Photo of the Week: The Bay of Naples

A view of the world famous Bay of Naples 
Photo by New York Scugnizzo

The Search for our Ancestry (XI)

Identifying Your Ancestral Town

By Angelo Coniglio

Most censuses give a person’s age at their last birthday before the date of the census, from which an approximate birth year can be determined.  In addition, often the following information is listed: date of arrival in the U.S.; country of origin; whether naturalized; occupation; and address. Family members living at the same address are shown with the same information as above for each member. A man and wife’s record may also include their ‘age at first marriage’ or ‘year of marriage’, but the wife’s maiden name is not given.  The children’s names may be helpful if you remember the naming convention previously discussed.  The first name of a man’s oldest son would be the same as the man’s father; oldest daughter named after his mother, etc.  Children’s names may help to confirm the person’s identity when other records are found.  If you plan to research the wife named in a census, the younger children’s names may reflect her parents’ given names.

Having the census information, you can search on-line for the person’s ship passenger manifest by first and last name, at libertyellisiforundation.org, castlegarden.org, or Ancestry.com. Use the census information to narrow the search to those who fit. The most commonly used of these sources is the free site libertyellisiforundation.org (formerly ellisisland.org) which has over 25 million passenger records, and the following discussion refers to that site. 

When you log on to HYPERLINK libertyellisfoundation.org, if it is your first use, you’ll be asked to join or contribute to the Ellis Island Foundation, but this is optional.  But you must register, for free, with a user name and password.  Future searches may ask for those, but there is no charge to do the searches.  After registering or signing in click the PASSENGER SEARCH box. Here you can enter the person’s name, as it was spelled in the ‘old country’. You can select “results” at this point, but that may return a long list to sort through, of persons with the same name.  You can also click on‘Wizard’.  Then, on the drop-down menu, click the right arrow until you see slide bars for Year of Birth, Current Age, Age at Arrival, Year of Arrival (i.e., age at the time of immigration), Month of Arrival and Day of Arrival. Don’t be intimidated. If you don’t know a fact, enter only the facts you do know. If your search is too general (last name only, or even first and last names), you may get TOO MUCH information, with hundreds of names to sort through.   

If your search is too specific (searching first and last names, exact year of birth, and gender, etc.), you may get NO matches. This is not necessarily because the person’s name is not in the database, but may be because the recorded data (whether correct or not) doesn’t exactly match your search criteria. For example, obviously your grandfather Andrea Petix was a male, but whoever entered the information in the original manifest or in the database may have interpreted ‘Andrea’ as a female name and entered the gender as female.  Therefore, your nannu wouldn’t show up if you searched for males only!

I usually start my search with my best guess for the first name and surname, and press the RESULTS box. That will produce either a message saying no one by that name was found, or a list of folks with the requested first name and surname. It may contain as few as one, or as many as hundreds of folks with the same name.  Here’s where the census information comes in.  The Ellis Island list will show first and last name; residence, year of arrival; the name of the ship, and other information. Study the list to see if there is anyone with your ancestor’s name whose arrival year and other information matches the information you found on the census.  If you’re reasonably certain of these facts, you may limit the search by the slide bars mentioned above, before you click on the RESULTS box, to reduce the number of names returned.  Select one of the names in the list shown, and click the ‘Ship Manifest’ icon on the far right.

You’ll see a display with the pertinent information above a ‘thumbnail’ of the manifest.  Moving your cursor over the thumbnail will enlarge it for reading.  I urge you to look closely at the image of the manifest, and do your own interpretation of the names and other information, rather than trusting someone else’s transcription. Hand-copy the information, or order a copy ($20 - $30).  Before mid-1907, there was one page per manifest; after that there were two pages, and both pages are important. Very early records may give only the country of birth. Manifests for about 1900 to mid-1907 give the town of last residence, and from mid-1907 on, both the last residence and town of birth are given. Once you’ve found the manifest for the right person, you can navigate back for a ship image ($10 - $12.50), or a diploma-like ‘passenger record’ ($30). Warning: if there are misspellings of the name or town, or other errors, they will also be in error on the purchased passenger record.

Coniglio is the author of the book The Lady of the Wheel, inspired by his Sicilian research. Order the paperback or the Kindle version at http://bit.ly/SicilianStory. Coniglio’s web page at http://bit.ly/AFCGen has helpful hints on genealogic research. If you have genealogy questions, or would like him to lecture to your club or group, e-mail him at genealogytips@aol.com

Via Crucis – The Way of the Cross 2015

Bensonhurst’s Good Friday Procession of the Dead Christ

Devotees carry the statue of the Dead Christ through the neighborhood

Photos by New York Scugnizzo

Thousands marched through the streets of Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, this Good Friday (April 3rd) in the annual Via Crucis, or Way of the Cross, candlelight procession commemorating the Passion of Christ.  Led by The Most Reverend Bishop Nicholas DiMarzio, members of several Italian American societies and congregations participated, including Saint Athanasius, Saint Dominic, Regina Pacis, Saints Simon and Jude, Our Lady of Guadalupe, Saint Finbar, Saint Mary Mother of Jesus, Saint Bernadette and Saint Frances Cabrini.

