Monday, April 25, 2011

Why Transylvania Romania?






Back in Junior High School when I was working at the local library I became interested in genealogy and started to research my Fesing family tree. I discovered that my grandfather, Martin Fising moved to America along with his sister Maria Fising when he was just 17 y/o and his sister 20 y/o. They came from Romania; however, I never knew exactly where in Romania they came from. My Great grandparents Stefan & Maria Fising had originally came to America in 1904 and settled in Cleveland after they met there and got married. I later found out that they came from villages in Romania that were only about 2 miles apart; however, they did not meet until they arrived in Cleveland, OH along with thousands of other Eastern European immigrants. Once they were married in 1905, they eventually had two children; my grandfather Martin Fising and his sister Maria. In 1909 they moved back to Romania and settled back down; WWI broke out and Stefan was drafted and fought for the Austro-Hungarian Army; he was shot in combat and later died of Pneumonia. After his death my grandfather had to quit school and went to work to support the family. His mother eventually remarried and started a new family; times were hard in Romania after WWI and because of their fathers death Martin & Maria decided to come to America for a better life; since they were already US citizens (because they were born in America) they thought it would be a good decision. They arrived in NY in July of 1926 and settled in Cleveland and eventually started there own families; they never returned back home and never saw there mother again.

Last year the television show, "Who Do You Think You Are?" peeked my interest in my family history once again and with the help of ancestor.com and all the available online resources I discovered the small village that they came from, Gergeschdorf (German name) and Ungurei (Romanian name), it is located in the Transylvanian Plateau near the Transylvanian Alps in central Romania. I did additional research and discovered other Fising relatives in Germany as well as in OH and decided I wanted to step foot in my families village so that is why I am headed to Transylvania, Romania. I hope to do additional research on the family while I am there and connect with my past. I will be leaving on May 25th and will be there for one month.

5 comments:

  1. Hello! I like your blog very much. In 2007 I made ​​a round trip to Romania (Transylvania). The journey I will never forget. Regards, Sabine

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  2. Hi Tom, A wonderful surprise your story! I learned about new travel project, we wish to be a success. Rural Romania waiting to be discovered.

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  3. Nice storry, I am a jurnalist in Alba Iulia, at Unirea, and I whant to write this storry in jurnal, if is possible.

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    1. No problem sharing the story in your paper. Just please let me know whenpublished and send an elctronic link if possible when published.

      Tom Fesing

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