52 Ancestors, Week 5: Ida Petrini Orsolini, also known as China

China "Ida" Petrini Orsolini
photo from the collection of Susie Petrini
digitized by KM Kolk - Jan 2017

Welcome to week 5 of my 52 Ancestors in 2017 challenge.  Today I want to tell you a little about Ida Petrini Orsolini. There is not much to tell based on fact because I know very little about her. I DO know that she is the sister-in-law mentioned in last week’s story who took pity on my Grandma and told her the ‘secret ingredient’ for the family sauce. I owe you one, Ida!

Ida came to the United State with her mother and brothers in 1907, when she was 11 years old, according to the ship manifest from Ellis Island. This would put her birthdate sometime around 1896. The 1920 census shows her living with her parents in St. Louis, Missouri and gives her age as 21.[26] This would put her birth year around 1899. I’ve not been able to find a birth record for her yet, though I still hope to do so. I will look in Capannori because to the best of my knowledge, that is the only place her parents lived until they came to the U.S.

Ida was married to Dan Orsolini, and died in Chicago, Illinois on July 5. 1928.[1022] There are no children listed in her obituary and I’ve never heard any mention of her having children. She is buried with her parents, Umberto Petrini and Aurelia Orsi, in the family plot in Calvary Cemetery in St. Louis, Missouri.

That is everything I know about Ida and have documentation for. There are some family stories that I have no evidence for, but are fun to tell anyway. Though she is listed as Ida on the ship manifest and in her obituary, I’ve been told she was ‘China Petrini’ before she came to the United States. That is ‘China’, “spelled like the country, China, but pronounced like ‘Keen-uh’”.

There is also a family story that she had an affair with Rudolph Valentino, the famous Italian silent movie star. There is another story that she was poisoned by her husband, a result of his jealousy. I don’t remember being told those two facts were connected, but, maybe….  Do I think these stories are true? Well, probably not, but as former St. Louis Cardinal pitcher Joaquin Andujar would have said, “You never know!”

 

Sources

• “1920 U.S. Census,” PETRINI, Albert Family, St. Louis, Missouri, Ward 5, ED 89, 16 Jan 1920, NARA Microfilm, T625, FamilySearch, https://familysearch.org/pal:/MM9.3.1/TH-1951-23020-17174-54?cc=1488411, image 22 of 24, accessed 11 Jul 2016.
• ORSOLINI, Ida, “obituary,” St. Louis Post-Dispatch, St. Louis, Missouri, 8 Jul 1928, pg 71, Newspapers.com, accessed 12 Jul 2016.