September 9, 2023 • 37 mins
Peter Hurley’s journey to Mangone is where roots meet route. It's a trip where genealogy and family research become a roadmap to understanding. He proves that when you dig deep into your family tree, you don't just find names and dates—you find destinations.
Peter sets off on a 28-day odyssey to Mangone, his mother's ancestral village in Southern Italy. Though his local guide bails, Peter finds his way to the mayor and town historian Raffaele, who becomes his impromptu guide. They explore an old church where Peter's ancestors were baptized and visit WWI memorials that deepen his connection to his roots. While Peter doesn't discover living relatives, he finds something just as valuable: his family's enduring legacy in Mangone.
Equipped with genealogy and family history research, Peter returns from Mangone with fresh insights and vivid memories. His adventure serves as a how-to guide, offering a wealth of tips for anyone planning their own ancestral trip!
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Pat (00:08):
Fill To Capacity, crazy, good stories and timely topics.
Podcast for people too stubbornto quit and to creative not to
make a difference Inspiring,irreverent and informative.
Stay tuned.
(00:29):
Hi, I'm Pat Benincasa andwelcome to Fill To Capacity.
Today's episode "Beyond DNAPeter Hurley's Italian Odyssey.
" Peter Hurley is a man of manyjourneys, from construction
(00:52):
yards to Colombian jungles, he'slived life like an open road.
The world's been his classroom,leading youth groups in four
countries and eco adventuresfrom Ecuador to Patagonia.
He hung up his globetrottingboots, got a degree in
(01:12):
communications tech, worked in anewsroom and then had a 20 year
career as videographer andeditor to managing media
production.
He is now retired, which meanshe's into serious genealogy and
family history research.
Welcome, Peter, so nice to haveyou here!
Peter (01:36):
Thanks, pat, it's great to be with you.
Pat (01:38):
We've got a lot to talk about.
In this episode, we're divinginto the journey of a lifetime.
We will explore the do's anddon'ts of visiting the land of
your ancestors, and Peter willshare his epic 28 day adventure
(01:59):
through southern Italy to thevillage of his mother's family.
But before we begin, I'd liketo start with the surge in DNA
testing and genealogy sites thatfueled this ancestry tourism.
People are eager to connect thedots between their genetic
(02:21):
makeup and geographical origins.
It's like the science isproviding the why and the trips
are the how.
In exploring one's roots, a DNAtest might reveal that you're
60% Irish, but setting foot onIrish soil, that's a different
(02:43):
story.
So, Peter, for people wantingto visit their ancestral home,
they may not know where to begin.
What tips would you give them?
How should they prepare forsomething like this?
Peter (02:59):
Well, Pat, I think the first thing that people need to
do is to, before they even stepoutside of their country or
outside of their house even, isto sit with themselves and think
about what is it that they wantto accomplish with any heritage
travel?
I think for a lot of peopleit's like, well, I'd just like
(03:19):
to go back to the old sod, orI'd like to go back to the town,
but if you sit down and think alittle bit about it, well, why
do I want to go to the old sod?
want to go to that town?
And when you come up with moreconcrete objectives, that's
going to make it a much moresatisfying trip.
It's going to help you focus onwhat it is that you'll be able
(03:43):
to accomplish once you get overthere.
For example, you might want toidentify some relatives that are
still living in the old town orthe area.
Your goal might be to fill insome blanks in your family tree,
and the only way to do that isto go to a local church and find
the documentation.
(04:04):
It might be something like well, I'd love to know and see the
house where mygreat-grandparents lived.
The more that you think aboutthose concrete whys, then it
will bring that trip into focusand help you a lot in terms of
planning and realizing a greattrip.
Pat (04:23):
So the organization up front is really critical.
Peter (04:27):
It's key.
Yep, it certainly helps a lot.
For example, before I left, Ihad a lot of good online
databases to work with and I hada lot of the nuts and bolts the
BMDs, as they say the birth,marriage and death documentation
.
But the more I thought aboutthat well, I don't need to go to
(04:49):
the municipio and dig out allthese records, they're available
to me online.
So when I get there, what is itI'd really like to do?
And I went hey, I want to go tothe cemetery.
I want to see if I can find somefolks there, and it also freed
me up then to think aboutlearning more about the history
of the region.
That could help me paint abetter picture as to the type of
(05:12):
lives that my ancestors lived.
Pat (05:15):
So, Peter, maybe you've already answered this, but what
was the key motivator?
What was that one thing thatreally pushed you to go to the
country?
What was it?
Peter (05:30):
Well, it was an aunt.
I remember when I was younger alot of our family history
stories came from my dad and, asyour listeners can probably
guess, with my last name, hurleythat's an Irish last name and
we grew up hearing lots ofstories.
My dad was very proud of hisIrish heritage.
(05:51):
Him and his brothers did a lotof research and that's kind of
where my interest grew from.
But as I got older I began tothink well, that's just one half
of the family.
That's just one quarter of thefamily if you think about it.
And I remember that my motherused to talk a lot about her
family, but in more of ananecdotal way.
She never looked for the datesor it was never a big concern of
(06:16):
hers or an interest of hers.
But in our house we ate Italianfood.
We had Italian words that wouldpop up every once in a while,
especially when my aunt anduncle came to visit.
Italian was their firstlanguage.
So it was there, but more inthe background.
But it was in the background,but it was more of the fabric of
(06:37):
our family history than it waswith my dad's, which was more
about dates and when they cameand where they lived in Canada
and all of that kind of stuff.
So I remember talking to myaunt one day about where the
family came from and she said,oh, it's this little town called
Mangone.
It's up in the mountains andone day I'm going to go.
(06:59):
So that was about it.
And then a few years later Iheard from my cousin that she
was taking her mom to visitMangone, and that just stuck
with me.
She was, oh, probably in herlate 60s at the time that she
did that.
But it stuck in my head thatthat was something that I could
(07:21):
do at some point and that wasthe genesis of my interest in
going to Italy and tracking downour Mazzei family roots in
Mangone.
Pat (07:31):
So you went to your ancestral village of Mangone.
For our listeners it's about 12miles south of Cossenza in
Southern Italy, and it's alsothe village where my parents
were born.
So I have a vested interest inthis conversation with Peter.
Peter (07:48):
In the interest of full disclosure, I suppose we're
distant cousins.
Pat (07:52):
Peter, I have this theory that Italy is so small that if
you dig back far enough, we'reall related somewhere.
So I suspect we are cousins.
So you went to Mangone.
My first question, it soundslike you had some pretty
terrific organizational skills.
You were ready to go.
Did your trip go as planned?
Peter (08:15):
Well, in some ways it did .
I kind of did a lot of thethings that you would expect to
do.
