Lindsay Marie Morris

Angelo J. Grinceri III never intended to be a farmer. He left his home in New Jersey for New York City to work in fitness and real estate. But his work for a large developer, learning about taxes and zoning and navigating the intersection between private and state legislation, led him back to his family’s land and roots.

Today, Old Forks Farm has emerged from a plot of land in Hammonton, New Jersey, which Angelo's great-grandfather, Sebastiano Grinceri, once farmed. Born in Castanea delle Furie, Sicily, Sebastiano arrived in the early 1900s aboard a ship out of Messina. At that time, the Atlantic City Railroad owned the property where he found work. He and his wife, Rosa, ultimately embraced the American Dream and purchased the land to grow tomatoes, potatoes, and peaches, as well as to raise pigs. 

"On a daily basis, I think about how he left his world and worked for someone else and then had the ability to purchase that land and do something with it," Angelo says. 

After much sweat and paperwork, Angelo now oversees 30 acres of about 20 crops, including figs, privacy trees, lemons and oranges, cucumbers, carrots, peppers, peas, string beans, and sunflowers (along with a recently acquired blackberry property, operating under Curated Nature).

In addition to its fresh produce, the Old Forks Farm market sells honey, jams, and bread. They also offer opportunities to pick your own blackberries in July and celebrate with a visit to Santa's Farm Festival on Thursdays, Fridays, and Saturdays in December. The farm hosts onsite kids' workshops and fitness classes and rents space for events and activities, such as weddings and family photo shoots. 

Angelo shared his inspiration, experience, farming practices, favorite crop, offerings, and what he ultimately hopes to deliver.

Angelo J Grinceri III with his father, Angelo J. Grinceri Jr.

How and why did you start Old Forks Farm?

Since I was born, my father had been using the property, which he called Old Forks Holly Farm, to operate a small nursery where he grew privacy trees.

When I was around 33, I was watching my dad get older, and I really saw how much time and attention are required for the land to be of value. I felt a massive sense of responsibility. I realized that no one would take care of your things unless you chose to do so.

I decided it shouldn't just be an overgrown piece of land. It should be something that's curated and taken care of. That became a driving force behind everything that I was doing. It was the emotional and financial driver because I equated a lot of my purpose to revitalizing and rebuilding that farm into something that could be really special.

It was interesting because our farm, which is now very legal, wasn't actually a legal, tax-identified farm. The first thing I did was contact the USDA, and I found out what was required to make it a farm again.

The property had a few issues. A large part was overgrown by woods, and another, which was a big issue, was that there was no more topsoil in the area that was to be farmed. It was gravel and sand.

Apparently, over the past 30 or 40 years, there was a lot of wind, and there wasn't a wind barrier of trees. All that topsoil got blown away and wasn't managed appropriately.

The first thing I did was work with the USDA. We created what's known as a farm conservation plan. That was the first step in becoming a legally identified farm. It gave us access to the USDA's professionals and expertise. It helped us understand what to do with the soil and what that property specifically needed: a lot of soil regeneration.

One of the most natural ways to regenerate the soil is to take in leaves like decomposing plant matter. You can't accept those things onto your property in New Jersey unless you are cleared and registered with the New Jersey DEP. We had to go through this whole approval process to be able to accept leaves from different towns and local municipalities because leaves from a town are considered a waste product. We did that, and we've been working with them since 2020, really focusing on that.

Angelo worked with the USDA on a soil regeneration program.

What farming practices have you employed?

The first and biggest thing we did was figure out how to bring water throughout the entire property. We had to run large main-line irrigation systems.

The second thing was soil regeneration. So the soil regeneration program that we did with the USDA consisted of three different parts for about four years: collecting leaves, letting those leaves decompose for two years separately in a pile, and then spreading those leaves throughout the property every year. We did that with a manure spreader.

We also plant cover crops. Tillage is a large part of what destroys soil health. Say you plow and overturn the soil, and there is no covering over it. What you'll see in most conventional farms is that they'll go through their summer crop and then till the soil in the fall right before the winter, leaving the soil bare all winter long.

Winter is the windiest time, so all that soil is being blown and also dried out. The wind also dries out the biochemistry of what makes healthy soil.

One of the practices that we really took on was cover crops. As soon as we're done with the crop season for the summer (or even the fall, sometimes), we plant different types of things over the entire property. We chose different species that would also cover nutrient regeneration.

The third thing is that we planted a wildflower field. The USDA had a specialist come to identify the specific wildflowers and collection of plant flowers that would best support bee pollination. We had to get a custom-made seed mix, and it was a blend of 20 different native species. This special blend of these fine seeds was a pain in the butt to plant, because I had to plant them by hand. But we did that to generate a healthier bee population, which would help pollinate everything we have fruiting.

