52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks: 2026 Week 2 - A Record That Adds Color

 The prompt this week is "A Record That Adds Color". I knew as soon as a saw it that I am meant to blog this week, because I just this week came across a newspaper article. While small, it adds color to the story.

This week I have been researching my grandfather's first cousin, Angelo D'Ercole. He was married at least three times, so I have been spending time getting to know his first wife this week. Angelo married Nellie Sambasile in Omaha, Nebraska 6 Jan 1945. A local Italian language newspaper announced the marriage and included the fact that "an excellent lunch in honor of the newlyweds was served at the Fontenelle Hotel." 

Liete Nozze Ellie Sambasile e Angelo D'Ercole Wedding Announcement Jan 29, 1945 The American Citizen (Omaha, Nebraska) Newspapers.com

I didn't pay much attention to that line until the next day when I found Nellie in the local city directory. The line about Nellie lists her parents living at the same address. What caught my eye was the information following their names that listed her father's employment; Charles Sambasile is listed as a pastry man at the Hotel Fontenelle! That little tidbit got me thinking about what it meant for Nellie's wedding lunch. I'm sure it was very excellent. Her father was listed in the 1930 census at a hotel cook, possibly also at the Fontenelle. I'm sure his coworkers took extra care in preparing and serving the lunch and making it a nice experience for the newlyweds. 

I then spent a little time learning about the Hotel Fontenelle. The Fontenenlle was an upscale hotel that opened in 1915. Through the years it hosted many celebrities from dignitaries including Harry Truman and John F Kennedy to sports personalities including Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig. The distinctive feature of the 18-story building was the tall castle-like spires at the top. The hotel transferred ownership several times until it closed permanently in 1971. Sadly, the hotel was demolished in 1983.

Image from Wikipedia

You can learn more about the history of Hotel Fontenelle on Wikipedia or at this site. 

 
HAPPY 2026!

I took a break from this blog and to a lesser extent, from researching my family history. In recent weeks I've started researching again and now it's time to get back to blogging about it. At this time I am concentrating on my PETRINI family line. Some of the affiliated surnames are ORSI, D'ERCOLE, and GALLACCI. As you've probably guessed, the family originated in Italy and migrated to the US in the early 20th century. Most of my research now is on the branch that settled in Omaha, Nebraska.

I hope to blog here more regularly about my discoveries. I will be using Amy Crow Johnson's "52 Weeks" prompts if they spark something in me, but I am not committing to using every prompt. I am also not confining myself to using ONLY those prompt. For now, let's just see where this goes. 

52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks: 2024 Week 3 - Favorite Photo

 The prompt for Week 3 of the 2024 52 Ancestors challenge is “Favorite Photo”. This is a re-run. The prompt has appeared in previous years of this challenge. You can see my previous entries here and here. But I have lots of photos and many are among my ‘favorites’, so this prompt never gets old.

This year I am sharing a photo of Mary Julia Parker. I don’t know the story behind the photo. I don’t even know who Mary Julia is. But this is one of my favorite photos anyway!

I’m assuming that Mary Julia as a friend of my grandmother’s when she was a young woman. There is no indication of the date or place where the photo was taken. I found the photo among my grandmother’s things, along with other photos. One of the photos is of my grandmother in a similar dress style in the same location. She is standing next to the water fountain and you can see the Camel billboard in the background. There is another photo of Grandma wearing the same dress that she has dated 1920. This photo was probably taken about the same time, before my grandmother married in 1923. My guess is that the location of the photo is St. Louis where my grandma lived at the time.

I’ve tried to find out who Mary Julia was, but I’ve had no luck at all tracking her down.

52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks: 2024 Week 2 - Origins

It’s week 2 of the 2024 52 Ancestors challenge. The prompt this week is “Origins”. Today I want to talk about the origins of the DeBee branch of my family. How did the DeBees came to be in America? 

Sylvanus Henry DeBee was my mother-in-law’s grandfather. The story she told is that DeBee is a French surname and that Sylvanus came to the United States from France. She also explained that original spelling was DeBoe or DuBois. The story is that Sylvanus changed the spelling when he came to America.

Is this a true story? There is probably at least a grain of truth to this story. DeBee probably does have French origins. After a couple of decades of genealogy research, I have not found an ancestor that came over from France. It definitely was NOT my mother-in-law’s grandfather, Sylvanus H. DeBee. His death certificate states that Sylvanus was born in Warren County, Pennsylvania. Census information corroborates this

It’s possible that his father, Lewis/Louis (Henry?) Debee was the original French ancestor, but that is not clear. Louis’s birth place is listed as France on the death certificates of his daughter Lucy. Pennsylvania is listed as the birthplace on the death certificates of his sons. The 1880 and 1900 censuses both state that the father of Sylvanus DeBee was born in France. My mother-in-law believed her grandfather was French. Was this because that is what her father told her?

