Long after my maternal grandmother and grandfather had passed, my mom and her siblings believed that their older brother who passed away from an illness as an infant had been born in Italy. Also, they believed that Giovanni and Raffaella buried their first born child in Italy.
Not so, baby Giatano passed away those many years ago, right here in America. My grandparents were here in the states when they had their first child.
This recent discovery for our family came about when my mom and her nephew, my cousin Joe, decided to begin searching to find Giatano's gravesite in Italy, where believed to be. Through their research, they surprisingly discovered his burial site right here at a Rhode Island Cemetery. Though no stone on his grave site, they did find the correct location.
My Uncle Anthony had a proper stone made for their eldest brother who they never knew, but now know just a little more about him. My grandmother always had his picture for the siblings to see but I'm sure she found it hard to talk about losing a child. Giatano would have been proud of the four girls and one boy born in the years after him. Ev has a little something to say about her siblings to celebrate their time growing up, while their older brother stays in her heart.
No doubt they were a hard-working family. Evelyn thought of her sisters almost immediately when I asked her about work (for the previous chapter). Theresa, her older sister started work at about 14 years of age at California Artificial, a former manufacturer of artificial flowers and arrangements here in Rhode Island. Helen, a bit younger than Theresa, joined her older sister there when she turned 14. Angie, the next sister in line, also began work when she turned about 14 at a yarn manufacturer in Atlantic Mill in Olneyville, a nearby town. The memory of Angie's work brought the remembrance of the 1938 Hurricane for Ev.
"My sister Angie walked home from Olneyville and she was soaked from the hurricane. After that, she quit the job fast!" She remembers Angie's dress being soaking wet. "It was awful".. and I bet walking home in that was quite awful. My mother, once again remembering details, said: "I walked home from school and I remember walking on Marshall Street and a piece of a roof came off a house and almost hit me on the head". She doesn't remember the details of Theresa and Helen coming home. Perhaps they got a ride from their job at CalArt. Hopefully, they did! :)
Angie, she said, worked as a housekeeper nearby after that job. Sounds like my Aunt Angie had a good plan!
Now on to more fun than work, we have memories of food, cooking, learning to drive, and going out dancing. woohoo!!!
Food first always with Italians, is a statement that a lot would agree with. I always remember a table full of food at family events, especially holidays. My grandmother's homemade pasta certainly brought joy to everyone's faces and stomachs but how about the meat of meal? Plain and simple, my grandmother killed chickens outside. My grandfather killed rabbits in the basement at times. There, I wrote it! Vegetarian or not, it's hard to hear this.
Ev has trouble saying it as well, but now that is out of the way, we'll mention that her Dad also made his own wine in the basement of their tenement home. Good thing I am the youngest grandchild. Had I been around earlier when my grandfather made this wine, I'd have been sneaking down that cellar and tasting it! (just kidding... I think!)
Another great food memory that my mother mentions is the homemade bread baked on the coal and wood stove by my grandmother. Helen and Theresa watched their mom bake and learned their cooking skills from her. "They followed to a T. They were superb," Ev says. "Angie and I threw stuff together". I guess the older sisters felt they would carry on the cooking traditions "to a T", as Ev says, and she and Angie added some modern flair to some of the recipes.
Ev and all her sisters always cooked delicious meals and I still follow some of their recipes. Actually, my Uncle Anthony cooks very well too. Thus, in my Italian family, food seems to be mostly always first, or at least, a top priority.
Next on to learning to drive with a sibling..... Ev learned from her brother, Anthony. "I remember he taught me at the state house and got mad at me. 'You're not doing it right', I remember that boy!"
Ultimately his lessons did teach her to drive and she continued until she reached 86 years of age. After breaking her right hip, recovering and driving again for a few months, Evelyn decided on her own that driving became too difficult for her. Her worsening osteoporosis and some limitations from the hip surgery brought her to see that the time had arrived to stop driving for her. I commend her for deciding on her own.
Lastly, sibling stories always seem to include sneaking in the house late. And sneaking in, they did!
She remembers Theresa and Helen coming back from dancing at Rhodes on the Pawtuxet and being very quiet not to wake up their father. If they were lucky, they came in successfully and snuck in their beds, their father remaining in his deep sleep and all would be fine. "They would creep in so Grandpa didn't hear them"! On those occasions that he woke and did hear, well, they'd have to contend with him being mad. Sounds like they did pretty good with their creeping in!
When Evelyn and Anthony's dancing years came, they went to Lake Pearl with a couple of their friends and danced the night away. Giovanni was a bit older at this time, and with some health issues, he tended to sleep quite deeply, which made coming in the house late easier! "We got away with murder"! She recalls her father not feeling well and sleeping soundly by the time she and Anthony were home. Poor Papa, as they called him, but his declining health did allow them to dance at Lake Pearl, and easily dance back in the house later that night with no problem.
Evelyn doesn't recall too many details about her sister Angie's social life, however, being the middle child I suspect Angie was somewhere in between the sneaking in and strolling in! She most likely experienced both and had the best of both worlds! :)
Stay tuned for part four of this eight-part story! Thanks and hope you are enjoying reading.