The USDA is fantastic if you choose to work with them. They have all the right tools and people at a farmer's disposal to help transition to organic farming, figure out soil conservation, and follow all these practices. You have to be willing to spend the time doing the office hours and applying for the contracts, but it's completely worth it.

That being said, last year, we started a process for organic transition. They have a specialist come out, identify what you're doing, look at your space, and write up a plan that has to be executed over three years, held consistently for three years, and rigorously checked up on for three years to become organic-certified.

Old Forks Farm's fig trees are a nod to Angelo's heritage.

Do you have a favorite item among the farm’s produce and products?

I identified with figs for a long time because they're a specialty crop specific to Italy, and no one is commercializing them locally. Figs grown commercially on the West Coast, for example, are driven by commercial practices, which drastically change the taste and texture of a fig.

Our figs are phenomenal, and anyone I've given them to is very excited to share that they are the best figs they've ever had. They're usually willing to pay twice as much for them because of their value and quality. And it very much feels like I'm paying homage to my ancestry. 

Book an Old Folks Farm workout class or bring the kids to Santa's Farm Festival. 

Tell us about your workshops and how these connect the farm with the community.

The workshops we've done so far have always been kid-focused. We'll have kids come in and learn how to plant a vegetable. So they'll walk home with a tomato or strawberry plant. It becomes this interactive thing where they design their cup or get their hands dirty. Then, we offered a Christmas series called Santa's Farm Festival.

Santa's Farm was awesome because we put lights on all the tractors, and the kids walked through this lit-up pathway. They were walking in between all the tractors and went through this greenhouse that we called the "candy cane forest," which was a tree nursery. They came around into another greenhouse, which was a maze of trees. And they found arts and crafts hidden in this maze. One craft they did was to decorate a hat, like a Santa hat, and they would put their name on it along with little decorations. After that, they would get to the next station, which was designing a cookie. They would decorate a cookie, get Christmas cookies, and then go through the maze some more and find Santa. They would just freak out because it was a big surprise that Santa would be there.

Santa with a little helper.

I know that's not a farming workshop, but it was the ability to celebrate Christmas in a different setting than what they were used to, while getting comfortable being on a farm. They're walking through dirt and greenhouses, part of our functioning farm property. People say, "Oh, wow, I didn't know that that was how this was done," or "I didn't know this was a thing." So that's been really nice.

This year, we're looking at launching a proper one or two-day-a-week kids' camp where they come and do farm chores for the day and play farm games. That's still in the ideation phase. But that is a goal of ours for the future. We've seen a few other farms do it, with parents raving about the principles and work ethic it instills in the children. It becomes regular if they're coming once or twice a week every week. Imagine how much of a difference that makes in their personality over the summer.

Jessica Eme and Angelo with Gator.

What do you hope to share?

Living in New York City for so long, the farm has always been a safe space for me, where it really allowed me to get out of my head and out of the hustle and bustle of work life. I guess simultaneously, meditation was becoming very large.

I started to realize that the practice of farming is a form of active meditation because you're present. You're actively present when you're doing something. In meditation, the biggest thing they're trying to teach you is how to be present. But you're in a seated meditation class; you're present with doing nothing, right?

The farm has taught me to be very present in the doing, not just in stillness. And I found that to be wildly transformative. There's action and proof that you had intention in what you were doing after spending a day working the land. You can see a physical change. Regular seated meditation doesn't really offer you that. This feels a little bit more purpose-driven for me.

When you're present within the biosphere of a farm, there are so many different things in play. There's the environment, the weather, the soil, insects, rodents, and reptiles—all these different things, and every single thing makes a difference.

I thought that it was such a beautiful observation of life in general. So, all being said, I also have a hatred for convenience. As a society, we're trending towards extreme convenience, where we don't have to cook our food if we don't want to. Commuting is very easy with ride shares and that kind of thing. There's just a lot of wisdom in coming back and learning about how things once were, how things are made and created, and how the earth works. So I try to really share that.

Angelo J. Grinceri III with Laurelette

If you enjoyed this article, consider subscribing to my newsletter for more content and updates!

Thanks to all who braved the Los Angeles traffic to attend my Beneath the Sicilian Stars signing and discussion on September 8 at Vroman's Bookstore in Pasadena, California.

The book is rooted in a rarely told chapter of California history: the Italian Americans who endured curfews, property seizures, forced relocation, and internment during World War II. These stories have long remained in the shadows. 

