Would the real Giuseppe Ribera please stand up?

Francofonte, of the province of Siracusa, Sicily, is a small city with a population of about 13,000. About 15 kilometers north is Scordia, of the province of Catania, Sicily, a city of 17,000 people. Scordia is the hometown of my paternal grandparents, Giuseppe Ribera and Maria Pernici. In a previous post, I wondered about the possibility that my grandfather had a first marriage to a young women from Francofonte. The reason for suspecting this was the discovery of a ship's manifest (S.S. Calabria) that listed "Giuseppe Ribera" traveling to the New York with his young wife, Francesca Ippolito. The age of this Giuseppe matched the age of my grandfather, 25 years old.
The only other Giuseppe Ribera we found through the Ellis Island website was a 39 year old farm laborer from Scordia, traveling from Naples to New York on the S. S. Algeria on March 20, 1907. Grandpa Ribera's passport was issued on May 1, 1913, so the 1907 sailing was unlikely. Further, in 1907 my grandfather would have been 19 years old, not 39.
So it was natural to assume that the Giuseppe Ribera who sailed from Palermo, on the S.S. Calabria on May 1, 1913, was my grandfather. That possibility made me curious about this passenger's wife Francesca Ippolito. So like a good detective I sought more information. The ship's manifest listed Francofonte as the last residence of Giuseppe and Francesca. I applied to the "Ufficio dello Stato Civile di Comune di Francofonte" for copies of the birth certificate of Francesca Ippolito and the marriage certificate of Giuseppe and Francesca.

In a little over three weeks I received not only extracts of these documents, but photocopies of the originals. In addition, they sent me the birth certificate of Giuseppe Ribbera (sic) born in Francofonte on xxx 1888. Alas, this man was not my grandfather. The documents all use an alternative spelling, Ribbera, in the originals and in the extracts. I have my grandfather's birth certificate from Scordia. The date of birth, the city of birth, and the parents of the child are all different. These were two different Giuseppe Riberas born in neighboring towns in the same year.

The last piece of evidence that confirmed that the Giuseppe who sailed on the S.S. Calabria on May 1, 1913, was not my grandfather, was the fact that my grandfather's passport is dated February 6, 1910. The passport was valid for 3 years. That means that it would have been expired on May 1, 1913, when the Calabria sailed from Palermo. My grandmother, Maria Pernici, received her passport on March 28, 1914, and sailed seven days later. It seems likely that my grandfather, too, would have sailed much closer to the date his passport was issued.

That means that Francesca Ippolito was not married to my grandfather. She was married to a man named Giuseppe Ribbera, who was not my ancestor.

So I need to continue my search for my grandfather's ship and record of emigration from Italy. So far nothing comes up on any of the sites that hold records: Ancestry.com, EllisIslandRecords.com, and Footnote.com. When I receive my grandfather's Naturalization Papers that will include a Certificate of Arrival. The Certificate of Arrival will indicate the ship he sailed on, the ports from which he embarked and disembarked, and the date of arrival. This search for Naturalization Papers is currently being conducted by the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services.

Welcome to the story

Βίβλος γενέσεως Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ υἱοῦ Δαυὶδ υἱοῦ Ἀβραάμ.

I like the way the English Standard and other versions translate this first verse of the gospel of St. Matthew. "The book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ...." The King James expressed it this way, "the generation of," which may not be a bad translation. It's just that I am in the midst of my own genealogical search, so I connect better with the former language. The bible devotes quite a few pages to the whole genealogy thing. The writers seem very concerned to establish a link between the promises in the Old Testament and the promised One in the New Testament, and one link is the ancestral lineage to Jesus Christ. This is the story of God's plan of redemption, from promise to fulfillment.

A friend was recently criticizing the current trend among some Christians to "tell their stories." "I'll tell you my story, you tell me yours." This friend retorted, "It's not about my story or your story. It is about God's story and you and I are a part of that bigger story."

I remember the first time I read the bible through in a more or less chronological fashion. I was impressed with the unfolding of God's story. When I got through the book of Acts I had the distinct impression that the story continued. It continued through the generations all the way to me. I was a part of that story of redemption. I was a son of Adam, a descendant of Noah, one of the children of Abraham by faith, I was one of the gentiles grafted in, as the story spread "in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth." I am a character in the story that God is telling.

I'm not going to lay deep spiritual meaning on the immigration of my forebears, though my grandmother, Maria Pernici, was probably the same age as Mary when she conceived Jesus. But the sovereignty of God and the grace of God are ingredients as essential in this chapter of the story that we are a part of as they were essential to the accounts in the bible. So I want to say this to all the little ones in the next generation, to Micah, Amos, Ezra, Josiah, Elijah, Aya, and our littlest precious Ivo. You are children of God, children of the promise of grace, you are part of God's unfolding story, just as Abraham and David were, and just as Giuseppe and Maria and Diego and Vincenza were. Welcome to the story.