Yet the 1910 census states that the father of Sylvanus was born in Canada (Fr). It’s possible that Louis was French Canadian by birth. It’s also possible that Louis was the first in the DeBee line to come to the United States. But it’s not clear whether he came way of Canada. Did he come from France, or was he descended from someone who came to Canada from France.

At this point, I can only conclude that the Debee family likely does have origins in France. I can’t confirm the original spelling of the name. I also can’t confirm who the first ancestor to come over from France was, or whether they stopped off in Canada. That leaves me a lot to research!

52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks: Week 1 - Family Lore

 It’s time for another year of 52 Ancestors. This year I plan to ‘think different’ about the challenge. In past years I’ve started out strong and then fizzled out after a few weeks. It seems that once I miss a week or two, I lose my momentum and just give up. One of the reasons that I give up is that sometimes I am not comfortable sharing what I want to write about. It feels too private to include on a public blog, because living people appear in the post. Sometimes there is sensitive information that could hurt people still living. So this year, I am going to try to write from each week’s prompt, but I may not be sharing online. I will keep my entries in Scrivener so that I can print them out at the end of the year. I will only blog the entries I am comfortable sharing.

The first prompt for 2024 is “Family Lore”. Family lore is part of the body of knowledge about the family. This is information that has been passed down through the generations. These stories that may or may not be true. Part of our Petrini family lore includes stories about my great-aunt China.

China was the daughter of Umberto Petrini and Eufrosina Pineschi. She was born about 1899 in Capannori, Italy. According to ‘family lore’ Ida was born China, pronounced ‘kee-na’. She went by Ida once the family came to the United States in 1907. I’ve not been able to find her birth record from Capannori, so I cannot verify her birth name. Every record I’ve found for her in the U.S. gives her name as Ida, pronounced ‘ee-duh’.

Ida married to Daniel Orsolini sometime between 1920 and 1928. She died at a young age. According to ‘family lore’ Ida died in New Orleans after being poisoned by her husband. Her family believed that Danieal was jealous about her affair with Rudolf Valentino. Yes, THAT Rudolph Valentino, the famous Italian-born star of silent films!

Rudolph Valentino See page for author, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

 

 

 

Is any of this true? I don’t know, but I’m doubtful that much of it is true. I was told that Ida and Valentino were from the same area of Italy. However, Ida came over from Tuscany, a province in northern Italy. Rudolph Valentino was born in Apulia, in southern Italy. Also, Valentino died in 1926, two years before the death of Ida in 1928. If her husband poisoned her because he was jealous, he nursed that grudge for a long time!

I also know that Ida did NOT die in New Orleans. I found a certificate for her death in Cook County, Illinois on 5 Jul 1928. The cause of death is listed as ‘Bilateral Pleurisy With Effusion’. There was a coroner’s certificate of death and an autopsy was held. It’s possible that the death was considered suspicious, leading the family to believe Ida was poisoned.

12 Months of Photos: March - Sports

March is coming to a close. My family has always been into sports, both as participants and as spectators. This month has been a busy one for spectating. We had March Madness watch party earlier this month. Coming up this week is our annual Home Opener watch party to mark the opening of Baseball Season! So there is a good reason that I almost forgot to post for the  12 Months of Photos challenge at WikiTree. The prompt this month is “Sports”. 

For as long as I can remember, sports and games have been an important part of our family gatherings. Almost every gathering included a game of wiffle ball or croquet or a wallyball tournament in the pool. If we were stuck indoors due to the weather we played a game of charades or trivial pursuit. 

The pictures below are of my Dad and his work buddy, Big John. They are playing an impromptu game of softball. My parents and Big John and his wife got together frequently to play pinochle. Meanwhile we kids played games or watched movies. We gathered often enough that when I was little, I thought Big John's kids were my cousins! 

These particular pictures are from a Labor Day celebration at Beaver Dam State Park in Illinois. It was a park my family visited often when I was growing up.

