family · lebrun
The Lebrun family
Alex's maternal line. Serge and his family lived in Turgeau, the hillside neighborhood above Port-au-Prince, until the late 1960s, when the family emigrated to Jackson Heights, Queens. The surname is French — the line came to Haiti one generation earlier, from the Paris region — and it re-crossed the Atlantic with Serge and Toye, whose household raised Alex and his brother. This page grows backward in time as the record fills in.
The founding couple
Serge Lebrun (papish) and Marie Thérèse "Toye" Chassaing (mamish) — a baker-turned-merchant and a seamstress who sewed for Ann Lowe and Norma Kamali in New York.
Father of Mireille and her seven siblings; baker, shopkeeper, tire merchant in Port-au-Prince; emigrated to the US ~1968 and retired from Mellon Bank in Manhattan.
Mother of Mireille and her seven siblings. Devoted family caregiver in Haiti; later a noted seamstress in New York.
Their children
Serge and Toye had eight children in Port-au-Prince, born in birth order below.
- Mireille Jeannopoulos b. 1947
Wife of Peter Jeannopoulos; mother of Alex and Christopher. Third of Serge and Toye's eight children. Formerly UNICEF; lives in Hollywood, FL.
- Pierre Richard Lebrun 1949–2006
One of Mireille's seven siblings; born in Port-au-Prince. Falls between Mireille and Rene Max in birth order.
- Frantz Lebrun (Fanfan)
Eldest of Serge Lebrun and Toye Chassaing's eight children.
- Jacques Lebrun
Second of Serge Lebrun and Toye Chassaing's eight children; Mireille's older brother.
- Rene-Max Lebrun
Fifth of Serge Lebrun and Toye Chassaing's eight children.
- Sagine Lebrun
Sixth of Serge Lebrun and Toye Chassaing's eight children.
- Sandra Lebrun
Seventh of Serge Lebrun and Toye Chassaing's eight children; contracted polio as a child and was treated in Cuba.
- Cedric Lebrun
Youngest of Serge Lebrun and Toye Chassaing's eight children.
The next generation
Serge and Toye's grandchildren, by parent. Step-children are marked — family too.
Ancestry, going back
The Lebrun spine above Serge, generation by generation, from Haiti back to Paris and the Franco-Belgian border. Newest documentation first.
- Serge's parents France → Haiti
Georges was born near Paris and crossed to Haiti, where he married Claire of Léogâne.
- Georges Marcel's parents Paris & Menin, Belgium
A Paris insurance agent and a merchant's daughter from the Franco-Belgian border, married at Autouillet in 1882.
- Marcel Romain's parents Meaux & Villecresnes, France
Émile Edme was an architect of the Paris region; the line reached back into the Brie countryside.
The Chassaing side — Toye's parents, of Port-au-Prince.
More generations will be added here as Mireille collects the records.