THE LANDETA - LEON CONNECTION
The story goes that Cynthia, Philip Jr & David Landeta's grandmother was an aunt of Charlie M. Leon (Jr.) (Joyce, Ronny & Patti Leon's father.) Charlie was one of my Dad's cousins. My dad's mother and Charlie's father were sister/brother.
Which grandmother, their mother's mother or their father's mother? Read on.
THE LEONS
To find Charlie's aunts we must go up one generation, to Charlie's parents:
Carlos Manolo (Manuel) Leon. and his FIRST wife Rita Maria. Carlos was my
paternal grandmother's brother. I will refer to
him as Manolo to avoid confusion.
Manolo and his sisters (he was the only surviving male beyond childhood) were children of Miguel Leon and wife Cristina Torres. They are my great-grandparents.
Story goes that before Cristina Torres married Miguel Leon she had a child already, Eliseo, who when she married Miguel he was adopted and took the Leon name.
So, we will go on as Eliseo is Miguel and Cristina's son.
Children of Miguel Leon & Cristina Torres (women by their married names):
Eliseo Leon 1886,
Teresa Perez 1894,
Estelvina Jiminez 1896,
Carlos Manolo Leon
1899,
Luisa Toral 1901,
Rosalia "Lilly" Fernandez 1903,
Celina Perez, 1905. (Her husband was Candido Perez, no relation to my tree.)
THE LANDETAS
Zoraida's parents were Braulio Alonso and Adelfa Diaz, marr. Aug. 2, 1941 (Marriage license at the end).
Philip Landeta's parents were Isidro Landeta and Dolores (no marriage record found to provide maiden name.)
Search for Philip Landeta on censuses:
#2 below:
1930 Census, Tampa - All census relationships are supposed to be in
relation to the head of the house.
25 yr-old Isidro Landeta with wife Dolores (24) and son Phillip 5 mos. (Purple outline) living in the home of Raymond LEON (Red outline).
Raymond is widowed, age 64. His daughter Mercedes is single, his daughter-in-law Lutgarda is 31, married to Benigno (Raymond's son-in-law) who seems to also have LEON last name. One of these must be a mistake. I'm going with Lutgarda not being a Leon because all their children are Leons, so carrying their father's surname. So Benigno should be "SON" instead of son-in-law.)
Listed after Lutgarda are their children Gilbert, Beningo,etc. listed as grandchildren of Raymond Leon.
The next daughter of Raymond Leon is Dolores Landeta, married to Isidro Landeta. So Dolores's maiden name was LEON.
Now to find a sister of Dolores Leon Landeta who married Carlos Manolo Leon. Which means we're looking for another LEON LEON marriage:
LEON marriages of Key West:
Starts all the way at the top YELLOW with my Gr-Grandparents Miguel Leon and Cristina Torres. Oh, look, surprise. Miguel's parents were both Leon. Seems to be a family tradition. I have his death certificate I ordered from Vital Stats in Jax. Says his father was Miguel Leon and his mother was Juana Leon.
Next is Eliseo, "their" son. His FIRST MARRIAGE. (He was really the son of only Cristina, he was born in Cuba supposedly by Cristina's first husband whose name was "Falcone". Story is that Miguel married Cristina so the boy could have a father. Cristina and Miguel were only about 30 years apart. Yes, confirmed. He was b. Dec. 1840, possibly even as early as 1838, Cristina was born Nov. 16, 1868, possibly as late as 1870. Anyway, Eliseo & Sofia Romera had a daughter Sarah Leon who married Manuel Mendez and had around 8 kids. A descendant of one of those kids contacted me long ago by email and gave me lots of details of this family. She's actually wife of one of these Mendez descendants. She's one of my FB friends now.
Here is Benigno LEON who married Lutgarda ALMANGUAL. There you go, it was Bennie that was the Leon. They married in 1918 so by 1930 they had all those kids.
Here is Carlos Manolo Leon's marriage to Rita Maria LEON. The LEON - LEON marriage we needed. Marr. 1918.
Next is Eliseo's 2nd marriage, Isabel Gonzalez. These are the parents of my dad's cousin Magalee Leon Weech. BIG family from her and her husband Jack Henry Weech. .
Just to dig deeper I found the Leons in 1920 to see if Rita Maria and Carlos were nearby her folks, and they were in Key West.
Green: Carlos Manolo Leon 21 with his newlywed bride of age 16 Rita (Leon) Leon, and their 3 mo. old son Charlie Leon (Jr.)--grandparents of Joyce, Ronny and Patti, and their father at 3 mos.
Living in their home at the time (PINK) Benigno & Lutgarda Leon--son and dau.-in-law of Raymond and Flora Leon. (Ray was a wid. in 1930 so Flora died between 1920 to 1930).
The next household BLUE is Jose Lopez and his wife Amelia and their 2 kids. Living in their home is Ramon (Raymond) Leon and his wife Flora, and they are listed as bro-in-law and sis-in-law to Jose Lopez. Which probably means that Jose's wife, Amelia, was related to Raymond or Flora. I could probably find her maiden name if anyone wants it.
And FINALLY, RED outline, Ramon & Flora and their daughters (nieces of Jose Lopez) DOLORES LEON and Mercedes LEON.
So Rita, Dolores, Mercedes & Beningo were children of Ramon & Flores Leon, and Dolores would later marry Isidro Landeta.
It's always nice to have the backup proof when you find something like this, which would have made the hunt much easier if I found it in the beginning. I use Find-A-Grave a lot for research. All volunteers who go around taking pictures of headstones and loading the info to this site. Others can come along and suggest changes, as more family members find the memorial. As you can see, somebody in this family knew she was the "LOLA" I was looking for all along. But at least now we know...the REST OF THE STORY.
I couldn't find their marriage record, but I did find Braulio's
I did a brief mini-bio on him a long time ago when I made a feature on Jefferson High School history. SEE https://tampapix.com/JHS.htm#braulio
So I guess this links me to the Landeta family.
My father's mother's (Teresa Leon Perez's) brother's (Carlos Manolo Leon Sr's) first wife Rita Maria (Leon) Leon was a sister of Isidro Landeta's wife Dolores "Lola" Leon Landeta (who were also the grandparents of David, Phillip & Cynthia Landeta.)