Eastern Europe Trip 2014 - Slovakia

Probably the main reason I have always wanted to visit the former Czechoslovakia is because that is where my grandparents came from.  My dad was the only member of his family born in the US.  My grandparents were Rusyns (or "little russians") from Circ in what is now Slovakia.  At the time they were born, Circ was part of Hungary.  It is a small village just south of the Polish/Slovakian border.  The Petriscaks, and indeed all Rusyns, probably originated as an ethnic group somewhere in the Ukraine, but Circ (and I'm leaving off the accent marks that are supposed to be over the "c's") is one of the places that Rusyns settled.  It is still a very small village: about 1200 people, including 240 Roma (we often call them "gypsies".)  My grandfather had been drafted into the Austro-Hungarian army, captured by Russians, and ended up in the US post WWI; although family legend has it that my grandmother Maria Havrilla then followed him to the US, married him here, and then went back to Circ where they started their family.  After several years, they returned to the US and there they stayed, ending up, after a time working in the coal mines of PA, in Cleveland, Ohio where my dad was born.  There is a lot of genealogy done  on my grandmother's family, but the name Petriscak seems to be a rare one.  I've never found another in the US and while I've located a few from the Czech Republic, I haven't been able to identify the common link.  I was hoping by going to Circ to see the village of my grandparents (my great grandmother reportedly had owned a sawmill there, but starved in WWII) and walk through the local cemetery to see if there were any Petriscaks buried there.

Circ is about a 2 hour drive out of Krakow through the Carpathian Mountains.  It is really lovely country.

I was so excited to see the road signs and city signs.  There are really only two main roads through the town, kind of an upper road and a lower road, divided by a very swift running stream.  We found the church and we could see a cemetery on the hill.  It took us awhile to figure out how to get up to it; we tried talking to a few people we saw, but of course they laughed and smiled and spoke no english at all.  We were a bit of a spectacle in such a small rural town.

Yeah, what is with the big stork in the nest  on a pole?  It is in the front yard of the school there.  As you can see we did find one gravestone with Petriscak. Born in 1914, and died at 39 years of age.  I had no idea who he might be.  As we walked around the village a bit (I shot some short videos, see below) I realized I was in front of some kind of municipal building.  There was activity in there, kids rehearsing something - turned out to be a rehearsal for a mother's day program that the Roma kids were participating in.  They were very excited about us.  Had no idea where Los Angeles was, but had heard of America.  Martin went into the Mayor's office and found a young woman named Lucia who worked as a social worker with the Roma population.  She spoke English.  Her father was the local priest (Greek catholic) and a history buff.  He had only lived there 9 years but wrote a history book about Circ and actually started his own little museum. She said he was willing to talk to us.  When she went into her office to pick up her jacket, she brought out a colleague named Lydia.  She told us that when Lydia heard we were looking for Petriscaks, Lydia stated that was her maiden name!!  We ended up meeting with Lucia's father who had ledgers he had found in the church in 2007.  He was able to find my great-grandfather's name in those ledgers as early as 1886.  After looking at his artifacts in his little museum, we went to meet with Lydia's mother and aunt.

Imagine this sweet woman standing in her front yard as we come to meet her.  She greeted me with a smile and kiss and welcoming me into her home where her older sister was waiting for us.  This woman handed me a photo.  I recognized my grandmother immediately.  She confirmed that the woman's name was Maria Havrilla.  The photo shows my grandparents with my two older cousins sitting between them.  The back of the photo says January 1950.  I asked her where it came from and she told me it was a photo taken in America and sent to her by my grandfather with whom she maintained a correspondence.  My grandfather was her uncle, the older brother of the man buried up in the cemetery.  It was a moment of tears and happiness.  Never in a million years could I have imagined that I would find family.  I was welcomed home with so much love and pleasure.  I still don't have everyone's names, but I do have a Facebook friendship with my cousin Lydia and I know we will be communicating.  They told me I have another cousin in town - a man in his 80's who is the son of my grandfather's older sister.  What an amazing experience!!