I was in my idea booth recently (a hot steamy shower) trying to think of a topic to write about, and for some reason, I started thinking of various mysteries surrounding some of my ancestors. These thoughts weren't necessarily about brick walls, but about events in my ancestor's lives where I just scratched my head and wonder what the heck happened. Over the next few days I plan on writing about a few of these characters. I'm not sure how many I will get to because we are leaving early Saturday morning for a week long vacation in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina and I don't know how much time I will get to work on this series. I'm hoping to have some quiet time where I can just sit back, listen to the ocean waves, and write. So here we go with the first installment...
Canadian Border crossing of Antonio Agazio. My paternal grandfather was born in the town of San Giovanni in Fiore located in Calabria, Italy in 1884. He boarded a ship in Naples sometime in 1900 and immigrated to Canada - there's a story behind this too, but I'll save it for another time. A family story 
has him traveling with a slightly older cousin (my grandfather was about 13-14) and entering North America somewhere in Canada. He then worked in the Canadian timber industry and eventually crossed the border into the United States. I don't have any official documentation showing this as fact, but in his citizenship paperwork from the mid 1920s he says he arrived at the port of Quebec, traveled by train across Canada, and crossed into the Untied Stated by ferry at Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan in July of 1901. He goes on to say he traveled to Spokane, Washington and I assume his intent was to look for work. Nine years later he shows up in the 1910 census as a railroad worker in Idaho's pan handle - a short 74 miles from Spokane. This is all good information, and it's probably true, but the only documentation I have is what he wrote in the Citizenship documents about 25 years later.
The big mystery: Did he cross the border legally or come
across undocumented? I've spent the last 3 years trying to find
documentation of his border crossing, but so far have had no luck. As I said earlier, the
first time I found him in government documentation was in the 1910
Census as a railroad worker in Idaho's pan handle. Everything up to 1910 is based on family stories and on what he said happened, but as stories go, the facts sometimes change over time. I'm sure my grandfather was an honest and honorable man, but I noticed discrepancies in what he wrote in his Declaration of Intention and his Petition for Naturalization that were only a couple of years apart. Was he trying to hide something thinking the government would find him out? There are also some differences in immigration dates in the various censuses and I'm looking forward to seeing what the 1940 edition says.
I was excited when Ancestry.com added a Canadian border crossing database, but I haven't been able to find him there. I did find a few names appearing close to my grandfather's, but the other facts on the documents were way off. There is one entry where the first name is Antonio and the surname starts with "A", but the rest is too faded to read. Also, the year of immigration differs from what I think is correct. I'm hoping Ancestry is still adding records to this collection and eventually I'll find him, but until then the big assumption is he just came across without being recorded by the government. This mystery is not really a brick wall because I've documented his family back to the early 1800s in Italy, but there is a span of time between 1900 and 1910 where I'd sure like to know what happened.
On Monday: My Greatest Genealogical Mysteries - Sentenced to Prison, but for What?
