Welcome Joseph to the Nuestros Ranchos family.. You're going to find people just like you who are working on reclaiming their families and share stories and memories of the families who got us here today. What a great way to start the new year and meet new family.. I'm not a blood relative but I guess what they call a kissing cousin since my link to your Banuelos is through the marriage of Virginia ( Cecilia) Banuelos to my Uncle Joe Gutierrez.

How wonderful that you can put your hands on a piece of your history in the music scores. I know when the genealogy bug bit me I couldn't find many articles but the few I did meant a lot to me. I knew my paternal gr-grandmother was small but when I saw her dress pulled from an old trunk I realized what a 4ft 10 woman looked like! Her straw hairbrush's were worn and her rosary was well used. I had been told about her husbands books that he carried from Jerez in 1916 when they left most of their belongings behind. Sadly a family member had sold them at the flea market I was told. My Dad had talked about how when he was a boy he lived with his grandparents for a summer and the "old" men would gather in Grandpa Vicente Castanon's back yard around a camp fire and pass the books around and talk about the revolution, people they had lost and the country they all loved but knew they would never return too. It was a good memory for my Dad but finding the books was a mission
I couldn't fulfill for him. Thank you for sharing your story. Well done!

Welcome to the group, Linda in Everett

Joseph de Leon wrote:

My name is Joseph de Leon. My ancestral roots come from both HUEJUCAR, JALISCO and JEREZ, ZACATECAS. Some of the surnames of my ancestors are: DE LEON, CARLOS, BANUELOS, FLORES, COVARRUBIAS, VILLANEDA, CAMPOS, BORREGO, and many others.

My father's name is Elias de Leon who was born in Huejucar, Jalisco and my mother is Maria del Transito Carlos who was born in Zacatecas, Zac. probably in Jerez, Zac. because that's where most of her ancestors are from.

I am related to the Banuelos family through both my father's side (his mother Petra Flores has a sister named Teodora Flores who married Ysac Banuelos) and my mother's maternal grandmother Vicenta Banuelos who married Manuel Villaneda.

I'd like to visit both Huejucar and Jerez sometime this spring 2008 and see my ancestral land before I die. I know that I have many CARLOS cousins in Zacatecas who have never heard of me.

My goal is to learn when and where my grandfather Francisco Covarrubias was born and when and where he died. He was probably born Abt. 1880 in Huejucar and probably died Abt. 1910-1915 in Piedras Negras but I don't have the proof. He was a music composer ( I still have his original music scores) who was beaten to death by Pancho Villa's thugs because they thought that he had the keys to the local bank.

His father was Nicolas de Leon (also a music composer) who was married to Refugio Covarrubias on 08 Jun 1866 in Huejucar, Jalisco. I have learned that he had 2 brothers and one sister, Pascual, Espiridion, and Maria Eugenia who were all born in Huejucar.

My siblings and my sons all inherited my grandfather's love of music and they compose music as well.