Our family has a street in Naples!

In advance of our trip, I am communicating with this lovely man, Alfonso Buongiorno, who owns a leather tanning business in Solofra. (https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100015900452619)

He thinks he is related to us like this: Biagio Buongiorno, father of our Great-grandmother Maria Michela Buongiorno Troisi and of artist Donato/Donatus Buongiorno, was a brother of his Great-great-grandfather Michele Buongiorno. (Update Nov 18: Later, when meeting him in person, Alfonso said there were two male cousins with the names of the ancestors we know, which means the ancestor in common is those two mens’ grandfather. This might be a translation issue. I will sort it out based on comprehensive documents Alfonso gave me, and will post definitive information later.)

He will meet us in Solofra on Nov. 1 and show us his family history book with his family tree!

He reports that the Buongiornos have been tanners and goldsmiths (not of jewelry, I learned later: gold leafing of leather and other interior furnishings, such as columns, capitals, walls) in Solofra for centuries, and that some of them went to Naples during each generation to facilitate trade. (Residency was required to get a license for trade, I learned later.)

In Naples, still today, there is a Vicolo Buongiorno, which dates from the time when goldsmith Buongiornos were on the street. (Vicolo, also Vico, means alley.)

Guess what. It’s only a few blocks from Via Cesare Rosaroll where Domenic Troisi and his family lived in 1907 right before they migrated to the U.S.

The plot thickens….

Check it out on Google Earth and see how glamorous Vicolo Buongiorno is today. https://www.google.com/maps/place/Vico+Buongiorno,+80137+Napoli+NA,+Italy/@40.8560405,14.2553281,19z/data=!4m5!3m4!1s0x133b086941cb0da9:0xdec1e3b3eece833c!8m2!3d40.8560405!4d14.2558753

We come from class, people!