Making Ends Meet!

Last week I was pretty fortunate to be able to search through the Adjuntas church records which were microfilmed by the LDS. I knew that some ancestors in my family through my paternal side lived in Adjuntas for a while thanks to the Census records.

Adjuntas, Puerto Rico- a town nestled in the Central Mountain Range
Picture: Wikipedia

I knew that my great grandfather, Felix Vélez Mercado, was born in Utuado in 1905 but his parents somewhere between 1911 and 1914 moved to Adjuntas and some of the birth records of Felix's brothers and sisters pointed to their parents being naturally from Adjuntas, Puerto Rico. Felix's father, Nicodemus/Nicodemo Vélez Ríos and his wife Domitila Mercado Cruz were a bit of a mystery to me. I didn't have any birth records for them and neither any death record. I knew that they married in 1906 in Utuado, Puerto Rico- but besides that I had nothing.

Utuado, Puerto Rico
Picture: Wikipedia

The Adjuntas church records were able to clear up some things about this side of my family! I was fortunate to find a lot of baptismal and death records in the church documents, which would help to prove some lines and extend others. Nicodemus Vélez Ríos was born in Adjuntas in 1878 to his parents José María Vélez Sepúlveda and Ana Ríos González. I knew that his dad, José María Vélez, was a part of a pretty extensive line of Vélez and Sepúlveda family members that dated back to the 1600s in Puerto Rico and even to towns in Spain. Now that I have confirmed that Nicodemus is the son of José María Vélez, I have been able to solidify that line. Thanks to all the research of those that came before me, I was able to extend some of these lines like I mentioned to the early 1600s. Nicodemus is also the grandson of Bernardina Sepúlveda Roman who I wrote about before, who owned a few slaves in Guaynabo Dulce, Adjuntas, Puerto Rico when the slave census was taken in 1872. My Riós González family is still missing a bunch of ancestors and this is due to the fact that this family probably originated in San Sebastián and those records aren't microfilmed with the LDS so to figure out more I'll probably have to visit the church itself.

My Mercado Cruz line on the other hand had eluded me for a long period of time! Most of the records say that Domitila's father, Cayetano Mercado was born Lares and would end up dying there. Cayetano's wife, Cristina Cruz Pérez was also said to have been from Lares but she was still alive in the 1910 census living in Utuado, Puerto Rico with her daughter.

Surprisingly, Domitila had a few sisters who were born in Adjuntas! Finding the baptism records of these sisters allowed me to extend these lines one generation further. Now I know that Cayetano's parents were Francisco Mercado and María Isabel Cajigas and that Cristina's parents were Francisco Cruz and Gabriela Pérez (she is sometimes written with the last name Gerena). The records state that the Mercado Cajigas family was from San Sebastián while the Cruz Pérez family was from Lares. I've tried to find some of these grandparents' death records in their respective towns as well as in Adjuntas but so far no luck.

I was pretty happy to be able to push the Mercado Cruz line one generation further on the paternal side because I had been struggling with that line for so long now. And hopefully I'll be able to find Domitila's birth certificate which I've also had a hard time locating. Hopefully more will be discovered about this family!

It's also interesting to note that San Sebastián and Lares are actually neighboring towns in Puerto Rico demonstrated below:

Lares, Puerto Rico

San Sebastián, Puerto Rico

Finding Where They Lived

So we all know that technology is awesome, for the most part. We are able to see things miles and miles away from simply typing in some words and BAM there is the Eiffel Tower on our screen. But more importantly we can see where our ancestors lived.

By looking at the 1930 Census and using Google Maps I was able to look at where my great grandparents had lived during that time. My great grandfather Alejandro Rivera González born in 1883 married for the third time in 1922 with Mercedes Ortiz Marrero who was only about 18 years old. Alejandro was originally from Toa Alta, Puerto Rico while Mercedes was from Corozal, Puerto Rico. In 1930, both were living together in the barrio Mercado in San Juan, Puerto Rico.

Alejandro & Mercedes in 1930 living in Mercado, San Juan

Along the left-hand side you can see that it says they were living on Calle Lucila Silva in Mercado, San Juan, Puerto Rico. By typing in Cll (Short for Calle) Lucila Silva into Google Maps I was able to find it on the map. Calle Lucila Silva is actually located inside La Perla located near the Fort of El Morro in Old San Juan. Ironically, if always passed near this place every time I go visit Puerto Rico not knowing that my great grandparents lived in that neighborhood. The neighborhood unfortunately isn't very welcoming to outsiders due to the high issues with drug trafficking so it wouldn't be safe for me to roam around and find Calle Lucila Silva.

Calle Lucila Silva in La Perla, San Juan, Puerto Rico

If you notice, La Perla is located very close to the Santa Maria Magdalena de Pazzis Cemetery. Here it is said that my great grandmother is buried! I didn't even know this as well until last year when I spoke to an aunt in Puerto Rico. So hopefully I'll be able to head into that cemetery and check to see if she really is buried in there! The story goes they had a plot in the cemetery so they buried her in there, my guess is that maybe her husband Alejandro Rivera González is buried in there who passed away before her. I guess we'll find out soon! Thanks to the power of technology we're able to figure out things like this!

What Started It All- Part I

My great grandparents, my grandmother and her siblings  

This portrait of my great grandparents, Felix Vélez Mercado and Rosalia Avilés González along with my grandmother Carmen Avilés Vélez (seated close to her father) along with her brother Antonio (older boy) and a baby sibling I don't know the name of, was the start of my interest in genealogy.

The picture hung in our apartment where I lived when I was younger and I always remember seeing it in the dining room and asking myself two questions: 1) Who were these people? and 2) How did MY brother end up in this picture? (I was convinced my older brother was the little boy in the picture, hey- I was young at the time!). Along with the picture came a story that also sparked my interest in genealogy.

I was told that my great grandmother (pictured above) was from Spanish and Taíno descendants (if you look at my great grandmother, holding her baby, you can notice her straight black hair and rather small, slanted eyes); this coming from her mother, a "pure" Taíno Indian. [I haven't confirmed this claim, but I have high doubts it is completely true being that around the time her mother was born (abt. 1892), there weren't too many full bloodied natives running around the island- from what I've gathered from research.] I was also told that her father came to Puerto Rico during the "war" (my guess the Spanish-American War) where he fell in love and decided to stay and had my great grandmother. I was completely enthralled by this story, could I really have Spanish blood as close as 4 centuries back and have a full-bloodied Taíno great-great grandmother?!? I was too young at the time to actually begin research, sadly, and wasn't able to ask my grandmother the necessary questions about this picture and her family. But it was up to me to solve this mystery and many more about my family's past.