Right, a photo of Mother (on the right, with her sisters Lilika left and Irini seated).
Mother and Father and their friends walked to school to the town of Vamos, the capital of the county of Apokoronas, about 6 miles away.
Right: Father as a lieutenant in the Greek army (he went on to become a captain).
Left: Mother at age 19, in 1934.
1934 - Left: A photo of Mother and Father with their "parea" or group of friends in Kefalas. Father is at the top of the photo. Mother is in the white coat. Two of the women are fraternal twins Hariklia and Katina Pothoulakis.
At right is another photo of Mother taken in 1934, age 19.
Mother's family, the Angavanakis's, were 'royalists' who supported the King of Greece, while Father's family, the Kouklakis's, were 'Venizelists' or republicans; therefore the two families were not especially close. Rev. John Kouklakis took his coffee in the 'Venizelist' cafeneion, and Mother's father John Angavanakis spent his leisure time in the 'royalist' cafeneion with his 'parea'. One day Father worked up the nerve to go to the royalist cafe to find John Angavanakis, to ask if he could marry his daughter Catina. After some discussion, John agreed and asked Father what he wanted as a dowry, which was the custom at the time. Father replied that he wanted no dowry, only that he loved Catina and wanted only her. John gave them his blessing to marry. [Story related byThia Stella]. Not to worry about the dowry though, Father and Mother did receive a small grove of olive trees as a wedding gift from Mother's parents, which were sold prior to their leaving for America. This grove of olive trees was pointed out to the author by Mother's sister Lilika.
Mother and Father were married in 1936, in Kefalas. The service was performed by Father's father, Rev. Ioannis Kouklakis.
In this wedding photo, right, Father is in the suit and tie, and Mother is in the white wedding dress. They are standing with Father's sister Katina (Galanakis) to his right, and Mother's sister Stella (Papidakis) to her right. Seated is father's father, Rev. Ioannis Kouklakis. The lady in the middle is Maria Marousakis; the other lady is unidentified. (June 21, 1936)
In 1932, Father went to theological seminary at the monastery of Agia Triada Tzangarolon, left (founded in the 11th century, restored in the 16th), in Crete's Akrotiri peninsula. Before their marriage, Mother took a job in Hania as a secretary at the offices of the Bishop of Kydonia, and lived with her Thia Smaragdi (in the home that later belonged to our cousin Magda at 11 Thrakis Street, Koumkapi).
In 1937, he was ordained as a Greek Orthodox priest (right).
After their marriage, our parents remained in Kefalas, where Father served as a priest in the churches of the village. When Costas and Catina were first married, Mother's father would get up early on Sunday mornings to ring the church bell (which was Father's job), so that the 'newlyweds' could spend the morning together. [Story related by Thia Chrysoula].
They had three children: Maro (Maria) in 1937 and a son John in 1940.
In keeping with tradition, they named their first girl and boy after the childrens' grandparents (coincidentally both grandfathers were named John (Ioannis) and both grandmothers Maria). Here is a photo of John at 4 months. Their third child, Crete (Kriti), was born in 1943; Crete was named after the island, by her Godfather, who knew that the family would be leaving Crete and going to America after the war; he wanted them to always remember their homeland. It is said that Mother was quite upset when she heard that her daughter would be named "Kriti". As a girl's name, Crete is an unusual one in Greece as well as elsewhere.
Below is a composite photo of Mother, Father and Maro, made in 1937.
World War Two -
The village, as well as the rest of the island, came under Nazi German occupation after the heroic Battle of Crete in May 1941. Family events and memories of the wartime years:
A German soldier was stationed as a lookout on top of the family windmill (overlooking the Bay of Souda). One day, while chatting with Thia Stella, the soldier kissed her. Immediately, Stella stopped him, and warned him that if her father found out he would kill him, regardless of the consequences.
This same soldier received a letter from home, and showed it to Thia Stella. Thia Stella pointed to the stamp (a picture of Hitler) and said to him in German, "Hitler nichts gut" ("Hitler is no good"). The soldier told Stella that he agreed with her, but if anyone overheard her, she could get killed.
Father was a commissioned officer in the Greek army and somehow got stranded in Athens for a long period of time. He and Mother communicated by letters, written in a "secret" combination of Greek and French that only they understood. The censors in Hania asked Mother to tell Father to keep his letters short...they took too long for them to investigate!
Maro remembers German soldiers giving her chocolates.
