Why can’t I find your physical mailing address or phone number?

To match the nature of what we do and where we do it, we determined the best way to conduct our programs was through the World Wide Web.  For now, we are still a group of individuals working from our homes.  We anticipate having a physical mailing address soon.  Meanwhile, we have a physical address for legal purposes but it’s not a good way to contact us for services or volunteering.  Instead, please use the links on our genealogy and heritage visits program pages, our general contact form or email

Services and Fees

How does the service work?

When you submit a request, we

• First search all our available information to provide you an answer.  If we have the information, we email back a response as soon as possible, usually within 48-72 hours.
• If we don’t know it or can’t find an answer in our information databases, we contact volunteers in the area you are requesting help. 
• If we don’t have a volunteer in that area, or the volunteer can’t find the answer, we’ll let you know what we DID find, then ask if you want help finding a paid researcher, translator, etc.
• If you're thinking about paying for help, we’ll try to connect you with reputable, affordable researchers, translators, etc., preferably ones we have used in the past.  We’ll tell you fees and estimated time, so you can make an informed decision before you commit.
• We will review the work of both volunteer and paid researchers for reasonableness before submitting to you.

Unfortunately, we can’t give you a one-price-fits-all answer.  We provide individual, customized service, so the associated costs depend on what you need and what we have.  If the information you’re looking for is already available, or a volunteer can provide it, there is no cost at all. [Of course, we’ll gladly accept donations—once we’re set up for it!  How You Can Help FAQs]  If you decide to go with paid assistance (researcher, translator, etc.) we help you find someone reputable with reasonable fees.  We’ll tell you the charges ahead of time, before you commit to paying for help. 

What kind of information do you have available?

We maintain several information databases that are continually updated.  For example, one database indexes over 20,000 birth, marriage and death records spanning 250 years for the town of Bonefro.  We also have a growing index (currently about 3,000) of passenger manifests for emigrants from Bonefro, Santa Croce di Magliano, Casacalenda, Montorio and other nearby towns. 

Thanks to the generosity of Signor Giuseppe "Peppino" Blanco, President of the Bonefro chapter of the Associazione Nazionale Famiglie Caduti e Dispersi in Guerra, we recently added genealogical and military data on about 250 additional Bonefro names to our database--mostly fallen soldiers of WWII and earlier, and their families.

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Privacy

Do you have private, personal information in your databases? 

No, we don’t maintain Privacy Act data in our databases.  Generally, the newest information goes back about 75 years and is a matter of public record (e.g., federal census) or was already posted by someone on the internet.  And we don’t ask personal information of you, except your name and email address so we can communicate with you.  Of course, if you’re researching genealogy or trying to find relatives in the Molise, the more information and generations you can give us, the more help we can return. 

How can I be comfortable giving you my personal information?

When you submit an assistance request, we add the information you provide about your ancestors to our database, and tag the records to indicate your search.  If we find someone else looking for the same ancestor or related family, we’ll email both of you, letting you know we found a possible match and ask you if you want to provide your contact information to the other researcher.  We will not give out that information without your permission.  To maintain your privacy and the integrity of the information, we do not post our data on the internet or otherwise make them available to the public. 

How much private information do I have to give you?

We’ll ask for basics, like your name and email address so we can respond to your request.  If you’re asking for genealogy information, we’ll also need information about the ancestor you’re trying to find.  We WON’T ask for social security numbers, bank account numbers, passwords or anything like that.  We have no reason to. 

I read about hackers stealing personal information from government agencies and banks.  How can you prevent a hacker from getting my personal information off your databases?

We appreciate your question.  Maintaining privacy in this day and age is a growing concern.  Our approach to preventing theft of personal information is simply to not keep personal information!  First, we maintain very little information about you in our databases (name and email address only).  Second, we don’t put the information on the internet or otherwise make it available to the public.  The data we do maintain is old and archaic, ironically making it valuable to us, but not to a modern identity thief!

If I donate or shop on your website, is my credit card/bank information secure?

How Can I Help?

It's easy to make a tax-deductible donation! You can shop our Gift Shop or donate directly. Clicking on the button below brings you to a special ECHO Molise page on the PayPal secure website, where you can make a payment by credit or debit card, or your PayPal account.  When your transaction is complete, PayPal will send you an email with all the transaction details. 

 
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Genealogy

What do I need to do to get started on my family tree?

Contact us for free "getting started" advice.

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Visiting the Molise

If I decide to visit the area, will I be able to find the places of my family?

A lot depends on how much information you have before your visit and how long you plan to stay.  Do you already have documents showing addresses for you ancestors?  Do you know if the street names or house numbering system changed over the years?  Have you made contact with relatives that can point out the old homestead?  Are you staying there long enough to track this for yourself?  Even if you don’t have an exact address, we encourage you to go and see the town.  But we know it’s even better to see, to touch, the places of our families, walk the paths they walked for hundreds of years.  So let us help you ahead of time to find these places. Heritage Visits page

Is it possible to get in touch with my distant relatives through emails and letters, or do I actually have to make a trip to Italy?

Any way you want it.  We’ll be happy to make initial contact with your relatives and find a way for you to communicate, for example through email or letters.  If you’d like, we can also act as an intermediary, for privacy purposes or translation.  If you decide later to visit them in person, we’ll help smooth the way for your family reunion.  Heritage Visits page
 

I’m worried that my Italian relatives won’t want me to visit them because they don’t know me.

There are people of all backgrounds and emotions on both sides of the ocean, so it’s possible to find a relative who doesn’t want you to visit.  However, to date, our experience has been the opposite.  We’ve found the people of the Molise to be warm and welcoming, and generally as curious about their North American relatives as we are of them.  But just in case—if you’re planning a visit, contact us.  We can make initial contact with your relatives, “introduce” you, explain how you fit into their family tree, and ask them if they want to meet you.  Also, having  family books in English and Italian that show your relationship and family photos helps relieve some of the worry on both sides.  Heritage Visits page