Big Spokane Italian family traces roots back home, finds cousins and sets sights on another trip to Sicily and Sardinia this spring

Geri Guinn knew she came from a large Italian family; that much was clear. Growing up in Chicago with her parents and two sisters, she lived near her aunts, uncles and paternal grandparents, Pietro and Crocifissa Congiu, who had immigrated to the United States from Italy in the early 1900s. Although her grandparents only spoke Italian, weekly spaghetti dinners were loud and boisterous, and the family was close-knit.

But as she got older, Geri always wondered what had become of the other part of the family – the siblings and extended family that Pietro and Crocifissa had left behind when they’d moved to America. As far as Geri knew, her grandparents were the only ones who had ever left Italy.

Although her family history was often on her mind, there wasn’t much time to look into it. Geri and her husband, George, were busy raising their five kids: Garret, Grant, Genera, Graham and Genae. They moved to Spokane in 1985 so George could attend Gonzaga Law School, while Geri ran an in-home hair salon.

Over the years, the family grew, with each of the Guinn kids settling in the Spokane area, all within 30 minutes of each other.

“Have you ever seen ‘My Big, Fat, Greek Wedding’?” said Geri’s son Grant. “That’s us. We’re just a big, loud, Italian family.”

In 2021, Grant felt the need to spend more time with his mom. He decided to go to her house every Tuesday to eat lunch together and do whatever she wanted to do. Often, that included learning more about her Italian ancestors.

They didn’t have much to go on. Geri had one letter that a great-aunt had written back in the 1980s that contained information on their family history, but some of the details were incorrect. U.S. census records weren’t much help either, since they always listed Pietro’s country of origin as France, even though Geri was fairly certain he’d never lived there. With any records they did manage to find, there was always the language barrier.

“We can’t read Italian, we can’t speak Italian, so of course we didn’t know how to do any of this,” Grant said.

But for the Guinns, connecting with their family was of utmost importance. And so Grant and Geri pressed on.

For Geri’s Christmas gift that year, Grant secretly hired an Italian genealogist to piece together the family tree. When Grant handed Geri the report, she was thrilled.

They learned that her grandmother was from Sicily, and her grandfather was from Sardinia, a fact that was new to all of them. With the correct information in hand, Grant and Geri were able to look further into birth and marriage records and continue to fill out their family tree.

And the fire was lit. Geri and Grant, no longer content to know their newfound family on paper only, decided to take a trip to Sicily and Sardinia to meet as many relatives as possible.

Geri sent a few letters to anyone whose contact information she could find, informing them of their upcoming trip and asking if they could meet. She didn’t hear back from any of them. Undeterred, she and Grant boarded a plane in May 2022 and headed to Italy.

That’s when the miracles started happening. In Sicily, Grant and Geri showed up in the tiny village of Montemaggiore Belsito, where their Airbnb host greeted them in broken English. They used a translating app on their phones to tell her they were there to look for relatives.

“Immediately, she took us across the street, around the corner, directly to the house that my great-grandmother grew up in,” said Grant. From there, the Airbnb host started introducing them to people in the village.

“From then on, for the next 10 days, we were at somebody’s house for lunch or dinner every day,” Grant said.

“Before meeting Aunt Geri and Grant, I didn’t know we had relatives in America,” said Chiara Catalano, one of the relatives the Guinns met in Sicily. “When they finally arrived at my grandparents’ house, we introduced ourselves, and I remember Aunt Geri’s sweetness; she hugged my grandfather Nino so tightly. It was a very, very emotional moment that I will never forget.”

From Sicily, Geri and Grant traveled to the small village of Dolianova in Sardinia, where, again, they knew no one.

Hungry and not quite sure where to go, they sat on a park bench in the middle of the village to take a break. A man walked by and jokingly asked them what they were doing sitting on “his bench.” Grant used the translate app to explain that they were looking for anyone with Geri’s maiden name of Congiu.

“He looks at us and says, ‘Ah, one moment,’ ” Grant said. The man called his son, who explained to Grant and Geri that his best friend growing up was a Congiu.

“He came within 10 minutes. He puts us in his car, he drives us to the other side of the village, he takes us to his best friend’s house across the street,” Grant said.

Inside the house was Angela Congiu, whom they discovered was Geri’s second cousin. She was also the first Congiu that Geri had met outside of her immediate family. Geri was ecstatic.

After chatting for a while (all through hand gestures, translate apps and broken English), Geri pulled out a picture she had brought with her, showing Pietro, Crocifissa and their five children sometime in the 1920s or ‘30s.

“By golly, did (Angela) not get up and go into her back room and pull the picture off the wall – the matching picture of my great-grandfather and my great-grandmother,” Grant said. “All the other siblings were still there, and all their descendants are all still there … And all of these people in Sardinia had this picture.”

They assume Pietro must have sent the photo to the 11 siblings he left behind in Sardinia.

“In a few hours everyone knew of their arrival,” said Silvana Congiu, another one of Geri’s second cousins in Dolianova. “I often wondered if anyone in this American family was aware of our existence. I dreamed of being able to meet one of them one day. And when that day came, for me it was an indescribable and immense joy.”

Geri felt the same. Her lifelong dream had been to find her Italian family and share a meal with them. And now that was happening in abundance.

“It meant the world to her,” said her daughter Genera Smith. “It completed her. It was almost like … when kids get adopted and then they find their birth parents and they just kind of feel complete. That’s how I feel like she felt. She just felt whole.”

Following their return to the U.S., Geri and Grant kept in close touch with their newly found family across the ocean. Geri made an Italian feast for her kids and their families and showed them pictures from their trip. And she leaned into her Italian heritage.

“She was the walking Italian queen,” said her daughter Genae Millar. “She was so funny, walking around with her Italia shirt, singing the Italian songs. She was a hoot.”

But about six months after their trip, Geri was diagnosed with Stage 4 pancreatic cancer. She died a little over a year later, in January 2024. About 50 of her Italian relatives joined in over Zoom to watch the funeral services, which the Guinns had translated into Italian by a family friend.

After taking time to grieve, Grant proposed an idea to his siblings and extended family.

“Let’s go back,” he said. “Let’s go to Sicily and Sardinia and let’s see these folks. Let’s meet them and complete the circle.”

This spring, they’re doing just that. Twenty-three members of the extended Guinn family are heading to Sicily and Sardinia so everyone can meet the relatives that Geri loved so much.

The relatives in Italy are excited to meet even more of their “American cousins.”

“Almost every day I hear from somebody,” said Grant, who keeps in close touch with his Italian family over social media and messaging apps.

There are reunions planned in Sicily and Sardinia, where the families will meet, share a meal and learn more about how they are all connected. Genera wants everyone to wear name tags. Grant wants to map out a huge family tree on the wall.

“I can’t wait to meet all of them and hug each other,” said Chiara.

“I love that we’re kind of doing this in (my mom’s) honor,” Genera said. “She was so excited to have these people in her life, and then her life got cut short, so she didn’t get to enjoy the benefits … of having this great extended family.”

Even though she won’t be there in person, everyone feels that Geri will be there in spirit.

“I know that she’s going to be right along there with us,” Genae said. “This is all she could have ever hoped for.”

“She died happy,” Grant added. “She said, ‘I got to meet my Italian family. I know who they are. I know my roots.’ She died a happy lady.”