She was sixteen years old

My grandmother, Maria Pernici grew up in the "comune di Scordia, provincia di Catania, Sicilia." Perhaps "grew up" is not quite accurate. She was whisked away to America at a young age. She was not even 18 years old, as her marriage certificate says, she was 16. I wonder if she had ever traveled beyond Scordia, "Città delle Arance Rosse" (the City of the Red Orange). Was her trip to the Port of Palermo her first venture across the island of Sicily? She did not even sign her own passport. She was accompanied by a 38 year old laborer named Giuseppe Liggerio. Were her father, Luigi Pernici, and her mother, Giuseppa Barchetta, there to wave goodbye as the S. S. Berlin (above left) pulled away from the dock on April 4th? What was this 5' 3" fair-skinned sixteen year old Sicilian girl thinking? How did she spend her time on the 12 day voyage?

My grandfather Giuseppe had already been in New York for almost a year. He had arrived on May 16, 1913. The manifest of his ship, the S.S. Calabria (right), bears some strange news for the Ribera family. His name "Giuseppe Ribera" age 25, appears on line 12 of the manifest; below his name on line 13, is one Francesca Ippolito. At 17 years old she is listed as "his wife." Column 13 of the manifest asks, "By whom was passage paid?" For Giuseppe it says, "self," for Francesca it says, "husband." Column 18 asks for the name and address of the relative or friend the immigrant is going to join. For my grandfather it says, "Brother-in-law, Ippolito Salvatore 125 Olive Street, New York." For Francesca it simply says, "Brother." Stranger still, for place of birth, for both Giuseppe and Francesca it says, Sicily, Francofonte. Now, I have not yet received my grandfather's birth certificate, but every other document I have seen (passport, U.S. marriage certificate, U.S. military registration) indicates that he was born in Scordia. Francofonte is about 13 kilometers south east of Scordia, about a 2-3 hour walk. I wonder how they met? Did they sail to America with their families' blessings? When were they married? Was this a family arrangement? What happened to Francesca? Did she die? How did Giuseppe get a new bride so fast? Did Maria Pernici know Francesca Ippolito? Was the marriage to Maria a family arrangement?

What was Maria thinking as the S.S. Berlin docked in New York harbor? Was she awed by the Statue of Liberty? The night of April 16, 1914, was she sheltered at the St. Raphael Society for Italian immigrants, which is listed as her residence on her marriage certificate? Did she sleep that night? The next day, did Giuseppe walk the mile and a half from 14 Monroe Street, on the lower east side of Manhattan, cross town to 10 Charlton Street where they were married? Prior to the ceremony, I imagine she was told to say "diciotto anni," (eighteen years) for her age. That's why the marriage certificate says 18. I don't know what the law was in 1914, but to get married in New York today: "If either applicant is 16 or 17 years of age, such applicant(s) must present the written consent of both parents. If both applicants are 18 years of age or older, no consents are required."

Maria bore four children by Giuseppe between 1916 and 1921. My father was the youngest. In 1923, she passed away at 26; my father was only two. My grandfather remarried (again?); and that too is another story.

My Grandmother Maria Pernici

Yesterday, I received in the mail, the first official document related to my quest for Italian citizenship jus sanguinis. It was my paternal grandparents' marriage certificate from the Municipal Archives in New York City. I had requested this document through an online form on November 30, 2009. Marriage certificates that are over fifty years old are considered historic documents and are public records, so I had no trouble requesting a copy.

There are many small discrepancies in these old documents. Take the case of my father's mother, for example. Until yesterday even my father did not know when his parents had been married. One reason for that is that she passed away when my father was only two. My father recently sent me a copy of his mother's passport. It indicated the date of her birth and the date the passport was issued. According to her passport she was 16 years old when she emigrated to America. The ship's manifest (the S.S. Berlin sailing from Palermo) indicated that she was 16 years old. Her marriage certificate says she was 18. I am inclined to believe the passport, since it was issued in Italy, the land of her native tongue.

In the days of my forebears public services in the U.S. did not seem to employ translators. I recall that my grandfather hardly spoke any English. I do not wonder that with his heavy accent the clerk or clergyman filling out his marriage certificate wrote what he thought he heard and thus the certificate says, "Rebera." In 1930, family data was recorded on a U.S. Census form; my father's name (Caleb) is written as my grandfather pronounced it: "Colbi."

Back to my grandmother. My father was unsure when she and his father were married. We knew the date of my grandfather's immigration. Giuseppe got his passport on February 6, 1910; he was 22. He finally set sail for America when he was 25. According to ship records (S.S. Calabria sailing from Palermo) he arrived in New York on May 16, 1913. (Who my grandfather sailed with and what he did during that year is the subject of another investigation.) My grandmother got her passport on Monday, March 28, 1914, set sail from Palermo on Saturday, April 4, 1914, and arrived in New York City after a voyage of 12 days on Thursday, April 16, 1914. According to the marriage certificate she was married the very next day, Friday, April 17, 1914.