from whence one comes

[franksolich]

A bonfire lit by a primitive on Skins's island yesterday (Friday), in which the primitive had ostensibly discovered her true ethnic origins (eastern European Jewish rather than the always-assumed eastern European Roman Catholic), got me to thinking about someone.....although I've thought about this person every year around Christmas anyway, given that the ancestor always struck me as a "Christmas" sort of person.

- - - - - - - - - - - -

I never met my great-grandfather, the father of the mother of my mother, who died in 1938, long before I was born.  All the people and events described herein can be placed and dated in the Carpathian Mountains of central Europe circa 1880-1890, and in northeastern Pennsylvania circa 1890-1940.

One time I interviewed his second-oldest son (i.e., an uncle of my mother; by then a long-retired Ph.D. of "education"), and asked, quite pointedly, if there had been any particular problems or interesting situations for him, given that my great-grandfather, his father, was a dwarf, and by the time his own children were 7 or 8 years old, they towered over him.

The ancient paused, as if hearing something he'd never thought of before, and finally responded, "You know, as children, we didn't see things that way; all we were seeing that here was our father, the source of our lives, the one who gave us everything that we had, all that we had.

"And he gave it with such joy, such merriment; the toys he made, the tops, the wooden soldiers, the marionettes, the chains whittled from a single piece of wood, the rocking horses, the dolls, the wagons with wooden wheels.....not to mention we lived in a house he had himself built, and were fed and clothed by the sweat of his own labor.

"I don't think anybody ever saw him as 'short,' as his sheer muscular strength overshadowed all else about him.

"As one of his own sons [i.e., a 5-year-old younger brother of this ancient] was dying in pain and agony, it took three men from town, all of them more than twice his size, to keep him barred inside an outbuilding until it was all over, so he couldn't see it.

"Mother was with my brother, but as for father, whose joy in all things was considered extraordinary, it was feared the sight would cause him to curse God, damning him.

"And then some days later, in the middle of the night, he roused we children from our beds, shooing us outside and across the road in our bed-clothes, and the animals in the barn too, and then proceeded to douse all with kerosene, setting afire all that he had created, and using small dynamite to blow up whatever didn't burn quickly enough.

"The sight in the middle of the dark night attracted attention and commotion, but once others saw what was going on, they knew all they could do was stand and watch, as to interfere with father would invite trouble.

"It was as if a child imagines Hell; the flames, the explosions, the smoke, in the middle of the forest, the fearful children and animals, the silent adults, and father running amok in it it all, urging the fire to burn more, and the explosives to explode more.

"The priest urged others to put a stop to it, saying father was committing blasphemy, putting his Immortal Soul in peril. 

"We children didn't understand it, but the priest and adults did; father was challenging Satan to destroy him, and only God, no mortal man, could win against Satan.

"After it was all over, towards dawn, father put all of we children into a wagon, and with the animals following behind, we rode to mother's, 15 miles away, leaving behind still-burning ashes of what had once been much, but now was nothing."

- - - - - - - - - - - -

Ever since I was a little lad, I had always been curious about those who came before me, those whose blood runs in these veins--and equally curious as to why others did not, or do not, feel the same way.

In fact, it can be rather disturbing, this lack of wanting to know what came before them.

How can one possibly live, not knowing those people who have created one?

At the age of 9 years, I began gathering information for a "family tree," writing in pencil on green ledger paper, all those people, dates, and things known to me, after which much more was added.  It is all a great deal of information, and I still have it, including the original childish notations that were sometimes corrected in an adult hand on those first pieces of green ledger paper; corrected by either my father or my mother, depending upon the side of the family described.

In addition, I spent many summers away from Nebraska, with relatives in Pennsylvania and New York.  I had, or have, many cousins my own age, but I was an aloof, lone-wolf, sort of child and teenager, preferring to spend my time with ancients, who corrected my notes of what they told me, and when I was back home, wrote me often, giving me other useful information and statistics.

The ancients started leaving this time and place when I was a child, but it pleased God that I was already an adult before the last one did.  I am sure that what I was not told far exceeds what I was told, and that saddens me greatly, but time was short, and one grasped all that one could.