I reached out to family to findout if anybody knew of any
existing relatives in town.
The answer was no.
I did find contact informationabout the town, the municipio,
(08:36):
the church.
I did a lot of research with,Google Maps, looking at the town,
and I joined a social mediagroup on Facebook actually, that
specializes in collaborationgenealogy, so I heard a lot of
stories from people who hadalready been to Mangone.
Of course, I spoke with yourbrother, Gary,
(09:15):
But what I didn't count on andthis kind of goes to one of the
core messages I'd like to leaveyour listeners with, is that you
may hit an unexpected brickwall in planning or actually
executing your trip, but don'ttake that as permanent brick
(09:36):
wall, but there's always a wayto break it down or to walk
around it, and in my case, thebrick wall was that the guide
that I had contracted withghosted me.
So I had everything lined upfor the trip, all the logistics
were taken care of.
And weeks out from the trip,when I reached out to him to
(09:56):
find out when we were going tomeet and what he had been able
to find out so far, I didn'thear anything from them.
It was basically crickets.
So I thought, well, you knowhe's busy and maybe we'll catch
up once we get over to Italy.
So every few days I'd beshooting him a message and
nothing.
We're working our way throughCalabria and, like I say, every
(10:20):
few days I'd send them a textand I didn't hear anything back
from them.
And the day before we were toarrive in Cosenza, which, as you
pointed out, is just north ofMangone, we were going to stay
there and just do day trips tothe town.
Well, the day before we were toarrive in Cosenza, I still
hadn't heard from the guide.
So I thought oh well, you know,I'll just enjoy walking through
(10:44):
the town, visit the cemeteryand that'll be nice.
On a whim, I reached out to ourAirbnb host and I just said well
, would you happen to know of astudent who speaks some English,
and wouldn't mind joining usfor the day in Mangone.
That might help out a littlebit.
Well, she texted me back withinthe hour and said my husband
(11:07):
happens to know the mayor ofMangone, so I'll get back to you
.
And in less than an hour sheresponded and she said well,
Tuesday you've got a meeting atthree o'clock with the mayor and
, by the way, his wife will bethere and she speaks English.
So, through all of my planningand my best efforts and parent
brick wall that was thrown in atthe last minute, I persisted
(11:31):
and I ended up having a fabulouscouple of days in Mangone,
largely because of this contactthat I made through the Airbnb
host.
Pat (11:39):
Well, you bring up an important point that sometimes
you've got to roll with what'shappening and try to make the
best of it, but for you, oh myGod, you spun gold out of that
situation! I'm curious because Itoo went to Mangone.
I went in the 70s, and there'ssomething about going to the
(12:00):
village of your ancestors, andso I'd like to ask you what did
it feel like for you to be there?
Peter (12:09):
Well, it's very hard to describe.
Let me put it to you that way.
I thought I was prepared and Ihad kind of visualized what the
experience was going to be like,having done all of this
research online.
I had all of the names, I hadmany of the dates, I'd looked at
Google Maps.
I felt like I kind of knew thetown in a way.
But when I first arrived andyou're just kind of getting
(12:34):
oriented and you look around andit was very quiet, it was just
me in these cobblestone streetswith these stone walls and all
of a sudden it was like I don'tknow how much information I
would have got off of aWikipedia page or an ancestry
Search or whatever.
But nothing could duplicatethat feeling, a sense of place,
(12:58):
by being there, having yourfeet on the ground, being able
to literally smell the rocksand hear the sounds of the
church bells, hear yourfootsteps as you're walking down
the narrow streets on thecobblestones.
It was fabulous.
Pat (13:14):
You know, we spend so much time in virtual geography that
when we are in physical space,like what you're describing it
is really profound.
Someone used the expressiononce, they felt "genetic
palpitations when they went totheir homeland and I have to say
, being in Mangone myself, Ifelt it before I even met people
(13:38):
that were there.
When I went there, the town was, as you say, quiet, streets
were empty.
I was backpacking with anotherkid and this woman comes up to
me.
I thought, boy, she looks likemy, my grandmother's sister.
But I didn't.
I did, I had not made contact,we didn't have internet back
then and I said in Italian, Iam the daughter of Ida Rizzuto
(13:58):
and Francesco Benincasa, thedoors fly open.
She gives me that, you know thedouble pinched cheeks and it's
a difference of a split second.
It felt like, and the wholeuniverse kind of tipped on its
axis.
I know what you're describing.
Now it sounds like the mayorand his wife played an important
(14:22):
role in your Mangone experience.
Well, as I mentioned, I hadthis appointment set up through
the Airbnb host and when Ishowed up, they were just so
welcoming.
They sat me down and asked mewhat I was interested in, and we
(14:44):
just started to have thisconversation about my family.
And to have somebody whoactually recognized the name
that could confirm that indeed,your family was from this town,
that they go back a long wa swonderful.
.
Piece of bad news that they hadfor me is that they weren't
aware of any current relativesthat were living in the town
(15:07):
that they thought that therewere people that lived in some
of the outlying villages.
They had moved, but that theMazzei family was extremely
rooted in the town of Mangone.
And I had had a chance to visitthe cemetery prior to meeting up
with Orazio Berardi and hiswife, Alessandra, and I had
noticed a Mazzei in the cemeteryand I asked him about that
(15:32):
particular person because he hadpassed away in, I think, the
late 40s, early 50s.
He knew that family and he wasexplaining to Alessandra in
Italian much faster Italian thanI could follow, and the name
Italo that came up and it justsort of rang a bell.
(15:53):
When there was a break in theconversation I said what did you
mean by reference to Italo ?
He said Italo was the son ofLeonardo, who is the fellow that
was buried in the cemetery.
And all of a sudden I had thisrecollection of my niece who had
been to Italy as a nanny about10 years earlier.
(16:15):
She had been given the name ofa Mazzei by my aunt,
the one who inspired me to go toMangone in the first place, and
she had connected with thisMazzei who lived just outside of
Rome and his name was Italo .
When my niece came back andtold me this story, my sister
(16:38):
and her husband had been inItaly at that time and they
actually went with my niece tovisit this fellow who lived
alone.
They had a good visit.
He treated them really well.
They figured they were cousins,but nobody actually knew what
the connection was.
So the mayor, as I'm sittingacross the table from him,
mentioning this Italo Mazzei, Icould remember what my niece had
(17:02):
told me about him, that herented fancy cars and that he
was a poet.
As Orazio, the mayor is tellingthis story and I'm saying to his
wife, did Italo rent cars?
And as she translated toOrazio, he goes yes.
(17:23):
And I said to Alessandra, washe a poet?
And Orazi o's eyes get a littlewider, and goes yes.
