MESSA family in Bari Italy

A while back I was visiting the local history museum and the staff asked me to research a piece for them to see if I could figure out what it was.

It looked like it was probably a piece of farm equipment, but that's all I felt safe in guessing.  It's kind of hard to research "red farm equipment maybe" with any kind of efficiency or potential to hit it right on the mark.  So I let it go until I was recently reminded they were waiting for some magic from me so this item could be appropriately displayed.  This time I noticed it was called "The Clipper" and the manufacturer was also listed so off I went with my research feeling pretty confident.  Upon checking and rechecking the photos I had taken originally, I noticed for the first time that the machine TELLS us that it is a "grain and seed cleaner".

The answer was right there all along and I just hadn't seen it because I was concentrating on the whole piece instead of its parts.

So goes family history research.  Lots and lots of times the answers are sitting right there waiting for me to find them again.  In my MESSA family folder I recently found a ship manifest from 1920 listing Francesco and Onofrio Messa which I printed out because I thought they were probably Jake Messa's brothers.  Notice the record says they are from Castellano which matches what your Aunt Josie has told me.

This time I studied the record more carefully and noticed that it lists for "the name and complete address of the nearest relative or friend in country whence alien came" father Luigi Via Felice Cavalletti Castellano.  I believe Luigi to be the name of Jake's father and I believe he lived in Castellano.  This gives me Luigi's address which somehow makes him seem very real, especially when you look it up on Google Earth or a mapping program.  It also helps to verify that these are members of your family.  This piece of information had previously been overlooked but now seals the deal in my belief that these are relatives AND gives me a solid location for the MESSA family in Bari Italy.

It's right there just waiting to be discovered.  Seems like a pretty good motto to live by.  Or a travel jingle.