1. Who did you talk with? My grandmother on my mom’s side, Linda Donn (born Lucia Scalzo).

2. When did different relatives come to America? My grandmother is a first-generation American. My grandmother and her family came to the United States in 1959. My grandmother came with her mother, father and newborn baby sister.My great-grandfather’s brother came 10 years earlier with his wife. My great-grandfather’s two sisters came five years after him and lived with them until they got married.

3. Where did they come from? My grandmother’s family came from Sicily, Italy.

4. Where did they settle initially? Later? They moved to Brooklyn New York and live with my great-grandfather’s brother Vito. They have never lived more than two blocks away from the first house they lived in. My great grandfather passed away in that house. My great-grandmother is still alive but she lives with her daughter in Delaware.

5. Why did they come to the U.S.? (if possible, why did they choose America?) My grandmother’s uncle, my grandmother’s father’s brother Vito had moved to the United States 10 years earlier and had started a deli that was doing a good business. Vito came to America to get a job with mobster wannabes from Sicily. Vito worked for the mobster wannabes for a few years but the higher-ups went to prison and he started working at a deli that he eventually owned. My great-grandfather got a letter from his brother that promised him a job in the deli and an apartment next to his if he moved to America.

6. What stands out among your ancestor’s experiences in the U.S.? The best story my mom told about growing up in Brooklyn was that she has to take elocution classes to try to get rid of her Italian accent. My grandfather also wouldn’t let his family go to the Catholic Church in Brooklyn because he didn’t want his employer to know that he was a Catholic. People were really separated back then and the Protestants and the Catholics didn’t get along very well. He worked for a Protestant family and sent his kids to the public school so no one would figure out that he was Italian.

 

7. What does your own family’s experience say about the role of individualism and of community? The community was very good to my family. When Vito stopped working for the mobster wannabes he had made enough friends that he could open up a deli and everyone would come. Eventually Vito went to prison for the time spent as a mobster but the Italian community didn’t blame my great-grandfather and they still came to the deli. The deli is still in business today run by Vitos two boys and their kids. 50 years later one small business has produced enough money to support 65 family members. The community could have turned their backs on my extended family after Vito went to jail but they didn’t.

8. Is it important for you to know this information? Why or why not? It is always important to know where you came from. My great-grandfather was embarrassed about his heritage so he hid it and did everything he could to look like an American. I find that fascinating because my great-grandmother didn’t even speak English when she arrived here and America and now she doesn’t even have an accent so you would never know where she spent the first 10 years of her life. People in the Pacific Northwest all looked exactly like everyone is white and pasty and from some part of of Europe. I think the melting pot of Brooklyn sounds more interesting although I’ve never been there.

9. In what ways does your ancestry affect your day-to-day life? Directly, indirectly, not at all? Why? I’ve never thought about it before but I imagine the reason my parents worked so hard is because they want me to have a better life than their parents who wanted a better life than their parents etc. etc. and it affects everything they do. My great-grandmother moved away very early because she didn’t want to be anything like her parents which is ironic of course because by leaving everything she knew to have a better life she did exactly what her parents did before her. The direct result is a work ethic and an expectation of excellence from each new generation. A ‘B’ is unacceptable in my house, a ‘C’ is cause for mass alarm. My parents worked like dogs to give us everything just like their parents were like dogs to give them better than they had growing up. I don’t doubt for a moment when I have kids I will push them harder than my parents pushed me.