Favorite Links
Must-See | |
This is an interesting, fun and totally addictive downloadable program. You are at the controls as you fly around the world, viewing the important locations in your life - your high school, your childhood home, old boyfriend's house, as well as other interesting sites. While all of the big world cities - New York, Rome, London, Paris - appear in high resolution, even some no-so-big cities are in high-def too. Chieuti, for some unknown lucky-for-us reason is in high definition, so you can zoom in and view the land below from an altitude of less than 2,000 feet in exquisite detail. Take a look! Oh, there's the bus stop where we waited for the bus, and the road from Serracapriola. And there's the town hall . . . addictive . . . | |
General Genealogy | |
New to genealogy? Start here. You can access loads of information through this site, including your nearest Family History Library where you can rent films and view the actual birth, death and marriage records of your ancestors. I've acquired most of my database information by viewing the films at my local Seattle FHL. Together with Genealogists Guide to Discovering Your Italian Ancestors: How to Find and Record Your Unique Heritage by Lynn Nelson, you can become an expert on your ancestors. | |
If you are pursing your ancestors, you need a place to record all of your information. The Personal Ancestry File (PAF) is a simple, east-to-use and free downloadable database program offered by the Family History Library. While you may eventually decide to use another, more sophisticated database program, all of your PAF date can be converted to your new database program. This is the database program that I currently use. The Personal Ancestry File Companion is an additional program which gives you various ways to display your genealogy information. A limited version is free, but the full program is a bargain for under $10. | |
Ancestry.com is a pay site. While you can access much of the Ancestry.com's databases (i.e., census records, Social Security Death Index) somewhere other than at Ancestry.com for free (census records are available at National Archives and Family History Libraries), it's a great convenience to have all of the resources at your fingertips at one location. It's worth the yearly cost to me. (Access to Ancestry.com is also free at the Family History Libraries.) | |
The yellow pages of genealogy. | |
Looking for the county in which a U.S. city is located? Quick and easy. | |
Resource for locating U.S. vital records on the internet. | |
Public Records Directory. Some databases are free and some are pay. Their blurb: Search Systems continues to be by far the best resource of business information, corporate filings, offenders, inmates, criminal and civil court filings, vital records, property records, unclaimed property, professional licenses, and much more. | |
An important site, and I haven't begun to explore the riches it provides. I'm lucky to live in one of the nine National Archive branch cities. This means I can drive to the archives and view the census record films and immigration record films, page by page. But I'm usually at the Family History Library. | |
Italy | |
Information and statistics on Italian regions, provinces and municipalities, all cities, towns and villages in Italy. Official site, zip codes, population, useful links. | |
Italian Immigrant Fun Facts. | |
Enter your Italian surname and you will see a geographic representation illustrating where that surname occurs in Italy. | |
Mimi Torchia Boothby provides a valuable resource for finding your Italian ancestors, posting links to websites/email addresses of researchers who transcribe the birth, death and marriage records of particular Italian towns. While most researchers concentrate on one town, some are working on the records of multiple towns. | |
Chieuti | |
Contact information for the Comune of Chieuti. | |
Interesting information about the people, businesses, geography of today's Chieuti. Most common surname in Chieuti today? Dardes. | |
Italians Coming to America | |
| A great site for locating the ship manifests for your ancestors' arrival at Ellis Island. Best-case scenario: you enter your ancestor's name and - violá - you find your ancestor's record. More likely, however, you will have to try different possible (mis)spellings of your ancestor's name. Human beings transcribed the original ship manifests, and the handwriting could often be a challenge to read. For instance, my grandfather's name was "Donato Miniello" but his name was transcribed as "Donato Mintells" and his town of origin was listed as "Chienti." My sister was able to find him because she knew the year of his immigration. A great new feature: if you believe there have been transcription errors, you can e-mail your suggested corrections. Grandpa's name now appears correctly. |
