Hi everyone, I want to share some new things I discovered. This past Tuesday I went to the Catholic Church in the Iowa town near where my Dad's family lived and where he grew up as a child. I obtained copies of his and his siblings baptism records. I did not realized until last week that they keep all records at the church no matter how old they are and believe me these were old records.

Anyway, my grandmother's given name was spelled different ways on all documents, but on my aunt's Margaret's record, who was the first to be born in Iowa, grandma's name was documented as Michelangela Collella and my aunt Margaret's given name was Michelin.

I hope they find my grandmother's records in Gizzeria since in the letter I sent off to Italy we stated Maria Angela Colella, but given them the correct birth date should help find the right person, I would hope. I do know too there are some misspellings of names in baptism records as well as the census records since my grandparents spoke very little English at that time.

I also discovered my father true given name (Giovanni Natale) which I was ecstatic to find out. Our mother had said his name was Giovanni Christmas and I thought that was odd, but is was Natale which means birthday or Christmas...lol.

Will continue to keep you all posted.

Thank you!
Tena

Congrats on the find Tena! If the Comune doesn't reply will a positive answer then you can just rewrite the info and include the other name. As for Giovanni Natale - was he born in Dec? Its so common to give Natale as a name if a child was born on Christmas or in the month of Dec,

Thanks for keeping us posted!

No my father John was born on April 20th. My grandparents must of liked the name or maybe he was named after his Uncle John or my Great Grandfather. Great Grandpa is the one I am hoping to find out what his actual given name was. Thanks!

Update...nothing back from Gizzeria yet. It has been 8 weeks and hoping to get something back soon.

It has been 3 1/2 months since I sent my request and still nothing back from Gizzeria. Should I resend the letter? Thank you all for your guidance.

Try to email them at the address: servizidemografici @ comune.gizzeria.cz.it (no spaces)

Thank you for the email address. I will send the request again via email. I will need help to interpret the response when and if I get one.

Updated the request and sent via email just a few minutes ago...wish me luck! Thank you so much Livio!

Good luck and keep us posted.

Most definitely will.

No reply from email yet.

Nothing back from Gizzeria via mail or email. I am very frustrated and loosing hope of every finding out about my Italian heritage. Any other suggestions would be Greatly appreciated!! Thank you all for your support in helping try to find my family information from Italy.

Don't give up! Remember they are just finishing their summer reduced holidays (mid August for two weeks). Resend it and if worse comes to worst we will have someone call the Comune and follow up for you!

Thank you for your words of encouragement. I sent a letter in March with no word and then an email on June 23rd with no word. So do you think I should resend the email again?

FYI Nuccia, I just now resent the email. I will again keep you all posted. I truly hope I hear something soon. It's been a long wait.

Thank you!