Carrying banners, crosses, and statues of the Madonna Addolorata and the Dead Christ, devotees recited prayers and sang hymns during the nearly two-hour-long procession. Fortunately, we were blessed with terrific weather and the rain threatened in the forecast never materialized.

Rotating between the churches, this year Saint Finbar had the honor of hosting the Benediction and brief prayer service. Bishop DiMarzio concluded the outdoor ceremony in English and Italian with a solemn blessing with the Relic of the True Cross.

Before leaving, flowers from the statues were distributed among the women and children. We said our goodbyes and boarded our charted bus back to our parish.

I offer my heartfelt thanks to the organizers for a job well done. Special thanks to John Cordi and the Holy Name Society of Saint Bernadette for their hard work and dedication. It was an honor to march with them. 

Not far behind the Dead Christ, participants carry Our Lady of Sorrows

Bishop Nicholas DiMarzio walks in quiet reflection

Members of Gruppo Italiano Sant'Atanasio (G.I.S.A.)

John Cordi and members of the Holy Name Society of Saint Bernadette

Members of the Sacred Heart League and the St. Frances Cabrini Society of Brooklyn join together in song and prayer

Members of Our Lady of Guadalupe

Members of the Italian-American Apostolate of St. Mary, Mother of Jesus Parish

The Knights of Columbus served as Honor Guard

It was great to see so many young people participate in this year's procession

Red Mike Festival Band

Rocco and John Cordi with Stephen La Rocca, President of the Saint Rocco Society of Potenza in New York City

Bishop DiMarzio offers his blessing with the Relic of the True Cross

Pasquetta – Little Easter 2015

Frittata di Maccheroni alla Napoletana

This Easter Monday (Pasquetta) I was pleasantly surprised when a friend of mine was able to join me for a relaxing picnic in the park. Unlike our brothers and sisters in Europe, we here in America do not get the holiday off. Customarily we would be taking a trip with family and friends to the countryside, but we kept the tradition as best we could.

After packing lunch, we travelled to Prospect Park in Brooklyn in commemoration of the risen Christ's meeting (and subsequent dinner) with disciples on the road to Emmaus, a small town outside Jerusalem. She brought a few leftover goodies from Sunday's dinner and I contributed my proud attempt at Frittata di Maccheroni alla Napoletana, a traditional Neapolitan dish made with spaghetti, ham, cheese and eggs.

Stuffed and well rested, we decided to take a stroll through the park to help walk off the lethargy. Far from scenic Via Caracciolo in Naples or the English-style Gardens at the Reggia di Caserta, Prospect Park offered us a terrific alternative. Naturally, we visited a few of the many landmarks and attractions the park has to offer, including The Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Arch and The Horse Tamers monument, sculptor Frederick MacMonnies tribute to the Dioscuri, Castor and Pollux.  

We relaxed and enjoyed our bucolic surroundings, we enjoyed a delicious meal, and (most importantly) we enjoyed each others company. I hope next year other friends will join us. Buona Pasquetta!

Photo of the Week: The Società Operaia di Mutuo Soccorso in Sorrento

Men playing scopa at the Società Operaia di Mutuo Soccorso (Workers Mutual Aid Society) in Sorrento’s historic center. Photo by New York Scugnizzo

Thank You Easter Bunny!

A Basket Full of Treats: Amaro from Calabria, wine and taralli from Puglia, and chocolate covered terrone from Benevento

New Books

Some new and forthcoming titles that may be of interest to our readers. All are available at Amazon.com 

• The Stone and Bronze Ages in Italy and Sicily by T. Eric Peet 

Publisher: Cambridge Library Collection 
Publication Date: April 30, 2015 
Paperback: $43.20 
Language: English 
Pages: 544 

Read description 

• Sicily and the Mediterranean: Migration, Exchange, Reinvention edited by Claudia Karagoz and Giovanna Summerfield 

Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan 
Publication Date: August 13, 2015 
Hardcover: $90.00 
Language: English 
Pages: 256 

Read description 

Click here to see more books

Feast of the Pupazze

Photos of the Pupazze courtesy of Made in South Italy Today

Every year on Palm Sunday (Domenica delle Palme) in Bova Superiore, a scenic commune in the Province of Reggio Calabria, the locals celebrate the Messiah’s triumphal entrance into Jerusalem with a unique ritual known as the Feast of the Pupazze.

