As you know, I've been going through the family pictures before figuring out who should get them. I've saved pictures of people I don't know for last so I can do some detective work to find out who they were. This picture, among about a dozen others, was in an envelope addressed to Gramps in handwriting I now know belonged to his sister, Helen. She and a few relatives went to Greece in the 'Eighties, to Dimitsana in particular.
Gramps and his two sisters were first generation Americans. Their parents came to America in the 'Twenties (and I have their dad and theo's naturalization papers!), and they referred to Gramps as "their American son." Dimitsana is where they were from.
And that house above? Take a look at the back of the photo:
The John in question is Gramps. I was named after him. How many people have a picture of their great-grandfather's childhood home? And to find out that it's 300 years old? Holy shit. I also have his death certificate, so I know my great-great-grandfather was named Zaharis Kyriakopoulos. (No mother is listed.)
That leg of my family comes from a mountain town with more buildings that look like that one. In fact, here's another picture:
And here's the back:
Not sure who Dave is. All I know is, Dave's not here. Not a lot of people live in Dimitsana. Not even 800 souls populate the town, and Kyriakopoulos is a common name there. I almost certainly have blood relatives still living there. There were times when I was a kid when I thought, wouldn't it be weird to go to, say, Greece and look up the Kopoulos family? (I didn't know they shortened the name until I found the papers back in 2022.) Or maybe go back to Ireland and look up the Dunnes? (I actually did go to Ireland only to discover Dunne is one of the most common names in the country.) And then, because I know the least amount about the Bruni family, wouldn't it be nice to go to Italy and look them up?
(Three of my four grandparents were 100% one nationality. Grandma had a lot of diversity in her background, so I can't really pick a country to go back to for her family.)
Now that I've seen The White Lotus? Maybe not. I think that's probably the most realistic way something like that would go down. But it's nice to think about.
I've gone down some interesting paths looking up my family history. I'm pretty good with Mom's side. I come from families with names like Cota, Friend, Noanes, Demeroukas and so on. I just wish I'd thought to ask all the questions I have now back when Grandma and Gramps were still alive. My aunt is the only one older than me on that side of the family, and I've found she unfortunately doesn't have all the answers I'm looking for, just some of them.
Is anyone else at all curious about where they came from? Have you done research without resorting to stuff like Ancestry, etc.? So far I've done a lot of detective work without it, and I've done pretty good, but I'm reaching the brick wall point in my research. Any thoughts on what to do without sending my DNA off to a corporation that is most likely to use it in ways I couldn't possibly imagine?
And now I have an added bonus mystery, this one from Grandma's side of the family. I was under the impression all my life that the one great-grandparent I'd come closest to meeting was Grandma's mom. The reason I had that impression was because Grandma told me, herself. I found something today which she might not have been aware of. I asked my aunt, "When did Grandma's dad die?" She said she didn't know and didn't think Grandma knew, either.
The thing I found? Grandma's mom's death certificate. On it she is listed as married, not widowed. I learned lately that Grandma's parents separated early in her life. I know her dad didn't go too far because I found a picture of him with Grandma's sister sitting in his lap at the 50th anniversary of Grandma's maternal grandparents. That was back in the 'Fifties, and her mom would die in February 1978.
Because next to that MARRIED space on her mom's death certificate? It says she was survived by her spouse!
It is possible that he and I lived on this planet at the same time. I have tried everything to find out what happened to him, and I've come up with nothing. The internet has no idea whatever happened to Harold McKinley Cota, Sr. All I can find is Harry, Grandma's brother. So yeah, any suggestions?
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