Life Story Quotes

“To set a path for the next phase of your life, you have to know where you came from. You have to know your own story.” **************** “The point is to see the movie of your life as a coherent storyline rather than a series of isolated fromes. When you do that, you make more sense of what you need to carry with you for the next step in the journey, and what you can safely, comfortably, and confidently leave behind.” **************** “Our stories reflect our purpose and our connections.” ***************** Life Reimagined: Discovering Your New Life Possibilities, October 1, 2013 by Richard J. Leider (Author), Alan M. Webber. Ebaychatter0, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons

This is a story of trying to differentiate between two different men named Blazej. There can be multiple people with the same name so it can get very tricky determining which is which. Birth, marriage and death records are about the person and may or may not list their parents. Witnesses are listed so there are clues about who might be their relatives or neighbors.. Their age is usually listed so you can sort out which ones fit into the right time frame. It turns out that there were two men with the same name- of Blazej Wisniewski. He was the parent of Ewa Wisniewska (my 3rd great grandmother.) One was born about 1761 and died in 1844. He worked as a foreman of a faience factory and later a grave digger and a farmer. He had two or three wives and a fiance and at least four children with one of the wives. The other one was born about 1755 and died in 1823 while he was in some sort of facility as a patient or resident. He had one child with an unmarried employee of some sort who worked in the hospital or alms house that he lived in. I am telling you this story today because on January 20 in 1844 at 2:00 p.m., Blazej Wisniewski (my 4th great grandfather) died. He was a grave digger who lived in Tomaszów Lubelski. He lived to the age of 92 according to his record but maybe 83 according to some other records. So maybe he was born in 1761 or maybe in 1752???? He was the son of Mataeusz & Maryanna Wisniowski, deceased gravediggers even though when he died the witnesses didn’t know who his parents were. One witness was Józef Kurkiewicz, farmer, age 29, He was Blazej’s son-in-law, married to Ewa (my 3rd great grandmother.). The other witness was Franciszek Szcześnicki, bricklayer, age 29, As a Szcześnicki, Franciszek would have been related to Blazej’s prior wife, Jagnieszka Szcześnicka. Blazej left behind his widowed wife Anna nee Adamczak. There was a lot more to his story though. Blazej had two sons and two daughters with Jagnieszka Czernicka. (my 4th great grandmother.) Their four children were born between 1809 and 1817 beginning when he was about 44. It is possible that he had a wife before Jagnieszka because of how old he was during this marriage. His wife Jagnieska passed away on May 20, 1823, in Tomaszów, Lubelskie, Poland, at the age of 49. Just a little over three months later on Sept 7 1823, Blazej Wisniowski, as a 55 year old widower, became engaged to the MUCH younger Maryanna Cyronskowna, age 25. “Owna” on her name meant she was unmarried. She was a labourer, and the daughter of deceased Ignacy Cyronik, farmer & living Helena nee Kowalik. Maybe because her father was deceased, the engagement happened so her mother had one less mouth to feed in the house. In any case, the announcement of the banns in this case must have caused something to turn up to stop the wedding. He then eight months later married Anna Adamczk instead on May 9, 1824, when he was 63 years old. He ended up with Anna for the next 20 years until his death. I noticed that Maryanna (his former fiance) died in 1840 unmarried. Now even though there are sometimes mistakes in ages in the records, it doesn’t make a lot of sense that he was 55 years old in 1823 and then 63 in 1824. Another confusing thing was seeing what occupation was listed in the various records: grave digger, farmer and faience factory foreman. Did that mean some of the records were of the “other” Blazej? Blazej worked in the faience factory & so did his wife’s Agnes’ brother Bart. I eventually figured once I studied the pottery industry in the area that he worked there until the factory closed. He may still have needed to work so ended up a grave digger, who maybe also farmed. When his on Jozef was born in 1810, he was a 40 year old faience factory foreman. In 1817 when his daughter Anna was born, he was referred to as the “famous” Blazej Wisniewski. By 1823 when his wife dies, he was listed as a grave digger. He was a grave digger when engaged to Cyronik still in 1823 and when he marries Adamczyk in 1824, he is a grave digger. A different 68 year old Blazej died February 20 1823. He would have been born in about 1755. He died in some sort of hospital or alms house #71 and Szymon Wojpieki, 32, an organist and Piotr Fedorowicz, 50 a church sexton were the witnesses. His wife Anna nee Paszkowska was a church sexton. When he was 50 in 1814, he was a , "dziad szpitalny" a hospital grandfather,and he had a child Francziszka Wisniowska with Anna Paszkoska, age 35. This story shows one of the harder people to figure out. Amazingly, with many of them, the pieces all match up right and their family falls into place! There was a lot to this puzzle! (Image from Heirloom Archeology, LLC FB page)

