52 Ancestors In 52 Weeks: Immigration

His name appeared like a shooting star across the sky. Then, he fizzled out of sight on the horizon. I had found my grandfather’s older brother as he disappeared into the mist in front of a brick wall.

A cousin alerted me that our grandfather’s brother, Josef Slabik, appeared in a marriage license application in the records of Manchester, Hillsborough County, New Hampshire. He also could be found in a birth record for his daughter. So, the search was on.

As a 21 year old, Josef married a fellow Polish immigrant Karolyna Makar on 21 October 1902. He was a weaver at the Amoskeag Textile Mill in that New Hampshire town. In researching the mill, it was one of the largest in the world at the turn of the century. Advertisements were placed in European newspapers to call workers to America. Were these ads Josef’s calling card to a new life from being a serf in his home country?

In October, 1905, Josef and Karolyna welcomed their first child, daughter Maryanna. Her birth certificate was located.

Then, the brick wall stands between me and the rest of the details of their lives. No appearances in passenger lists, censuses, city directories, town records. Vanished…unknown…no paper trail to their lives. I could just shake those branches of my family tree in frustration. The paternal side of my tree is this side of barren.

What was found did tell me of my grandfather’s older brother who came before him to America. My immigrant grandfather never spoke of his family. So, these facts became little diamonds in the rough. Perhaps, another day more can be found about Joseph, Karolyna, and Maryanna.

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