I shared how this historical novel came to be, explaining that my research for my debut, The Last Letter from Sicily, led to my discovery of Una Storia Segreta, a collection of essays and testimonials by Italian Americans affected by World War II restrictions and imprisonment. The book's editor, Lawrence DiStasi, dedicated the last three decades of his life to bringing these stories to light, helping convince President Bill Clinton to pass the "Wartime Violations of Italian American Civil Liberties Act," which was signed into Public Law 106-451 in November 2000. I was fortunate to have had the chance to meet and interview Mr. DiStasi just weeks before he passed away in May of this year.

Vroman's holds a special place in the historic events portrayed in Beneath the Sicilian Stars. During the war, the bookstore donated and delivered books to Japanese American internees, offering comfort and connection in a time of hardship. Holding this event here felt both literary and deeply historical, honoring Vroman's legacy of community support.

I'm grateful to everyone who attended and sent well wishes. It was touching to see former colleagues alongside new faces in the audience. Everyone you meet influences your journey, and sharing this night with such an engaged group was an honor.

Thank you to Storm Publishing for releasing both of my books to the world this year, and to the small businesses who helped make the evening memorable with customized swag: vegan book-cover cookies from Dottie's House of Sweets (@nicoooo8), lip balm from Bulk Apothecary, and bookmarks from Platinum Print USA.

I appreciate all of the support I've received from those near and far. It means the world to this author.

Thank you for reading and watching. Check out my upcoming events and appearances. 

Like my Sicilian grandparents, Mario Sanfilippo's family emigrated to Milwaukee from Porticello, Sicily, in search of a better life. After his uncle passed away, his grandparents relocated to the Boston area. Mario and his family joined them when he was 10, but always kept a piece of his Tyrrhenian seaside hometown in his heart.

His love of his mother's Sicilian cooking inspired him to seek work in restaurants, starting from a young age. He was just 11 when he got a job at a pizzeria, where he bused tables and washed dishes. Even while pursuing a bachelor's degree at the University of North Carolina, where he played soccer, he would pick up shifts at a local restaurant. He'd continue to do so, even while working in the banking industry.

"Somehow, I always ended up at a restaurant," Mario says. 

In 1992, he left his job to open Mario's Trattoria, an Italian eatery in Dorchester, right in the heart of Boston's Irish section. Six years later, he opened Porticello Ristorante in South Easton, Massachusetts, south of Boston and east of Rhode Island. He shared more about his passion, journey, challenges, favorite dishes, lessons, and what he hopes customers take away.

What do you enjoy most about running a restaurant?

It's social. You've got instant gratification. You give somebody a good product, and they let you know about it. You develop a lot of different relationships along the way, whether it be vendors or patrons. I combined my accounting and all my background in business, and it was helpful opening up a restaurant and figuring out what would work numbers-wise and how we would do it. It's a combination of things, but I enjoy making people happy, which is part of it.

Porticello's housemade sauce 

Was there a pivotal moment in your culinary career?

It was in 1998 when I went from a casual restaurant to a casual fine dining restaurant, where I had to step up my game and surround myself with different talents. I threw myself into it at that point. You think you know a lot, but you're always learning. When I went into the fine dining end of it and became a pretty good chef, I got to where I could handle it. If that key person decided to leave, I knew I would be OK and could move forward.

View from Porticello

What inspired you to name the restaurant after your birthplace?

Porticello will stay with me for the rest of my life. I lived there only for 10 years, but I consider myself very Italian. I stayed connected to the Italian people here in the Boston area and played soccer with all my Italian friends growing up. It kept me watching RAI (Radiotelevisione italiana) on television because my mom and dad could hardly speak English. So, growing up with all that, plus Porticello had a nice ring to it. It's where I was born.

We incorporate certain things into our dining. We're primarily an American Italian restaurant, but we make the arancini the way they do over there. I make panelle and incorporate them into antipasti. I also do pasta.

We incorporate these things and don't miss a beat when we have the Italian Italians that come and dine. They know that we're authentic. 

Porticello serves pizza and pasta, as well as arancini and panelle.

What challenges have you faced?

Most people think about Umbria, Emilia-Romagna, or Tuscany. So it's kind of tough to push Sicilian food because they see it as more like peasant food. They don't look at Sicily the way they look at Tuscany. So it's a risk when you go into business if you want to tell people that you're Sicilian and push your food. There is still this discrimination. 

That was the biggest challenge because you could easily embellish whatever write-up you come up with and not mention Sicily, just talk about Italian food and touch upon all the different regions. It's easy to do that. It's challenging to tell people you're from Sicily, but it came easily to me. I'm proud of where I come from, Porticello.

A vibrant antipasto plate

What are your favorite dishes to serve and why?

I like to cook with a lot of seafood. I like doing Chilean sea bass and cooking with meats, whether a sirloin, filet, or rack of lamb. Those are staples at Porticello. But I also like cooking Sicilian. I like making a salad with fennel, tomatoes, olives, and simple things like that. I like simplicity, so when I grill my seafood, I complement it with a nice salad or potato. 