On Palm Sunday, as the name suggests, it is traditional for devotees to weave palm leaves into religious symbols. However, in southern Italy palm was hard to come by, so during the feast celebrants used olive branches instead. In Bova, this art form was taken to new heights. Townspeople skillfully weave ornate female figures out of the branches and adorn them with flowers and local produce. The verdure effigies are carried through the town in a colorful procession to the shrine of St. Leo, Bova’s beloved patron, where they are blessed.

After Mass, the figures are stripped of their bounty and distributed among the revelers. The blessed branches are brought home and fastened to doorways or mantels for good luck and to ward off evil. The dried fronds of the previous year are burned and the ashes buried to help reinvigorate the crops and fields.

While the origins of the rite are lost in antiquity, some believe the Pupazze are allegorical figures symbolizing Lent, which is sometimes depicted as a woman. In Greece, for example, cookies are made in the image of Kyra Sarakosti, or Lady Lent, to help children learn about their religion. There is also a similarity to Lady Maslenitsa of Slavic tradition, who’s straw effigy is immolated before the Russian Orthodox Great Lent. The ashes are used in a similar fashion.

Others say the custom dates back to pre-Christian times and the images actually represent the Greek goddess Demeter and her daughter Persephone (Kore), thus celebrating the transition from winter to spring. According to legend, the god Hades spied the maiden Persephone picking flowers on the slopes of Mt. Etna in Sicily. The earth shook and a great chasm opened beneath her. Up sprang Hades in a chariot, whisking the surprised goddess away to his underworld realm to be his wife and queen.

In her grief, Demeter (the goddess of fertility and agriculture) threatened to make the earth barren unless her daughter was returned to her. After a period of famine and woe, Zeus intervened and mediated a compromise begrudgingly accepted by Hades and Demeter. Persephone would spend part of the year with her husband in the underworld, and during those months Demeter would withdraw her gifts from the earth, causing the seasons of autumn and then winter. When she was returned to her mother, the goddess would once again restore her gifts and spring would begin and pass into summer. Oddly enough, Persephone and Hades were supposed to have been very happy together while she was with him in the underworld, but as every married couple should know, a mother-in-law is not something to be taken lightly.

Terracotta hydria (water jar) depicting

the abduction of Persephone by Hades.

Greek, Apulian, red figure, ca. 340-330 B.C.

Found at Canosa, Puglia before 1878

Metropolitan Museum of Art, NYC

Photo by New York Scugnizzo

Whatever the origin of the Pupazze, the feast is very special. It is practiced only in Bova, which incidentally is one of the few remaining pockets of Griko speakers in Calabria. It is quaint and fun, but more importantly it symbolizes ideas that are ancient and widespread. Any agrarian population understands the importance of spring and the seasonal agricultural cycles. The harvest is your life, surviving winter depends upon it and the seeds planted in the spring is where that harvest begins. In the seasons of the Church, it is also when the Son of God died, descended to Hades and was resurrected.

Even in this modern world we are not so different from our ancestors; the bread we eat and wine we drink remain products of the seasons and the harvest. Symbolism and ritual have been helping people express concepts since before written history. If we see ourselves as seekers of knowledge, then instead of turning away from these practices we should be trying to understand them, and understand ourselves through them.

Photo of the Week: Il Duomo di Vietri sul Mare

A look at the ceramic dome of the Duomo di San Giovanni Battista in Vietri sul Mare. Photo by New York Scugnizzo

A Look at the 2015 Festa di San Giuseppe in Ridgewood, Queens

Viva San Giuseppe!

Photos by New York Scugnizzo

Hundreds gathered at Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal Church in Ridgewood, Queens on Sunday (March 22nd) to celebrate the annual Festa di San Giuseppe. Mass was held in Italian by Father Thomas, followed by a procession through the neighborhood with marching bands and the saint’s statue.

Sponsored by the Associazone Cattolica Italiana di Miraculous Medal, there was a terrific turnout with plenty of support from several other Italian American societies. As always, it was great to see our friends from the Congrega San Gerardo Maiella di Brooklyn, Società Concordia Partanna, Maria SS. Delle Grazie di Montevago, St. Rocco Society of Potenza and New York City's Sicilian Food, Wine & Travel Group.

After the procession, the marchers returned to the Notre Dame Catholic Academy gymnasium behind the church for the benediction. We warmed-up inside with some caffè and lite fare, and were treated to a few more songs by the Giglio Band. Guests mingled and spoke Sicilian, but sadly no one recited poetry this year. After the raffle, blessed loaves of bread were distributed to the attendees and flowers from the statue were given to the ladies.

Special thanks to President Tony Mulé and members of the Associazone Cattolica Italiana for their warmth and hospitality. My friends and I had a great time and we look forward to celebrating with them again next year. Viva San Giuseppe!

