Field Study Experiences

A Journal Entry from my first trip to Spain and Garganta la Olla- May 9-10, 2007

On Monday, we went to the provincial archive in Caceres. I went through notarial documents, which are legal documents from wills, lawsuits, land transactions,anything that the town notary had to copy into an official book. I was looking particularly for documents about my ancestors. I found a few things. The next day we went to the archive again and did the same thing. Also I had an ancestor who was a town notary or escribano, so I was able to look at a book that he filled out, with his signature. His name was Jose Gonzalez Trejo. I found a page where he signed and his brother.

That afternoon we drove to Garganta la Olla. It is a small little town where my great grandfather was born and lived until he joined the military. It is so wonderful. It was magical and I could have lived there and been really happy. We spent two days there. We visited the church and found a relative named Sagrario. She gave us a tour of the church, a small museum of catholic relics and then took me and two other students to her son's house to get cherries and then to take a picture at the house of her husband's grandfather (our common relative). She was 76 and very sweet.

We attended a Catholic Mass at the church. It was an 2 month anniversary mass for a lady who died in the town. There was a man there that looked very much like my great uncle, Jared Trejo. Brother Ryskamp talked to him and found out his surname was Sanchez. He must be a relative. Many of the townspeople looked liked my grandfather and his brothers and sisters. It was rather fun to see the resemblances. I wondered how my great-grandfather was able to leave this beautiful place, his family and never return. He traveled to the US by taking a leave of absence from the army in the Philippines, but then he never returned. His military record says that he must have died on the journey. (However, we know that is false.) I could only imagine how sad he was and how sad his mother must have been to never see her son again. That night I was very sick all night from the cherries (I thought). I didn't get to sleep until 5 AM. I also had my own room in the hotel. It was very nice. (The sickness ended up to be a virus, which was shared by many on our trip.)

The next day we spent in the Parish Church archive. The students were taking pictures of what they call- Cofradia Books or Fraternities Books of the church. We are doing a study of this town. I spent the day looking up family records in the parish books. It was so exciting. I got to see the parish record of my great grandfather's baptism and many others. We took a 3 hour walk that night. It's such a beautiful town, you just can't explain it. The weather has been perfect after the rain of the first two days.