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The Italian-American

Cultural Center of IA

1961 Indianola Avenue

Des Moines IA 50315

515-280-3719

Numerous resources are available for researching your family history and annual seminars are held. If you are unable to come to the Center and need information, please contact Susan DeFazio or Kathy Foggia.

  • maps, books, photographs
  • family tree databases
  • translation guides, Italian form letters
  • birth and death records, census records
  • membership rosters
  • Italian history manuscripts
  • The American Citizen Newspapers
  • set of "Italians To America"
  •  our favorite links

The Storytellers

 In each family there is one who is called to find the ancestors.  To put flesh on their bones and make them live again, to tell the family story and to feel that somehow they know and approve. All tribes have one.  We have been called, as if it were in our genes, to breath life into all who have gone before us.  We are the storytellers of the tribe.   

 Genealogy is more that a cold documentation of facts, it goes to clarify who I am and why I do the things I do. It goes to deep pride that my ancestors fought to make a better life.  It goes to a deep and immense understanding that they were doing it for us, that we might be born who we are, that we might remember them.  So, we do.

 So, I tell the story of my family.  It is up to the one called in the next generation to answer the call and take their place in the long line of storytellers.

 We are the chosen.

The Valerie Lacona Genealogy Branch