Bazinga! Fun with Flags for our Italians

Bazinga!" is the phrase popularized by Dr. Sheldon Cooper on The Big Bang Theory  to express "gotcha" so it seems an appropriate title for this blog post as a recent episode gave me the idea.  Sheldon and Amy Farrah Fowler were recording their new video "Fun with Flags" and one of the notes displayed on his chart said: Your Father's Grandfathers' Flags. And I thought that seemed like a great idea for a blog post.  Little did I know what I was getting myself into.

With apologies for historical inaccuracies and vague detail, here we go.  The father's grandfathers used for this post were Jacob Messa and Giuseppe Dalpiaz.  Jacob Messa was born in Bari Italy in 1880 and the Kingdom of Italy flag's reign was just coming to its end.

I am unclear as to why this flag became obsolete in 1880 (showing my historical lack of knowledge) but the Italian national flag for this time period looks different from the Italian flags seen today prominently displayed especially for Columbus Day.

This flag's life span was 1861-1943.  But a nice safe bet is the flag of Bari:

When Jacob died alone in that hospital in Ohio after falling from the railroad tracks into a freezing creek in 1936, the hospital was no doubt flying a 48 star US flag.

Things get a little murkier with Giuseppe Dalpiaz who was born in Tassullo on 1869 just as Italy was on the cusp of unification.  The 1869 Austria Hungary flag was brand new for its subjects and I believe the Dalpiaz family would have seen this flag

By 1942 when Giuseppe died, the flag of Italy above was coming to the end of its life as well.  It's interesting that his life span very nearly matches these great changes in Italian history.

This research was a great deal more interesting than I expected it would be especially as I did the Ryan flags as well with similar conclusions.  So I guess this is where the BAZINGA comes in.  I should have known the history of the flags would speak to the political and social history experienced by our ancestors, yet I found myself surprised and touched by their place in global history.  BAZINGA indeed.

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.