- - - - - - - - - - - -

to be continued

[Crazy Horse]

Part Indian..........German............English.............Southern.............slave...............etc

I'm an American and damn proud of it

[JohnnyReb]

Thanks to someone elses hard work, I know my family back to 1635 here in America and a few years before that in England.

But whenever the subject of family trees come up, I think back to an old fellow I worked with 45 years ago. He would always say, "Best you don't shake your family tree to hard.........there's no telling what might fall out of it."......

[franksolich]

But whenever the subject of family trees come up, I think back to an old fellow I worked with 45 years ago. He would always say, "Best you don't shake your family tree too hard.........there's no telling what might fall out of it."......

Oh yeah.

There's a lot of that, this no telling what might fall out of it.

But it's all good.

[chris_]

The American side of my immediate family migrated to America through Nova Scotia in the early 19th century and down the eastern seaboard.  I have a relative that ran some sort of theater in Red Bank, NJ.  Part of my family worked with John Barrymore back when being an 'actor' was next to being an opium dealer on the social ladder.  My aunt has the original playbills.

I have the lineage of the male side of my family back to the 17th century or so.

My mother's English and her family has probably lived in the area around the same small town for a couple hundred years.  She gets old newspaper clipping from my grandmother with pictures of freshly-plucked hens hanging for sale at the meat market.

[franksolich]

Part Indian...German...English...Southern...slave...etc.

I'm an American and damn proud of it.

Of course; we all are.

By the way, the two events as described above, took place here in America, near White Haven, Pennsylvania, in 1901.

I'll have to backtrack to Ruthenia in the Carpathian mountains during the late 19th century--it was a part of Austria-Hungary at the time, later the tail end of Czechoslovakia, later stolen by the Soviet socialists and incorporated into Ukraine.

And then Amsterdam in the Netherlands is much involved.

After I get the "back story" all done, everything happens in America.

It's a "literary technique," although I have no pretensions about being literary; setting the stage by describing a later incident, so as to set the tone and (one hopes) captivate the audience, after which all goes in chronological order.

But most of it, fifty years of it, took place right here.

[Zeus]

My ancestors discovered the new World 500 yrs before that Italian rookie got lost and washed ashore in the west Indies thinking it was the New world.

My Blood kin are the true minorities. There are only about 1 million of us worldwide.

[Traveshamockery]

My mother's side of the family comes from Denmark.

[franksolich]

The last name of my great-grandfather was "Vlsk," in Slovakian meaning either "wolf" or "son of the wolf," whichever one chooses.  It was a last name of recent origin, as until the 1870s, peasants (and others) in the Austro-Hungarian Empire had never used last names.

According to my great-grandfather, who passed the story down to his children, there had been a large wolf terrorizing the village, causing much damage to livestock and other living things.  No one, even imperial soldiers barracked nearby, could ever catch it.

One day an ancestor of my great-grandfather was strolling down a forest-arcaded lane, from his field back to home in the village.  Suddenly this "thing" lunged at him from behind the trees.  Having no weapon, and having left his farming-implement hidden in the field, the ancestor did the only thing he could possibly do, wrestle with it.

It was not until he had strangled it to death, choked it to death with his bare hands, that he realized it was a wolf.

The deed attracted a great deal of attention, eventually reaching the imperial court in Vienna.  The emperor of Austria-Hungary had a public-relations policy of occasionally acknowledging heroic accomplishments of the poor and humble in his empire, usually that of bestowing some flattering second name upon he who had done the deed, along with awarding ten silver kronen, then an enormous fortune.

And hence the family earned the last name of "Vlsk."

- - - - - - - - - - - -

Anyone attempting to verify long-ago facts in eastern Europe is, usually, undertaking a futile enterprise.  Throughout the centures, eastern Europe has been ravaged by invasions, wars, and lately, history-erasing socialism, to the detriment of records--such as the records were.

How happy the fate of those of us of British or Scandinavian descent, who can actually delve into centuries past, those ancient records generally undisturbed.

In the 1870s, the government of Austria-Hungary decided that all must have a last name, for purposes of a census.  A census of course would enable ease of identification, and better yet, ease of collection of taxes.