What lessons have you learned from being in the restaurant business for decades?

Don't stand still because you'll get run over. That's the biggest lesson. Don't worry about what you're doing and not what other people are doing. Worry about putting yourself first. Don't worry about the competition; worry about what you need to do to make yourself better. And it's worked financially. I mean, we get hit like everybody else. When there's a downturn in the economy, everybody feels it. We feel it. But if you're on good footing, you should be able to move forward.

Come for the flavors; stay for the experience.

What do you hope your customers take away from their dining experience at Porticello Ristorante?

I care about them and what I put out, and want them to return. But they know I've made a lot of friends along the way, and they know what I'm all about. I'm not about the money; I'm more about the experience.

If you enjoyed this article, consider subscribing to my newsletter for more content and updates! 

For more than 20 years, Melissa Sepulveda enjoyed a photography career. She took family portraits and provided shots for the advertising department of a high-end handbag company. But everything changed on Mother’s Day weekend of 2019 when she learned she had breast cancer.
 

She chose not to share this news with her mother, who was not feeling well, even after scheduling an August mastectomy. As it turned out, her mother was hospitalized in July, a stay that lasted until September. Melissa had her operation on a separate floor in the same hospital wing, but still, she kept her diagnosis from her mother. She knew it would make things more difficult.
 

After she was discharged from the hospital, Melissa spent two weeks recovering before returning to her mother’s bedside, where she spent her mother’s final days on the pull-out chair until her mother passed on September 16. She was devastated, exhausted from her own recovery, and struggling to make sense of what life looked like without her mother. Her father was already gone. 
 

Melissa turned 50 that December and decided that after such a harrowing spring, summer, and fall, she needed to celebrate. She held a holiday open house without telling anyone it was her birthday—just an opportunity to have fun, relax, laugh, and sing together. 

One of her friends gave her a book called Baking Bread for Beginners. The two had fantasized about opening a cafe.

Melissa didn’t open the book until January, when she made her first loaf of bread. As she kneaded the dough, she was struck by its texture, which, funnily, reminded her of her mother and grandmother.
 

Working with dough reminds Melissa of her mother and grandmother.

“My mother and grandmother both had very soft upper arms, and as kids, my cousins, siblings, and I loved holding on to those arms,” Melissa remembers. “We would call them dough arms, which is what that dough felt like.”

Kneading it was therapeutic, as was the smell of the yeast, which brought her back to her Sicilian grandmother’s kitchen. From then on, she couldn’t stop baking.

Today, as the owner of Forno Bakery in Wareham, Massachusetts, on the southern outskirts of Greater Boston, Melissa bakes and sells breads, cannoli, quiches, focaccia, fonuts (a hybrid of a donut and focaccia), and more. 

We discussed her influences and how she took her baking from personal therapy to a community-oriented business. She shared her challenges, goals, and what she hopes to deliver.

Forno Bakery loaves

How did your grandmother influence your passion for baking?
I consider myself a generationally taught baker, because it's nothing that you can learn in school, or you can learn from a book. It's really your hands-on experience. It was with my grandmother as soon as I could hold some dough. Without knowing it, I was experiencing what that texture felt like, and I liked to feel that. 

I remember distinctly loving the smell of yeast at a very early age. Some people are kind of offended by it, but those two things really resonate with me. 

When I bake now, it's different. It's a feel. It isn't just in my hands. It's almost meditative. It's extremely therapeutic and comforting because I'm returning to my grandmother and mother, who made things differently. 

My grandmother loved to take the time, and she could embroider. She was very, very talented and very creative. When she passed away, we found all these little scraps of paper with different ingredients written on them randomly around her kitchen. They were notes for herself about something she was working on or something she had added as she was baking or making whatever it was. We just realized at that point just how smart she was with very limited resources. 

You have to think about how she arrived on Ellis Island with her little sister in the early 1900s. She was nine years old, one of many children, and a lot of them were still back in Italy. When they came over, she actually had conjunctivitis, so she was separated from her mother when they landed. 

My mom and I went to New York and visited Ellis Island, and just to imagine that my grandmother walked through there… It wasn't just a setup of chairs and suitcases off to the side. She couldn't speak English and was being separated from her mother in a different country. 

She was a child and did not know what was happening. I can't imagine the fear or the anxiety that she must have felt during that time. The next day, she was reunited with her mother, but the idea of that made me so emotional as I stood in that building.

Eventually, all the other family members slowly came over, and everyone was here in Massachusetts. They started in Mansfield, Massachusetts, and then ended up in Quincy, Massachusetts. 

