My mom's father came from a family of 11 children who came over from the island of Ischia, Italy, and settled in Providence, RI. Her mother was part of the large community of French-speaking Canadians who settled in Woonsocket, RI.

I was born in Washington, D.C., where my father was working for the Federal Trade Commission, and my mom was editor for the National Council of Catholic Women, but my parents were simply awaiting my birth before moving back to their roots in Rhode Island to raise their family.

I was my parent's first child, Joanna Catherine Going, named for my great-great grandmother Catherine, and my father's maternal aunt Johanna Burke, and bearing the initials of my father's father, John Christopher, who passed away just months before I was born.

Joanna Going Quotes