y paternal grandfather, John Peter Wright, was born May 31, 1897 in a mining town called Delamar in Lincoln County, Nevada. When he was born, Delamar was a boom-town but within a very few years it became a ghost-town. After his father died of what was then called "Silicosis" (literally sufficating from silicon dust in his lungs) in 1903, his mother, little sister and he moved to Hiko, Lincoln County, Nevada, about 40 miles away, where his mother had lived since she was about 12 years old until her marriage in 1896. John lived most of his life in Hiko and the neigboring town of Alamo, both of which are part of what is known as Pahranagat Valley. All of John's grandparents and one great-grandparent were immigrants to the United States from Western Europe. What follows is a brief history of these ancestors and their journeys.