We got press

So I got a call from Newsday columnist Patricia Kitchen last week for a brief in the paper about a blog I update for Press Club of Long Island. She thought it an interesting way to communicate with members of a professional association.

She said I must be comfortable with this kind of thing given my job at News 12. Sure, I said, and I added that the family has had a blog since Charlotte was born, and that I and Angela have ones of our own. They got mentioned, too.

Here’s an excerpt:

New blog on the block

As a hip, new way to connect with members, as well as ease them into new online applications, the Press Club of Long Island has created a Facebook page for members, along with a new blog – the PCLI Reporter, found at pressclubofli.blogspot.com.

Launched in August, the blog has provided posts on local job opportunities, news on events such as the official opening of the School of Journalism at Stony Brook University, as well as comings and goings right here at Newsday.

The goals: “getting younger members involved by speaking their language” and encouraging more seasoned members to learn to “speak their language,” says Carl Corry, executive producer of News 12 interactive, as well as the blog’s prime poster. He says he’s hoping in time to get more board members onto the blogging bandwagon.

Such online applications are great ways to “engage your members and get with the times,” says Corry, past president of the club.

In many ways, he’s the perfect person to launch such an endeavor – it took him all of 30 minutes to set it up. Besides the online nature of his job, both he and his wife, Angela, have personal blogs, as does his 2-year-old daughter,Charlotte. OK, if truth be told, Corry admits to setting the site up for her the day she was born.

First taste of history

It’s been about seven years now that I’ve been researching our family tree (combined, we’re up to 600 people). It’s only been a couple of months since I discovered that the Mormons have made microfilm copies of the birth, baptism, marriage and death certificates of everyone in Sant’Andrea dating back to the early 1800s.

I ordered one roll of film with records dating back to 1865 about three months ago. When it came in recently, I zoomed to the local Family History Center. In less than 15 minutes, after getting to know how exactly the certificates are organized, I hit paydirt. Below are the birth certificates of three of my great grandparents — Bruno Coccari and Elvira Sama — my father’s paternal grandparents, and Antonio Codispoti, his maternal grandfather.

This is only the beginning.

Bruno Coccari, 1898. On the left it notes that he married Elvira Sama on May 31, 1923.

Elvira Sama, 1897. It says her full name in Elvira Savina Marianna Vittoria Italia Sama.

Antonio Codispoti, 1887. Married Maria Concetta Dominijianni on Feb. 1, 1913.