Of course, I prepared myself to discuss some Coffarelli family history and was grateful to find a receptive audience! It was great fun for me to share some of what I'd learned across the kitchen table on a beautiful spring afternoon. Too often, such information comes to a discussion point when there's some other event taking up the family energy in the room but that wasn't the case last weekend. It was quite delightful for me. Thank you Angela!
Another item in the the box of James Coffarelli memorabilia that I think you should see is a letter James wrote to his son John (your uncle) from the hospital:
This letter is not dated but seems to have kind of a final tone to it in the advice he's sharing with his son. Angela tells me he did not actually die of leukemia as his death certificate suggests, but that he suffered from pernicious anemia. Apparently your grandfather James was a carrier of thalassemia minor (a genetic blood condition) and your Uncle Johnny was also a carrier. Regardless, at the time of James' illness, I imagine he was treated for the chronic myelogenous leukemia noted on his death certificate. Treatment for such in the 1930s might have included arsenic trioxide which was a newly "rediscovered" treatment at the time. Apparently this treatment has achieved a bit of a resurgence recently in the treatment of other related conditions. It sounds pretty horrible to me, but apparently it's fairly standard as far as cancer treatments go. What goes around, comes around--even in the medical world!
I find this letter to be very comforting and I hope Uncle Johnny and your mother thought the same.
March brings several birthday shoutouts: Pat, Jean, Patty, Amy, Danielle and Robert!
1 comment:
Thats so neat! I wish I could have been there to learn more about our family but i'm thankful to have this blog to keep me informed. Thanks for all of your hard work!
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