Into the Past: My Road Trip to Scranton

November 12, 2025

Readers Remember My Mom

Image: rawpixel.com My post two weeks ago honoring my mom , Anna Margaret Kozlina Gilbride (1937-2010), encouraged others who knew Mom to comment with their memories of her. Readers responded on my Facebook page (where I share my posts weekly), with comments that were heartfelt, fun, and even surprising. Relatives and even an old neighbor from our Willowick, Ohio, neighborhood chimed in with a recollection that had me saying, "Oh yes! I remember that now, too. " 1 By cousin Becky was the first to write, "I loved Aunt Marge so much! I really loved hearing my mom on the phone with your mom. Sometimes they’d talk and laugh for hours. I always loved going to visit her. I loved her Christmas cookies. So many good memories." Yes, our moms did talk on the phone, sometimes for hours on end. Laughter would bubble up into my second-floor bedroom from the first floor kitchen where Mom was on the phone. My Aunt Margaret, Becky's mom, and my mom had been fast friends for ...

I am participating in 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks, a writing challenge encouraging genealogy researchers to write about their ancestors. The challenge is hosted by genealogist, blogger and podcaster Amy Johnson Crow.

Here's my post for Amy's Week Eighteen prompt: Road Trip

By Nancy Gilbride Casey

Part preparation, part dumb luck, part generosity of others, part serendipity. These things equal success on a genealogy road trip, in my recent experience. Scranton and Wayne County, Pennsylvania were my road trip destinations in March 2019—the places my Gilbride ancestors first called home in the United States.

Facebook was the perfect medium to share my discoveries while on the road in Pennsylvania, and I reported back each night to my family and friends in a series of posts I'll share here. They create a neat road trip timeline, while capturing the thrill of the find, somber closure, and other emotions which may only come by actually walking where our ancestors trod.