It takes a village to tell a family story
Just FYI in case you’ve never heard of me…What is Immigrant Secrets about? In less than 100 words…
The only thing my father ever said about his Italian immigrant family was that his parents died in the 1930s, shortly after arriving at Ellis Island. Except they didn't. Once I began the search for my grandparents, I mostly ran into dead-ends. Until the 1940 Census. My grandparents magically appear, but as inmates at the Rockland Insane Asylum. What happened? Why all the secrecy? What did it mean to never talk about your family?
Many aspiring writers (including me) have been so impressed with the success of Chelsea Banning in breaking down the wall that exists for writers publishing independently. Only independently-published authors appreciate the very high wall that exists between writing a book (as if that wasn’t hard enough!) and getting anyone to actually pay attention to it. Her story reminds me of the incredible village it takes to put a book together and THEN to get anyone to care.
As we approach the end of the first year of my little Immigrant Secrets project, I am reminded of all the people who have helped me on my journey. And so, consider this just a short end-of-year thank you.
First, thanks to my parents for providing me and my five siblings the family stability that they never knew growing up. They leave a rich legacy. My Dad is long gone and so he is not here to tell how grateful we all are. My Mom read the book early this year before she began to decline, and I hope the memories the book stirred up will stick to her a while longer.
I am grateful for the contributions to our collective family history provided by Donna DeFabritus Binzer, whom I have never met and never even knew existed but is family and shares my obsession with documenting our origins. If I am doing the math properly, she is my second cousin. Her grandfather was Dominick, my grandmother’s brother.
I know there is a big debate in the genealogy community about what should be freely available and what is only available behind the Ancestry.com paywall. I do know that many of the documents and connections central to my story could only have been found through Ancestry.
So many of the asylums that were set up with such good Kirkbride intentions toward the end of the 19th century wound up overwhelmed and overcrowded by rising numbers and shrinking public funds. It is inspiring to read about these early pioneers in the treatment of mental illness, and yet it’s a shame how far we have fallen from their vision. It is easy to feel outrage at the institutionalizing of those who find themselves on the fringes of society and/or sanity. So much of the history of these institutions has remained intentionally hidden, the subject only of horror film movie plots. The Buffalo State Asylum and Hospital Facebook page is a striking exception, and the insights on that page often serve as a reminder to examine our own behavior with regards to mental illness.
I am grateful to Annie—last name unknown—at the Immaculate Conception Church in lower Manhattan (which was absorbed by the Mary Help of Christians Church after it was torn down) who found the marriage record for my grandparents that finally revealed their actual birth dates... and two sets of great grandparents.
Steve Luxenberg (author of Annie’s Ghosts) put me onto an invaluable idea—searching for commitment records as an end-run around health record restrictions. And thanks to Libby Copeland (author of The Lost Family) for turning me on to the records potential of the New York Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children (NYSPCC).
Which brings me to the NYSPCC’s Chelsea Frank. I am so grateful to her for uncovering the records that FINALLY told the story of how my grandmother wound up committed. You were like the cavalry riding in at the last minute when I had given up hope of ever finding out what happened.
I am still amazed that Jamie Ford (author of the fabulous book The Many Daughters of Afong Moy – which I both read and listened to -- and many other books) responded to my Facebook message early one Sunday morning within an hour, offering encouragement and directing me to Characters & Viewpoint by Orson Scott Card. I so wish I could write like Jamie.
Dr. Eliana Gil is one of the foremost authorities in the world on child trauma; many people know that. But I can also say that she is one of the nicest people as well. Out of the blue, I contacted her to ask her whether my thoughts about how my dad dealt with trauma were on target or not. She contacted me less than ninety minutes after I emailed her, providing incredible insights and encouragement.
Projects like this swirl around in your head for a long time. When you finally get down to putting words to paper—or I guess more accurately, electrons to screen—you agitate a long time about even telling anyone what you are up to for fear of looking foolish. I am so grateful to my wife, Mary Glenn, who has been supportive of this weird enterprise every step of the way. It was her extended family that first got me interested in family history, because there wasn’t much history on my side, not to mention very much in the way of family. There are a host of interesting family stories on her side that need attention.
Thanks to my sibs—June, Joseph, Jennifer, Jeff, and Jeanne—for being the family growing up that my father never had. Yes, we are weird. Very weird. But we know it and we laugh a lot, even if we repeat the same jokes over and over and over. Many thanks to my brother Joseph for his equal zeal for this weird genealogical project. Some of the story has been condensed into an “I” to make the story-telling easier, when it might have been more accurate to say “Joseph” or “we.”
And thank you to my niece Leann Carroll (she immediately “got” the point of the book exactly), and friends Linda Johnson Wood (the first brave reader other than Mary Glenn!), family history savants Kristin Brown and Mary Sue Magee Hunt, Joe Ryan (pages of notes and the advice to open up a bit more, never an easy thing for me), fellow aspiring author Dan Antion (check out his Dreamer’s Alliance series), Judi Elmore, Jim Williams (he is responsible for the title and will be in charge of casting for the movie), Craig Shogren, Sean McGauley, and Larry Wischerth. They all took seriously my desire to write all this down, read drafts of this book, and were willing to spend time telling me what they thought.
Thank you to following organizations who invited me to speak this year about the book and its relevance to modern information governance and archiving challenges.
ARMA International and ARMA chapters in Nebraska, Dallas, Houston, Canada, New York, Northern Virginia, Mountain States, and Seattle
NAGARA (National Association of Government Archives and Records Administrators)
Indiana State Archives
Heritage Hunters podcast
I greatly appreciate all the Amazon reviewers (HERE). Well, except for the person who gave me a “2.” Any self-published writer will tell you that these reviews make a huge difference (hint, hint). Likewise, thanks so much to everyone who contacted me directly via Facebook message and email to tell their stories. They remind me that EVERY family has STUFF, despite the perfect facades we put up on Pinterest and Instagram.
I probably forgot somebody. So sorry.
Thanks. Happy holidays, Merry Christmas, and Happy New Year.
And a prayer for a bit more peace for everyone in 2023.
