L'Italo-Americano

THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 24, 2016 www.italoamericano.org 11 L'Italo-Americano LA VITA ITALIANA TRADITIONS HISTORY CULTURE Dear Readers N ovember notes w ith an Italian Connection: Th an k s givin g D ay is celebrated the last Thursday in November, since it was so fixed by President Lincoln in 1864. The custom dated back to the day of Thanksgiving set aside by the Mayflower Pilgrims after their first harvest in 1621 and was later adopted by the various colonies and states. *** D ays of drums ticks and Thanksgiving turkey remind me that one of the first turkey farms in Rhode Island was started in 1935 by Joseph Baffoni, who immigrated to the U.S. from Abruzzo in 1917. After working as a textile worker and a mason, Baffoni learned to farming during the depression because industry was slow and he had a background in farming. He went into it and stayed in it. Baffoni operated a strictly retail bus ines s until his s on A lbert, A rthur and D onald became involved during the 50s. The three brothers added a small wholesale trade but retail remained the main stay of their business. The old people (immigrants) w ere the firs t cus tomers at Baffoni Farm. Then the next generation sort of drifted away. Now people are more health conscious. The second or third generations are, coming back because they want fresh food. Ironically, des pite the renewed interest in fresher food, local poultry farmers are becoming a dying breed. A seven-day-a week job is just not popular with young folks. For readers with family or friends in Rhode Island who w is h to try a Baffoni F arm Turkey call (401) 231-6315. *** Tacch in o (turk ey) never entered my vocabulary until my mid-teen years, simply because it wasn't on our Thanksgiving table. it was only at the urging of their American born "bambini" that my father and his "paesani" finally began ordering turkeys for their Thanks giving D ay M eals "per fare contenti i ragazzi" (to make the kids happy) but after the initial tasting of turkey, that required gravy and cranberry sauce to make it tasty, the "old timers" may have had a turkey on the table. But it could have been made out of plastic and none w ould have know n, becaus e their thanksgiving holiday meal started out with escarole soup with tiny meatballs, followed by homemade ravioli, accompanied by meatballs, sausages, meats, mushrooms, stuffed artichokes, s autéed beans and ins alata. Homemade wine was sipped with dinner. Fruits, nuts, and anisette or cordials followed by coffee was served with cannoli biscotti and an abbondanza of pastry. *** The I talian Pres en ce in Colonial Virginia one of the most important of the colonies, was relatively sizable. Most people think that no Italians came to America before the migrant waves that began in 1880, but Giovanni Schiavo, father of research of Italians in the United States stated that the Italians in Colonial America were probably 3% of 1.500.000, s o approximately forty five thousand colonist with an Italian Connection! It isn't the role of the worker immigrants that is important, it is also the role of pioneer leaders like Father Chino and Fra' da Nizza in the Southwest, Henry Tonti in the Mississippi Valley, Vigo in the north central states. Let us not forget the discoverers and the explorers of the colonial period. And then, the influence of Italians who never came to America, like Cesare Beccaria, but w hos e book Cr im e and Punis hm ent w as the bas is for juris pru dence in the colonies . The U nited S tates could not have been what they are if it hadn't been for the Italians. In order to understand what happened during the colonial period, one mus t s tudy how Italians went first to England and from there came to the colonies as did Philip Mazzei who was in many respects a Founding Father. He plead a major role in the colony of Virginia. Italians fought in the Revolutionary War and three regiments under Rochambeau w ere compos ed mos tly of Italians. We find names that are Italians, other names that were Italians but have been altered. At the time and throughout the immigrant period, spelling was careless. Different people would spell a name in different ways more or less as it sounded to them: P aca became P acker, Taliaferro became Tolliver. S ometimes the immigrant himself simplified his name or it was anglicizes for him. Caboto became Cabot, Rossi became Ross. If he was among French men, the name became Franch: Priolo became Prioleau, Lencare became Lanier. *** More Turkey talk: Why is a turkey called "Turkey"? There are s everal pos s ible explanations. Columbus thought that the land he discovered was connected to India w here peacocks are found in considerable number. And he believed turkeys were a type of peacock (they are actually a type of pheasant). So he named them tuka, which is "peacock" in the Tamil language of India. Another explanation is that when the turkey is scared, it makes noise that sounds like, "turk, turk, turk." Or, Turkeys could be named ofter the country of Turkey. *** Until 1863, Thanksgiving Day had not been celebrated annually since the first feast in 1621. This changed in 1863 w hen S arah J os eph H ale encouraged Abraham Lincoln to set aside the last Thursday in November "as a day for national thanksgiving, praise and prayer." *** Who gets the wishbone? The Romans who probably got the wishbone tradition from the Etrus cans , brought the wishbone tradition with them when they conquered England, and then when the "Pilgrims" left England, first to Holland and then America, they brought the wish bone tradition with them and that is how we got it. If you believe your wish will come true when you win the break in a wishbone contest, then you're following in the footsteps of civilizations dating back to the Etrus cans , 322 B.C.and - it started with a hen, not a turkey. In those days, when a man wanted an egg, he waited for the hen to announce the coming of her p roduct. That made the animal mystical in that it could tell the future - and that led to what became known as the "hen oracles." If you lived back then and wanted to receive an answer to an important question from these oracles, you would draw a circle on the ground and divide it into the 24 letters of the alphabet. Grains of corn were placed in each section, and the cock or hen was led into the circle and then set free. It was believed that the fowl would spell out words or symbols by picking up kernels of corn from the different sections. For example, the first letter of a future husband's name would be the first kernel of corn picked. After writing the message, the fowl was sacrificed to a special deity and his collarbone hung out dry. Then, you'd get to make a wish on the bone. Two other people got a chance to make a wish by snapping the dried bone in the same way we do now, with each one pulling on an end. The person with the larger end of the bone got the w is h - and it became know n as a "lucky break." **** It is the wish of Indigenous people, that the w is hbone tradition be updated to serve as a Thanks giving reminder that without the help of the American Indians, none of the Pilgrims would have survived their first winter in Plymouth. So, when the P ilgrims s at dow n w ith the American Indians for the first Thanksgiving, they celebrated their blessing of a good hunt and bountiful harves t, and gave thanks to God and the American Indians, who had helped them through the devastating winter. This Thanksgiving, as you celebrate the blessings received over the past years, share the history of the first Thanksgiving and the role American Indians palled in helping the Pilgrims survive in the new world.

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