By MICHAEL DWYER
In 1923, when Dillor Eugair, his wife, Stella, and their six children moved from Burlington to Pittsford, Vermont, he brought with him an unusual first name and a one-of-a-kind last name. Dillor, also known as Frank, left a confusing genealogy trail for his many descendants. His death certificate, dated 24 July 1957, stated that he was born in North Adams, Massachusetts. Earlier records pointed to Canada as his birthplace. Dillor’s marriage record in Burlington, 28 October 1907, settled the question that he was born in St. Jean, Quebec. Rev. Jerome Cloarec, a French-speaking priest, wrote his name differently in the marriage register of St. Joseph’s Church: Adelard and then surname (Jewett). “Dillor,” therefore, evolved as a nickname deriving from the French pronunciation of Adelard (Ah DAY-Lar). Baptisms of Dillor and Stella’s children at St. Joseph’s spelled their surname six different ways: Julère, Eugeais, Eugear, Eugair, Eugère, and Eugier! Since the surname Eugair is not found in any Québec church records, what was Dillor Eugair’s authentic last name?
Two entries in Burlington’s 1910 City Directory left tantalizing clues: Dillor Eugair, laborer, lived on 243 Elmwood Avenue. Cross-referencing that same directory by street address revealed that Dillor Brignoil, weaver, boarded at the same address. Were they the same person? My sister-in-law, Susan L. Valley, a retired French teacher, eventually cracked the name puzzle and its “dit name” variant: Juaire dit Brignol. Thus, Juaire morphed into Eugair. Even with this revelation, it was still a labyrinthine path tracing this family’s migration from Canada to the United States.
In 1900, we find “Delor” Bregnol, age 16 (but really 14), living in North Adams, Massachusetts, with his parents, Wilfred and Mathilda Bregnol, and several siblings. Many French-Canadians of this time took Wilfred as an English-sounding nickname in honor of Sir Wilfred Laurier, the first French-Canadian prime minister. Wilfred Bregnol, also known as Zen or Teb, was born as Eusebe Juaire. Earning his living as a shoemaker, Eusebe and his wife Matilde Loiselle had ten children, all of whom immigrated to the United States. Not one among them was named Adelard! Instead, we discover Ulric Juaire, baptized on 12 October 1886, at St.-Alexandre, Iberville, Québec, near the city of St. Jean—the same man known in Vermont as Dillor Eugair.
Dillor was only four generations removed from his ancestor, Jean Baptiste Juher, from Aix-en-Provence, France, who came to Canada in the 1760s. Juher’s descendants vacillated in the spelling of their last name and whether they added the dit name Brignol. Imagine my delight in discovering, by chance, the surname Brignol in the crypt of the medieval church of St. Trophime in Arles, France, as a soldier who accompanied St. King Louis IX on the 12th Crusade in 1248!