The Germans would frequently conscript citizens for work details. When they would come for Mother, she told them, "Kinder, kinder"...indicating that she had small children, and they would pass her by. Her younger sisters occasionally had to go, and Thia Chrysoula and Thia Lilika would frequently "call in sick" for these work details.
Our parents and the three oldest siblings remember eating carob pods, a food usually fed to animals, during some periods of food shortages during the war.
A German commandant, along with the village mayor, came to the house one evening to inspect it in order to have soldiers stay there for the evening. Our aunt Lilika said in Greek to the mayor "Don't think about putting those horrible Germans here!" , thinking that the commander didn't understand Greek. He replied to her in Greek, "Young lady, that is not a very respectful way to speak to the mayor". Lilika was terrified after that...and thankful she wasn't shot.
The same German leader would visit the house often...and would frequently lament about the war, and about how he missed his family very much. He would say to our family in Greek and Italian "You are a 'famiglia extra prima'". After his return to Germany during the war, he corresponded with our uncle Ioannis Angavanakis and the family.
One of Mother's and Thia Stella's close friends in Hania was named Sarah Osman, who was Jewish. Thia Stella had a picture of Sarah with her husband, taken on their wedding day in front of the Torah of the Hania Synagogue. Along with the rest of the Jewish population of Hania, Sarah was deported by the Nazis during the war.
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Part II - Ameriki
During the war, Mother and Father decided that they would emigrate to the United States in order to make a better life for their family. Also, after World War Two Greece was in the midst of a civil war. In 1946, Father left his village and family and immigrated to the United States. His boat docked at the port of Philadelphia. Father did not speak any English but planned to learn it in the new country. He was assisted in making his trip by an uncle in Canonsburg, Pennsylvania, Efthmios Cookles, who was married to Persephone (Percy) Zolintakis. Here is a photo of Father and this uncle.
Father's first parish was in Rock Springs, Wyoming, where there was a small Greek community. After one year, he saved enough money to send for Mother and Maro, Johnny and Crete.
At right is Mother's passport photo, 1946.
1947: At left: Father, Mother and their children Maro, Johnny and Crete at their first home in America in Rock Springs, Wyoming.
Mother, with Maro, John and Crete, left the Island of Crete in December, 1946 for Piraeus (the port of Athens), where they boarded an old, refurbished troop-ship called the "Katoomba", which was built in Belfast in 1913 and named after an Australian city.
The Katoomba is pictured below in an old photo:
It was the middle of winter, 1946-47, and the voyage was not smooth. Mother kept a diary of the trip to America; in it she mentions the turbulence and how her children were frequently sick during the voyage. Many days were spent staying in the cabin due to the rough seas. She writes that they attended a Greek Orthodox church service on board ship on Christmas Day 1946. She also mentions the ship stopping at the ports of Genoa, Italy, Oran, Algeria and the Straits of Gibraltar before crossing the Atlantic and arriving in New York City harbor on January 9, 1947. Another Katoomba passenger, reunited with the family in the 1970's, remembers Mother on this boat with her three sick children. [Fani Koutsobaris of Clarksburg, WV] .
The family was reunited in Rock Springs. Here is a photo of Mother in 1947. In Rock Springs, in 1948, they had a fourth child, a girl, Georgia.
Below is a photo of the family in Rock Springs, Wyoming, 1948 (Mother is "expecting" Georgia):
In 1950, Father was transferred to a parish in Stockton, California. In 1952, their fifth child, a son Costas, was born. While in Stockton, Mother and Father became naturalized American citizens.
Father wrote some short stories of his first experiences in the United States. Topics include "grocery shopping" and "respect for the flag". Click here to read Father's stories.
In 1952, the family moved to Tacoma, Washington, where Father served the St. Nicholas parish for five years. In 1957, Father was transferred to a parish in Lansing, Michigan. The family moved to Lansing, minus Maro who remained in Tacoma after her marriage, and Johnny, who remained there to finish his senior year of high school. In Michigan, Father taught a course in Modern Greek at Michigan State University, and of course he taught "Greek School" on Saturdays, as he did at most of his parishes. A son Chris, their sixth child, was born in Lansing in 1959.
Right: Father and Mother, Lansing, MI, 1958
Right: A family portrait, 1960.
Top row: Mother, Chris Basil (Maro's son), Father (holding son Chris), Johnny, Maro (holding her son Dino); Bottom row: Crete (holding Synthe), Costas Jr., Georgia.
Left, a family photo taken in Jamestown, NY in 1964. Standing: Georgia, Johnny, Crete; seated: Mother, Father; front: Chris, Costas, Jr.
