This epic poem was written by James Morcaldi, husband of Olga and father of Jim, John, and Dominic. It is, in essence, a list of famous Italians who have contributed to society in various ways since Roman times. His hope was to inspire in Italian Americans a love for their culture and pride in their heritage. Armand kept this copy, and I remember him sharing it with me.
James writes in the preface; "The purpose of the poem is to stimulate and develop in the hearts and minds of all those of Italian blood in this country, a love of all the fine, beautiful, and idealistic things which the Italian race has produced and is producing, and to stimulate and develop that selfsame pride, which carried the eagles of Rome into the farthest corners of the known world at that time, spreading their civilization and the culture which formed the foundation and the basis of our modern civilization." Enjoy! Click on "comments" above to add your thoughts and/or memories.
0 Comments
Below, you'll find Giovanni's World War I draft registration card. At the time, in 1918, he claimed he was 42 years old, though if he was 59 when he passed away in 1940 (as last week's Memorial Record stated), that would have made him 37 in 1918. His birthday here is listed as December 20, 1875, but the information in the Memorial Record places his birth date as December 20, 1880. It’s pretty common for these older documents to have puzzling and inconsistent information. Sometimes it's due to the fact that they are handwritten. Sometimes things simply get lost in translation. For instance, I have seen census documents that list Armand as "Herman"! But if Giovanni had given this date to the registrar, the interesting question is; what would he have gained from aging himself 5 years? Not much, it seems, as men would have to register for the draft anyway if they were younger than 45. Perhaps at the time he felt he couldn’t reasonably pass for any older than 42, after all he was only 37. All things considered though, I suppose that aging yourself, even a little, could make it less likely that you’d be called. If that was his plan, it’s possible that it worked as he’d hoped. As far as I know, Giovanni was never drafted. At the time of the draft, he was working as a lock maker for Pfleghar Specialty Company on Winchester Avenue in New Haven. I found a copy of the patent for the Pfleghar lock, and a diagram for the lock that Giovanni is likely to have worked on. A copy of the diagram and a link to the patent can be found below his draft card. Click on "comments" above to add your thoughts and/or memories. I feel very fortunate that our family has this document in our possession. We have the records for Antonetta as well, and I'll be sharing those in the coming weeks. Though these documents are somber in nature, I think it's important to share them, as they too are small windows into our family's past.
Below, is the memorial record of the proceedings of the funeral service for Giovanni. This document gives us the location of his burial in St. Lawrence Cemetery, and a record of all who attended. At the bottom, you'll find articles already posted earlier in the blog, with the addition of one article detailing the events of the service. Click on "comments" above to add your thoughts and/or memories.
The road from San Massimo to Piedimonte D'Alife...
Surnames in Italy started to become popular around the 11th century, when an expanding population made them necessary (see article here). Only wealthy families could afford them at first, but by the 13th century even poor families adopted them as a way to make it easier for the church to identify two families uniting in marriage. As the article states, "The evolution of Italian surnames is moulded upon a series of things: patronymic, occupation, description of one's habits or personality, place of origin, etc."
Our surname Santomasso (derived from Santomassimo), is indicative of our place of origin. The commune of San Massimo, named for Saint Maximus of Rome, is a likely candidate for the birthplace of Giovanni's line. Years ago, my friend Mike printed out a map which identified a small village called San Massimo in the province of Campobasso, about an hour drive over the mountain from Piedimonte D'Alife. He was also able to identify no less than 16 families with the surname Santomassimo living there in the year 2000. I just came across the map in my papers and decided to do some digging. Though this is speculation, it is possible and even probable that before the paternal side of our family settled in Piedimonte D'Alife, we were up the road and over the mountain in San Massimo. Unfortunately, Antonetta's last name D'Andrea, seems to be patronymic and doesn't give us any clues about her family's geographical origin before Piedimonte D'Alife. Below, please find footage of the area, and a link to the website for the commune of San Massimo here. If you are interested in reaching further back to understand the origin of the name of the town, here is a little bit about the life of San Massimo. There are several Saints named Maximus, but according to the history of the Commune San Massimo in the link above, the town is named after Saint Maximus of Rome. His feast day is coming up, on April 30! |