And it turns out that Italowho my niece and my sister had
met, was the son of Leonardo,who was buried in the Mangone
cemetery, who I had justdiscovered that morning.
We had quite the conversationand made a lot of connections
(17:45):
and confirmed the fact that thisfellow that my niece had met,
indeed was a second cousin.
What a story! Now you also met someone
Peter (18:02):
Right, and that was kind of like the cherry on top of an
already you know delicious visit.
As we were sitting he saidwell, you're obviously very
interested in the history ofMangone, even beyond your family
, and I said yeah, I'd like toknow about what the conditions
(18:23):
were like when my family wasstill here.
And he said well, you need totalk to my cousin Raffaele.
He said, give me a minute.
He leaves the room and he comesback a couple minutes later and
he said Rafael will be here ina couple of minutes.
He shows up and it turns outthat he was indeed the historian
(18:44):
of the town.
He had written a book and herecognized the family name.
He knew some of them from anearlier time in his life.
We got talking and he helped togive me a lot of context about
the town and the conditions andthe types of crops that were
grown back in the day and all ofthat.
And one of the things that I hadas my objective in going to the
(19:07):
town was to visit the churches.
There's two beautiful smallchurches in Mangone, a Madonna
Dell' Arco and San GiovanniEvangelista, and Both had been
closed for a long time becauseof renovations.
And I just threw out thequestion would it be possible to
visit the inside of the church?
(19:28):
I'd already gotten some photosfrom the outside and Rafaela
reached into his pocket and hepulled out a bunch of keys and
he said well, which one do youwant to visit first?
I guess one of the advantagesof visiting a small town in
Italy, or a small town anywherefor that matter.
It turns out that Rafaela is aleader in the local Catholic
(19:49):
Society and a caretaker of thechurches.
We went over and we visited theChurch and it was beautiful,
and he thought that I wasleaving later that day.
So he said well, it's too badyou aren't going to be around
(20:10):
longer, because tomorrow I couldtake you to see the other
church, which is actually theolder of the two.
And I said, well, it so happensthat I am going to be here for a
couple more days.
And he says, well, how aboutnine o'clock tomorrow morning?
And I came around next day atnine.
In addition to taking me intothe church, he also gave me very
memorable tour around the townand was able to identify the
(20:33):
original neighborhood where myfamily lived.
One of the highlights ofvisiting the church actually was
as we were walking through andhe was showing me parts of the
church that dated back to thelate 1500s, and I noticed a
baptismal font in the main bodyof the church and it was a
beautiful chunk of carved rockand I asked him.
(20:56):
I said, well, how long has thatbeen here?
He said, well, the church wasestablished in about 1584.
And he said that was probablyinstalled within a few years
after that.
And I said so, all people inMangone who were baptized since
that time were baptized in thatfont?
And he said, yes.
He said if they were Catholicand they were baptized in this
(21:18):
church, that's where they wouldhave been dipped.
So, right there, I looked at itand I went well, I've got my
family dated back to at leastthe mid 1700s.
I was looking at the stonebasin where all of my, let's say
, ancestors would have beenbaptized.
Pat (21:36):
What a story! You know, what is it about baptismal fonts
?
Dante Alighieri, in his DivineComedy, there's a canto in the
Purgatorio where he lovinglydescribes a baptismal font as a
beautiful carved font made ofpure white marble.
(21:57):
There's something about that,and I think the tone and the
words that you just said is thatthat is the link of heritage,
that font, and it's so important.
Peter, how many people get toview an ancestral village
(22:21):
totally from the inside out?
That's breathtaking.
Peter (22:26):
Y eah, there were a few goosebumps.
I must say one thing I did wantto mention, going back to your
earlier question about how Ifelt when I first arrived in the
town.
That also brings to mind arecommendation I would have for
anybody who's fortunate enoughto get back to a town where
their family is from, especiallyif it's a smaller town is to
(22:48):
think about what would have beenan activity that your ancestor
would have done, a dailyactivity.
Yes, it might have beensomething like they got married
in the church.
But there are other things like, well, where did they do their
laundry?
Where was the bakery?
And make that one of theactivities that you have while
(23:09):
you're there.
So, again, go earlier in the day, identify where the communal
washing station was, becauseusually in these towns there was
no indoor plumbing, so thewomen would take their basket of
clothes and they would go tothe communal stone washing place
and probably their kids wouldcome with them and they would be
(23:33):
getting caught up on the localnews.
And so there's an activity thatcan really bring it home to you
and give you a real connectionwith your ancestors is to do
something.
Walk the same streets that theywould have walked to a
destination that they would havehad.
Pat (23:50):
Oh, that's wonderful.
You know, I stumbled on todoing that when I was in Mangone
.
Again, I was a college kid witha friend and we stayed at the
house of Zia Catarina and theheat source for the house was a
corner brazier.
As we are getting ready for bed, she tells us tomorrow we're
(24:15):
going to the bakery.
I'm thinking, whoa donuts andyou know all these Italian
pastries.
We get out in the morning, wewalk and it's a communal oven.
That was the bakery.
And so, as you say, I had noidea, but that's where the town
(24:37):
women would go to bake theirbread.
That was the bakery, a communaloven.
That's quite shocking, you know, as an American, to come into
that situation and see that.
Now I want to ask you what wasit like for you to see your
great uncle's name not on justone but two World War One War
(25:01):
memorials in the town?
Peter (25:03):
Well, that was an interesting story, because when
I met with the mayor and hiswife and we were trying to make
a connection with Mazzei family.
I mentioned to him that I hada great uncle, Vincenzo, who had
died during the First World Warin near Bologna, actually in
(25:25):
1917.
He didn't die in battle, he diedof a disease.
He was in a hospital there, andI had only recently discovered
a photograph of him, and so Ipulled out my iPad and I had
saved a bunch of images in caseI needed to share them with
somebody, and here was a perfectcase in point.
(25:47):
I brought it up and Oraziolooked at it and he said oh your
great uncle is on our warmemorial.
And he said, as a matter offact, I think he's on two war
memorials, and so that was kindof special to then go out and
find them and again give verydeep sense of place.
(26:08):
I had a relative that I knew ofand somebody who had been
recognized by the community forhis service not only to his
community, but to his country.
Pat (26:18):
Yeah, I think you're segueing into the next question;
what questions were answeredfor you during this visit, and
were there any mysteries thatpopped up?
Peter (26:35):
Well, I think the most important question that I
alluded to before was are thereany living relatives?
Because that was something thatI had high expectations was to
meet somebody who was stillliving in the town, and
unfortunately nobody came tomind, and if I'd had another
week or so I probably could havetracked somebody down in one of
(26:55):
the nearby villages.
By the same token, they didconfirm for me the legacy of the
family in the town, and I wasalso very happy to find out that
it was a town that had beenrelatively unchanged in many
ways.