Melissa's grandmother's home in Sicily

My grandmother met my grandfather and married when she was 16. She made her wedding dress, which is just so beautiful. Her sister used to create a Maypole like the one they use for the May Day celebration. She would make paper dresses for all of the girls. You would not even know that they were paper—the craftsmanship, the detail, and all that were so relevant.

I grew up with her. She and her sister were very close, and her sister married my grandmother's husband's brother. So we were so interconnected with this huge family. 

I'd watch my aunt crochet, and my grandmother embroider, bake, make things, and just go about her day. They were always busy doing something productive and very clean. 

My mother liked to do everything very quickly. She did not enjoy the process, whereas I enjoyed it. I really have that connection, and my mother always wanted to make it as fast and efficient as possible.

As a teenager, I remember wanting to make and decorate some cookies. I think William Sonoma had just come out, and they had these giant Christmas cookie cutters. So I got the cutters and told my mother I was going to put one at every place for Christmas dinner. I said, “I need 20, so we're going to decorate these. This is what you do.”

My mother’s cookies ended up looking like something a 3-year-old would do, because again, she just did not have the patience. And I was so into the actual craftsmanship, making, and experience.  

Forno Bakery cannoli

What did you bake with your grandmother?
My grandmother made homemade cannoli. She made the shells. Obviously, I wasn't allowed to fry the shells or anything like that, but we would make that.

We made polenta on the first snow. She'd get out a huge board that sat on the kitchen table, and then she would spread the polenta all over the board. The sauce would go on top of that, and the meatballs and sausage would go on top of the sauce. I would help her stir and spread it out on the board. 

When we made biscotti, I’d help her roll out the dough. That wasn't too often because she was up very early, but she did live around the corner from my house, so I could visit as often as I wanted. 

When she would make things, it wasn't even like she sat me down to say, “OK, now this is how you do this.” It would be mostly from observation and her understanding of taste and smell. She’d say, “Can you smell the salt in the water? That's how you know to put enough.”

You would just see the amounts of the ingredients that went in. I don't even remember anyone teaching me how to make our family's tomato sauce, but I just did it over the years. 

I made bread one time, and she had come over. I was living at home with my parents, and she came over to the house, and I said, “Ma (we called her Ma), I made bread.” 

She kind of looked at it with a discerning eye, which was odd for her. She was very gentle and very kind. She wasn't your stereotypical Italian grandmother with a rolling pin in their hands and yelling or swearing. She wasn't like that at all. I asked, “Do you want to taste it?” and she said, “OK.”

She took a little piece, and the bread had been sitting on the kitchen table under the fan. As it was cooling, it made the house smell good. But I didn't realize that the fan was blowing on it, making the crust nice and crispy. 

She was out of her mind with excitement and joy. As soon as she bit into it and it crunched in her teeth, she looked at me and said, “This is delicious!”

She took some home, and that had to be the biggest compliment from my grandmother.

 

Melissa's boule loaves are Forno Bakery's best sellers.

What inspired you to launch Forno Bakery?

One day, I made 14 loaves out of my little kitchen oven, and my husband was like, “What do we do with these? I love bread, but this is getting a little silly.” And I said, “I'll just post on Facebook, ‘Whoever needs bread—I made extra, come and get it.’”

They did. Then I did it again, and they came and got the bread again. My friends were saying to me, "You can't do this. You can't just give away the bread. You need to sell the bread." And I said, "I'm not a baker." And they said, "We think you are a baker." 

I ended up charging like $5 for a loaf. I didn't do any numbers or anything like that, but it started to catch on really quickly because then COVID came, and people were coming to my door, buying bread, and just finding that sense of community. We were all reaching out to each other. 

My local town market, a general store, wanted to carry my bread, so I sold it to them. It just really caught on like wildfire. But I was just working out of my little oven in my kitchen, finding myself working from five o'clock in the morning until about seven o'clock at night, passing out in bed, and getting up and doing it again. 

I was like, “I can't keep doing this. This is silly.” So, I had to make a decision. I would either go forward or stop because I was at a crossroads. 

One dog walk changed everything.

We got a COVID dog for my son when he wanted a puppy, and one day, I was walking the dog. The town I live in is very Norman Rockwell, unlike anywhere I've ever experienced. Everyone says “Hi” to everybody. Everybody's going to take care of you. And that's just kind of how we roll. 

So I was walking the dog, and I met up with a neighbor, who said, “My wife used to go around the world teaching people how to set up bakeries.” And I said, “Oh, wow. Well, isn't that a coincidence? That's amazing.”

He said, “She's got this commercial oven she wants to give you. It's just hanging out in her warehouse.” I said, “I don't have a location. It's just in my house, and I’m trying to decide which way to go.” 