Crete remained in Lansing to attend college while the rest of the family moved to Jamestown, New York in 1962. Click here to see a photo taken in Jamestown. That year, the family's surname was legally changed from "Kouklakis" to "Kouklis", which was the name most family members were using. While in Jamestown, Father helped to build a new Greek Orthodox church (St. Nicholas) in 1968, after the old church was destroyed by fire. Also in 1968, the parents returned to Greece for a visit, after an absence of 22 years. They visited their brothers, sisters and Mother's mother, Maria Angavanakis, who was still living at the time in Kefalas.
In 1968, Mother, Father, Costas and Chris moved to Bloomfield Hills, Michigan. Georgia had left home to go to college, and Costas did likewise in 1968. In 1970, Mother, Father and Chris began a series of moves to large church communities where Father served as the assistant priest and Greek school instructor. They first moved to San Francisco in 1970, followed by Vancouver, Canada in 1971. While in Vancouver, Father traveled by prop plane to northern and eastern British Columbia, to a different town each Sunday (Penticton, Prince George) conducting services.
In 1972, they moved to Houston, Texas, where Mother (then age 58) underwent heart bypass surgery at the Texas Medical Center. In 1973, Mother, Father and Chris moved to the town of Clarksburg, West Virginia.
By this time, Kouklis family members were in Tacoma, Seattle, Michigan and California. In 1973, Mother and Father visited their brothers and sisters in Greece once again. Here are photos of Mother, and of Father in the 1970's.
Left: May, 1979: Mother's birthday.
In 1978, Father became ill; he died in the summer of 1979 in Clarksburg. After Father's death, Mother moved to Tacoma, WA , and there she became an active member of the St. Nicholas church.
Right: Maro, Chris, Mother, Georgia, Johnny, Andrew in 1980.
Mother died in September 1988 after a brief illness. Mother and Father are buried in Tacoma Cemetery.
Part III - Father's Family Tree - Kouklakis/Saatsakis-Giannikou
Our Paternal Grandfather was Reverend Ioannis Kouklakis who was born in Kefalas in 1883 (pictured left).
Father Ioannis went to theological school in Iraklion, Crete's largest city. There he met a beautiful young woman from a prominent, wealthy family named Maria Saatsakis-Giannikou (born 1885), pictured right.
As the story goes, they fell in love, and she ran off with him to Kefalas where they were married. Her family disapproved, and they didn't have much more to do with her after that. Life in a small village was a new and difficult experience for Maria, a well-bred city girl, and running a household was not her strong suit. She did however entertain her children with her musical talent - playing the mandolino (mandolin). Rev. John was not only the priest of Kefalas, but also the teacher.
At right is a photo of Rev. John with some of his many students at the Kefalas schoolyard. In 1998, the author met several of these "students" at the cafe in Kefalas; they were in their 90's and still fondly remembered their teacher.
Maria's and John's first child was our father, Costas, and their other children were: Efthihia (died 1933), Katina (Galanakis, died 1997 in Athens), Nikos (died 1975, children John and Lefteri in Piraeus), John (died 1950), Aspasia ("Soula", died 1999, Athens), Eleni (Koutroupis, living in Athens as of 10/2007), and Efthimios (died 1962, children John and Christos, in Toronto[?]).
Below are separate photos of Efthimios, Katina, and Nikos:
Rev. John Kouklakis died in Kefalas 1942; Maria died in Piraeus in 1954.
Rev. John Kouklakis's parents were Reverend Paraskevas Kouklakis (born about 1854) and Maria Marousakis (born about 1855).
The above photo of the "family patriarch" Rev. Paraskevas Kouklakis's family was taken around 1910.
Identifed so far: Bottom row, 3rd from left: Efthimios Kouklakis, who emigrated to Canonsburg, PA, USA, and the grandfather of Karen (Cooklis) Jendruczak. 4th from left: Reverend Paraskevas Kouklakis;
5th from left: his wife Presvytera Maria Marousis Kouklakis. Top row, 3rd from left: our grandfather, Reverend John Kouklakis (father of Rev. Costas Kouklis); Top row, 6th from left: Eleni Kouklakis Vorinakis, mother of Alexandria (Sandra) Fricchione and Kay Zabetakis. The remaining people in the photo are presumed to be the other children of Paraskevas and Maria;
[Thanks for this photo goes to cousins who corresponded with me through this website, Karen (Cooklis) Jendruczak and Alexandria -Sandra- (Vorinakis) Fricchione].