 

52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks: Week 10 - Translation

 It’s Week 10 of the 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks challenge. The prompt this week is “Translation”.
Most of the ancestors on father’s side of the family tree came spoke German. Most of my mother’s ancestors spoke Italian. Now throw in a little Dutch, a little Latin, and a little Slavic. I’ve gotten very good at asking for translation help! I’ve even gotten pretty good at translating a basic vital record from German or Italian to English! The hardest part isn’t translating one language into another; it is reading the handwriting!
But sometimes it is even harder to interpret a document that is written in English, my native language. Words written 100 years ago didn’t mean then what they mean today. And sometimes those words are obscure. One example is figuring out what people did for a living. Sometimes it is are. Many of my ancestors listed their occupation as ‘farmer’ or ‘laborer’. Other times it is not so easy. What is a ‘roller tender’. The death certificate of my great-uncle Harry Kolk lists his occupation as ‘roller tender’ in a flour mill. Googling has taught me that flour can be made by a rolling process, where the grain is crushed between rollers. And apparently someone had to tend to those rollers to make sure everything was proceeding as it should.
Many of my Ohio ancestors were involved in the pottery industry.

• The death certificate for William Anthony Brown lists his occupation as ‘Batterout’ for a china company.
• The 1920 census lists Eddie DeBee as a ‘Mold Runner’ in a pottery factory.
• James A DeBee was listed as a “Batter Out’ and later as a ‘Jiggerman’ in various censuses.
• Louis H DeBee was also a ‘Jiggerman’.
• I feel like I’m reading a foreign language. I need a ‘Pottery-to-English’ dictionary similar to the ‘German-to-English’ dictionary I used in high school!

Luckily for me—I found one! Or at least a good substitute. The Pottery Jobs Index. This is actually a site about pottery in England, but I’m assuming the job titles were the same in Ohio.

52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks: Week 9 - Gone Too Soon

It’s time for 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks. This week the prompt is “Gone Too Soon”. That brings to mind my cousin Maureen.

Maureen Elizabeth Malloy was born April 27, 1950 in Evergreen Park, Illinois. She was the second child of Clarence Malloy and Ruth Petrini. Maureen shared her middle name with her mother.

Maureen was a happy baby. She had sparkly eyes and dark curly hair. She brought joy to her parents, her grandparents, and her aunts. Sadly, just before her first birthday, Maureen became ill with what was probably a common cold. Within days Maureen was hospitalized with pneumonia. Sadly, Maureen passed away the day after her first birthday.

Maureen had an older sister at the time of her death. She had three additional siblings as well as many cousins. None of us ever got to meet Maureen because she was ‘gone too soon’.

12 Months of Photos: February - Homes

February is almost over and I haven’t yet shared a photo for the 12 Months of Photos challenge at WikiTree. The prompt this month is “Homes”. This month I am sharing a photo of the Hixon house in Michigan City, Indiana. This is a photo of Ella Herrold Hixon and her son, Julian Verne Hixon. They are standing in front of their house at 113 S Woodland Ave. Verne appears to be about 6 in this photo. The photo must have been taken about 1918.

 I found a street view of the house on Google Maps. This image was made in 2017. 

 

The house looks very much the same. The porch that spanned the front of the house is gone, but other features are still present. The leaded glass at the top of the front 1st floor window is still there. You can still see the double windows at the front on the 2nd floor. You can even make out the small round window at the side of the house. It’s amazing to me to see this house still standing 100 years later. I hope that someday I will have the chance to drive by the house.

52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks: Week 8 - I Can Identify

It’s another week of the 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks challenge. The prompt this week is “I Can Identify”.

Several years ago my cousin’s daughter sent me scans of some photos from her grandmother’s (my aunt) collection, along with some notes she had made.The collection had been handed down from Tecla Kolk, her father’s cousin. Many of the photos are unidentified.This is a photo from the collection. 

The baby is unidentified, but Tecla said it was a ‘boy cousin’. My cousin’s notes indicated that the photo is on black cardstock and appears to be of the same vintage as a photo of Tecla taken 1898-1899. Tecla had five male cousins, including my grandfather William and his brother, Harry.

• Harry - born Sep 1895
• Arthur - born Apr 1898
• William - born Nov 1898
• Paul - born Feb 1902
• Albert - born Jun 1904

If this photo was really taken 1898-1899, it cannot be either Paul or Albert as they were not yet born. This baby appears to be about a year old, and certainly no older than 2. Harry would have been 3-4 years old at the time, so he this cannot be Harry. That leaves only Arthur or William as possibilities.

I have no photos of Arthur, but I do have a photo of my grandfather. This is a photo of William with his older brother Harry, taken when William was 8 months old. 

If I compare the photos, I can say that the face shape, particularly the jaw line, is very similar. The nose on both babies is also almost identical. The eyes are not the same, but with a baby that age, it is hard to say. It could be sleepy eyes in the unidentified baby. I do see both my sister and my grandson in the unidentified baby.

I can’t say that I have 100% identified the baby in the first photo, but I believe it is my grandfather, William Kolk. I can say that the baby is definitely a Kolk.