Once a government compels someone to involuntarily take something, it also compels that same someone to involuntarily pay for it; last names were not freely given out.  One had to pay for them, unless it could be proven that a last name had been in common and general use for a long time.

Those of Jewish derivation had it the worst; they had never used last names, and the fees for a last name, for them, was higher than the fees for a last name for the Roman Catholics.  If one was Jewish, like a Roman Catholic, he had to first pay for the privilege of having a last name.....but unlike a Roman Catholic, then he had to pay again, for the privilege of choosing his own last name, rather than being assigned one.

This was a sore issue, because court bureaucrats purposely assigned last names to Jews that were blatantly offensive, even obscene; this was so as to encourage the Jews to pay an additional bribe to change their last name to something more aesthetic.  (But if one was a poor Jew, which most were, one was stuck.)

My ancestors were Roman Catholic, and did not face the second obstacle, although the first one, paying for the privilege of having a last name, was formidable enough, given that the fees were not chump change, but quite onerous.

However, as mentioned earlier, one could avoid the fee if one already had a last name, in common and long-time usage.

Much of the name-changing records and censuses of the 1870s still exists.

There is, recorded in 1873, a statement made by the village priest, probably the only literate person in the village, and so as to save the family having to pay a fee to acquire their last name, stating that my ancestors "for two generations past, and into the current one", had used the last name "Vlsk."

(Which would place the wolf-strangling incident, perhaps, in the 1820s.)

There is an additional statement to the effect that the name derived from "a service to H.I.M. the Emperor" so as to "preserve" the health and well-being of his "humble subjects," and that ten silver kronen had been awarded for it.

As if crying for a long-ago injustice to be rectified, it follows that the governor (actual term untranslable; probably a lower-level court official) had thought "ten silver kronen too much for a mere peasant, and so gave only three, keeping the other seven for himself."

One suspects the guy was a Democrat.

- - - - - - - - - - - -

The birthdate of my great-grandfather is unknown; on various American records (no non-American records in existence)--in which instances my great-grandfather supplied the year himself--it could have been 1868, 1869, 1870, 1871, or 1872.

My great-grandfather had a father, and older brothers and sisters, but their names and fates long ago evaporated into the mists of history, now known only to God.

It was one autumn day in, probably, 1879 or 1880 or 1881, that black-hooded Ukrainian horsemen from just over the border came riding into the village, seaching for Jews.  Why they were searching for Jews, could have been that there had been a poor harvest, or there was an epidemic raging, or simply that the Ukrainians were bored and wanted some sport.

The villagers were corralled into the square, and their identities questioned.  There was a boy present, whom no one acknowledged.  Then the mother of my great-grandfather (i.e., my own great-great-grandmother), betraying her ancient Roman Catholic conscience, lied and claimed the boy was hers.

Some other person, perhaps to save someone or something of her own, alleged it to be a lie, that the boy was an orphaned Jew, and no Christian.  Upon finding the boy had been circumsized, he was immediately poked through with a sword, spear, or javelin of some sort.

A Christian who had harbored a Jew was worse than a Jew, and so the mother of my great-grandfather was tied behind a horse and dragged to death, her broken body tossed down a well, after which the Ukrainians left the burning village.

to be continued

[franksolich]

My great-grandfather had been hidden by some adult during the raid on the village, and so survived unscathed.  But being a child, what was he to do?  The villagers were kind and took care of one another best they could, but times were bad, and there was little to share, especially with someone not family.

He apparently remained for some months, during which time others urged him to "go to America, where the peasants live better than the emperor."  Everyone being illiterate with no idea of geography, pointed out that if one followed where the sun sets in the evening, and crossed a great water, one would get to America.

So sometime that winter, my great-grandfather, at the time perhaps 10 or 11 years old, essayed to walk to America by following the sun.

He did in fact walk, from the eastern edge of present-day Czechoslovakia, through the mountains and forests of upper Austria and lower Bavaria.  He sustained himself as many orphaned or abandoned children have sustained themselves since the beginning of mankind, begging, stealing, always looking out for a kind soul; sleeping in haystacks, that sort of thing.

