Family Legends Debunked

Growing up, my mom sometimes talked about her father. She mentioned that he had been schooled back in Italy and that the family was from Bavilla. He would sometimes sing a song that, she said, went something like "be bop baviiilla".

She also told me, and I don't know where she heard it, that back in Bavilla, that the family home was very grand and had been turned into a pensione of some sort and that in it, hung a picture of my grandmother.

The story shifted here and there. Some versions had my grandmother in a wedding dress, sometimes the picture was on a mantle or hanging over a fireplace, sometimes the house was a castle or a palazzo.

In any case, the house was large and nice enough to now be some sort of Bed and Breakfast like establishment and it was all very romantic sounding in a maybe I-should-go-there-and-do-the-expat-thing-for-a-while-sort-of-way.

Recently, actually about 2 years ago, I showed my mom how to use http://www.ancestery.com/. She quickly became addicted and spent days doing research. Her efforts were rewarded when she discovered some ship manifests that listed her father and some other family members travelling back and forth to the U.S.

Through these documents, she discovered that Bavilla (which no one could ever find on a map) was actually Boveglio and suddenly, there in the northern reaches of Tuscany not far from Lucca was Boveglio!

Well, armed with this information and dragging my father and aunt and uncle with her. She set out to go to Boveglio during her next trip to Italy and she hit gold. She befriended some people in the courthouse of the neighboring town of Basilica and was able to view many old family documents, including the handwritten testimony by my great grandfather of my grandfathers birth.

At some point during this journey, she figured out that the song I mentioned earlier was actually "Viva Boveglio!" (which makes a lot more sense).

She and my dad, aunt, and uncle also went into Boveglio which ended up being more like a hamlet... at the end of the road... at the top of the mountain. Once up there they went into the bar (and by this I mean the ONLY bar/restaurant).

Not speaking Italian and the bar keeper not speaking English posed a little problem but then my mom mentioned the Boveglio Club (which my grandfather was a part of here in the US) and the barkeep immediately pointed to the wall.

And there, on the wall, was a photo of my grandfather (and also his brother and the other young men who left Boveglio for the US where they started the Boveglio Club). There is also, apparently, a monument to them in the town/hamlet square right next to some other monument to something that seemed much more important but I cannot remember what.

So you see, the picture of my grandmother hanging above the fireplace in the palazzo was actually a picture of my grandfather hanging in a bar. Which, if you know us, seems apropos.

Wonder what family legend will be be debunked after they return from this trip?? Stay tuned and Viva Boveglio!