty."  The big statistic (as gathered from recent census data) is that a "third of families headed by single mothers is in poverty and they are four times more likely than married-couple families to be poor."  My initial reaction was "Well...duh."  Of course there is a better chance for a family to earn more money and be above the poverty level if there are two able-bodied workers in the home.  I read a few more articles from other news outlets and "traditional" family-oriented organizations that discussed the same statistic.  Not surprisingly, the more conservative, traditional family organizations hailed the institution of marriage as the obvious answer to solving the woes of families in poverty.  And, of course, that got the online comment and debate boards rolling.

In modern society, it's absolutely ridiculous to tell a single mom (or dad) to get married, or stay married in an unhealthy relationship, just to avoid poverty. (This is my opinion, but I think a lot of you would agree with me.)   And many of the online comments reflected how extreme this option seems in the 21st century.  How could you marry someone without being in love with them?  Why would you take vows to stay with a person forever just because it will help you economically?  And in today's world, it does sound absurd, BUT until relatively recently this WAS how single-parent families, especially those with young children, DID stay out of poverty. 

Let's go back, say, 150 years.  You live in a small rural farming community.  How did you meet your first husband?  At church?  Or maybe you attended the local schoolhouse together?  Perhaps your fathers farmed land adjacent to one another.  Considering how slow and difficult traveling long distances was at that time, most people tended to stay near their towns and most definitely within their home counties for their entire lives. 

The image below is a map of land owners in Wabash Twp, Darke County, Ohio in 1875.  My husband's great-great-great-grandparents were John Nicolas (J.N.) Grilliot and Mary Anne Aubry.  Just by looking at the map, you can see how (and why) the marriage came about.  ("S. Aubry" is Mary Anne's brother, Stephen, who inherited the land from their father when he died in 1873.  Stephen actually married one of John Nicolas's sisters.)

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Portion of 1875 Wabash Twp, Darke Co, Ohio Land Ownership Map.
Marriages initiated by local neighborhood proximity were commonplace and even expected well into the 20th century, and not just in the rural areas.  The addresses of my grandparents on their 1939 Cleveland, Ohio marriage license are literally right around the corner from each other.  Of course, people still fall in love with and marry people they grew up with, but that phenomena is much less common than it used to be. 

Ok, so you are, say, 34 years old, living with your husband on your farm (which you may own outright or on which you may be paying a mortgage) and you have 6-7 kids.  What happens to your family should you or your husband suddenly die?  In a time when good hygiene and antibiotics didn't exist, disease and infection were all-too-common parts of life.  In the mid 19th century, women were 40 times more likely to die from childbirth-related complications than they are today.  Work-related accidents, whether on the farm or in a factory, took many parents' lives as well.  Life insurance did not exist and many families only scraped by as it was, so there was no savings to draw from.  There were no government-sponsored welfare programs; any assistance to families in distress originated from local neighbors and churches.

Widows and widowers with small children usually found it necessary to remarry in order to keep their families intact and to keep food on the table.  There were no such things as day care centers to watch the kids while mom or dad worked 12-14 hour days.  Occasionally, neighbors or extended family members could help, but nearly everyone had their own families to support and sometimes they could not handle that extra burden.  A struggling single parent would often be forced to send several of his/her children, some as young as nine years old, to live and work for other families as farmhands or house servants.  Even if they were able to stay at home, other children would be forced to quit school in order to work on the homestead or find a job in the community. 

The death of a parent forced my grandfather's family to split up temporarily.  My great-grandmother, a Polish immigrant, died suddenly of appendicitis in 1919 at the age of 29, leaving my great-grandfather with four sons between the ages of ten and five.  In the 1920 census, my great-grandfather and the two oldest boys are living with a cousin and the third boy is living with another family.  I cannot find my grandfather, the youngest, in this census, so I don't know where or with whom he was living.  My great-grandfather remarried in 1921, at which point I know the brothers were reunited.

Did all of these widows and widowers marry because they fell in love, or was it more because of the need to take care of their families?  Old marriage certificates can't tell us that, so we'll never know for sure.  It's unrealistic to expect single parents to do so today, but, if I ever did find out that one (or more) of my ancestors' marriages were for more practical reasons other than for love, I would not judge them or think less of them.  They did what they had to do for their families and their livelihoods.


©2014, copyright Emily Kowalski Schroeder

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    Emily Kowalski Schroeder

    Emily Kowalski Schroeder

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