Somewhere in lower Bavaria he encountered an Irish itinerant, who took my great-grandfather under his wing.  It's possible my great-grandfather was put on exhibit in circuses and fairs of the region, but more probable, since dwarves were a dime-a-dozen, he served as some sort of "gofer," or errand boy for the guy.

It was not an amicable association for reasons unknown, other than that it appears the Irish itinerant beat him, thumped him, and kept all the money for himself.

So my great-grandfather resolved to escape.

- - - - - - - - - - - -

I always found use of the word "escape" interesting.

My great-grandfather had told all of his children this story, and I myself heard it from their own mouths, from seven of them, over two decades.  The time and place and person was always different, but they all seven used the word "escape."

Not "ran away," but "escaped."

I have no idea what was up with that.

- - - - - - - - - - - -

One day in summer, my great-grandfather came, at last, to a great body of water, the most water he had ever seen.  He stowed away on a boat that, not following the sun, went north, some days later docking on the other side.

My great-grandfather surreptitiously deboarded, and beheld the land in front of him.

Windmills, dikes, canals, tulips, wooden shoes.

He was in America.

to be continued

[franksolich]

Despite certain, uh, obstacles presented by my great-grandfather--a small dirty child, no knowledge of the native language, no means of support--the phlegmatic Dutch burghers and the robust Dutch housewives took him to their hearts, setting him up as an apprentice to a woodworker.

Flourishing under the warmth of friendship and affection for perhaps the first time in his life, my great-grandfather learned the skill well, assiduously carpentering under the approving eyes of the pipe-smoking burghers.

He even essayed to learn Dutch, which he thought was English.

And to acquire a life-long preference for wooden shoes.

My great-grandfather was there perhaps three years before he learned that he in fact had not reached America; that the Rhine River was not the Atlantic Ocean, and one had much further to go.

Greatly discombobulated, because he had found life comfortable, but it was not where he was supposed to be, my great-grandfather pondered the issue greatly, discussing it with all of his hosts.

It was ultimately decided that such a promising young man would have an even better future in America, where even the peasants lived better than the emperor in Vienna, and so the burghers and housewives took up a collection, which netted sufficient gulden to buy him passage to America, steerage.

And so my great-grandfather, who was by then 13 or 14 or 15 years old, bravely took off again, heading in the direction the sun sets.  He had been well-provisioned, food, clothing, and gulden by the good people of Holland, but his riches aboard ship attracted avaricious eyes.

The morning the ship reached Boston, an Irish peddler stole his belongings, all of them, everything.

to be continued   

[Schadenfreude]

Frank.... Your family's story is fascinating and I am riveted. I hope you write a book some day.

[franksolich]

Here we get to the first official acknowledgement that my great-grandfather existed; the immigration records for Boston in 1885 (Ellis Island hadn't been created yet) give his name and his "age" (15 years, but he might have lied by a couple of years, as one apparently had to be at least 15 years old if not accompanied by someone older, to come in).

His last name of "Vlsk" was really garbled, mangled.

As it was to be from forewith on, until his death in 1938, this constant distortion of the good name "Vlsk."  Currently, the descendants of my great-grandfather through whom the name has passed (I am not one of those), the name has six known variations, but there are perhaps more, of which I'm not aware.

One hopes to God one variation is not "Pitt."

- - - - - - - - - - - -

Left stranded on the dock, robbed of all his possessions other than the clothes on his back, my great-grandfather grew desperate.  Unfortunately, his first and only victim happened to be an off-duty policeman, a Boston cop, a son of Eire.

The irate Fenian thumped him on the head and carted him off to jail.

My great-grandfather was very rapidly acquiring a dislike for the smaller-islanded subjects of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland; a dislike later further more than justified.

The penal institutions, like the mental institutions, of the Commonweath of Massachusetts were even back then--just like today--noted for their squalor, their dirt, their filth, their crowdedness, their corruption, their disease.

My great-grandfather was packed into a cell apparently built to hold four, but which held nearly ten times that.  A pandemonium of noise, odors, and dirt.  He was in there for some days, during which time the population changed considerably, what with prisoners constantly being released, and new ones shoved in.

