Responses are coming in

Since the last handful of family trees went into the mail a few weeks back, I have received a few phonecalls from recipients all very happy with the tree. As I suspected, a few mistakes have been found which will be corrected very soon.

The completed family tree is HERE!

After a few weeks of transcribing my notes from all of the phone interviews for which I am grateful, the HRICKO FAMILY TREE is complete...at least as far as I could go.

Before you look down at the scanned pages (all 16 of them), here are some instructions on how the sheets are laid out. Each sheet is lettered A through P. You'll notice that each sheet is set up in column format. Why this way? It was the easiest for me. Anyway, each column is a generation so the farther left you go on a page, the further back a generation you go.

I also circled in RED the base couple that produced the 8 HRICKO CHILDREN that is responsible for every one of us on the tree. Once you print the pages out, lay them down vertically so that page A is above page B and so on. You'll see how they all fit once you start. My name is highlighted in yellow so that you can see how I fit into the family if you were confused with my explanation in an earlier post.

Here they are. Any questions, feel free to leave a comment!

The Final Touches

As indicated by my last posting, the end is near.

Upon looking at the holes in the tree as it is now, I decided earlier this week to make one last final research "push" to search for any people that might be able to shed light on the missing links.

First, I went back to the people who were responsible for getting the ball rolling 3 months ago. Those people are: Betty Senich and Steve Hricko. Without their help, this peoject would not have happened.

The first was Steve. I told him of my progress but also that I needed a few names to fill in the gaps. He gave me another phone number belonging to a lady by the name of Sue Davis (she is Steve's cousin) who was the mother of the person I needed info on. As of this writing, I still can't
get a hold of her. I'll try again next week.

Later that evening, I called Betty Senich and asked her if she had any information on her sister's son Vernon Miller. She remembered his wife and three children. Bingo!

The day before, I finally received an email from Linda Breckenridge from Florida. She gave me the phone number of Helen Costello's daughter Judy in Estero, Florida. I called her, introduced myself and got the names of her children, etc. As it stands now, the only information I need to
complete this branch are the grandchildren of Bob Hricko. Efforts to contact him have failed multiple times so it looks as if the well has run dry.

The Louis Hricko branch is 99% complete.

The Aftonas Hricko branch was next. I called Ron Hricko in texas to inform him on my progress. I still needed information on his cousins from his Aunt Edna Grainer. He wasn't close to them but he did have her number in Farminton Hills, Michigan. As always with me, the juices were flowing knowing that I was that much closer to nailing this branch down so I called her that evening. She gave me her family names and grandchildren. Afterward, she mentioned that she would like a copy of the tree when it was done. "You'll have it in a few weeks", I told her.

The last piece of information on the Aftonas Hricko side that I needed has proved to be the most elusive, that is until a hunch and alot of luck would surface a few nights ago. As mentioned a while ago, Aftonas Hricko had 8 children. One of his sons named James had a daughter names Shirley. After more than 3 months of phonecalls and internet research, no one knew if she had a family or whether or not she was still alive. I called Patricia Barber in Florida (distant cousin on the Aftonas Hricko side) and told her of my predicament. She had no information but she did say she was married to a Bill Sisk and that they lived in Cleveland and that she was sure she had two boys, one was named Billy. She said Shirley had passed decades ago but that all the information she had.

That wasn't much to go on. So I checked the phonebook for all of the William Sisks in Cleveland. It was a shot in the dark but what did I have to lose. Of course it figures, there were dozens of Sisks in the phonebook. I went to the web and tried to scale down the Sisks to the ones that would have been born between 1940 and 1950. Another shot in the dark. I found a William Sisk was born in 1941 and he still lived in Cleveland. In fact, there were several William Sisks with those criteria but the gentleman who lived just outside of Cleveland stood out. I don't know why but I figured this was a good place to start. So, out of the blue, I called him not knowing if he was related or not. His wife answered, as always I introduced myself and told her what I was doing, etc. I asked her if her husband's parents were named Shirley and William.

SHE SAID YES!

I guessed right. What were the chances of guessing the right person out of 20 or 30? Very exciting stuff. She was VERY apprehensive about giving me information. She gave the phone
to her husband. To make a long story short, after talking with him for more than half of an hour, he gave me the names that I needed to finish the Aftonas Branch. At the end, I promised to give him a copy of the tree in the weeks ahead. All in all, the best evening of research to date!

As of March 11th, the Hricko side of the family tree is 99% complete!

Follow phone calls signal and end in sight

Filling in the vacant holes in the tree is proving more difficult than constructing the tree itself. I talked to Ron Hricko in Texas (He is the great-grandson of Aftonas Hricko who, again, is the brother of Mary Hricko, my great, greatgrandmother). Anyway, he was still unsure of a few names that I asked about back in January. However this time, he gave me the phone number of the mother of the names in question! Her name is Edna Grainer (Hricko).

Edna Grainer lives in Farmington Hills, Michigan. After explaining to her who I was (which doesn't really help) and why I was calling and who gave me her phone number, she gladly filled in the holes--her kids, grandkids, etc.