It was when my ancestors left.
(27:18):
The town had about 1900 people,according to the census records
that I could find, and Mangonetoday has about 1800 people.
So lots of changes, of course.
But you walk down many of theside streets in the town, you
know, close your eyes, spinaround, open your eyes and you
could be back around the late1800s or early 19th.
Pat (27:42):
I think one of the spectacular things about your
trip was how you posted onFacebook and I would say this
for anybody planning to do atrip you didn't just take random
photos, you identified what youwere looking at and I'll tell
you, peter, I so enjoyed it.
It was like I was travelingwith you, church that's the
(28:06):
big church in my family.
The pictures of that churchthat you posted and everywhere
where you went, your photographswere spectacular.
They were breathtaking, butthe identification that you put
on there really made it awonderful travelogue for those
of us who are trapped behind thescreen here, you know,
(28:28):
following along with you.
So you really did a beautifuljob on that.
Peter (28:33):
Well, thank you, Pat, and there was sort of a method to
that or another purpose otherthan just documenting my trip.
It was meant to create a recordfor me because one of the
things that people should thinkabout if they're planning on
doing a heritage trip, anancestral travel trip, is what
(28:53):
happens with all thatinformation.
And then you actually go back astep further.
What kind of information is itthat you want to capture, and
then what are you going to dowith that information?
I had two reasons fordocumenting everything on
Facebook.
One was to share with my familyand friends and give them all a
sense of place, but also tohave a record, and Facebook will
(29:17):
be around for a few years, andso that is something that some
legacy information about thefamily that can be shared by my
cousins, by my nieces, longafter I'm gone.
Then people will have a placethat they can go and check it
out.
So for people that are planningon doing something like that,
keep that in mind.
What is going to happen with theinformation that you collect,
(29:39):
and maybe it will help you thenthink about well, what kinds of
information should I becollecting?
As somebody who comes from amedia background.
One of the recommendations thatI have is think about the
recording devices and how you'regoing to capture certain types
of information when you go.
Obviously you're going to wanta good quality cell phone that
(30:02):
takes good pictures.
Make sure it's something thatcan take a decent picture in low
light, because you might be ina church that doesn't have a lot
of lighting.
You might be given access to anarchive where, again, it's a
low light situation.
If you're serious aboutcapturing good images, that
might be one thing that youwould think about upgrading or
bringing along a camera that canhandle those types of tasks.
(30:25):
But also, what form do you wantto record this information in?
Is it going to be somethingthat you're going to just dump
onto a hard drive when you getback or leave it on your phone?
You might want to think aboutputting it into a format with
details about what you'verecorded so that it can be
(30:45):
shared with family forgenerations that come.
This is something that peopledon't often think about.
I guess what you could callsuccession planning for the
information that you gather fornot only for these trips but for
all of your genealogicalresearch.
If it dies with you, then it isa bit of a waste.
(31:05):
Facebook is a great platformfor that, Instagram as well.
But also think about a way thatyou can document the trip and
also have it in a format thatyou can hand off to a cousin or
a son or another family memberwho may not continue the work
directly but at least could be acaretaker for it and pass it on
(31:29):
to maybe their children ortheir cousins.
Pat (31:32):
You know that is a huge point.
When you talk about familyhistorians, usually when people
go on vacations they'll takepictures in the moment.
But what you're talking aboutis something much deeper.
We're talking about a digitallegacy and so documenting not
just the trip but the locations,the dates, who you talk to and
(31:55):
if you could make notes about oh, there is so-and-so second
cousin or not sure how we'rerelated, because you're right,
it might not be a generationafter us, but maybe a hundred
years from now someone's goingto go into that information and
go oh, that's what Peter did.
I see where he went.
I mean that's really important.
(32:15):
And I guess the other piece Iwould add to that if you have a
chance to talk to olderrelatives, I so regret that I
did not do that.
You know, when you're in your20s, 30s or 40s you don't think
about.
I should ask grandma about whenshe did X, Y and Z to get those
stories recorded.
Peter (32:35):
Yes, I have the same regrets.
I remember my folks sent me upto Prince Rupert, British
Columbia, to work a summer inthe fish plants up there and I
think there were ulteriormotives to get me, as a
16-year-old boy, out of thehouse for the summer.
But it was great for me becauseI got to spend time with
relatives in Prince Rupert,which is where my Mazzei family
(32:58):
arrived after leaving Mongone,and I remember staying with my
great aunt for a couple of weeksand her husband and they both
were Italian speakers, and so alot of the time when I was in
the house I didn't understandwhat was being said because they
were speaking Italian and theirfriends would come over.
They spoke Italian.
But I do now think back on thattime and what a great
(33:21):
opportunity it would have beento have just said hey, you want
to sit down in front of mycassette recorder for half an
hour and tell me some stories.
But we can now learn from thatand make sure that we do what we
can to do a good job ofrecording the information that
we're fortunate enough to findand pass on.
Pat (33:41):
Absolutely, and I like your point about how do you choose
to convey that information.
Well, it's not hard to do ane-book.
There are so many platformslike draft2 digital, all sorts
of different things.
You write it, you load it up,you add the photographs and
there you have this preciousgift of your family history.
(34:01):
There's a lot of different waysto do this.
Peter (34:05):
Well, and I think it also starts with how you visualize
your trip.
Kind of going back to one ofthe first points that we talked
about, is it before you evenleave your house Is, think about
what you want to accomplishduring your trip and go prepared
to do that.
Have a camera or a good iPhonewith you, but also make sure you
(34:26):
got good old paper and pen andtake notes and sometimes it's
not convenient or appropriate totake notes while you're perhaps
meeting a relative or meeting acity official or something like
that, but just be thinkingabout how can I capture this
information?
As soon as you're done with aget together with somebody, even
(34:46):
if it means scratching downsome key phrases, that will just
trigger the memory at a latertime and when you can do.
Maybe at the end of the day,over a good glass of wine, sit
down and flesh out your summarya little bit about the day's
activities.
You will be so thankful thatyou did that, because when you
get back you're going to getcaught up into the rush of your
(35:06):
regular life and you might notget back to your notes or back
to your photos for a few months.
So having anything that cankind of trigger memories and
recollections of what was saidwill be very helpful.
Pat (35:17):
On that note, I would say, even doing a travel journal and
or a day log is terrific, andwhen you have train tickets or
stubs, just put them right intothe journal so that you have
that.
Wow, these are all terrificsuggestions.
Peter, you know, your journeyto Mangone is a compelling
(35:41):
reminder that exploring ourroots isn't about retracing
steps but about taking new oneson ancient soil.
And what you talked about theidea of those gifts of
serendipity, the people that youmet is really a remarkable,
(36:03):
remarkable story.
