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Hi SandyJose - and to all; I am interested in ALL of Cumbria's Italian Community and Dumfries & Galloway's.

The area I am working on this year is photography of ALL those Italians who had ever lived in these two counties.  I am looking to create from everyone's original photos, Hi Res photos 10 x 8 inch scanned in TIFF at 600 dpi, which is the format I use.
I then repair them using manual methods, as automated repairs tend to degrade pictures in various ways. Those repairs can take me up to 200 hours !! depending on the level of damage per picture.

In answer to your very kind offer SandyJose - I already know the following:-
There were several groups of Gonnella in Cumbria, circa pre 1960, including the late "Adelmo & Co" his wife being Catherine Fontana, and another family that came in from Glasgow in 1976 - the late Joseph G. & Renata Dinelli.  I work with the Italian way of using the wife's maiden name rather than her married name in my archive.


I don't have photos of Pietro G. & Renata (Rossi), or their children;  Domenico G & Candida (?) and their children.
I am also looking for specific photos of the Perruzza's in Cumbria, the Negri's in Cumbria and the Croci (Cross) families in Cumbria.

The Jpeg photos uploaded are wonderful - however, I need to have these in TIFF format and preferably scanned using my own scanning gear and software.

Everyone please note that handling of loaned photographs and care of them is at archive standards with me.  Within the archive, all digitally scanned photos are given their unique folders and credits/details of who owns those photos.  All photos and data are held in the archive for posterity, with the hope that in the far future they will help others connect with their roots.

The Relational Database is large, but uses a simple, intuitive Index system created by myself many moons ago, currently using Office 2010, which tells the user where and what data is held within the system, and in the real world. To give some idea of the real world side - I only have a little over 80k documents in print taking up our study room - no room for more :-(

Yes, the digital data is backed up on 3 terebytes of drive, and some critical data is also further backed up on BluRay.  The 1000's of photos have almost all persons identified - though I have many more that still require work.

Each year we chose a couple of areas to cover: 2014-16 was Dumfries & Galloway cemeteries along with Newspaper stories between 2000 - 2016 for both counties.
For 2017 - 2019 it's Cemeteries in Cumbria, plus the mentioned photographic work, plus the Italian Street Directory alongside this work, and a time line directory which traces movements of all Italians listed around the two counties (Cumbria & D&G) for each family.
   
Cemeteries were last done 20 years ago - they have grown dramatically in that time :-(hence we are now getting ready to come to a Cumbrian cemetery near you - circa 150 of them :-).

I already have had over 100 families graciously help supply photos, newspaper clippings etc, to add to the archive over a period of 30 years & more.

Basic arrangements have been made for the archive (apparently the largest in Northern England according to the professors) to be handed over to the Cumbria Archive Services and Dumfries Public Library Archive on our passing - hopefully we will have many years yet !

Why are we doing it?
It started off as my simple Italian family tree!  got hooked, and found I was related to pretty much everyone so started gathering all the info out there but organising it was tough at the start.
So took 2 years out to study Relational databases and walked away with the advanced diplomas in all main areas of IT.

We already have 1oo's of photos covering a few thousand faces whose names would have been forgotten - but not now.

Thanks for sparing the time to post the list of musicians.

I recognise all but one surname name - yes, musicians were much enjoyed by the majority in Cumbria / Cumberland - North Lancashire, where they paid to hear a tune.  I have details of how much they earned, and it was good money - today we buy a CD to enjoy at home, back then an organ grinder often with a monkey would entertain.

They became so numerous by the early 1900s that laws came into force to curtail their numbers.
Sadly, many were abused including an expectant Italian girl who was assisting but was kicked in her stomach in Keswick by an ungrateful person (the story got into the papers - I have many thousands of stories in our archive).

In Scotland they were not permitted at any time and so no organ grinders appeared in Dumfries & Galloway.

Many thanks - Paul

Quote from: Fynn on Friday 01 January 16 14:56 GMT (UK)

They were from barga Italy also her brothers and other relatives went to Kendal Lancaster Workington to open shops. Tried looking on other sites but doesn't give much information

My family are from Barga & tiglio etc.

Hope everyone has found their answer's already - if not - let me know what your after but please note that I am focused on Cumbria & Dumfries & Galloway - I have nothing outside those areas, well, almost nothing.

Has anyone tried to arrange a group meeting in Cumbria to help solve some of our Italian social / commercial history ?

After 30 years plus of work on this subject using our (Wife & Self) "boots on the ground", I am now finally turning to the Internet.

Some of you are hoping to see a Rossi, Fabbri connection to Tognarelli ?

Answer: You may be still related but here is a list (excluding the local and not so local English element) of surnames Tognarelli's of Cumbria are directly related to in my Relational DB :-
I should add that the following list of names are for Cumbria's Italians related to Cumbria's Tognarelli's !

Arrighi, Bilotti, Casci, Cecchini, Cosimini, Ennini, Franchi, Gonnella, Lunardi, Moscardini, Olympia ? (difficult to decipher original writing), Pieraccini, Pieroni, Renucci, Rosa, Turicchi.

I dare not claim that this is a complete list ! 

Hi Toggie, I have wondered where you had gone. I am convinced our families are linked in some way, historically. I have posted quite a few photos, including Tognarelli ones and my own Fabbri ones. Would your Grandfather be able to shed any light on the link? William Tognarelli was my Grandfather`s Best Man and I`m pretty sure that is my Nan in the doorway. I also contacted  a family in Keswick who were interested, so I sent photos, but they never replied. Any info you can find out would be great. The photos I have posted are on this thread, further "up".

I'm just hoping that BronxPiano, and Toggie are still visiting this site - hopefully you all live in Cumbria :-) ?

  Hi Bronx and everyone else looking to build their family history story and tree.

Bronx, I am very grateful that you were able to post photos of the Tognarelli's and Fabbri up on this forum.

I have just joined RootsChat tonight.
Have been building my Italian Community Archive for more than 30 years now, and have tried to obtain photos of every Italian that stayed in "Cumberland & North Lancashire" + "Dumfries & Galloway" since 1750 up to the present day.

Both sides of my parents are Italian, 1 from Dumfriesshire, 1 from Cumbria, hence I cover both counties.

I'm still trying to work out how to PM anyone on the RootsChat forum.
I should add that I am very busy like everyone else, but will try to help where I can in the Cumbria & D&G area.

If anyone has an "Italian" family member interred at Mount Vernon in Edinburgh, you may be interested to know that after using up 2 years of spare time, my wife & I have just completed a very accurate mapping out of that cemetery and listed all occupants including photos of all 585 Italian headstones.