The only holes left on the Aftonas Hricko branch is located on Jim Hricko's small branch, Aftonas's son. Jim Hricko has a daughter named Shirley. She had--from what I found out--three children whose names are a mystery. If she is still alive, she's probably in Cleveland, Ohio. If all of this is true then acquiring her phone number is the next step.

One other hole is on the Wasyl Hricko branch. Wasyl's daughter Julia had a grand daughter Hope who was married to "someone". That someone is who I need to find out, at least his last name. I called Steve Hricko in Los Angeles wondering if he knew. He didn't but he had the phone number of Hope's mom Sue Clark. I called and left a message.

The missing link hanging over this project is Bob Hricko and his information. He's in Elmira, New York. Beyond that, who knows. I need the names of his grandchildren to finish off that side. I have a feeling that I may never get a hold of him due to his lack of a permanent address. Hopefully he will have information on Catherine Hricko and Nicholas Hricko, the last two remaining siblings of eight that make up Hricko tree as we know it.

Back to the Hricko Side

...Just got off of the phone with three people: Richard Kish, John Kish and Linda Breckenridge. Each one is a cousin of Betty Senich.

Richard Kish was busy but his wife kindly filled in the gaps on their side of the family namely their kids, nieces and nephews. The next step was to contect John Kish, brother of Richard Kish to fill in the gaps there. Again, all went well. He was a bit leary in sharing family information. I told him I understood and our conversation ended.

The next person was Linda Breckenridge. She is Betty Senich's niece. Linda's mother is Mary Davis. Linda and her husband, who have done extensive geneology research already spent more than a half an hour on the phone with me sharing what information they had and I with them. I told them what information I still needed to complete my branch of the tree. Through their connections with other family members, she said she would check and email me whatever she can uncover. All in all, not too bad in an evening's work of research.

By my count, the tree, as I see it is about 95% complete.

Big Time Switch to Anna Balash's Side...

While waiting on a few phone numbers to FINALLY finish up the Hricko side, I decided to call my grandmother to give her an update on my progress. Suffice it to say, she was amazed and was eager to look at the hundreds of names that now encompass the family tree.

As with most of my projects, nothing is ever quick or simple. One thing leads to another which in turn leads to another. While talking to my grandmother, she mentioned yet another cousin of hers from her mother's side. This new information suddenly kicked my mind into overdrive assembling questions to ask which I did at a feverish pace. A friendly conversation that should have been 5 minutes summarizing my weeks work suddenly morphed into a questionnaire session which lead to my project taking a detour into uncharted territory:

ANNA BALASH'S side of the family.

Grandma gave me the name and phone number of her cousin Janette who lives in Pennsylvania. Janette is the granddaughter of the brother of Anna Balash wich makes her my second cousin twice removed. Got it?

She gave me names and some basic history of her family which I will include later.

Another Hricko Sister

A few weeks back while talking with Stephan Hricko (my 91 year old cousin) he mentioned yet another Hricko sibling. If I've lost you, here are the main consituents of the main branch of the Hricko tree:

(Rumor has it, there were 10 children. So far, I've only come across six)

Mary Hricko - My Great-great-grandmother

Louis Hricko

Bill Hricko

Aftonas Hricko

Wasyl (William) Hricko

The new sister is named Tekla Hricko. According to Stephan, she lived in Cleveland and attended St. Vladimir Church. He gave me a name and address of a grand daughter of Tekla who lives in Illinois. I called her and was able to get some information albeit in fragmented form due to her Parkinson's Disease which she informed me of at the start of the call. The bottom line: I've got more names.

Upon looking at the Louis Hricko branch, I noticed a bunch of holes that evaded me earlier. So, I gave Betty Senich (my grandmother's first cousin and daughter of Louis Hricko) a call inquiring whether or not she had any information on the "holes" that I found. She is now working on getting four addresses and phone numbers. I should have those sometime next week.

The graph showing what I am doing is coming.....soon....I hope.

Updated Family Tree Count

Almost forgot this one in the last posting:

As of this writing, my research has netted:

256 new family members

...most of whom reside on the Hricko side of the tree. This number does not count husbands or wives of a family member only children.

Shifting Gears Ahead One Generation...

The Hricko tree has burned me out a bit so I have shifted my attention to the Balash side. More specifically, Peter Balash's brothers and sisters and their descendants which lie one generation later on the family tree.

Nick Balash, brother of Peter lived in Pennsylvania and New York. At some point, he and his wife Helen moved to Arizona in an effort to treat her Tuberculosis. They ended up in Denver, Colorado where their family has remained.

Nick has 3 children. Mary, Ann and John. I gave Ann a call and three weeks later, her daughter Sandra called me back informing me that her mother Ann and her Aunt Mary live in a retirement community but she would be happy to talk. Sandra (married name: Meyer) kindly filled in the blanks with the names of her nieces and nephews, cousins and spouses.

