Extending the Family Tree

I have found that once you begin your family tree, branches keep growing in so many directions that you wonder how it all fits the puzzle. Starting with me growing from my father and mother, then their parents, their parents, their parents and all their siblings and children in between makes my heart race.

My main focus has been the SILVAN and RUIZ families because I am writing a book about Abuelita (Grandma Manuela Silvan Ruiz) and her emigration from Spain with her family as a young girl not quite 10 years old in 1911. But while pedaling backwards, it is impossible to create the pedigree (family tree limbs) chart without darting in all directions.

There are the Chubbs and Hubbards. Then there are the Hobarts who are really the Hubbards before the name was Americanized. Then the Hubbarde family, again our line with an added 'e' at the end. Following them from England across the sea to Massachusetts created such excitement within me! Could they have been on the Mayflower? I wondered.

This has lead to a date in Washington, D.C. next month with my friend (from England herself) and the possiblity of traipsing through the Library of Congress to find specific records of our ancestors. She will check her family, PARKE and I'll check HUBBARD/HOBART/HUBBARDE. I've been told once we pass through security at the Library of Congress all I can take into the archival room is a pencil and pad of paper. No phone, no purse, nothing. At least with that small bounty, I won't have to worry about forgetting anything when I leave. LOL

Ah, the quest is a never-ending story and I am enjoying it whole heartedly.