John Pio Came to Maine  /  Al Newman

INTRODUCTION

My mother, sister and I were living with my maternal grandparents in 1945.My grandmother, who never ran out of bizarre stories, happened to mention to me that there was a mysterious book in Nova Scotia that showed how our family was related to President Grover Cleveland. Fascinated, I began writing to my deceased great-grandparents’ then-living siblings in Nova Scotia. I was deluged with facts, rumors, and photos that I immediately labeled and preserved. When I finally learned that the "mysterious book" was the Cleveland family genealogy, available in many libraries, and that my relationship to the president was only that of fourth cousin, twice removed, it was too late. I was hooked. I’ve spent the last 60 years probing ever deeper into my family history. This book is the culmination of my research.

John Pio Came to Maine is not a standard genealogy. It is, first of all, a history of all deceased, blood descendants of John Pio, the immigrant. It is intended, secondly, to present documents, theories, anecdotes and other data that will enable future generations of genealogists to begin their research where I have left off. The book also presents ancestral photographs, properly identified, that might otherwise have been consigned to the dustbin when my estate is settled. Finally, the book contains comprehensive pedigree charts of many people who married John Pio’s descendants. In some cases, sadly, I can show nothing more than the first name of a person who married into the bloodline.

If you find erroneous information in this book, please send me the details of the error plus the source of the correct information so that I can verify it. My email address:  gobelize@comcast.net.

My mailing address:
    Al Newman,
    9750 Old Placerville Rd., Apt. 118,
    Sacramento, CA95827.

Privacy protocol in genealogy calls for living individuals not to be mentioned online by complete name.  Accordingly, I am the only completely identifiable living person mentioned in the book. Other living people are referred to as “Living” plus a last name and any relevant dates and places. If any living people mentioned semi-anonymously in this book would like to be identified, they are asked to send a hard-copy, signed letter of request to my mailing address, and I will revise the online text accordingly.  Additionally, if I have identified a living person because I believed that person to be deceased, I will immediately take whatever steps are necessary to rectify that error upon notification. The privacy protocol does not apply to photographs.

Although this work is copyrighted, the intent of the copyright is not to impede the work of other researchers.  Everyone is encouraged to make wide-ranging use of the information contained herein for research purposes.  This is copyrighted only so that I may retain credit for my 60 years of research as well as its arrangement and presentation.

If I have inadvertently included the copyrighted work of others under my own copyright, it was inadvertent, and I want to make that right.  Please advise me of the oversight and I will immediately correct the online presentation to credit the true copyright owner.
During the course of my research, I have obtained information from numerous private, family genealogical websites.  While much of the information in the narratives and pedigree charts that is under 200 years old is the result of my own original research, almost all information over 200 years old is the product of the research of others, and was obtained in great part over the Internet.  I have made copious use of the following websites and wish to express my appreciation:

   ancestry.com
   genealogy.com
   familysearch.org
   Rootsweb
   Cyndi’s List
   Social Security Death Records
   Maine Marriage Records
   Maine Death Records
   California Death Records
   Jean’s List

Other credits are mentioned in the narratives.

In some instances, pedigrees contained herein are terminated after several hundred years, and reference is given as to how to continue them online.

With respect to the hundreds of pedigree charts:

In some instances “irrational” is used when online data is unlikely or impossible.

I try to warn of frequent coincidence of dates.  I suspect that some researchers have nonchalantly assigned wives the same death dates as their husbands.

“Or,” as used in the charts, indicates that correct choice of two offered bits of information is unknown, but that one of the two is almost certainly correct.

“Of,” as used in the charts, indicates that the actual location of an event is not firmly established, but that the person involved was known to be associated with the location at roughly the same time.

“DE,” in front of names of French origin, means “of,” and refers to geographic locations or important lineages.The same is true of “VON” in German and “DI” in Italian.In Welsh, “AP” means “son of,” and “VERCH” means “daughter of.”

(not known) indicates that an individual’s given name is unknown.

(NOT KNOWN) indicates that an individual’s surname is unknown.

Counties in Great Britain are shires.  Sometimes I show them without the “shire” reference, as, for example, “Lancaster,” or with that reference, as in “Lancashire.”Or Worcestershire vs. Worcester; or Buckinghamshire vs. Buckingham.

The program that I used to produce the pedigree charts often abbreviated words that I did not wish to have abbreviated, or omitted words that I wished to include.  Accordingly, a massive amount of cutting, pasting, and scanning was required to obtain the informational end product that I wanted to present.  I apologize for the sometimes sloppy appearance of those charts.  I will try, bit by bit, to replace them with neater charts.  

In case of conflicting online pedigree info, I have tried to pick the most reasonable for inclusion in these charts.  Alternatively, I have combined the more reasonable elements of both.