Thank you so much for sharingyour incredible journey with us.
Peter (36:10):
It's been my pleasure, Pat.
Pat (36:12):
Wow, I feel like I was just there.
We're just having, you know,good coffee, some cheese and
good bread, and we're justtalking about this.
So thank you and thank youlisteners.
If you enjoyed today's filtercapacity, please tell your
friends and subscribe.
Thank you and ciao for now.
Fill To Capacity, crazy, good stories and timely topics.
Podcast for people too stubbornto quit and to creative not to
make a difference Inspiring,irreverent and informative.
Stay tuned.
(00:29):
Hi, I'm Pat Benincasa andwelcome to Fill To Capacity.
Today's episode "Beyond DNAPeter Hurley's Italian Odyssey.
" Peter Hurley is a man of manyjourneys, from construction
(00:52):
yards to Colombian jungles, he'slived life like an open road.
The world's been his classroom,leading youth groups in four
countries and eco adventuresfrom Ecuador to Patagonia.
He hung up his globetrottingboots, got a degree in
(01:12):
communications tech, worked in anewsroom and then had a 20 year
career as videographer andeditor to managing media
production.
He is now retired, which meanshe's into serious genealogy and
family history research.
Welcome, Peter, so nice to haveyou here!
Peter (01:36):
Thanks, pat, it's great to be with you.
Pat (01:38):
We've got a lot to talk about.
In this episode, we're divinginto the journey of a lifetime.
We will explore the do's anddon'ts of visiting the land of
your ancestors, and Peter willshare his epic 28 day adventure
(01:59):
through southern Italy to thevillage of his mother's family.
But before we begin, I'd liketo start with the surge in DNA
testing and genealogy sites thatfueled this ancestry tourism.
People are eager to connect thedots between their genetic
(02:21):
makeup and geographical origins.
It's like the science isproviding the why and the trips
are the how.
In exploring one's roots, a DNAtest might reveal that you're
60% Irish, but setting foot onIrish soil, that's a different
(02:43):
story.
So, Peter, for people wantingto visit their ancestral home,
they may not know where to begin.
What tips would you give them?
How should they prepare forsomething like this?
Peter (02:59):
Well, Pat, I think the first thing that people need to
do is to, before they even stepoutside of their country or
outside of their house even, isto sit with themselves and think
about what is it that they wantto accomplish with any heritage
travel?
I think for a lot of peopleit's like, well, I'd just like
(03:19):
to go back to the old sod, orI'd like to go back to the town,
but if you sit down and think alittle bit about it, well, why
do I want to go to the old sod?
want to go to that town?
And when you come up with moreconcrete objectives, that's
going to make it a much moresatisfying trip.
It's going to help you focus onwhat it is that you'll be able
(03:43):
to accomplish once you get overthere.
For example, you might want toidentify some relatives that are
still living in the old town orthe area.
Your goal might be to fill insome blanks in your family tree,
and the only way to do that isto go to a local church and find
the documentation.
(04:04):
It might be something like well, I'd love to know and see the
house where mygreat-grandparents lived.
The more that you think aboutthose concrete whys, then it
will bring that trip into focusand help you a lot in terms of
planning and realizing a greattrip.
Pat (04:23):
So the organization up front is really critical.
Peter (04:27):
It's key.
Yep, it certainly helps a lot.
For example, before I left, Ihad a lot of good online
databases to work with and I hada lot of the nuts and bolts the
BMDs, as they say the birth,marriage and death documentation
.
But the more I thought aboutthat well, I don't need to go to
(04:49):
the municipio and dig out allthese records, they're available
to me online.
So when I get there, what is itI'd really like to do?
And I went hey, I want to go tothe cemetery.
I want to see if I can find somefolks there, and it also freed
me up then to think aboutlearning more about the history
of the region.
That could help me paint abetter picture as to the type of
(05:12):
lives that my ancestors lived.
Pat (05:15):
So, Peter, maybe you've already answered this, but what
was the key motivator?
What was that one thing thatreally pushed you to go to the
country?
What was it?
Peter (05:30):
Well, it was an aunt.
I remember when I was younger alot of our family history
stories came from my dad and, asyour listeners can probably
guess, with my last name, hurleythat's an Irish last name and
we grew up hearing lots ofstories.
My dad was very proud of hisIrish heritage.
(05:51):
Him and his brothers did a lotof research and that's kind of
where my interest grew from.
But as I got older I began tothink well, that's just one half
of the family.
That's just one quarter of thefamily if you think about it.
And I remember that my motherused to talk a lot about her
family, but in more of ananecdotal way.
She never looked for the datesor it was never a big concern of
(06:16):
hers or an interest of hers.
But in our house we ate Italianfood.
We had Italian words that wouldpop up every once in a while,
especially when my aunt anduncle came to visit.
Italian was their firstlanguage.
So it was there, but more inthe background.
But it was in the background,but it was more of the fabric of
(06:37):
our family history than it waswith my dad's, which was more
about dates and when they cameand where they lived in Canada
and all of that kind of stuff.
So I remember talking to myaunt one day about where the
family came from and she said,oh, it's this little town called
Mangone.
It's up in the mountains andone day I'm going to go.
(06:59):
So that was about it.
And then a few years later Iheard from my cousin that she
was taking her mom to visitMangone, and that just stuck
with me.
She was, oh, probably in herlate 60s at the time that she
did that.
But it stuck in my head thatthat was something that I could
(07:21):
do at some point and that wasthe genesis of my interest in
going to Italy and tracking downour Mazzei family roots in
Mangone.
Pat (07:31):
So you went to your ancestral village of Mangone.
For our listeners it's about 12miles south of Cossenza in
Southern Italy, and it's alsothe village where my parents
were born.
So I have a vested interest inthis conversation with Peter.
Peter (07:48):
In the interest of full disclosure, I suppose we're
distant cousins.
Pat (07:52):
Peter, I have this theory that Italy is so small that if
you dig back far enough, we'reall related somewhere.
So I suspect we are cousins.
So you went to Mangone.
My first question, it soundslike you had some pretty
terrific organizational skills.
You were ready to go.
Did your trip go as planned?
Peter (08:15):
Well, in some ways it did .
I kind of did a lot of thethings that you would expect to
do.
I reached out to family to findout if anybody knew of any
existing relatives in town.
The answer was no.
I did find contact informationabout the town, the municipio,
(08:36):
the church.
I did a lot of research with,Google Maps, looking at the town,
and I joined a social mediagroup on Facebook actually, that
specializes in collaborationgenealogy, so I heard a lot of
stories from people who hadalready been to Mangone.