Ultimately, perhaps the second or third day, a batch of Slovakians were crammed in, after which my great-grandfather could be illuminated (he of course knowing only his native language, and Dutch).  He learned his fellow countrymen were headed for the anthracite coal region of northeastern Pennsylvania, and decided to tag along with them, especially after hearing them talk of the riches one could acquire.

The other Slovakians talked long and loud about life in the coal-mines, speculating that here in America, even a mere coal-miner could live better than the emperor in Vienna.  They were going to have big houses and fancy women and sprightly carriages, torte and strudel and weinerschnass and poppyseed rolls every day, and beef on Sundays.

There was however, one inmate not of Slovakian origin, but who understood the language, a tall gaunt rickety wild-eyed immigrant apparently headed back to the Old Country, as he had been driven insane; a lunatic, a madman.

He ranted and raved and held forth advice for these greenhorns; that they simply take their money, and move on out of the coal-fields as soon as they were able.

Part of his advice was that these newcomers not accept company "benefits," such as free housing and free goods.  "Take your money, cash, and don't be in debt to the company.  Sleep under the stars, rather than taking a roof of the company."

The other Slovakians were confused; they were going to join others of their fellow countrymen in the coal-fields, who had illuminated them about big wages, free housing, the free goods (and possibly the "free medical care for all"), and besides, they would be more comfortable with their own, everybody living all together in their own company town.

This strange guy was nuts anyway; why pay attention to a madman?

My great-grandfather was released, but hung around until the other Slovakians were set free, and went with them to the coal-fields of northeastern Pennsylvania.  As no one had any money, they all walked (apparently there were about six or eight of them), from Boston to Hazleton, Pennsylvania. 

My great-grandfather was used to walking, and so for him, it was nothing.

He applied at the coal-company, and was immediately hired, mostly because of his short height.  Short men and boys were much in demand for miners, as the coal veins were such that no man, unless a dwarf or a midget, could stand upright in them; if one was even of only "average" height, one spent a great deal of time crawling.

There was a brief moment of disconcert when my great-grandfather noticed the boss was a little upset that he would not take a company house.....which meant my great-grandfather would have to be paid in cash, rather than in company script, which could be spent only at the company store.  But it was only momentary; it passed.

The first week of work, my great-grandfather slept under the stars.  And then with his first week's wages in his pocket, he acquired the services of a boarding-house near Jeddo-Highland.

While at the boarding-house, his perceptive eyes saw that the landlady of the premises was actually making twice the money one assumed she was.  Miners worked in 12-hour shifts.  A bed was rented to one miner for 12 hours a day, when he was off work, and then rented again to another miner for the other 12 hours a day, when the first miner went to work.

For whatever reason, my great-grandfather filed that information away, for future use.

to be continued

[franksolich]

In 1887, my great-grandfather purchased some land near White Haven, Pennsylvania; land sold cheaply because it was considered too remote to be convenient, $400 for about seventy acres.

None of his immediate descendants knew where he had gotten the money, an enormous sum for a coal-miner of the time, and records show the land was paid for in cash, no middleman such as a bank or a friend.

In generations to follow, the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania ultimately surrounded the farm with a "state forest," buying up private holdings of others living nearby, but this piece of land, the farm, remains with descendants of my great-grandfather even today, a private island within a vast ocean of governmental terrain.

As late as the 1990s, getting there was easier on foot, or on a horse, than by motor vehicle, even an ATV (all-terrain vehicle).  The road, the width of a modern motor vehicle, twisted and turned through the state forest for about six miles, and was wholly of dirt with deep ruts.

And just as soon as one assumed he would never cut through the trees, one burst through and beheld a miniature valley of cleared land, a large pond, meadows, and an orchard.

It was here that my great-grandfather built his house, a barn, and outbuildings.

The barn and outbuildings apparently were of appropriate sizes, however, because of his short height, my great-grandfather sort of miscalculated when putting up the house, its entries and ceilings suitable for dwarves and midgets and short people and children, but not for "average" adults.