I just felt like everything in the universe was pointing me toward continuing, and that my mother and my grandmother were part of this. Like, “You need an oven? We'll find one for you.” Your neighbor, two doors down, whom you didn't meet until you got the dog. They have a commercial oven. 

When he said this, I kind of laughed it off and thought, “Nice guy; that’s sweet.” I didn’t do anything about it. 

A few months passed, and he said again, “Amy really wants to give you that oven.” I was like, “OK. I’m going to go and find someplace to put this oven.”

Fast-forward: One of my closest friends did not like her executive job, didn't know what she was going to do, and said, “I want to come on board and help you open up a brick-and-mortar. I'll do whatever you want.” So, we found a spot in the next town over, and that was almost four years ago, last December. 

She quickly realized that baking was not her passion and helped me get off my feet for the first six months to a year, after which I was on my own. 

Owning a business is not an easy feat, but every time I encounter something that would deter me, something else counteracts it. Like the gift of the oven, which tells me, “Keep going.” So, I continue, and I kind of laugh to myself because I'm selling all of the things that my grandmother taught me or made, and we all still make in my family.

The cannoli cream is very specialized for what we do. There are the anise pillows and biscotti, raspberry bars, lemon squares—all those things. I never realized what a gem they were, how special they were, and that other people weren't growing up having those as good or so consistently. 

Shelves full of Forno Bakery goodies

What are your goals?
For so long on this journey, I was just riding the wave. And now that it's established and people know me, people recognize me outside of my town from different silly videos on social media, or they know the name of the bakery. I am floored. It made me kind of rethink, “Am I going to continue this?”

I would love to continue expanding, have management and departments, and have my own free-standing building where I could have a section with classes and a little section for retail. So, ultimately, that's what I would like: to have my own spot.

Quality ingredients and small-batch, hand production: Forno Bakery

 
What do you hope to share?

I'm not a huge baking company where things have to be commercialized and really huge baked. Everything is still small batches and very nice, good-quality ingredients, and everything comes from what I know. I get so much joy from giving somebody something I made and seeing them so thrilled and happy about it. That is returning a feeling of joy to me, and I think without that, I would be very, very lost because that's where I got my joy. 

Don't get me wrong; I love my children, but the core of my joy was the security I had from my parents. I remind myself that my mother had to go through losing her mother, and her mother had to go through losing her mother. They taught me along the way how to deal with this. 

The inside is different from what you see outside, so I always try to fix that inside piece by selling our goodies. 

If you enjoyed this article, consider subscribing to my newsletter for more content and updates!

Since its groundbreaking in 1999, the Italian American Community Center of Rochester has been a celebration destination. The three-story building offers 27,000 square feet of floor space with ballrooms, bocce courts, an Italian-style bar/cafe, offices, a boardroom/classroom, and an area for dancing. 

Locals have booked the facility for weddings, proms, corporate events, engagement parties, birthday bashes, showers, reunions, fundraisers, and quinceañeras. They can also attend IACC events ranging from St. Joseph's Table and Festa Italiana to the Ferragosto Picnic and Christmas Gala. 

It's a place to gather for food and fellowship while tapping into the traditions and history of immigrants from Italy's boot and islands. And no matter where you come from or your family history, "Everyone is Italian who walks through this door," says IACC Office Manager Cassandra Pettrone. 

I spoke with Cassandra and her colleagues, Event Coordinator Erin Noll and Event Coordinator/Cook Sonia Amadio, about their nonprofit organization's efforts to preserve Italian culture, provide a sense of community, and reach younger generations.

How does the IACC maintain its ties to culture while reaching the community?

Erin: We have a strong membership. They'll have their family events here. We have biweekly luncheons where original members come together and prepare the meal with Sonia. We do the St. Joseph's Table, a picnic in June, Ferragosto in August, and the Gala every December. At this past year's Gala, we were able to donate to a local organization called It's About Caring for Kids.

A past IACC St. Joseph's Table. Learn more about this tradition here.

How is IACC engaging with younger generations?

Sonia: We've had Italian classes in the past. We're actually looking at doing cooking classes—Cooking with Nonna—in the future.

It's hard to pull in the younger generation because they're involved in many different activities and sports. For my generation, it wasn't that way. Our parents had a lot more time to bring back to the community, to be here, and to do so many things for the Italian American Community Center. So, we're looking into activities to bring them back, where they can engage with their grandparents or parents. 

Cassandra: I continue to do this type of work in my adult life because of my background. I have always felt very connected with my heritage and where my family came from in Agrigento, Sicily. I took Italian classes from seventh to eleventh grade in high school. So, part of it is finding people who care about their heritage, culture, and continuing traditions. 

IACC caters and hosts weddings, banquets, corporate functions, and school events.

What experience do you hope to share?

