When reviewing all the records I’ve collected on my great grandmother, Violetta, I found that she is has 15+ different variations of her name listed! I’m still on the hunt for her birth record from Italy and when I find it, I look forward to learning her true name!
For this week’s Throw Back Thursday image, I thought I’d share this adorable gem! This is me and my younger brother atop my dad’s first of MANY tractors he owned during our 20 years on the farm. It was an old red Farmall and we loved playing with the steering wheel and watching the cap on the exhaust pipe pop up and down as the exhaust flowed through the pipe. Fun times!
Anthony Carra, or as I call him “Uncle Tony,” was quite possibly the most colorful character on my dad’s side of the family–at least that I had the opportunity to know. He lead the life of an Italian bachelor and passed his time decorating, gardening and his favorite, gambling! In a future post, I’ll share more about his life but for now, I want to share my personal memories of him. The year was 1995 and my brother and I were homeschooled. My mom would take us into town for groceries on Wednesdays and we would stop by to visit him at his apartment on the westside of Kalamazoo. My mom has always had a soft spot for old men and since he had no spouse or children, she made it a point to check in on him. As we walked through the door, we were immediately hit with a STRONG aroma of garlic and vinegar and our ears were assaulted by the volume of his television. To say he was obsessed with watching the news (CNN) would be an understatement! I can remember him watching coverage of the OJ Simpson trial and the Oklahoma City Bombing. At every visit, he would be sitting in his lazy-boy chair with his leg up in a foot rest. He had gout so his mobility was limited. His arms were always crossed above his belly and when he would get all worked up (which was OFTEN), the Italian would come out as he flapped is arms all about. His false teeth would shift around and he would often jut out his jaw as he spoke. At every visit, he would say to me and my brother, “there is juice in the Iza Bogza”. Regardless of modern advancements, he still called his refrigerator an ice box. The juice was always cranberry. Not the sweet cran-mix kind but the strong tart kind that made an unpleasant tingling sensation in your cheeks. We didn’t have cable at home and we rarely had juice in the house so the experience made a lasting impact in my memory. I also remember his beautiful white chenille bedspread and credenza that contained cigar boxes with various treasures inside. I still have a cigar box that he let me have. I thought it was so cool and I kept it in my room with mementos in it, showing it to my friends when they would come over.
Later that year, he moved to an apartment in Battle Creek and passed away shortly after.
From what I can remember, he was passionate, vocal, cranky with a dash of paranoid tossed in! He was the stereotypical elderly Italian uncle and the only great uncle I ever knew from my Dad’s side of the family. Though I wasn’t always thrilled to visit at the time, I’m grateful now that I had the opportunity to get to know him before he was gone.
After contemplating way too long how to start this blog, I have decided that the best place to start would be to show the results of our DNA. Once I researched the pros and cons of all the DNA tests on the market, I chose to go with Ancestry. The main reasons being that they have the largest database for cousin matches, the ability to link my DNA to my family tree on their site and their ethnicity estimate and associated tools. Yes, I know that the ethnicity results are merely estimates and do change over time. That being said, I had my DNA test done years ago and each time Ancestry makes an update, I find my results becoming increasingly accurate (based on the record trail). After years of trying to convince my father to have his DNA tested, he FINALLY agreed to take one this past Father’s Day and I am so grateful! We knew that his paternal grandparents immigrated from Southern Italy (Sicily) but to see through his father, he is 49% Southern Italian with just 1% Egyption, helps to prove how Italian we really are! As you will see from our results below, there are so many vibrant colors represented in our DNA. Though my skin is VERY white (thank you Polish roots), my not-so-distant grandparents had olive, brown and even ebony colored skin. Unfortunately, through my research, I have learned that some of my ancestors were ashamed of their skin color and in some cases went to great lengths to cover it up. Now that their generations have passed on, my goal with this blog is to celebrate their origins, backgrounds and shades of beautiful color! Everyone has a unique DNA story. Do you know yours?
Our Colorful Roots 