Question of the Week: Do You Set Weekly Genealogy Goals?

There’s a new Question of the Week up at WikiTree. This week the question is: “Do you set weekly genealogical goals?”

My answer is: I do not.  Setting goals would be pointless as I always get sidetracked. But that is what makes it fun! I do try to blog 52 Ancestors each week, and to answer the Question of the Week, but I haven’t really set a goal.

I also have a rough outline in my head. Right now I am working my way down one branch of my tree, double checking sources and info, and looking for missing sources. But I don’t have a time limit. I go where the path takes me.

I have instituted a bit of a monthly plan this week. The first week I concentrate on updating WikiTree. Week 2 is for new research. Week 3 is to work on scanning and organizing my photos and other family records. And the last of the month is for ‘catch-up’. I don’t expect to really stick to it, but it is an effort to balance, so that nothing gets neglected.

Your turn! Tell me about any goals you have for your genealogy, weekly or otherwise. You can leave a comment here or answer the WikiTree post.

52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks: Week 7 - Outcast

 It’s week 7 of the 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks challenge and the prompt is “Outcast”. This week I am going to tell you a sad story of Nellie Weiss. It contains some difficult information. It happened over 100 years ago, so I think it is okay to tell the story.

I came across Nellie in my research for my Weiss line. I’ve not been able to prove that she is part of my line, and suspect that she is not. Nellie’s father was William Weiss. It get’s complicated because my Weiss line is one of two that migrated to the area in the mid-1880s. Both men were named Henry Weiss, and both has sons named William. Sorting this out gets difficult sometimes. Anyway, back to Nellie.

 

When Nellie was 17 years old, she was sent away to a reform school. She had become difficult to control, sneaking out at night and leading a life of ‘waywardness. So she was effectively cast out.

What is sad to me is that Nellie was obviously acting out. Nellie’s father was in prison because Nellie was his victim of incest. Nellie needed help, and today she would get counseling. Unfortunately that was not the case in 1915. Instead she had a probation officer who sent her off to reform school. To be fair, the probation officer did seem caring, and was trying to help Nellie. Unfortunately, she was limited by the ‘help’ available at the time.

 

I do not know what happened to Nellie. I hope she was able to get the help she needed and live a happy life. I’ve been unable to find any mention of Nellie after the court case. You can read the full story here.

 

 

Question of the Week: What's a Favorite Discovery You've Made In Your Research?

There's a new Question of the Week at Wikitree.

I've made many discoveries through the years, but one of my favorite was the discovery that my 'bachelor' uncle, Harry Kolk, had actually been married! I blogged about it for the 52 Ancestors i 52 weeks challenge a few years ago. You can read about that discovery here.

Now it's your turn. Tell me about one of YOUR favorite discoveries you've made. You can comment below or add your comment to the post at WikiTree here.

52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks: Week 6 - Social Media

 It's already Week 6 of the 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks challenge! This week the prompt is ‘Social Media’.

Many years ago I was helping to clean out our church library. I came across a stack of old newspapers from the small town where the church was located. The papers spanned the 1950s. One thing that struck me was how ‘chatty’ they were. Stories about who visited who, and what child suffered a dog bite or fell off the swings and needed stitches. There were stories about people traveling to St. Louis for the day, about 30 miles away. Now many people routinely make the trip daily for work or play. Definitely not newsworthy today!

This discovery of mine was before I got involved on Facebook. It didn’t take too long for me to realize those ‘social’ articles were the equivalent of a Facebook post today. So this week I am sharing a newspaper clipping. It tells of my great-uncle John Janco visiting my great-grandfather Paul Janco’s farm in Michigan.

Michigan Newspapers, 1817-2009, MyHeritage.com [online database], Michigan Newspapers, 1817-2009
MyHeritage.com [online database]

I created a simulated Facebook post to show how that news might be shared today. I guess sometimes we are more like our ancestors than we realize!

Question of the Week: If You Wrote a Novel About Your Family History What Would the Title Be?

Here is another Question of the Week from WikiTree.

I'm not very creative. But I think this title sums up how I feel about researching my family history:

Where Did They Come From? Where Did They Go?

What the title of YOUR family history novel be? Comment below or add your comment to the post at WikiTree here.

12 Months of Photos: January - Grandparents

This year there is a new photo challenge at Wikitree: 12 Months of Photos. Each month has a different theme. The January theme is "Grandparents".

By the time I was born, 3 of my 4 grandparents were already gone. I only knew my maternal grandmother. Consequently, there are very few photos of my maternal grandparents together. I think I only have 2 and one is very poor quality. This is the other one that I have—a photo of my grandparents with their two youngest daughters.