Erin: I did not grow up Italian like Sonia and Cassandra. So for me, it's nice. I love learning about the different traditions and the culture. I try really hard to learn the language. I love hearing the stories of how things happened back when members lived in Italy and stories of coming over here. My absolute favorite thing is just learning their history and how everything came about—and then seeing them come together and how everybody's sauce is made. It's like a big family where we can all get together and share stories and feel welcomed.

Sonia: Most members have been here since the very start, so this is their second home. They take pride in the Italian American Community Center and can carry on their traditions. When I cook for luncheons with the members, we come together to bring home cooking back. It is a great community.

Cassandra: The part of the job I love is touching my family's Italian roots and tying them into my everyday life. I feel like our mission is to emulate that with anyone who walks in our building so that they can feel that Italian-American family atmosphere and feel like they're at home, too.

"Everyone is Italian who walks through this door," says IACC Office Manager Cassandra Pettrone.

If you enjoyed this article, consider subscribing to my newsletter for more content and updates!

Beginning in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Italian immigrants with farming backgrounds began arriving in Iowa. However, most came without the money to purchase the necessary land. Instead, they found work in the coal mines of southern and central Iowa, or settled in areas such as Oelwein, Council Bluffs, and Des Moines, where they laid track for the state's railroads or worked on streetcars. After the mines closed, many workers moved to Des Moines and formed their own Little Italy.

In 1981, a small group of proud Italian immigrants founded the Italian-American Cultural Center of Iowa to build on the legacy of those original settlers. The 501(c) (3) organization aims to promote, preserve, and share Italian heritage and culture with the Des Moines metro area and the state of Iowa through a museum, events, and on-site amenities. Even this year, amid renovation and remodeling, the center remains a hub for everything from bocce and Italian language and genealogy classes to a St. Joseph's celebration and gala.

I spoke with Therese Riordan, the Italian-American Cultural Center of Iowa's Secretary of the Board of Governors and Chairperson of the Heritage Advisory Council, whose parents were among the founders. She's been with the organization for more than three decades, honoring her family's largely Calabrian heritage. Her mother, Patricia Civitate, the Center's former Director, remains an active member at 95.

Therese shared more about Des Moines' Italian ties and the organization's offerings, challenges, and goals.

Patricia Civitate speaks to a women's group about the significance of the St. Joseph's Altar and breads.

What most memorable events or initiatives has the Center hosted over the decades?

We hosted RAGBRAI from Veneto when they came over from Italy to ride on the Iowa bike tour. The Center also hosted receptions for visiting Italian sports teams and sometimes gave tours of the city. We also provided meals for people who toured our museum.

Our organization pursued a partnership between the Greater Des Moines Sister Cities and Provinci di Catanzaro in Southern Italy. We've hosted Italian chefs from various regions on three occasions. Folk dancers affiliated with us (although it's a separate organization) have hosted the Italian Folk Art Federation of America Conference in Des Moines twice. And we've sponsored numerous trips to tour Italy.

At our museum, we've had some nice, one-of-a-kind things come in. We have a large display of regional hats donated by a lady in New York. We also received puppets. Someone recently donated a hand-carved Italian Jesus made from Italian wood, and a story goes with that. Somebody even gave us a grand piano, and for me, that was exciting.

Day camp members learn about Venice.

Tell us about your children's day camp.

Children from ages six to 12 are invited to spend the week with us, and it's a themed week. This past year, we set an Italian table. They made a centerpiece and an appetizer, and they learned the Italian language around those things, watched videos, sang songs, and did some crafts.

Every day, they do a craft, learn the Italian language, cook, make music, and play a game. They have five days to put together an Italian meal, which they can take home.

We've done some fun stuff. I don't think we'll do volcanoes again. That year, we had 21 kids, which is an unusually large number. They made their own volcanoes after we studied the Italian volcanoes. We let them have them erupt, and it was very exciting, but it was very messy. That was a good time.

The children meet La Befana, Italy's beloved Epiphany witch.

Tell us about your other offerings.

The Iowa Genealogical Society of Iowa has generously allowed us space for our language classes. They have been approximately twice a year for the last three or four years. They have been fairly well attended, and people on their way to Italy are always anxious to take them. We're hoping to continue doing those.

We offer translation services for people who need them and have provided dual citizenship classes. We also have a lady who's extremely good with genealogy, so she's very welcoming and helpful whenever there's a question. 

We hosted our St. Joseph altar celebration and Italian Father's Day in March, an activity we haven't been able to do recently because of COVID. It involves putting together a large center altar and then six or more side altars, and they all have to be decorated and laid out with memorabilia from the organization that sponsors it, plus fruits and vegetables. It used to be with a dinner, but we couldn't do that this year. But they did a beautiful job of decorating.