Of course, I spoke with yourbrother, Gary,
(09:15):
But what I didn't count on andthis kind of goes to one of the
core messages I'd like to leaveyour listeners with, is that you
may hit an unexpected brickwall in planning or actually
executing your trip, but don'ttake that as permanent brick
(09:36):
wall, but there's always a wayto break it down or to walk
around it, and in my case, thebrick wall was that the guide
that I had contracted withghosted me.
So I had everything lined upfor the trip, all the logistics
were taken care of.
And weeks out from the trip,when I reached out to him to
(09:56):
find out when we were going tomeet and what he had been able
to find out so far, I didn'thear anything from them.
It was basically crickets.
So I thought, well, you knowhe's busy and maybe we'll catch
up once we get over to Italy.
So every few days I'd beshooting him a message and
nothing.
We're working our way throughCalabria and, like I say, every
(10:20):
few days I'd send them a textand I didn't hear anything back
from them.
And the day before we were toarrive in Cosenza, which, as you
pointed out, is just north ofMangone, we were going to stay
there and just do day trips tothe town.
Well, the day before we were toarrive in Cosenza, I still
hadn't heard from the guide.
So I thought oh well, you know,I'll just enjoy walking through
(10:44):
the town, visit the cemeteryand that'll be nice.
On a whim, I reached out to ourAirbnb host and I just said well
, would you happen to know of astudent who speaks some English,
and wouldn't mind joining usfor the day in Mangone.
That might help out a littlebit.
Well, she texted me back withinthe hour and said my husband
(11:07):
happens to know the mayor ofMangone, so I'll get back to you
.
And in less than an hour sheresponded and she said well,
Tuesday you've got a meeting atthree o'clock with the mayor and
, by the way, his wife will bethere and she speaks English.
So, through all of my planningand my best efforts and parent
brick wall that was thrown in atthe last minute, I persisted
(11:31):
and I ended up having a fabulouscouple of days in Mangone,
largely because of this contactthat I made through the Airbnb
host.
Pat (11:39):
Well, you bring up an important point that sometimes
you've got to roll with what'shappening and try to make the
best of it, but for you, oh myGod, you spun gold out of that
situation! I'm curious because Itoo went to Mangone.
I went in the 70s, and there'ssomething about going to the
(12:00):
village of your ancestors, andso I'd like to ask you what did
it feel like for you to be there?
Peter (12:09):
Well, it's very hard to describe.
Let me put it to you that way.
I thought I was prepared and Ihad kind of visualized what the
experience was going to be like,having done all of this
research online.
I had all of the names, I hadmany of the dates, I'd looked at
Google Maps.
I felt like I kind of knew thetown in a way.
But when I first arrived andyou're just kind of getting
(12:34):
oriented and you look around andit was very quiet, it was just
me in these cobblestone streetswith these stone walls and all
of a sudden it was like I don'tknow how much information I
would have got off of aWikipedia page or an ancestry
Search or whatever.
But nothing could duplicatethat feeling, a sense of place,
(12:58):
by being there, having yourfeet on the ground, being able
to literally smell the rocksand hear the sounds of the
church bells, hear yourfootsteps as you're walking down
the narrow streets on thecobblestones.
It was fabulous.
Pat (13:14):
You know, we spend so much time in virtual geography that
when we are in physical space,like what you're describing it
is really profound.
Someone used the expressiononce, they felt "genetic
palpitations when they went totheir homeland and I have to say
, being in Mangone myself, Ifelt it before I even met people
(13:38):
that were there.
When I went there, the town was, as you say, quiet, streets
were empty.
I was backpacking with anotherkid and this woman comes up to
me.
I thought, boy, she looks likemy, my grandmother's sister.
But I didn't.
I did, I had not made contact,we didn't have internet back
then and I said in Italian, Iam the daughter of Ida Rizzuto
(13:58):
and Francesco Benincasa, thedoors fly open.
She gives me that, you know thedouble pinched cheeks and it's
a difference of a split second.
It felt like, and the wholeuniverse kind of tipped on its
axis.
I know what you're describing.
Now it sounds like the mayorand his wife played an important
(14:22):
role in your Mangone experience.
Well, as I mentioned, I hadthis appointment set up through
the Airbnb host and when Ishowed up, they were just so
welcoming.
They sat me down and asked mewhat I was interested in, and we
(14:44):
just started to have thisconversation about my family.
And to have somebody whoactually recognized the name
that could confirm that indeed,your family was from this town,
that they go back a long wa swonderful.
.
Piece of bad news that they hadfor me is that they weren't
aware of any current relativesthat were living in the town
(15:07):
that they thought that therewere people that lived in some
of the outlying villages.
They had moved, but that theMazzei family was extremely
rooted in the town of Mangone.
And I had had a chance to visitthe cemetery prior to meeting up
with Orazio Berardi and hiswife, Alessandra, and I had
noticed a Mazzei in the cemeteryand I asked him about that
(15:32):
particular person because he hadpassed away in, I think, the
late 40s, early 50s.
He knew that family and he wasexplaining to Alessandra in
Italian much faster Italian thanI could follow, and the name
Italo that came up and it justsort of rang a bell.
(15:53):
When there was a break in theconversation I said what did you
mean by reference to Italo ?
He said Italo was the son ofLeonardo, who is the fellow that
was buried in the cemetery.
And all of a sudden I had thisrecollection of my niece who had
been to Italy as a nanny about10 years earlier.
(16:15):
She had been given the name ofa Mazzei by my aunt,
the one who inspired me to go toMangone in the first place, and
she had connected with thisMazzei who lived just outside of
Rome and his name was Italo .
When my niece came back andtold me this story, my sister
(16:38):
and her husband had been inItaly at that time and they
actually went with my niece tovisit this fellow who lived
alone.
They had a good visit.
He treated them really well.
They figured they were cousins,but nobody actually knew what
the connection was.
So the mayor, as I'm sittingacross the table from him,
mentioning this Italo Mazzei, Icould remember what my niece had
(17:02):
told me about him, that herented fancy cars and that he
was a poet.
As Orazio, the mayor is tellingthis story and I'm saying to his
wife, did Italo rent cars?
And as she translated toOrazio, he goes yes.
(17:23):
And I said to Alessandra, washe a poet?
And Orazi o's eyes get a littlewider, and goes yes.
And it turns out that Italowho my niece and my sister had
met, was the son of Leonardo,who was buried in the Mangone
cemetery, who I had justdiscovered that morning.
We had quite the conversationand made a lot of connections
(17:45):
and confirmed the fact that thisfellow that my niece had met,
indeed was a second cousin.
What a story! Now you also met someone
Peter (18:02):
Right, and that was kind of like the cherry on top of an
already you know delicious visit.
