The premise: write once a week
about a specific ancestor. It could be a story, a biography, a photograph, a
research problem — any that focuses on that one ancestor. The next week, write
about a different ancestor. In 52 weeks, you’ll have taken a closer look at 52
people in your family tree… and maybe learned a little bit more about them in
the process.
Alexandria Conacova
was born in St. Petersburg ,
Russia in
1871. I thought I would write about her
this week as the Olympics are being held in Russia . This woman was my husbands Grandmother. Alexandria
died when my husband was only 2 so he has no memories of her. All my information about her came through her
daughters and some historical documents.
Sometime before she came to America
she married John Glessoff also of St.
Petersburg .
Her condition on marrying him was that they immigrate to America . The two of them arrived in New
York ’s Ellis Island on 16 June 1899 from the port
of Bremen , Germany .
The story I heard from the daughters, Florence , Valentine, Mary and Anna was Alexandria and John Glessoff, after arriving in New
York , travelled to St. Louis with a
friend. Apparently they could not get
work in St. Louis so they returned to the New York area. I have not found any record of them being in St. Louis . On the passenger list the person next to Jwan Glasow (as it was spelled on the
passenger list) was a Michal Swald,
of Russia , going to his
brother in St. Louis . So the story seems like it could have been
true.
In 1902 Alexandria and John
had their first child Florence and they were
living in Elisabeth , New Jersey .
I found the family in the 1910 census and it indicates he worked in a
machine shop. The area in New Jersey where they settled was adjacent to the docks with
all the traffic of New York
harbor so I’m sure his talent came in very handy.
Unfortunately, John
Glessoff died in May of 1910 leaving his wife Alexandria and 4 children. The children were Florence , Walter, Valentine, and Mary. Several years later Alexandria remarried another Russian named
Walinsky Shesnesky. They had a daughter
Anna. Alexandria and Walinsky did divorce after
several years.
When I married into the family she had been dead for 20
years and the family still talked of her as if she spoke to them
yesterday. Alexandria Glessoff died in Brooklyn ,
New York 21 April 1943.
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