A lead turns up to be a deadend

In research like this, deadends a foregone conclusion. Call it being naive but in my utopian thinking during this project (which, I'll admit, has surpressed any trace of pragmatism necessary to offset my overly optimistic mindset), never did I actually believe that my research would lead to a deadend. A foolish notion but nonetheless true.

I finally got a hold of Tom Hritzko in Minnesota. According to Steve Hricko in California, he believed that he and Tom were cousins. Over the last three weeks, I left several messages at Tom's residence but to no avail. Through Steve, I finally reached him and talked to him at length. He DID confirm that his mother and Steve's mother MIGHT be related. If his informatio is true, then unfortunately, there is no direct relation (only a relation by marriage).

I still have a lead or two to explore. If those do not pan out, the Hricko side will be complete. At least as far as I can go with the information that I have.

Review of my work so far...

The journal of numerous phonecalls that make up most of the posting on the website can get a little convoluted and understandably so. After all, there hasn't been an actual family tree to reference as of yet. So, in an effort to streamline the lineage of data (names, dates,locations, etc), I will be launching a graph of this branch (Hricko) and others (Balash, etc) in the near future showing the progress at filling the holes along with the holes that still exist at the time. It will be color coded so as to make the deciphering process that much easier. Let me know via the
comment section if this works for you.

Just this afternoon, I had yet another conversation with Laurel "Laurie" Ballash (her married name; husband is no relation). The conversation lasted more than hour but it yielded yet more names from her side as well as some interesting (more like disturbing) pieces of trivia that I will

only share if you email me or call me. Yes, its that bad. Here is where Laurel Ballash (Hricko) resides on the tree: Her grandfather, Aftonas Hricko is Mary Hricko's brother . Remember that Mary Hricko is the mother of Peter Balash. She gave me a couple of phone numbers of other relatives which I should be able to get to later on this week.

Phonecall to Pat Barber

Another jackpot. Last night, I spent a half an hour speaking with Patricia Barber, yet another distant cousin whom I was made aware by Betty Senich (Hricko), my grandmother's first cousin.
I made my first call to her several weeks ago at her home in Ohio. About a week later, she left a message saying she was living in Florida through the winter. Lucky her.

I then called her at her home in Florida and was amazed at the amount of information she had and conversely, how much information I DIDN'T have about her, her parents, aunts, uncles, etc. Her grandfather Aftonas Hricko (he lived in Cleveland on Denison Avenue) didn't have 5 children as I thought through my other research, he had NINE! Patricia filled in the blanks on most of the nine children as well as gave me the addresses and phone numbers of other people related to her (and me), some who happen to live very close to me. As per her request, I sent her a copy of my branch of the family tree which starts with her Great Aunt Mary Hricko.

Once I compile my notes this weekend, I am sure another call to Patricia will be needed to complete this section.

Miscellaneous Calls to Minnesota

After playing phone tag for more than a week, I finally got a hold of Andrea Hjelm, niece of Stephan Hricko. She lives in Minnesota as does most of this side of the Hricko family. She provided a few names to fill in the blanks and also gave me another number to her first cousin Leonard Cline. His father is the brother of Steve Hricko.

Feeling adventurous, I called Leonard Cline right away. As it is with most cold calls, the level of apprehension always builds right before I dial the number knowing the possibility of the person hanging up is better than average. Luckily, each time I've done this, the people have been very courteous and quite helpful. Leonard Cline was equally as courteous and very helpful with names.

Now it's onto another branch: Aftonas Hricko's family

The Hricko Family Historian

Talking to older people can be an exercise in patience. An older relative's mind is an untapped reservoir of knowledge. Its just a matter of asking the right questions which might trigger the memory otherwise locked away for decades. Sometimes it means asking the same question but in a different way in the hope that it will garner that small piece of info that might uncover the unknowns of the family tree. At the risk of sounding redundant and patronizing toward the interviewee, I've been using this technique in my quest for family information. So far, so good.

As previously stated in another posting, I have a cousin who is 91. He's as sharp as a tack. But as he's admitted on a number of occasions, his memory is not what it used to be. I give him a call every two weeks or so when I hit a dead-end. This is where I employ my "ask the question in a different way" technique. Last week, my "sneaky" technique yielded a potential jackpot of knowledge. Steve told me that his niece Andrea Hjelm is the family historian! So I gave her a call and later on this week, we are scheduled to talk at length about the family. My questions are locked and loaded. More next week after the interview.

Conversation with a priest in San Diego

Late last week (before the New Years Weekend), I finally had the chance to call John Hritzko, a Ukranian Catholic priest in San Diego, California. (His grandfather was the brother of Mary Hricko who was the mother of Peter Balash just to refresh the connection to all of us.)

John is a man of very few words, probably due to the fact that he doesn't know me from Adam. But I guess that's the price you pay when you cold-call someone for information about their family in this day and age.

He was able to give me some more names which I have to confirm through the internet databases. Steve Hricko in LA also gave me John's father's phone number in Minnesota. Thomas Hritzko, John's father, once I get a hold of him should be able to shed some light on the information that I got from John earlier.