Descendants of Antonín Filipek began coming to the USA in 1869. Because of the distance and the times it was pretty hard for the families that came to keep in touch with those that stayed. Families did use the mails, but it was unusual for visits given the time needed for travel, generally months, and the expense. As our research progressed, however, we began uncovering evidence that there were a number of trips back to Bohemia along with visits to brothers and sisters in America. This chapter will review these old connections along with contemporary ones.

The Trips
In a conversation with Rose Filipek in 1977, she mentioned to me that Vaclav (James) Filipek returned for a visit about 1912. It took me many years to find a record of this but eventually I found his 1911 Passport Application. While we don't know for certain, this trip appears to be a nostalgia trip back to visit his sister Rosalie at the farm and his brother Frantisek the architect. In early 2000, Terry Nelson found a number of photos of this trip. On the return trip to the USA, James brought James F. Filipek, Frantisek's son, whom we know as Jim the Gardener.

Through a bit of luck, we discovered that Jan Filipek of Montgomery, Minnesota visited his brother, James Filipek in Chicago sometime around 1907. This was found by identifying an unidentified man in a picture of James in his Chicago backyard. As the pictures for Jan and his family became available for our web page, it was noted that the unidentified person in the backyard picture was Jan Filipek. Thus there is evidence that Jan came to Chicago to visit his brother and most likely James, given his familiarity with traveling the rails, visited his brother occasionally in Minnesota.

Terry learned from her mother that the Filipeks took a trip back to Kolence in 1929. Katherine Filipek, her son John and his wife Rose and their two children, and Katherine's granddaughter Mary Barrett traveled that summer to Rome and to Czechoslovakia. In Kolence, they visited the Kandls at the old Filipek Farm and probably the Nemecs at their farm in Mazelov and also Rose's home in Lomnice. This trip was confirmed with a number of photos and also by Katherine's May 3, 1929 Passport Application. On her 1929 Passport Application, Katherine indicated that she had also traveled back in 1914 and later I found the May 18, 1914 Passport Application. The 1914 trip was the summer after her husband had died and Katherine stated on the application that the purpose was to visit relatives and travel in Czechoslovakia. Most likely she was heart broken over her husband's early death and wanted to visit and grieve with old friends and relatives.

Recent evidence suggests that James and Katherine Filipek and the Frank Jana family were in Pueblo at the same time. It is believed Frank Jana went there after his wife died, possibly as early as 1890. Perhaps after his wife died, Frank came to Chicago from Minnesota, dropped the Sokolik boys off and then went on to Pueblo. In 1894 or 1895, it appears that James and Katherine Filipek and their children joined Frank and his family in Pueblo. There is also additional evidence that Frank Jana returned many years later to live in Chicago. So James Filipek and Frank Jana, two brother-in-laws appear to have kept in touch over many years.

In 1930, JK Sokolik and his wife visited the old Sokolik and Filipek Farms in Kolence. It appears that John and Katherine told him how great the 1929 trip was. John Sokolik's maternal grandfather was Antonín Filipek and his father was Frantisek Sokolik. There are other recollections of trips back by Katerina Filipek and John Filipek's wife Rose, although these have not been verified.

Rediscovery
Gradually as the first generation aged they began to lose touch. With World War II, it would have been impossible to visit and then the Russians came after the war. As I began my Filipek research in 1976, no one could tell me the name of the towns where the Filipeks, Sokoliks or Nemecs were from. I then began a long series of research trying to find it on a document, eventually finding it in the late 1980s on James Filipek's Passport Application.

Independently, Vladmir Kandl in Czechoslovakia and Cindy Filipek Johnson of Minnesota were also doing Filipek genealogy research in the 70s and 80s. In the early 1990s, Cindy connected with Vladimir and went for a visit to Czechoslovakia in 1991. In 1996, I found Cindy because of a FILIPEK surname interest she had posted in the Czechoslovakian Genealogy Society's surname database. Cindy and I discovered we were third cousins once removed and we began a series of information exchanges via letters.

In 1999, Terry Nelson found Dave via a FILIPEK surname match in Rootsweb and we discovered we were 2nd cousins and our mother's grew up together. We both had high-speed e-mail and thus began an extensive exchange of information including Terry's discovery of about a hundred old photos, Vaclav's Agronomics Journal, and a number of old letters, many of which are in Czech.

To organize all the information, the Filipek Web Page was begun in April 2000. Then during the spring of 2000, Terry made contact with the son of James F. Filipek and also the offspring of Mary Barrett. Later Dave made contact with the Sokolik branch via Virginia Leonard, Ted Curtis and Mary Fritz. In August 2000, Ted Curtis used our research to know where the old Filipek and Sokolik farms were. With that knowledge, Ted and his wife Celia discovered not only the old farms but also Vladimir Kandl while on their bicycle trip from Prague to Austria. Later, after viewing the web page and seeing Antonín's watercolor, Mary Fritz told us that that she had a watercolor similar in style to the three other Filipek water colors. She also mentioned that she had numerous old photos and letters passed down from JK Sokolik. Hopefully someday we will be able to add some of this information to the web collection.

In January 2001, Terry found Barbara through an on-line bulletin board listing for JANA, which is a variant of Janu. After a month of exchanges and verification, there is now a link to the original Frantisek and Katerina Jana (nee Filipek) family of Minnesota.

So it has been a circle of discovery. Our forebears came as immigrants over a hundred years ago. They strove to stay in touch but with the passage of time, the links began to fade. But through our wish to understand who we were and where we came from, a period of rediscovery and learning about the past has taken place. Through our joint endeavors we have discovered so much about our origins and our immigrant families, and by sharing we have all shared the joys of seeing their watercolors, their pictures, their faces, their homes, their letters and their stories.