Making our way to Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal Church

After Mass, our beloved patron is carried out to the expectant crowd

The color guard leads the way

The procession makes its way through the neighborhood

Members of the Congrega San Gerardo Maiella di Brooklyn show their support

Numerous devotees brave the cold

Halfway through, we stopped by the Società Concordia Partanna clubhouse to honor San Francesco di Paola

Members of the Associazone Cattolica Italiana di Miraculous Medal take turns pulling the vara, or cart

The Giglio Band kept the festivities rolling

Afterward, we returned to a packed gymnasium for the party

A foolproof (and fun) way to keep the raffle drawings fair 

Boxes of blessed bread were distributed to attendees

(Above and below) Men give flowers to the ladies

Photo of the Week: Mt. Vesuvius in the Distance

A view of Monte Vesuvio looming in the distance, taken from within the Parco Regionale dei Monti Lattari, Corbara (SA). Photo by New York Scugnizzo

Ponderable Quote from “Terroni” by Pino Aprile

“The South has been deprived of its institutions; it has been deprived of its industries, its riches and of its ability to react. It has also been deprived of its people (with an emigration that was induced or forced unlike any other group in Europe). Lastly, through a cultural lobotomy, the South was deprived of its self-awareness; its memory. 

“We no longer know who we were. It happened similarly to the Jews in the Holocaust (the comparison is not exaggerated: hundreds of thousands, or perhaps even a million, Southerners were killed by the Savoy troops; thirteen to twenty million people, according to records, were forced to abandon their land over the course of a century). Many who were able to survive the concentration camps began to wonder whether the evil that was inflicted upon them was perhaps deserved. When the damage becomes intolerable one seeks a cause to blame it on, even if the cause is inexistent or absurd, in order not to lose one’s mind. The historian Ettore Ciccotti spoke of ‘a sort of Italian anti-Semitism’ referring to the treatment of Southern Italians. The Lega, an expression of local comical nationalism, were it not so tragic, is the most sincere example of this." 

[...] 

“It is in this manner that the resistance against the invaders, rapes as well as the loss of wealth, life, identity, and of one’s own country becomes ‘shame.’ It is only now, after a century and a half, the Southern families are beginning to recuperate their pride in their ancestors, who had previously been labeled as brigands by their aggressors (Naturally this phenomenon has also caused the moral redemption of those who effectively were brigands as well. There were other criminals: those mafia members that were enlisted by Garibaldi and the Piedmontese, but they were considered ‘good Italians.’ To be deemed a criminal it does not matter what you do, but for whom).”

* Quoted from Terroni: All That Has Been Done to Ensure That the Italians of the South Became “Southerners” by Pino Aprile, Bordighera Press, 2011, p. 8–9

Around the Web (March 2015)

Items of interest from around the web.

Courtesy of YouTube

• Io Non Festeggio at Sanfedisti: Altar & Throne

In opposition to the Anniversary of Italian Unification (commemorated every March 17th), and to remind everyone of southern Italy's rich and independent past, our friends at the Sanfedisti: Altar & Throne blog posted a YouTube video of Eddy Napoli's anthem MalaUnità, a scathing indictment of the Risorgimento and Italian "unity."

Courtesy of Briganti

• Faccio Parte del Regno delle Due Sicilie at Vesuvio Live

During a recent interview at the Convento di San Domenico Maggiore in Naples, popular Sicilian actress Maria Grazia Cucinotta (star of “Il Postino”) declared her affection for the Neapolitan people and stated emphatically, “I am part of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies.” Visit Vesuvio Live to read the article in Italian.

Photo of the Week: The Cathedral of Montecassino

A look inside the Cathedral of Montecassino Abbey
Photo by New York Scugnizzo

Photo of the Week: The Sea Giants of Capri

Stella, di Mezzo and di Fuori, the isle of Capri's breathtaking faraglioni, or giant rock formations, in the Bay of Naples. Photo by New York Scugnizzo

Happy Women’s Day!

Shrine to my foremothers

March 8th is La Festa della Donna (Women’s Day), a time to recognize and celebrate the invaluable contributions women have made to our community. In southern Italy, bouquets of bright yellow mimosa (and sometimes chocolates) are given to women as a sign of love and respect. To commemorate the occasion, I’m posting “Lace,” a poem by Maria Terrone.* The accompanying photo is this year's familial shrine I set up in memory of my beloved foremothers.

Lace

In small Mediterranean towns
women, stooped, and girls
with rag-soft bodies
are making lace intricate as brain circuitry.

See how the light spins through,
imprinting the wall—
not with a maze, but a map
to trace your way home

to women yet unborn who’ll find
the lace at the bottom of a cedar chest,
and marvel.

When the world is like a skein
unravelling, look again to the lace: see
how absence forms its pattern,
and purpose fills even the smallest space.

* Reprinted from Eye to Eye: Poems by Maria Terrone, Bordighera Press, 2014, p. 104