L'Italo-Americano

THURSDAY, MAY 17, 2018 www.italoamericano.org 22 L'Italo-Americano LA VITA ITALIANA TRADITIONS HISTORY CULTURE D ear Readers,  a May mix of Italian Con- nections for you. Deportation from the U S is a very unwelcome possibility for many immigrants these days, therefore, I was surprised to learn that back in 1835 a bunch of Italian pris- oners in Austria were offered amnesty if they would just get out (go to New York) and stay there... Italy did not exist as a nation but as a geographical description in the early 1800S. An immi- grant from Naples was a citizen of the Kingdom of Naples. The Italian exiles who had come to New York came directly from Austrian prisons and most were political prisoners. In 1835, the new Austrian Emperor Ferdi- nand II offered an amnesty to Italian prisoners interred in the dungeon at Spielberg, if they got out and s tayed out, that is , accepting perpetual banishment. Most of these prisoners were youthful revolutionaries called Carbonari, who were in their early twenties at the time of their arrest. One such person was Felice Foresti, a lawyer born in Ferrara, who later became a pro- fessor of Italian literature at Columbia University. He had been in Austrian dungeons for 18 years. In A ugus t 1836, having accepted the offer of amnesty, about twenty such men were put aboard an imperial Austrian brig in the Adriatic and brought to new York under guard. Arriving in New York and still technical- ly prisoners, they were received by the Austrian Consul who lib- erated them to the American authorities. The American press hailed them as these "Martyrs of Spiel- berg" and as the N ew Y ork Times pointed out in a piece welcoming them to America, they were not immigrants, but exiles; saying "we sincerely trust that these worthy victims of despotism may be able to find a hos pitable s ympathy in our country until a change for the better in the politics of the Euro- pean Cabinets may afford them an honorable occasion to return to their homeland." Arriving in 1836, most of them found it difficult to adapt to an environment that w as wholly new. They had to learn a new language and adapt to the new customs. There was no "Lit- tle Italy" area to help make the transition easier. Most of the men lived quiet, melancholic lives as political exiles. Some earned a precarious living teach- ing Italian at home; however, two Sicilians, Pietro Bachi and Luigi Monti, became Harvard professors. Louis Tinelli was a Lombard who had earned a law degree in Milan. He had established a silk spinning plant near Lake Como prior to his arrest by Australian p o l i c e . A f t e r c o m i n g t o t h e United States, with the help of A m e r i c a n f r i e n d s , h e e s t a b - lished a spinning plan in New Jersey and won a gold medal from the Institute of American Industry in 1840. He was appointed a United States Consul to Portugal in 1841. During the Civil War, he helped form an Italian regiment in New York. He saw action h i m s e l f a s a C o l o n e l i n t h e Union Army, along with his two sons who were also Union sol- diers. Before Louis Tinelli died in 1873, he asked to be buried in Brooklyn, New York. By 1850, many Italian politi- cal prisoners fled to New York. New York was a different kind of town when Giuseppe Garibal- di, fleeing the Austrians, sailed aboard the English packet ship W a t e r l o o a n d r e a c h e d N e w York harbor on July 28, 1850. A m i d - c e n t u r y c e n s u s revealed a count of only 3,045 Italians residing in the entire U n i t e d S t a t e s . I t a l i a n i m m i - grants were already crossing the A t l a n t i c O c e a n b y t h e t h o u - sands, but they were bound for the countries of South America, particularly Brazil and Argenti- n a , w h e r e t h e y c o u l d d w e l l among other Latin people and where the process of assimila- tion promised to be smoother and more rapid. *** The President's pizza order was ignored, recalled Hilary Clinton back in the days when her husband Bill was serving as our 42nd president from January 20, 1993 to January 20, 2001. The First Lady Hillary Clin- ton complained on "Larry King Live" that she couldn't get a pizza delivered to the White House because the pizza place didn't believe the "numero uno" family would really place their o w n o r d e r . ( W e a l l s a w t h e P r e s i d e n t a t M c D o n a l d ' s . . . what's not to believe?) Mrs. Clinton was not alone. Lawmakers in Lansing, Michi- g a n h a d t o e n d u r e a s i m i l a r h u m i l i a t i o n a n d n e a r l y w e n t hungry when Domino's refused their cry for a pie. The pizza franchise wouldn't deliver to the M i c h i g a n C a p i t o l b u i l d i n g because the landmark domed structure had no official address. T h a t d i s c o v e r y c a m e a s a shock to several state House lawmakers who'd call a nearby Domino's to order lunch. Asked for an address, a representative confirmed the Capitol is down- town, just around the corner from the Domino's franchise, a n d e x p l a i n e d t h e r e w a s n o exact address for the building. But without a three-digit numer- ical address, he was told there would be no delivery. "It's not like I was calling from a vacant l o t a t t h e c o r n e r o f 5 t h a n d V i n e , " h e s a i d i n d i s b e l i e f . " G e e z , y o u c o u l d h i t [ t h e i r store] with a baseball." Just goes to show you that even the big and important can be reduced to the hungry and whiney when it comes to the power of pizza. *** Good friends are good for the heart. *** S a l e s i a n F r . L a r r y L o r e n - zoni's passing at age 94, in San Francisco reminded me to re-run this info on the Salesians in the US and Canada. I n 1 8 9 7 t h e f i r s t S a l e s i a n missionaries (Priests & Broth- ers) settled in California. Sale- s i a n S i s t e r s s o o n f o l l o w e d , arriving in New Jersey in 1908. Being a missionary in the US at the time was difficult and chal- lenging - but the good works progressed. Today over 450 pro- fessed Salesian Priests, Brothers and Sisters are present in the United States and Canada. Sale- sian Provinces based in Haled N J , N e w R o c h e l l e N Y , S a n Antonio TX, San Francisco CA, a n d M o n t r e a l , C a n a d a s e r v e thousands of young and poor throughout both countries. Their ministries encompass day care centers, elementary and high schools, formation houses, reli- gious education centers, parish- es, summer camps, development o f f i c e s a n d y o u t h c e n t e r s . Thankfully, the spirit and joy of Don Bosco is still alive today in the US and Canada!

• Cover