Madden Cousins Meeting Up

Regular readers may recall my stories about all of my newly discovered cousins on the  Madden (my mother's) side of the family.  

The short story: In 2015, I received a call from Marla Madden in Florida.  She had been doing genealogical research on the family tree of one Thomas Madden, our great-grandfather.  Thomas had nine children, one of who was Bill Madden, my grandfather.  He had only one child, Ruth, my mother, and we, my siblings and I, knew little, if anything, about any of our grandfather's family.  As Marla told me that day, I was to learn that I have more cousins out there than I could possibly imagine.

Over the years, I have personally met some of them - Dorothy Brannon, Cheryl Intartaglio, Casey Brown (who lives in Pittsburgh and, in fact, we grew up probably within three miles or so of each other), and Marla Madden herself, the one who started it all!

This past Friday evening I made yet another Madden connection in the person of Janice Madden Spencer.  Jan is the sister of Marla and Cheryl, and she lives in the state of Maine.  She and her husband Ron....

are currently vacationing, and made it a point to come to Pittsburgh in order to connect with Casey and me, and indeed we did....

Casey, granddaughter of Marie

Bob, grandson of Bill

Janice, granddaughter of Leo

It was great to meet Jan, although through the magic of Facebook, both of us felt that we already did know each other.  She and I have had many a lively exchange during football seasons as we have debated the relative merits of the Pittsburgh Steelers and the New England Patriots!

 Ron and I properly suited up for battle!

I did give Jan and him a special Pittsburgh gift - a Terrible Towel.

I think they liked it!

It was a fun and pleasant evening as these second cousins met and got to know each other a little better.  A very memorable night.

(Side note: Marla, Cheryl, and Jan have yet another sister, Marcie Madden Corrie of North Carolina, so I've now met three of four.  If you are reading this, Marcie, we have to work on this!)

As always, thanks go out to Marla, whose genealogical curiosity started it all and made this all happen.  Until she did, none of us knew of the others' existence.

Family Reunion

Well, it wasn't really a "reunion" since prior to about two weeks ago, neither of us knew that the other existed, but last week second cousins Casey Brown and Yours Truly met for the first time over lunch in the Strip District at the Smallman Street Deli.

Casey's grandmother, Marie Madden Brown and my grandfather, Bill Madden, were brother and sister.  It was yet another cousin, Marla Madden of Boca Raton, FL, who is the granddaughter of yet another Madden sibling, Leo Madden, who did the genealogical research and who ferreted out the existence of Casey Brown and me.  Amazingly, while I was growing up in Squirrel Hill, Casey was growing up in Swissvale, not even ten miles apart.

Bill Madden was my mother's father, and, for whatever the reason, I knew very little of the background or history of the Madden branch of my own particular family tree.  So, I am grateful to Marla for finding us, and I am grateful to have had the chance to meet Casey.  We spent a delightful couple of hours together learning about our heretofore unknown shared pasts.

Kind of like something you'd see in a movie.