As we were sitting he saidwell, you're obviously very
interested in the history ofMangone, even beyond your family
, and I said yeah, I'd like toknow about what the conditions
(18:23):
were like when my family wasstill here.
And he said well, you need totalk to my cousin Raffaele.
He said, give me a minute.
He leaves the room and he comesback a couple minutes later and
he said Rafael will be here ina couple of minutes.
He shows up and it turns outthat he was indeed the historian
(18:44):
of the town.
He had written a book and herecognized the family name.
He knew some of them from anearlier time in his life.
We got talking and he helped togive me a lot of context about
the town and the conditions andthe types of crops that were
grown back in the day and all ofthat.
And one of the things that I hadas my objective in going to the
(19:07):
town was to visit the churches.
There's two beautiful smallchurches in Mangone, a Madonna
Dell' Arco and San GiovanniEvangelista, and Both had been
closed for a long time becauseof renovations.
And I just threw out thequestion would it be possible to
visit the inside of the church?
(19:28):
I'd already gotten some photosfrom the outside and Rafaela
reached into his pocket and hepulled out a bunch of keys and
he said well, which one do youwant to visit first?
I guess one of the advantagesof visiting a small town in
Italy, or a small town anywherefor that matter.
It turns out that Rafaela is aleader in the local Catholic
(19:49):
Society and a caretaker of thechurches.
We went over and we visited theChurch and it was beautiful,
and he thought that I wasleaving later that day.
So he said well, it's too badyou aren't going to be around
(20:10):
longer, because tomorrow I couldtake you to see the other
church, which is actually theolder of the two.
And I said, well, it so happensthat I am going to be here for a
couple more days.
And he says, well, how aboutnine o'clock tomorrow morning?
And I came around next day atnine.
In addition to taking me intothe church, he also gave me very
memorable tour around the townand was able to identify the
(20:33):
original neighborhood where myfamily lived.
One of the highlights ofvisiting the church actually was
as we were walking through andhe was showing me parts of the
church that dated back to thelate 1500s, and I noticed a
baptismal font in the main bodyof the church and it was a
beautiful chunk of carved rockand I asked him.
(20:56):
I said, well, how long has thatbeen here?
He said, well, the church wasestablished in about 1584.
And he said that was probablyinstalled within a few years
after that.
And I said so, all people inMangone who were baptized since
that time were baptized in thatfont?
And he said, yes.
He said if they were Catholicand they were baptized in this
(21:18):
church, that's where they wouldhave been dipped.
So, right there, I looked at itand I went well, I've got my
family dated back to at leastthe mid 1700s.
I was looking at the stonebasin where all of my, let's say
, ancestors would have beenbaptized.
Pat (21:36):
What a story! You know, what is it about baptismal fonts
?
Dante Alighieri, in his DivineComedy, there's a canto in the
Purgatorio where he lovinglydescribes a baptismal font as a
beautiful carved font made ofpure white marble.
(21:57):
There's something about that,and I think the tone and the
words that you just said is thatthat is the link of heritage,
that font, and it's so important.
Peter, how many people get toview an ancestral village
(22:21):
totally from the inside out?
That's breathtaking.
Peter (22:26):
Y eah, there were a few goosebumps.
I must say one thing I did wantto mention, going back to your
earlier question about how Ifelt when I first arrived in the
town.
That also brings to mind arecommendation I would have for
anybody who's fortunate enoughto get back to a town where
their family is from, especiallyif it's a smaller town is to
(22:48):
think about what would have beenan activity that your ancestor
would have done, a dailyactivity.
Yes, it might have beensomething like they got married
in the church.
But there are other things like, well, where did they do their
laundry?
Where was the bakery?
And make that one of theactivities that you have while
(23:09):
you're there.
So, again, go earlier in the day, identify where the communal
washing station was, becauseusually in these towns there was
no indoor plumbing, so thewomen would take their basket of
clothes and they would go tothe communal stone washing place
and probably their kids wouldcome with them and they would be
(23:33):
getting caught up on the localnews.
And so there's an activity thatcan really bring it home to you
and give you a real connectionwith your ancestors is to do
something.
Walk the same streets that theywould have walked to a
destination that they would havehad.
Pat (23:50):
Oh, that's wonderful.
You know, I stumbled on todoing that when I was in Mangone
.
Again, I was a college kid witha friend and we stayed at the
house of Zia Catarina and theheat source for the house was a
corner brazier.
As we are getting ready for bed, she tells us tomorrow we're
(24:15):
going to the bakery.
I'm thinking, whoa donuts andyou know all these Italian
pastries.
We get out in the morning, wewalk and it's a communal oven.
That was the bakery.
And so, as you say, I had noidea, but that's where the town
(24:37):
women would go to bake theirbread.
That was the bakery, a communaloven.
That's quite shocking, you know, as an American, to come into
that situation and see that.
Now I want to ask you what wasit like for you to see your
great uncle's name not on justone but two World War One War
(25:01):
memorials in the town?
Peter (25:03):
Well, that was an interesting story, because when
I met with the mayor and hiswife and we were trying to make
a connection with Mazzei family.
I mentioned to him that I hada great uncle, Vincenzo, who had
died during the First World Warin near Bologna, actually in
(25:25):
1917.
He didn't die in battle, he diedof a disease.
He was in a hospital there, andI had only recently discovered
a photograph of him, and so Ipulled out my iPad and I had
saved a bunch of images in caseI needed to share them with
somebody, and here was a perfectcase in point.
(25:47):
I brought it up and Oraziolooked at it and he said oh your
great uncle is on our warmemorial.
And he said, as a matter offact, I think he's on two war
memorials, and so that was kindof special to then go out and
find them and again give verydeep sense of place.
(26:08):
I had a relative that I knew ofand somebody who had been
recognized by the community forhis service not only to his
community, but to his country.
Pat (26:18):
Yeah, I think you're segueing into the next question;
what questions were answeredfor you during this visit, and
were there any mysteries thatpopped up?
Peter (26:35):
Well, I think the most important question that I
alluded to before was are thereany living relatives?
Because that was something thatI had high expectations was to
meet somebody who was stillliving in the town, and
unfortunately nobody came tomind, and if I'd had another
week or so I probably could havetracked somebody down in one of
(26:55):
the nearby villages.
By the same token, they didconfirm for me the legacy of the
family in the town, and I wasalso very happy to find out that
it was a town that had beenrelatively unchanged in many
ways.
It was when my ancestors left.
(27:18):
The town had about 1900 people,according to the census records
that I could find, and Mangonetoday has about 1800 people.
So lots of changes, of course.
But you walk down many of theside streets in the town, you
know, close your eyes, spinaround, open your eyes and you
could be back around the late1800s or early 19th.
