Mi Famiglia

On Thursday, we decided to take a train from Florence to a little town north of here called Reggio Emilia. This sleepy little town is the very place where, well over a century ago, my Great-Grandfather was born. His name was Cesare DePetri, and he was my mother's father's father. It was also very near here that his wife, Onesta, was born. They met and were married in Italy before having their oldest child and immigrating to the United States, where their family continued to grow. Mom brought along with her copies of all of the birth, marriage, and death certificates she could get her hands on, as well as a genealogy report my Uncle had done on ancestry.com.

We had been planning on taking a trip up to Reggio Emilia since we arrived, wanting to research the family and see if we could find any relatives still in the area. Mom was just about jumping out of her skin with excitement when we stepped off the train.

Upon our arrival, we had no idea where we would start. We began walking towards the center of town and stopped in a coffee shop for something to eat and to ask directions (to where, we weren't really sure...). The man working behind the counter understood enough English to give us directions to the "municipal building," which was at the center of the easily walkable town. We had also planned to check churches we came across for any family names in their baptism records. On our way to the municipal building, we passed a church and went in to see if we could find the parish office. No luck inside, but it sure was beautiful! We walked around the outside of the church to see if there was a separate entrance to the offices. Still no luck. We ended up around back of the church, and ran into a group of people standing around in a parking lot. They were all a bit older, and spoke virtually no English, but made a surprisingly large effort to try to help us. We apologized for  not speaking Italian and attempted to ask them in English where the church offices were. Five minutes and many hand gestures later, they finally figured out what we were trying to find.

One of the men turned to an elderly gentleman in a wheelchair-- who's name we deduced was Frank (ironically this is the same name as my Grandfather's, Cesare's son)-- and asked him in Italian where the church office was. Frank seemed hard of hearing, and also seemed to have no idea the answer to our question. They tried their best, and were very kind in attempting to help us, but they eventually told us the church was "all together" and pointed in the direction we had come. "Grazie!" we told them, with complete sincerity for their honest effort, and continued on our search.

W gave up on the church, and walked toward the city center, still following the directions of the guy in the café. We practically ran right into the municipal building (did I mention how small Reggio Emilia is?). We walked in and climbed a flight of stairs to our left. At the top was a door, which my mom timidly cracked open, poking her head into an office. A lady sat at her desk and appeared startled by our unexpected entrance. We apologetically explained, again, that we didn't speak Italian and tried telling her in English that we were looking for some family records. She seemed to understand a little and led us down an elevator to an office on the floor below. She, too, was extremely kind in trying to help us.

She took us into an office where two other women sat. She spoke with them in Italian, presumedly telling them why she thought we were there, and then had us take a number from a machine (there wasn't a single person waiting in the office). Again, we told them we didn't speak Italian and asked if they spoke English. "Not really" they told us (this seemed to be a pattern here, Reggio Emilia not really being a tourist destination). Feeling like we may be hitting another dead end, it suddenly occurred to me to ask them if they spoke French- one of them did! "Alors, peut-être nous pouvons communiqué en Français!" I told her. She was the first person all day who understood perfectly.

I told her, in French, that Mom's grandfather was born in Reggio Emilia and that we were looking for any family records we could find. She understood and explained that the records we wanted were kept in another building just down the street from the one we were in. She gave us an address and the directions to get there. By this point, we all felt like detectives who had just come across their first big clue! We knew we were on the trail, but still had no idea where it would lead...

We left the municipal building and walked up another street toward the new address we had been given. It took us barely two minutes to find the right place. Inside were many people waiting and another machine which dispensed numbers based on what department you needed. Having no idea what any of the labels said--or really what we needed, for that matter--we decided our best option would be to take a number for each and see which one came up first. We pushed all the buttons, withdrew slips of paper, and then waited.

After our first number came up, and with some more poor attempts at Italian, we were passed around between a few different women in cubicles. We were told by one of the ladies that the records we wanted were kept in the basement, which was currently flooded, and that they wouldn't be able to access them until the water went down, and no one knew when that would be. We were handed a request form to fill out, not a word of which we could understand. Okay...

We eventually landed in front of a desk that belonged to a woman named Lucy- an incredibly kind person who understood and spoke only a little English, but who seemed to have infinite patience for helping us. We showed her the birth certificates we had brought, putting emphasis on the names we were trying to look up. We narrowed things down to "Cesare DePetri- born 1875." Lucy disappeared around the corner, and we held our breath. She returned a few minutes later carrying a large book with "1866-1875" printed on the spine.

The book contained lists of names--arranged alphabetically by last-- and next to them, the years in which the people were born (plus some other words we didn't understand). While the three of us peered over her shoulder, Lucy flipped through the pages looking for "DePetri."

Delligatti... Dentino... DePalo..... DePetri!

There it was. In the middle of the page, clear as day, my great-grandfather's name. And written next to it, "1875". That was it, we'd found him! Tears welled up in my mother's eyes as she starred at the page in disbelief. Here we were, half way around the world, in some tiny little town, and written on the page in front of us was his name. Her grandfather's name. Our name. If it wasn't for him (and all those before him, as well as those after) she wouldn't be here- I wouldn't be here.

But that wasn't all! Apparently, the other words on the page indicated to Lucy where the rest of his records were filed. You mean there's more than just a record of him being born here? We asked. Again, she disappeared, and again we waited, wondering what else we might learn about Cesare. She returned a few minutes later and, with a grin, handed us photo copies she'd made (for us to keep!) of a page in a book with his name at the top. It begins by stating the name of his wife--who's last name we hadn't known before-- and then goes on to say where they were married (just a few small towns away in Castelnovo Sotto). After that, there is a rather long paragraph containing all of the information that they have about him. Unfortunately, this information is in Italian and will have to be translated at some point, but Lucy was able to convey a small portion of it to us, namely the fact that Cesare was an orphan. With this information, we realized the continuation of our search, at least for today, would be cut short.

I've never been one to have a strong interest in family genealogy, but after our search through Reggio and our discoveries at the records office, I have a much greater understanding of why people find it so fascinating, and spend years of their lives tracing their bloodlines back for centuries.