We headed east for the first of our planned meetings. This trip was not intended to be a sight seeing trip but rather a meet and greet with Joan and Tom's relatives. Because we had some time on our hands, we made a stop along the way to see a couple places where ancestors had been. This first stop was at a church where our Great Grandfather was baptized. Up until this time, the earliest relatives we knew about were born in the late 1800's. This new connection now brought that date further back to the mid 1800's. Daniel, being a geneaologist, and fluent in the Polish language, went to work. A woman who came to the church right after us to do some volunteer work unlocked the doors for us and invited us in. Dan inquired about whether she knew the family name and she indicated that she had heard the name but did not know anyone specifically, but there was someone with that name who was going to do some work on the church roof.
We took some pictures, knocked on the pastors door with no answer and headed down the road.
The walls higher up that were covered with stucco were drawn on with what appeared to look like charcoal, but was paint.
We went to
see a sign on the way with the name of a town where relatives had lived.
By chance, Daniel stopped in a driveway and
talked to 3 men shooting the breeze to inquire if they new of any people with the family name. They did, but did not know where they
lived. Daniel found out where the town Mayor
lived and we were there in less that 10 minutes. Knocking on the
door proved to be a plus as there was someone home. Mayor
I..... was not native to the area however his wife recognized name and knew of Michal. She went to the phone book, made telephone contact with Zofia and she agreed to
see us. The Mayor rode in the car with us to see her.
When we got there, much to her great surprise, there were 3 people standing on her doorstep from America. Tom's sister Joan was the hugger in the group and made the day for all that we met.
After what seemed like only a couple of hours....and many more names (23) to add to the family tree.
She was making decorations for Christmas trees and she gave us 4 of them.
It was a very pleasant experience meeting out first relatives living in Poland.
Thanks to Daniel also as it was a surprise to him that he found a couple of our relatives
As the days went along, Grammie proved over and over that she remembered names much better than Joan and I did.
The day wasn't over yet so we will gather some more thoughts and continue with another blog segment later.
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