Is there a family document in Italy that shows the name of..

[maestra36]

I have never seen any scheda documents on microfilm. Been doing Italian genealogy since 1997 and never heard of them until you mentioned them in your post. Anyway, about the stato di famiglia, how much specific information did you need to provide in order to get the second one you requested? the one for the great grandfather?

[donnawright]

Here is what I sent, plus some commentary from me to you. Anything you would like to add to help me generate my third request?

Alla gentile attention dell’Ufficio dei Registri Civili:

Vi sarei molto grata se poteste fare una piccolo ricerca ed inviarmi:
MY COMMENT: Basically, do a little research for me

1. Stato di Famiglia – Paolo Tomaino MY COMMENT: Learned his name from the birth extract of my grandfather that the comune sent (the first request to the comune)

2. Estratto di matrimonio – Paolo Tomaino e Maria Rosa Mazza MY COMMENT: Learned her name first on the ship manifest of my mother’s sister. She listed Maria as her contact in Italy. Then confirmed her on the birth extract of my grandfather (first request to the commune). What I learned from this document is that the LDS has a film of processetti that falls within their date. I will order it very soon, as the second response from the comune has been in my hands for only about a week.

Per aiutare a localizzare: To help you locate:

Figlio di Paolo Tomaino e Maria Rosa Mazza
1. Tommaso Tomaino MY COMMENT: My grandfather
2. altri bambini MY COMMENT: Indicated that there were other children.....All unknown to me until the second response from the commune that showed my grandfather in the house of Paolo along with 6 other children

Busta affrancata allegata. COMMENT: Stamped envelope enclosed

For sure I am going to request the Scheda Individuale for the two sisters that had dashes in the column where other names had death dates -- on the Stato di Famiglia

Open to your ideas. You have WAY WAY more experience than I do.... about 13 years more.

Donna

[maestra36]

So, other than sending his name, you didn't have to provide any possible dates to get the stato di famiglia. I personally have done all my own research from microfilm but have a cousin who wants to gather information for her 90 year old grandmother for her birthday. The town she needs is Bella in Potenza Province and the records on microfilm only begin in 1860 and go back in time. There are no current microfilm records. She has the names of her grandmother's parents and grandparents, but only knows of two of the grandfather's brothers. They are probably the youngest ones who came to America. They seem to be three years apart, but she doesn't know how many siblings were older that remained in Italy. She's in a hurry for information about the grandparents and their ancestry, but I am trying to explain to her that it will take months, like you said, to get specific information and without being able to feed any specific dates to the town anagrafe office, particularly for the grandparents of her grandmother, I wasn't sure the town would even look anything up for her. That's why I was curious as to how much specific info you sent to get what you got.

[maestra36]

by the way, I posted a reply to your needing research ideas about the regional microfilm and don't know if you ever saw it.

[donnawright]

I wonder if the people in this small town remembered my first request to help them in any way with the second one. The second one wasn't too far behind receipt of the first information. On both requests I put what information I knew as reference points to help them locate and confirm my stuff. Guess it was enough. They did good! Since time is of the essence, perhaps you can find someone who will walk into the office and get your documents for you.

My town has film for only about 50 years. The birth records I received so far do not fall within those 50 years, but obviously the comune has them. Wonder why more weren't microfilmed. From the Stato's, I did learn that I can get original birth records for some of the greats on film.

Did you check the microfilm notes for processetti? I wonder if, even though the birth information is not on film for you, the processetti would have what you need.

[donnawright]

Yes, I sure did read your information about the regional collection for Tuscany! With the help of those Scheda Individuale for this family and your explanation of the film descriptions, I think I might now be better able to zero in on some films. When a film is so very specific as to gender and one year, the guess work and trial and error can start getting expensive. This collection does have a confusing description, and the folks at the FHC didn't have any idea. I'm going to try to get there this week and I'll tell them too.

Thank you. Donna

[maestra36]

There are no microfilmed records for Bella after 1860 of any kind. I don't have time to do those microfilmed records for her and she doesn't read Italian. I recently had emailed an anagrafe office in eastern Sicily. That town only had 3 rolls of microfilm which started in 1866. The town official there was so helpful and got me all the way back in the 1820s. I know the civil records exist in these town anagrafe offices even if they have not been microfilmed. But I kept feeding him specific information that I had gotten from marriage and death records I had already gathered from the microfilm. He actually gave me other kinds of info about some family members like when they emigrated out and back into the town, for example, even though I never asked him for that kind of info. I offered to email the town anagrafe office for my cousin, but I am not sure what I will get without specific info. I recently emailed two of my other towns looking for death info about two ancestors. The one death was between 1892 and 1917, but I think the range was too broad and they said they had no record of it. Of course, he could have died in some other town, but I have no idea where, but his widow died there in 1958, so I would have expected him to die in the same town. Even if he died during WWI outside of the town, I would have expected the town to have an annotation of his death, but they claim they don't. Then another office did not get me info when I had a huge death year range as well. But I sent to that same office for info about a marriage, narrowed down the marriage year within a 5 year range based on the couple's children's years of birth, and I got a lot of info from that same office.

[maestra36]

About microfilm research getting expensive-my town of Stigliano has the worst microfilmed I have ever seen. I pretty much had to rent province films which had only 1 or 2 years of a particular type of event-such as marriage, birth, death, to look for a lot of the records. Luckily I did research for my one cousin's other side of the family and he paid for the rentals. I otherwise could never have afforded to do that many films. There were some 220 province films for Matera province. He paid for the rental of the regional films, since I did those for him as well. It's good though if those documents you got from Italy helped you to narrow things down for the regional films.

[donnawright]

Sounds like you had a great and willing partner in that comune who did so much for you. He must have referred to his Scheda Individuale to get the information of when they came and left town! Sorano civil office workers have told everyone who inquired on my behalf that they are too busy with the living,,,,, thus the need for that regional collection. But this little comune in Calabria is responding. It takes them awhile, but so far so good. Good luck.

By the way, the first request for information I sent was via email. They responded, but there was a note on it asking for a stamped addressed envelope for future requests - which I did using Italian postage. I took note of how much postage was on the envelope they sent and bumped it up a bit for good measure. And my stamped, addressed envelope came back to me with Italian goodies inside.

[maestra36]

Thanks Donna for sharing so much information. I am going to try to do something first via email.
Peg

[donnawright]

Is there anyone in paginebianche.it with your needed surname who you could make contact with and perhaps go into the civil office for you?