![\"tedesco\"](\"https:\/\/rickzullo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/12\/tedesco.jpg\")
Not surprisingly, quite a few visitors to my blog have origins in Italy.\u00a0 Like me, they are descendants of Italian immigrants who were born outside of Italy, but retain a passion and curiosity for the \u201cOld Country.\u201d<\/p>\nNot surprisingly, quite a few visitors to my blog have origins in Italy.\u00a0 Like me, they are descendants of Italian immigrants who were born outside of Italy, but retain a passion and curiosity for the \u201cOld Country.\u201d<\/p>\n
For the most part, at least in the United States, these Italian ancestors came from the southern regions during the great wave between 1880 and 1920, when a total of 5.3 million arrived to Ellis Island.<\/p>\n
The 1910s marked the peak of Italian immigration, with over two million Italians immigrating in that decade alone.\u00a0 Included among them were my great-grandparents.<\/p>\n
Today I\u2019ve invited Mary Tedesco to write a guest post for my blog.\u00a0 She is the founder of ORIGINS ITALY, a firm specializing in Italian and Italian-American genealogical and family history research.\u00a0 For anybody who is curious about the journey that their Italian ancestors made, Mary\u2019s company is ready to assist you in your quest.\u00a0 And more specifically, for those of you with Sicilian<\/i> ancestry who have expressed interest in coming to Sicily with me this summer, this would be a great way to find out more about your roots before taking the trip.<\/p>\n
OK, without further ado, let\u2019s read what Mary has to say about Italian genealogy.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
By Mary Tedesco<\/p>\n
Are you doing it?\u00a0 Do you secretly look up passenger lists and Italian vital records online in the middle of the night?\u00a0 Do you have an account on a big name genealogy research site that your significant other doesn\u2019t know about?\u00a0 Well, then you\u2019re doing it too.\u00a0 Genealogy, of course!\u00a0 What did you think I was talking about? Italian genealogy is becoming a popular hobby with many (and profession for some) with Italian heritage, like Italian-Americans, Italian-Canadians, and Italian-Australians to name a few groups.\u00a0 In the United States and United Kingdom, popular TV shows like \u201cWho Do You Think You Are\u201d have propelled genealogy into the mainstream and have made it almost cool to be an Italian genealogist.<\/p>\n As a professional Italian genealogist, and founder of the research firm ORIGINS ITALY<\/a>, I have the privilege helping others explore their deepest curiosities about their own family trees.\u00a0\u00a0 In addition to that, I also assist people in navigating the process of Italian dual citizenship.\u00a0 My work often brings me to Italy to conduct onsite research in records that have not been microfilmed or digitized.\u00a0 It\u2019s incredibly interesting work and gives me no shortage of cocktail party stories.<\/p>\n Like many Italian-Americans, I am incredibly proud of my family and of my Italian roots.\u00a0 Italian genealogical research has allowed me to learn more about my family and fall in love with Italy many times over.\u00a0 I come from a family with both Northern Italian ancestors (Trentino-Alto Adige and Tuscany) and Southern Italian ancestors (Calabria).\u00a0 This special combination has allowed me relate to Italians and those of Italian descent with ties all over the peninsula.\u00a0 I am truly a lucky girl! There are many kinds people from all walks of life who wish to pursue their Italian genealogy.\u00a0 Some are focused on just one person; others wish to reconstruct their entire family tree back to Julius Caesar; and still others want to place their family into historical context using military, land, and other records.<\/p>\n Any way you slice it, it works.\u00a0 Genealogical research has become very customizable.\u00a0 Every client has different goals and objectives and even some secret hopes for the outcome of their genealogical research.<\/p>\n Sometimes the answers we seek are not actually written in the records, and circumstantial evidence must be reviewed and analyzed to reach a conclusion.\u00a0 Very CSI, right?\u00a0 Professional genealogy is not about typing names into a database, although that\u2019s sometimes part of it.\u00a0 It\u2019s about exploring a variety of research problems from an analytical point of view. The objective is to solve problems using procedures and skills developed though previous research.<\/p>\n After several generations living away from Italy, the knowledge of a family\u2019s ancestral town or towns is sometimes lost.\u00a0 That\u2019s where genealogical research comes in.\u00a0\u00a0 It is possible in many cases to consult records available in the United States (and in other countries where Italians have immigrated) to find the names of these ancestral towns.\u00a0 These answers do not always come easily, but we\u2019re Italian right, and as the granddaughter of a Calabrian immigrant, I have a \u201ctesta dura\u201d<\/i> (hard head), which means I do not give up when faced with a difficult research problem!<\/p>\n I would encourage everyone to start doing it.\u00a0 Embrace your Italian family history.\u00a0 You won\u2019t be sorry, I promise you.\u00a0 Here are some essential resources to help you get started with your Italian Genealogy:\u00a0 http:\/\/www.originsitaly.com\/getting-started-with-italian-genealogy<\/a>\/.<\/p>\n Italian genealogy is about heritage, curiosity, and discovery.\u00a0 It\u2019s about seeking to preserve our past and looking forward to a bright future.\u00a0 Remembering and honoring our own history, whether it is Italian or a mix of other nationalities, will only help us to understand ourselves.<\/p>\n Italian Genealogy.\u00a0 Are you doing it?\u00a0 I\u2019m doing it.\u00a0 Everybody\u2019s doing it.<\/p>\n Mary M. Tedesco\u00a0<\/b>is the Founder of ORIGINS ITALY, a firm specializing in Italian and Italian-American genealogical and family history research. She speaks fluent Italian and travels often to Italy where she conducts genealogical and historical research and visits family. Mary holds a Bachelor of Arts in Mathematics from Boston University and a Certificate in Genealogical Research from Boston University\u2019s Center for Professional Education. \u00a0She is on the Board of Directors of the Massachusetts Genealogical Council and is also a member of number of local and national genealogical societies. Her favorite destination on Friday afternoons (besides Good Harbor Beach in Gloucester, Massachusetts USA) is Massachusetts Vital Records! \u00a0Mary can be contacted via Twitter @originsitaly<\/a> or through www.originsitaly.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Not surprisingly, quite a few visitors to my blog have origins in Italy.\u00a0 Like me, they are descendants of Italian immigrants who were born outside of Italy, but retain a passion and curiosity for the \u201cOld Country.\u201d For the most part, at least in the United States, these Italian ancestors came from the southern regions […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5816,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[451,37,42],"tags":[181,380,56,182,28,129],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rickzullo.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2375"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rickzullo.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rickzullo.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rickzullo.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rickzullo.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2375"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rickzullo.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2375\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rickzullo.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5816"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rickzullo.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2375"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rickzullo.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2375"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rickzullo.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2375"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"origins\"](\"https:\/\/rickzullo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/12\/origins.png\")
<\/a><\/p>\n![\"italian](\"https:\/\/rickzullo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/12\/IMG_2044.jpg\")
<\/p>\n![\"find](\"https:\/\/rickzullo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/12\/IMG_2062.jpg\")
Many people in my family ask me \u201cWhen are you going to be done with our family\u2019s genealogy.\u201d\u00a0 Now I simply tell them, \u201cI\u2019m looking for Adam Tedesco.\u201d\u00a0 That\u2019s right, Adam, the Biblical first man.\u00a0 \u201cAdamo si chiamava Tedesco<\/i>.\u201d\u00a0 Of course, this is in jest.\u00a0 But I know my 85-year-old cousin Giuseppe Tedesco is secretly hoping I\u2019ll uncover that the first man\u2019s surname was in fact Tedesco.\u00a0 Stay tuned for that.<\/p>\n