| I love this website; Dr. Morse's forms provide nifty ways to search the available databases of Ellis Island and other ports of immigration, such as Castle Gardens, Baltimore, Boston. Example: I wanted to search on just the town name in order to extract all of the immigrants from Chieuti. The Ellis Island site above does not provide this feature; Dr. Morse's "gold form" gave me that option. Of course, I had to allow for transcription errors. The various ways in which "Chieuti" was misspelled? "Chienti," "Chicuti," "Chianti," "Chienta," "Chiente," "Chiento," "Chioti," "Chievoti," "Chunti," "Chanti," "Chiento," "Chiens," "Chientie." Even so, I was able to extract the immigration data for over 650 Chieuti immigrants. In addition, Dr. Morse details how to locate those "missing manifests" which you may have come across at the Ellis Island site. And he also has many other clever websites which may help you locate information about your ancestors. I can't recommend this site highly enough. |
Italians in America | |
Italians-in-America fun facts. From the 2000 census, this site provides the percentage of Italians in different American cities of at least 1,000 inhabitants and of which at least 25% of those people said they were Italian. American city with the largest Italian population? 46.7% of the citizens of Johnston, Rhode Island. Who knew? And 31.4% in Pittston, Pennsylvania. | |
Ohio/Cleveland | |
The Cleveland Necrology File contains paid deaths notices published in local Cleveland newspapers up to 1975. Because many of the Chieuti immigrants (including my grandparents) settled in Cleveland, this site has been invaluable to me in making the connections between Chieuti immigrants and their descendants. If I could find a similar site for Pittston, Pennsylvania - the #1 destination for Chieuti immigrants - I would be in heaven. | |
Like the Cleveland Public Library site above, this site enabled me to make those important connections between the Chieuti immigrants and their descendants. Enter the bride and/or groom and you will find the volume and page of the marriage license. Only for Cuyahoga County. Again, if I could find a similar site for Luzerne County, Pennsylvania . . . | |
This site can help you locate volume and certificate numbers for deaths occurring in Ohio for the years 1913-1941. I was able to locate my grandmother, her exact date of death, as well as two of her infant children. | |
How to order your Ohio vital records - birth, death and marriage records. | |
Pennsylvania | |
Luzerne County Historical Society. | |
Italian Citizenship | |
If you have a parent or grandparent who was born in Italy, you may be eligible for an Italian passport through jure sanguinis (or through ancestry). Other than marrying an Italian, this is the easiest route to obtaining Italian citizenship. This abundant site helps you determine if you are eligible and, if so, the process by which you can obtain your Italian passport. Lots of helpful information in the FAQ section, and links to all of the sites you will need in order to obtain the nessary documents. Important tip: acquire your ancestor's naturalization documents first. I made the mistake of acquiring these documents after I had collected every single other document I needed. I was suprised to learn that my grandfather became an American citizen before my mother was born. (The census records had said otherwise.) Hence, he was not an Italian citizen when my mother was born, and he could not pass on the right of Italian citizenship through jure sanguinis; consequently, she could not pass it on to me. I am not giving up though! Because both of my mother's parents were born in Italy, I can become an Italian citizen if I live in Italy for three years. A recent change in Italian law discards the previous requirement that you give up your American citizenship in order to acquire Italian citizenship. . . . Although after the stolen presidental election of 2000, and the Supreme Court's shameful appointment of the worst president ever, I am not sure that having to give up my American citizenship would have been a deal-breaker. I'm grateful that I don't have to make that choice. | |
A collection of interesting Italian websites. | |
Other Links | |
From their website: La Scuola Italiana is a small, intimate Italian language school located in Belltown. As an alternative space, it offers affordable language instruction and small class sizes (8 -10 students per class), in downtown Seattle. Each student's development is followed closely. A strong grammatical foundation is established while discussing customs, traditions, travel information, food, wines and integrating personal interests/goals. A common cause of frustration in language acquisition is the lag-time between student/teacher interactions caused by large classes. A smaller class size allows more individual attention, less delay and allows students to address individual issues the moment they occur in his/her learning. Gorgeous website. | |
From the website: The Dante Alighieri Society of Washington holds regular meetings on the second and fourth Wednesdays of each month, September through May in Seattle. The first meeting each month is in English and is preceded by an Italian pasta meal organized and prepared in a group effort at a nominal charge. In addition to the regular meetings, the Society sponsors and promotes other social and cultural events involving Italian language and culture. . . . The Society also maintains a library of Italian books and a photographic history of Italian activities in the greater Seattle area for display at various events. The Society has operated an Italian Language Program since 1984. Four levels are offered every quarter: introductory conversation, elementary, intermediate and advanced. Meraviglioso! | |