Happy New Year! My Reasons for Doing Family History Research

My cousin LaJean Brown on my father’s side always had an interest in documenting the Longwell family tree. While I talked to her sometimes about this, I wish I could really pick her brain now that I am very curious but sadly she has passed away. People get into doing genealogical research for lots of different reasons. Some people who are adopted may be looking for birth parents or medical information. Being able to join the Mayflower or other heritage society is sometimes a goal. Maybe you want to see if we are related to someone famous. Those weren’t my reasons. Some of the reasons I am interested had to do with wanting to learn more about and document close family members. I want to make sure some of the stories and family traditions are remembered. I wanted to break down the brick walls that existed beyond my four Polish grandparents and I have been able to do that for the two for the Anthony Raczkiewicz side. I am just starting on the Pauline Skrobat side with only a tiny bit of progress so far. I wanted to know the great grandparents’ names and when and where they were born and died. Learning the same information about their siblings and ancestors farther back from them has been a bonus on the Raczkiewicz side. As I learn about them, I want to try to preserve some of the culture of the country my ancestors came from. It is interesting to see what “Polish traditions” my grandparents practiced, my mother’s generation and what it currently looks like there now compared to in the U.S. After I start to learn dates and places, I try to take the basic facts about my relatives and find the story that makes it come alive. Can I connect my family to the history of what was going on at the time? For instance, I am trying to determine their motivations for why they moved from Poland to the U.S.. Why to Grand Rapids specifically? Why did the Kaszuckis move from Uhnow to Tomaszow Lubelski? What about the occupations--what was it like working in them? What was daily life like in the past? Another idea was to see if it was possible to connect with living relatives still in Poland. I have begun to connect with family I never knew about that are still alive who were born in Poland and that has been awesome. Equally amazing though is to find all kinds of people that were born in Grand Rapids who are some level of cousin. Interestingly, the found Polish relatives are on the Raczkiewicz side and the found Grand Rapids relatives are on the Kaszucki side. Lastly, I want to share what I learn with my family. That started out with telling and texting--to my Mom, sisters, newfound friend Connie Liszewski who is working this tree as hard as I am. I thought vaguely about starting a blog or Facebook page on January 1 but then I attended via google a genealogy conference that addressed how to do this and decided to start immediately. I share the stories in the hopes that the shared history connects us together and sparks interest in our family’s past, present and future.

Unrealistic Expectations?

My Mom's DNA Results

My Mom’s DNA results are 80% Eastern Europe & Russia, 8% Germanic Europe, 5% Baltics, 4% European Jewish and 2% The Balkans. Eastern Europe & Russia is made up of three parts Czech Republic, Slovakia, Poland & Lithuania. My Mom’s DNA is specifically from the areas of Świętokrzyski & Lesser Poland (Malopolkska) which are regions in southern to southeast Poland. From Ancestry: In the early 1900s, villages in southern Poland were among the poorest in all of Europe. Peasants had no land and barely enough food to survive; tens of thousands starved each year. Most immigrants who left home in search of a better life were these unskilled workers. They often immigrated to established Polish neighborhoods in Chicago and New York, or went to New England and Pennsylvania to work in the mines.

How Many Ancestors Do We Have

 

When I started doing genealogy, I knew that my father's side was extensively researched by others. already. I was more interested in my Mother's side.  On that side, I only knew the names of two of the four great-grandparents -- so finding Anthony's parents was my first goal.  At this point, I have a pretty good handle on my 4th great grandparents on the maternal side I know some information about some 5th great grandparents and am currently working to learn more.

One thing that I didn't realize is that I also needed to look at each generation's siblings so the tree grows even more.  Siblings records sometimes help to flesh out information missing about my direct ancestor.  Also, the siblings are the ones that may lead to some currently living descendants and it has been fun to connect with some new "cousins." 

Becoming Interested in Family History

 I really didn't expect to spend so much time in retirement researching family history.  It was definitely not part of the plan.  I thought I would be busy with organizing the house after moving into a condo, biking and other exercise, friends and family and maybe teaching a class or something.  All that is happening but a chance email sparked an interest that my husband says is now an obsession. I started my genealogy journey in November of 2019.

My sister Linda McCarthy had convinced us to have our mother Shirley Longwell spit in a cup and send it away for DNA testing.  While I was cooperative, I wasn't that interested.  The spit went in and the results came back.  Linda got around to giving my sister Lori Peterson and me the log in information.  I checked it out and sort of wasn't impressed.  I saw that my "cousin" John Spruit was a DNA match and saw a few people on my Mother's mother's side that I recognized.  Her DNA results were pretty much what I would have expected.  I looked around but couldn't get too excited.

Much later, Linda let us know that Mom had received an email in Ancestry from someone in Poland reaching out as a DNA match.  From Poland?  Now that was kind of interesting!  I thought it might be cool to find out more and maybe see what I could find out from this person.  Unfortunately, they didn't respond back but my interest was piqued.  I decided to also spit in the cup and send my results away which would be very helpful in sorting out which matches were from my Mom's side and which were from my Dad's. 

As I waited for my results, Ancestry suggests that you build a tree with what you know so far.  Thus began combing through what records I did have and collaborating back and forth with my sisters.  I had a tremendous amount from the Longwell side.  Our cousin Jeannie  Brown had done genealogy for as long as I could remember and it looked like other people had also done a lot of work.  I always had charts about my Dad's background.  It was my Mother's side that was very sketchy.  For her mother Apolonia Skrobat, we had some information that her siblings and families from a fairly recent trip to Oil City, Pennsylvania but could only go back to our great grandparents--who we had never met.  The information on her Dad's side was even thinner.  Did Anthony Raczkiewicz have siblings back in Poland?  Who were his parents?  Was there even any way to find any of this information?  

Little did I know but there would be a way.  I am in the middle of discovering lots of information and I think this will be an ongoing journey.  I have already "met" some relatives I never knew about and now collaborate with them.  I may even journey to Poland in a few years with some of them to learn more!  What I am struck with the most though is the stories that are emerging and that are sometimes interesting,  sometimes sad and sometimes amazing.  I realized I didn't want to know these stories alone so I text them to my sisters and relay them to my mother Shirley Longwell all the time.  This blog though is an attempt to share them more widely. Maybe a Facebook Page will be next?