Maria was the daughter of Ilias Marousakis (born 1830) of Kefalas and [first name possibly Areti] Tzeiranis of the nearby village of Drapanos. Rev. Paraskevas was known to have visited the Holy Land. Rev. Paraskevas's and Maria's children, in addition to grandfather John, were: Mihalis, Angeliki, Katina, Evanthea, Eleni, Efthimis and Aphrodite. Efthimis and Eleni immigrated to America; the other siblings moved to Piraeus, Greece.
Rev. Paraskevas's father was Emmanuel (Manolis) Kouklakis (born about 1821) who had three brothers: Giorgios, Giannis and Petros. Manoli's other children in addition to great-grandfather Paraskevas were:
Nicholas (moved to Hania), Emmanuel, and Georgios Kouklakis. Nicholas Kouklakis had a daughter and three sons: Maria, Emmanuel, Ilias and Epaminondas. Epaminondas's children were: Irene (Vancouver Canada); Vasiliki; Katina (Athens); Maria; Nicholas (Hania) [Nicholas's children are Maria and Epaminondas]; and Emmanuel, Hania (died 2000), his wife Irene,(children: Ioanna, Fotini, Epaminondas, (all in Hania), and Michael (Paris).
The senior Emmanuel Kouklakis's father was Konstantinos Kouklakis, born in Kefalas in 1781.
To read about distant 'Koukles' relatives in Tacoma, Washington and Utah, click here.
Our Grandmother Maria Saatsakis-Giannikou's father was Captain Ioannis "Giannikos" Saatsakis (born about 1850), pictured right. He was a leader in several of the numerous insurrections in the late 1800's that led to Crete's independence from Ottoman Turkish rule and ultimately union with Greece.
Because of this, he was given the title of "Captain", and today there is a street, "Odos Giannikou", (left) named for him in Iraklion, the capital of Crete. On the street signs, below his name is also written "Hero of the city". Captain Giannikou's wife's first name was Aspasia.
Paternal family tree:
Part IV - Mother's Family Tree - Angavanakis/Papadakis/Angisoulakis
Our mother's father was John Angavanakis, pictured left. In the photo, he is wearing the traditional Cretan outfit, complete with baggy britches, boots, and his Cretan knife sticking out of his cummerbund. He was born in Kefalas in 1882. In 1910, he emigrated to the United States to work, eventually traveling aboard the S.S. New York from Cherbourg, France, arriving at Ellis Island, NY. According to the boat records at the National Archives in Washington, D.C., he was originally destined to stay with cousins (?) in Milwaukee, WI by the name of Dimitrios Cavoulakis. The Archives list his statistics as: age, 28; hair,Auburn; eyes, gray; height, 5' 2 1/2", and that he was in possession of $30. Although the records state that he went to Wisconsin, family stories tell us that he eventually went to Utah where he worked in a mine. He returned to Crete just a few years later.
Upon his return to Crete, Ioannis (John) Angavanakis married Maria Papadakis (pictured right), daughter of Dimitrios Railakis (Dimitrios, born 1841, changed his last name to Papadakis.)
In her youth, our yiayia (grandmother) Maria was known in the village by her nickname, "Marigo". Like many Cretan villagers, she knew by heart hundreds of verses of the epic poem "Erotokritos" , and she would sing it to her children when they were young. The "Erotokritos" is a poem of over 10,000 rhyming lines, written in 1587 during the Venetian occupation, during a period called the "Cretan Renaissance". The poem is written in the distinct Cretan dialect still spoken today in rural areas, and it has become part of Cretan folklore over the centuries.
Thia Chrysoula relates that when John Angavanakis would go to the village square, holding his young daughters by the hand, people would look at brunette Catina and blonde Stella and say, "John with daughters so beautiful, you will never have to put up a dowry!" [author's note: they were right regarding the dowries].
Maria's and John's children in addition to Catina were Stella [Papidakis], died 1998; (two children Magda - married to Lefteri Hatzioannou, with children Hari and Fani, living in Agia Marina, Crete; and Sprio (married to Roula Xepapadaki - children Stella and Rena), all living in Hania, Crete). Stella was married to Mihalis Papidakis.
Below is a photo of Stella:
Irene [married Gus Gellepes], lived in Pittsburg, California, died 2004 (son Dan married Stacey Young [Yeronikakis], daughter Maria). Dan is an author; his works include two books of poetry: "Wildhoney" and "And All the Rest of It", and a verse play entitled "Hat in Hand".
