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For an expanded version of this column, go to Food For Thought.
I am proud and excited about the publication of The
Boston Italians for a number of reasons. First, I
am honored to have written the first full-length, 130-year
history of the Italians in Boston. More than half the book
covers what I colloquially refer to as the Great Immigration
and Settlement Years, stretching from the beginning of
the Italians’ arrival in Boston up to the onset of
the Great Depression. The people who defined these first
fifty-plus years were the immigrants themselves, who struggled
to get to America, overcame enormous odds once they arrived,
contributed their sweat to help build a country, carved
a place for themselves and their children in the American
mainstream, and forged an ethnic identity that still evokes
pride one hundred years later. As the years go by, and
history provides distance and the opportunity for fresh
assessment, their sacrifices and accomplishments appear
all the more remarkable.
There’s another reason this book means so much to
me: the story of the Boston Italians is my story, too. Three
of my four grandparents were immigrants, members of that
first “Greatest Generation.” My two grandfathers
and paternal grandmother arrived virtually penniless, with
few skills, and unable to speak English. My paternal grandfather
was barely literate in his own language. Both my grandfathers
eventually became citizens and entrepreneurs; my grandmother
never obtained her citizenship and was even classified as
an “enemy alien” at the outset of World War II,
despite the fact that three of her sons would eventually
fight overseas while serving in the United States Army. My
paternal grandparents settled in the North End and stayed
for years; my maternal grandfather spent a few years there
before moving to the nearby city of Everett. Theirs were
the quintessential experiences of Italian immigrants.
My parents and aunts and uncles also shared the experiences
of thousands of other children of Italian immigrants. Several
of my aunts worked in the garment industry, which was flooded
with Italian-American women in Boston. As a young girl, my
mother worked in my grandfather’s cobbler shop, lighting
the small stove to provide heat in the wintertime and waiting
on customers after school, contributing to the family business
as thousands of other Italian-American schoolchildren did.
My father and two of his brothers served in World War II,
which was a defining period for Italian-Americans, one in
which they were forced to prove their loyalty to America
as the United States battled not just Germany and Japan,
but Mussolini’s Italy.
Thus, I have woven the Puleo story through the course of The
Boston Italians as illustrative of the overall fabric
of the Boston Italian experience, a rich and colorful tapestry
of enduring strength and value, one held together for 130
years by the legacies of struggle, perseverance, hard work,
and the bond of family.
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