Hi Vicky, thanks for the response. I agree that the records are a bit skewed because of the interpretation of the person filling them out. It has always been an issue with my family because we have family in Detroit that spells their surname differently The name that I was trying to decipher would of been my great-grandmother. The only place that it shows up is on the manifest of her husband Guiseppe which is my great-grandfather (she fell ill and never made the journey). This particular manifest is from one of his trips back into this country. I have yet to find documentation on his original entry into the country which may help in my quest. When I first started on this I found what I thought would be my grandfather but the spelling on the town that he came from was incorrect. It took me a while to relies that. Because of the penmanship on the manifest I was just wondering if "Providenzia" was in fact an Italian first name. If so and if it where to translate into "Pearl" then that would be where my Aunt's name came from. I have done a search on google and it is in fact a word but all sites are in Italian (my bad for not learning). To my advantage I have 30+ first cousins and most of them have internet access and I forward a file of the manifests to them to help in trying to verify the name. Vas575@aol.com wrote: > Frank, > > If the entry on Ellis Island makes sense as to the other information > provided, you may have just found your ancestor. Ellis Island was not > generally staffed with Americans who read and spoke fluent Italian. They > often modifed both Surnames and Given Names to "Americanize" the immmigrants. > And, if Ellis Island didn't make the change, the public school system took > care of the matter. I would urge you to take a look at the actual manifest. > Compare information. Ages, City of Origin, that type of thing may help, and > the column on the manifest which lists the name of the relative they are > planning to stay with in America may confirm your suspicions. > > I read once that some of the information reported at Ellis Island could be > inaccurate. For example, if your relatives may have lived in a small > village, left the village and moved to Rome for an opportunity to make more > money to pay for steerage, they may have reported Rome as the last place they > lived. Rome wouldn't be an untruthful response, but for the family historian > it might certainly be a "left curve" in their research. Genealogy is not an > exact science, sometimes you have to give up a detail for the big picture. > > Regards, > Vicky > vas575@aol.com -- "I have not failed. I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work." - Thomas Alva Edison (1847-1931) _______________________________________ Home Page: http://home.insightbb.com/~fselvaggio/home.html Favorite Recipes: http://home.insightbb.com/~fselvaggio/recipes.html LaFamiglia Selvaggio: http://home.insightbb.com/~fselvaggio/lafamiglia.html Remove "*" to reply