Colleagues

Dr. Jeremiah Spence is a retired university professor of global media studies, a published author and a professional genealogist with over 20 years of experience. Dr. Spence was raised in the Houston, Texas area and is related to a significant part of the Sicilian community in Houston.  His paternal grandmother, Mary Elizabeth Gross (nee Corolla Spence) had a strong hand in his upbringing and for several years he learned to keep up with the large network of Scardino, Corolla, Danna and other Sicilian cousins in the area. It was during those years with his grandmother that he became enchanted with family history, and where he discovered that none of them knew much about their origins in Poggioreale. And so he began studying his Sicilian family and collecting records as a youngster. This was to become a life-long passion, and that path would lead him to be one of America’s foremost researchers of the families of Poggioreale.  In 2019 he was sponsored by Poggioreale in America to visit the town of Poggioreale for the first time in his life! There he was able to study vintage records first-hand and incorporate ancient information with modern technology using the tools of a twentieth century genealogist.

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Dr. Spence received his doctorate from the University of Texas at Austin (USA) and has lived and worked in Mexico, Brazil, the Netherlands and Belgium before returning to his native Texas where he currently resides.  Dr. Spence is a member of the Association of Professional Genealogists and the National Writers Union, NYC.  To date, Dr. Spence has published over 30 genealogy books on historical families from the United States, Italy, the Netherlands and Scotland, in addition to his numerous academic and professional publications.

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We are pleased to call him our friend and colleague,  an early consultant to the founders of Poggioreale in America, and a guiding force to so many in their studies of Poggioreale, Sicily.  See his website link below where he presents to Poggiorealesi everywhere the product of his years of study for all to utilize and enjoy.

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