When I first started interviewing ancients--the children of my great-grandfather--I was always fascinated by that they had the most curious habit, when going through a doorway, of bending down slightly, even if the top of the door was a foot or two above their heads.  They were still doing this well into their 80s.

At the time, there were others living nearby (this was before the place other than this particular farm became a state forest), but as they were of peoples different than Slovakians, while my great-grandfather got along okay with them, there existed little chance for much social intercourse.

My great-grandfather knew Slovakian, and had learned Dutch; at some time when queried about his lack of English, he said having had to learn Dutch, he was too tired to bother learning any more languages.

This led to perhaps the most fortunate thing to ever happen to my great-grandfather, in the pecuniary sense--although of course a tragedy had to happen for his wealth to happen, and my great-grandfather would have been happier if no tragedy had happened, and hence no riches.

The latter fourth of the 19th century was the heyday of the "three cents per week" "industrial" "life insurance" policies, in which one could purchase life insurance at the rate of three cents a week, the salesman coming around once a week to collect the coinage, and punching a card indicating payment had been made.

Despite the small sums collected, it was actually a lucrative business, mostly because of policies that lapsed due to unemployment of the policyholder, or because the policyholder had moved on, no forwarding address, or otherwise just simply disappeared.  And so what had already been collected, was just so much gravy.

Probably only a negligible percentage of such policies were paid, they having been kept current.  I once read a history of the Prudential, and of Metropolitan, prominent and long-time life-insurors, and it appears only circa one-half of one percent of such policies were ever paid.  But they were paid.

It happened that there was a young man in the area occupied with collecting these three-cent premiums every week.....and that this young man was of Dutch derivation, and so knew Dutch, and so could converse with my great-grandfather.

Apparently this enterprising agent arranged things so that he would arrive at the farm as the last stop of the week, giving him some hours to sit around and visit with my great-grandfather. 

My great-grandfather first bought a policy on himself, the local parish the beneficiary, so he could be assured a decent Christian burial.  Then over the years, he purchased other policies, on his wife, on his children, and then a second policy, and a third policy, on the same.

- - - - - - - - - - - -

Now having a farm, my great-grandfather essayed to get a wife.

The usual practice was that one wrote to a marriage-broker in the Old Country, stating his preferences, and of course including a down-payment.  If the marriage-broker were amenable, or had the inventory, then one paid the rest of the fee and sent along more money for passage of the bride to the United States.

My great-grandfather had left the Old Country as a child, and had no more connections, but would not be comfortable with anything other than a Slovakian wife.

Another Slovakian--my great-grandfather of course being illiterate--wrote to a marriage-broker in the Old Country, giving a description of my great-grandfather, and stating the sort of wife he wished to have.

Perhaps the letter-writing Slovakian had a sense of humor, or something.

The marriage-broker said yes, he had such inventory.

And so in 1887, a frightened 15-year-old girl, an orphan, a former serving maid, who had no idea where she was going, and why--only that these strange men had kidnapped her and taken her to Hamburg to cross the ocean along with many others like her, came to these shores, destined to become my great-grandmother.  She was even barefoot.

I have no idea what my great-grandfather had expected, but it was a shock, especially when she addressed him in Yiddish.

That she too was a dwarf was, well, okay, but that she was a Jewess was something else entirely.

- - - - - - - - - - - -

"You know, father had this idea that one had to make out the best one could," one of the ancients, a long-retired registered nurse, the next-to-the-last daughter of my great-grandfather, told me.

"He supposed he had gotten a bad deal, but as there wasn't anything that could be done about it, he simply made of it what he could.

"'Well, here it is, and so one might as well deal with it.'

"He didn't care much for her, and she didn't care much for him, but they were properly married, after which he took her out to his farm.

"And then the next morning, he loaded her and some things up in the wagon and took her to Freeland, fifteen miles away, where he rented, and then later, bought a house, and set her up in the boarding business."

to be continued

[Miss Mia]

My mom did genealogy for years.  I'm Arcadian, French, Spanish (Queen Isabella of Spain is a distant grandmother, and also a redhead), and some other things.  Pretty much all I know of my dad's family is that they're generic American mutts.