John (died of meningitis 1946, in his twenties);
Eleni "Lilika" living in Athens, [married Kosta Kasiotis/died 2005]; Chrysoula [Christodoulou], in Athens with daughter Mary (Chrysoula was married to Chris Christodoulou, originally from Monolithos, Rhodes. They lived in McCleary, Washigton and in Athens); and Dimitri "Mimi" who died in 1992. Mimi was married to Voula (Paraskevi) Tzangarakis (of the Cretan village of Souri) and they had two children: Maria and John (married to Christina [Leivadas], sons Dimitri, Panayoti and Giorgios), all living in Athens.
Another son, George, died at less than a year old.
Below are photos of Chrysoula, Dimitri (with wife Voula), and Stella (with son Spiro):
The above photo includes both Angavanakis and Kouklakis families. It was taken on August 15, 1936 in the village. Father is front row, left; Mother is at the right. Lilika and Chrysoula are top left. Stella, center top. Rev. Ioannis Kouklakis is center right (next to Catina). Above the bishop is Ioannis Angavanakis.
John Angavanakis died in 1943; Maria died in January, 1969. Here is a photo of the Angavanakis house in Kefalas.
John's father was Georgios Angavanakis (his wife's maiden name was Mantoudakis). Their children, in addition to John were Mihalis, Chrisy, Dimitri, Anastasia, and Penelope. Giorgios's brothers were Nikolas and Mihali; Mihali died in 1868 in the battle of Vafes.
As noted above, Maria Papadakis's father was Dimitrios Railakis (born 1840), whose nickname was "Papadakis", hence the last name; he was also known as "Ananias".
Dimitrios Railakis Papadakis was married to Katina Angisoulakis (pictured right), who was born about 1840 and died about 1928. His brothers were Georgios Railakis and Rev. Stilianos Railakis (known as a man who "loved to have a good time (glendi) and an excellent singer - but a very good priest as well").
Dimitrios's and Katina's children, in addition to Maria, were Phillipos (Canonsburg, PA), Smaragdi (Piperakis), Garifalia (Tsinitakis), Evlambia (Voutetakis), Argyro ([Daveronas], who lived in Davenport Iowa), and Christos (worked as a postman). [When my grandmother met me, in Kefalas in 1968, she asked my mother if I was named after her brother Christos...my mother replied "yes", although I'm not sure that was entirely true...]
Dimitrios Railakis was called "Papadakis" because his father was a papas (priest), Rev. Christodoulos Railakis, known as "Papachristodoulos" (born 1814). Here is a picture of Papachristodoulos's communion chalice, which has inscribed on it a cross, his name and the year "1870".
Katina Angisoulakis was the daughter of Phillipos Angisoulakis, nicknamed "Anagnostis" - deacon; he was reputed to be about 100 years old when he died (born about 1825; died about 1925). Phillipos's other children were Nikolis, Petros and Sprios [married to Terpsichori Koufakis]. Phillipos Angisoulakis is pictured here:
Phillipos Angisoulakis was married to Maria Spiridakis (born about 1840, whose original family name was Gaidakis). Maria's father was Spiros Gaidakis (born in Kefalas in 1817). He took on the surname "Spiridakis". Spiros was the son of [Emmanuel ?] Gaidakis born in Kefalas in 1793.
Maternal family tree:
Part V - Today
Descendants of Costas Kouklakis (Kouklis) and Catina Angavanakis:
1.Mary Kouklis "Maro" (b. 1937); was married to Bill Basil 1956 - 1976; they had four children:
Chris (b.1957, married Sheri Anderson; children Melanie and Matthew);
Dino (b. 1959, married Donna D'Alessandro; children Nicolas and Sophia.)
Michael (b. 1962, married Kathy Clemens; children Joshua and Alexander.)
Tina (b. 1963, married Rod Aasen; children Branden and Anthea.)
2. John Kouklis "Johnny" (b. 1940); is married to Laurel Guerrero;
was married to Norma Votaw Kouklis 1968 - 1999; they had one son:
Andrew (b. 1972, married Melinda Ciesla.)
3.Crete Griglio "Kriti" (b.1943, died 2006); married Paul Griglio; they had three children:
Maria (b. 1967)
Anita (b. 1968 , married Mike Kelly; children Aidan and Katina.)
Andrew (b.1972 was married to Amber Karpinski; they had one daughter, Mira.)
4.Georgia Kouklis (b. 1948)
5. Costas Kouklis "Gus" (b. 1951); married Mary Ann Kniseley.
6. Chris Kouklis (B. 1959)
If you have any information or questions regarding this page, please e-mail them to ctk99@aol.com.
Related links:
www.GreekFamilies.com features photographs from this website and indexes other Greek genealogy websites.