Bolesta

Charles Bolesta (left) and friend

Pictured on the left is Charles Bolesta (1875-1955). He was born in Poland and emigrated to the United States in 1900. He married Anna Kuryillo in Philadelphia in 1902. They moved to Northumberland County where Charles worked as a coal miner for many years.

While Anna’s last name seems to be spelled a 100 different ways, depending on the document, it’s Charles’ first name that gets the variety treatment.

He’s most often listed as Kazimir or Charles (his headstone and death certificate), but then there’s: Kasimir, Casimir, Charlie, and Calus. Of course, there’s the person who captioned this photo who just knew him as “Popi”.

Charles Bolesta always reminds me that researching a variety of variations of both first and last names is necessary—you can’t rely on a single “known” first name.