By John L. McHale
1996
Genealogy researchers have learned that key breakthroughs typically occur unexpectedly.
During a recent vacation trip, Joan Stevenson Faiello and her husband Sam, of Stockton, NJ were driving the 200 miles back to London from visiting Wigan, England, in the rain.
Joan recalls their exhaustion following an exciting day of sightseeing and photographing Lamb haunts. They had wandered around Wigan with two of Sam's British relatives, Terry and Rita McCormack of West Kirby, near Liverpool. Joan began browsing through a few local history newsletters about Wigan, a city in Lancashire, that were obtained by the McCormacks at the Wigan Heritage Service's History Shop.
 The McCormacks, who were not researching genealogy, had gone to Wigan simply to accompany Joan and Sam.
Suddenly Joan shrieked in delight. Sam, at the wheel, almost veered the car off the wet highway. There, in Past Forward, a Wigan publication , Joan had spotted a lengthy article detailing the birth, death and family of a James Lamb (1767-1805). As she read on, she noted that James, a corn miller, was a prolific patriarch. His offspring included Daniel Lamb (1791-1867), immigrant to the U.S. and forefather of Joan. Daniel and his wife Catherine Wallace Lamb settled in New Jersey in 1818.
The Faiellos soon learned in London that the Wigan article's author, David R. Lamb of Cumbria, Lancashire, was a distant Lamb cousin. They quickly got in touch with him.
Before touring Wigan, the Lamb details known to Joan and her kindred U.S. descendants traced only back to their ancestor Daniel Lamb (1791-1867) and his parents. Now from David of Cumbria, Joan's newfound kin, she had eagerly added extensive documentation -- a pedigree back two generations prior to James -- as early as Henry Lamb, a miller of Haydock, born in 1692.
Henry, Joan learned, wed Margaret Gorse in Winwick in 1720. Among their 11 children, their son Daniel Lamb of Sutton (1743-1816) and his wife, Margaret Moyers (1748-1820), had produced 15 offspring. These included a Joan forefather, James.Lamb (1767-1805).
Following on her startling revelation obtained while riding in the rain after a day of sightseeing, Joan found interesting descriptions of windmills operated by her Wigan Lamb relatives throughout the 19th century. She also learned the churchyard locations of numerous Lamb graves. 
"I certainly have lots more places to see on my next trip to Wigan, England," she said.
Joan's was the second recent Lamb genealogical find on behalf of descendants of Daniel Lamb (1791-1867), the founder of the Southern New Jersey village of Almonesson.
In early 1994, a two-year search that included professional researchers on both sides of the Atlantic had traced Daniel and his wife, Catherine Wallace Lamb, to Wigan. ('Tale of Two Cities')
Daniel Lamb (1791-1867) was a gristmill operator, farmer, manufacturer and merchant. Almonesson, the Southern New Jersey village he founded, was originally called "Lambtown." Few vital facts on the Gloucester County pioneer were known until clues from a mostly undecipherable gravestone opened the trail to his 1781 baptismal record at All Saints Episcopal Church, Wigan.
This earlier research of 1994 had led the Faiellos to All Saints Church. There, they enjoyed an interesting chat with the rector. From some 150-year-old maps obtained at the Wigan Heritage Service, they were able to visit and photograph along streets of Daniel and other early Wigan Lambs. But that was all. Their voyage to England featuring the entertaining but relatively fruitless Wigan sojourn had uncovered no gold, no genealogy.
No genealogy that is, until the unexpected wellspring - a ride in the rain.
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