Pat (27:42):
I think one of the spectacular things about your
trip was how you posted onFacebook and I would say this
for anybody planning to do atrip you didn't just take random
photos, you identified what youwere looking at and I'll tell
you, peter, I so enjoyed it.
It was like I was travelingwith you, church that's the
(28:06):
big church in my family.
The pictures of that churchthat you posted and everywhere
where you went, your photographswere spectacular.
They were breathtaking, butthe identification that you put
on there really made it awonderful travelogue for those
of us who are trapped behind thescreen here, you know,
(28:28):
following along with you.
So you really did a beautifuljob on that.
Peter (28:33):
Well, thank you, Pat, and there was sort of a method to
that or another purpose otherthan just documenting my trip.
It was meant to create a recordfor me because one of the
things that people should thinkabout if they're planning on
doing a heritage trip, anancestral travel trip, is what
(28:53):
happens with all thatinformation.
And then you actually go back astep further.
What kind of information is itthat you want to capture, and
then what are you going to dowith that information?
I had two reasons fordocumenting everything on
Facebook.
One was to share with my familyand friends and give them all a
sense of place, but also tohave a record, and Facebook will
(29:17):
be around for a few years, andso that is something that some
legacy information about thefamily that can be shared by my
cousins, by my nieces, longafter I'm gone.
Then people will have a placethat they can go and check it
out.
So for people that are planningon doing something like that,
keep that in mind.
What is going to happen with theinformation that you collect,
(29:39):
and maybe it will help you thenthink about well, what kinds of
information should I becollecting?
As somebody who comes from amedia background.
One of the recommendations thatI have is think about the
recording devices and how you'regoing to capture certain types
of information when you go.
Obviously you're going to wanta good quality cell phone that
(30:02):
takes good pictures.
Make sure it's something thatcan take a decent picture in low
light, because you might be ina church that doesn't have a lot
of lighting.
You might be given access to anarchive where, again, it's a
low light situation.
If you're serious aboutcapturing good images, that
might be one thing that youwould think about upgrading or
bringing along a camera that canhandle those types of tasks.
(30:25):
But also, what form do you wantto record this information in?
Is it going to be somethingthat you're going to just dump
onto a hard drive when you getback or leave it on your phone?
You might want to think aboutputting it into a format with
details about what you'verecorded so that it can be
(30:45):
shared with family forgenerations that come.
This is something that peopledon't often think about.
I guess what you could callsuccession planning for the
information that you gather fornot only for these trips but for
all of your genealogicalresearch.
If it dies with you, then it isa bit of a waste.
(31:05):
Facebook is a great platformfor that, Instagram as well.
But also think about a way thatyou can document the trip and
also have it in a format thatyou can hand off to a cousin or
a son or another family memberwho may not continue the work
directly but at least could be acaretaker for it and pass it on
(31:29):
to maybe their children ortheir cousins.
Pat (31:32):
You know that is a huge point.
When you talk about familyhistorians, usually when people
go on vacations they'll takepictures in the moment.
But what you're talking aboutis something much deeper.
We're talking about a digitallegacy and so documenting not
just the trip but the locations,the dates, who you talk to and
(31:55):
if you could make notes about oh, there is so-and-so second
cousin or not sure how we'rerelated, because you're right,
it might not be a generationafter us, but maybe a hundred
years from now someone's goingto go into that information and
go oh, that's what Peter did.
I see where he went.
I mean that's really important.
(32:15):
And I guess the other piece Iwould add to that if you have a
chance to talk to olderrelatives, I so regret that I
did not do that.
You know, when you're in your20s, 30s or 40s you don't think
about.
I should ask grandma about whenshe did X, Y and Z to get those
stories recorded.
Peter (32:35):
Yes, I have the same regrets.
I remember my folks sent me upto Prince Rupert, British
Columbia, to work a summer inthe fish plants up there and I
think there were ulteriormotives to get me, as a
16-year-old boy, out of thehouse for the summer.
But it was great for me becauseI got to spend time with
relatives in Prince Rupert,which is where my Mazzei family
(32:58):
arrived after leaving Mongone,and I remember staying with my
great aunt for a couple of weeksand her husband and they both
were Italian speakers, and so alot of the time when I was in
the house I didn't understandwhat was being said because they
were speaking Italian and theirfriends would come over.
They spoke Italian.
But I do now think back on thattime and what a great
(33:21):
opportunity it would have beento have just said hey, you want
to sit down in front of mycassette recorder for half an
hour and tell me some stories.
But we can now learn from thatand make sure that we do what we
can to do a good job ofrecording the information that
we're fortunate enough to findand pass on.
Pat (33:41):
Absolutely, and I like your point about how do you choose
to convey that information.
Well, it's not hard to do ane-book.
There are so many platformslike draft2 digital, all sorts
of different things.
You write it, you load it up,you add the photographs and
there you have this preciousgift of your family history.
(34:01):
There's a lot of different waysto do this.
Peter (34:05):
Well, and I think it also starts with how you visualize
your trip.
Kind of going back to one ofthe first points that we talked
about, is it before you evenleave your house Is, think about
what you want to accomplishduring your trip and go prepared
to do that.
Have a camera or a good iPhonewith you, but also make sure you
(34:26):
got good old paper and pen andtake notes and sometimes it's
not convenient or appropriate totake notes while you're perhaps
meeting a relative or meeting acity official or something like
that, but just be thinkingabout how can I capture this
information?
As soon as you're done with aget together with somebody, even
(34:46):
if it means scratching downsome key phrases, that will just
trigger the memory at a latertime and when you can do.
Maybe at the end of the day,over a good glass of wine, sit
down and flesh out your summarya little bit about the day's
activities.
You will be so thankful thatyou did that, because when you
get back you're going to getcaught up into the rush of your
(35:06):
regular life and you might notget back to your notes or back
to your photos for a few months.
So having anything that cankind of trigger memories and
recollections of what was saidwill be very helpful.
Pat (35:17):
On that note, I would say, even doing a travel journal and
or a day log is terrific, andwhen you have train tickets or
stubs, just put them right intothe journal so that you have
that.
Wow, these are all terrificsuggestions.
Peter, you know, your journeyto Mangone is a compelling
(35:41):
reminder that exploring ourroots isn't about retracing
steps but about taking new oneson ancient soil.
And what you talked about theidea of those gifts of
serendipity, the people that youmet is really a remarkable,
(36:03):
remarkable story.
Thank you so much for sharingyour incredible journey with us.
Peter (36:10):
It's been my pleasure, Pat.
Pat (36:12):
Wow, I feel like I was just there.
We're just having, you know,good coffee, some cheese and
good bread, and we're justtalking about this.
So thank you and thank youlisteners.
If you enjoyed today's filtercapacity, please tell your
friends and subscribe.
Thank you and ciao for now.
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