 To see photos of grandparents posted by other Wikitreeers, visit this thread.

52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks: Week 5 - Oops!

 

It’s week 5 of the 52 Ancestors challenge. The prompt this week is “Oops!”

If you’ve been involved in genealogy for any length of time, you’ve made a mistake. We all have. Sometimes this are little mistakes like misspelling a name. Sometimes they are big mistakes like adopting and following the wrong John Smith. Today I’m going to talk about one of my mistakes.

 

I have an Aunt Sis. Sis was not her given name, but it is the name she has been called by since she was a tiny tot. This is probably because she was the second girl in the family—the little sister.

 

I inherited my grandmother’s photo album many years ago. I was delighted to find a photo of the most adorable little girl. She was about 3 or 4 years old and had long blonde curls, sparkling eyes, and a beautiful smile. I didn’t recognize here, so I was lucky that that back of the photo had been labeled. “Sissy”! I’d wondered a bit about the blonde curls, since Aunt Sis has dark hair. But she may have colored her hair as an adult. Besides, I had shimmering blonde hair as a child, but it has been dark for years.

 

A few years ago my mom and I were visiting Aunt Sis, and I took along the photo album. The women had a great time reminiscing. The told me lots of family stories and identified several of the people that I didn’t know. Then I pointed out the picture of Aunt Sis and asked how old she was at the time it was taken. They set me straight immediately. That was NOT my Aunt Sis. That was Sissy, the daughter of their father’s cousin. OOPS!

 

52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks: Week 4 - Education

The prompt for week 3 of the 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks challenge is “Education”. There are a lot of ways I could have gone with this prompt. I could have talked about schools I’ve attended or career choices. I’ve decided to talk about a particular educator from my family tree—Lucile Hixon Striebel.

Lucile was born Leila Lucile Hixon in Michigan City, Indiana on November 26, 1896. She was the daughter of Julian Frank Hixon and Ella A. Herrold. Lucile was unusual for women of her time. After receiving her high school diploma, she went on to study education at Olivet College in Olivet, Michigan. She graduated with an A.B. degree in June 1918.
Lucile married Louis Daniel Striebel in Michigan City on June 27, 1922. At the time of her marriage, Lucile was teaching high school in Riverside, Illinois.
Lucile also held teaching certificates in the states of Michigan and Indiana. She taught into her 70s. In February of 1966 Lucile received a letter from the superintendent of the New Buffalo, Michigan school system. He wrote to remind her of the board’s policy: the retirement age was 65. The board felt that the policy should be implemented that year. However, in July she received a letter from the superintendent welcoming her back. She also received a probationary contract. She turned 70 in November of that year! Her Indiana teaching certificate was renewed for 5 years in 1970.

Lucile died in 1990 at the age of 93. She is buried next to her husband in Greenwood Cemetery in Michigan City.

QOTW: Which Of Your Ancestors Migrated The Farthest?

 There's another Question of The Week posted on the Wikitree forum.

This week's question is "Which Of Your Ancestors Migrated The Farthest?"

That one was a little tough to answer. My father's ancestors came from Germany to Illinois, a distance of about 4500 miles, "as the crow flies". My mother's paternal ancestors came from Italy to St. Louis, Missouri, a distance of about 4900 miles. But her maternal ancestors came a bit farther than any of them, from Aradać in current day Serbia to Peoria, Illinois, a distance of almost 5100 miles.

52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks: Week 3 - Out Of Place

It’s week 3 of the 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks challenge. The prompt this week is “Out of Place”.

My father was born and raised in Alton, Illinois. His family had lived in Alton and the surrounding areas since the mid-1800s, when his ancestors immigrated from Germany. Except for a brief period of time when he lived with my mother’s family after their marriage, my father spent his entire life in Alton.

Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

My mother was born and raised in St. Louis, Missouri. She did not leave St. Louis until about 2 years after her marriage, when she moved with my father to Alton. Her father’s family had immigrated from Italy to St. Louis in the early 1900s. Her grandfather, Umberto Petrini, had come to the United States first, arriving in 1904. The rest of the family followed him in 1908.

A few years ago I was researching his wife’s sister, Fravolina Orsi. Imagine my surprise when I found her living with Umberto and his family—in Alton, Illinois! This find was in the 1910 Alton City Directory.

The family wasn’t in Alton for long. By 1912, Fravolina has married in St. Louis. Umberto is found in the 1916 St. Louis City Directory. There may be earlier listings that are him, but I’ve not yet confirmed that. They were there only a short while. They couldn’t have guessed that 40 years later, their descendants would call Alton ‘home’!