Members prepared veggie frittatas to donate to the Catholic Worker House as part of their annual St. Joseph Altar celebration.

Are there any upcoming events you're particularly excited about?

We will have our October heritage month—whatever we can do without being in the building. We will have a large fundraising dinner in November, which should be extremely nice. We haven't done this for a few years, but there's a new committee working on it, and it should be beautiful. It will feature a chef from Italy.

What are your challenges and goals?

The challenge in the capital campaign is always money. And everybody wants the same pot of money, so that's one of the things we're working for. Our plan is not just to be a place for Italians. Our plan is to be a place where we can share what being Italian means with everybody else. It's not a clubhouse. It's a place to learn about our background, our customs, and how they fit into the fabric of the United States and Iowa.

The Italian American Cultural Center of Iowa's mitten tree, a collection of donated hats, scarves, and mittens, is distributed to neighborhood centers.

What do you hope to share?

We hope that we'll be a place where people can come and share their stories and learn about Italy, the background of some of the people who came here, and their contributions to the state of Iowa and the United States. Unfortunately, one of the things that, if you say Italian, is the first thing people think of is the mafia. There is so much more than that. There are so many contributions that Italians have made to the world and the state of Iowa that we would like to highlight, and we'd like to give this an opening for people to come in and talk about themselves and their backgrounds.

Boasting one of the most authentic Sicilian food festivals in the region of Pennsylvania's Lehigh Valley and Western New Jersey, Holy Cross Society members are proud to pass on the traditions of their ancestors, who migrated from Santo Stefano di Camastra in the Province of Messina. The organization has evolved since its 1911 founding while staying true to its deep Sicilian roots. Each September, they host their annual Holy Cross Celebration & Sicilian Food Festival, which began as a reenactment of Santo Stefano di Camastra's own La Festa del Letto Santo in which classic Sicilian foods are served, a queen is crowned, and music and fellowship are shared.

I spoke with Jim Palmeri, a member of Holy Cross Society's Board of Trustees and webmaster of holycrosssociety.com, whose grandparents were founding members, about the organization's history, how it promotes Sicilian heritage, the challenges it faces, and its goals as members embrace the future.

What is the history of the Holy Cross Society?

It started with my grandparents and that generation, who came from the same town in Sicily, Santo Stefano di Camastra. Like many organizations at that time, it was what we call today a mutual aid society, providing assistance with reading and writing English, immigration law, financial assistance, and job placement.

We are into the third and fourth generations of people from that same town in Easton, Pennsylvania, with about 65 families still with connections to the homeland. 

2011 Queen Gina Palmeri holds court between former Auxiliary President Sandy Callery and former President Tony Tumminello.

How does the society continue to promote Sicilian heritage in the community?

We have a meeting once a month. There's a Men's Society and a Ladies Auxiliary. Every September, we hold a festival at the same time as one held in our town in Sicily at the church called Letto Santo. About 114 years ago, our grandparents reenacted the same celebration here as their relatives did in Sicily. We focus much of our work around that festival because it's a bit of a homecoming time. 

So families come back to town. Usually, there are two days of festival time, Friday and Saturday. Then, on Sunday, we have a Mass of the Holy Cross at our local Catholic church, where we all process in. The priest talks about the Holy Cross. (It's the Feast of the Holy Cross on the second Sunday of September.)

We also crown the queen. Usually, she's the granddaughter or daughter of one of our members. And she has a court. She has to write an essay about why she should be part of the celebration. We're promoting our Sicilian heritage to the next generation.

Much of the learning is stories we tell about our parents or grandparents; many of us travel back and forth to our Sicilian town and still have cousins there. So we talk with them about what they're doing and what's going on in that town, and share what's happening in this town.

Every year, one of our members, Sal Panto, who is also the mayor of Easton, does a trip there and invites people to go. He has opened it up to the public to get enough for a group, but there are always several members of our society. It's really kind of a cultural exchange and immersion.

Those trips started on the hundredth anniversary of the Holy Cross Society when we did a bit of a pilgrimage. Maybe 30 of us went to Santo Stefano and spent almost a week connecting with our relatives. It was a really good way to reinvigorate the relationships. Then, a group from Santo Stefano came to Easton to celebrate our hundredth. We went over in the summer, and they came over in September.

Tell us about your members.

Right now, we'll get 35 to 40 members to attend a monthly meeting of the 80 members, which is pretty good. Our charter is closed. You must be a relative of someone from Santo Stefano or married to someone from Santo Stefano.

Holy Cross Society members march together in procession.

What are the highlights of your annual celebration?

Years and years ago, the organization used to actually march through the streets of Easton, and people would come out and donate money, and they would go from house to house when many of the Italian people lived in the inner city. Now, with suburbia, that doesn't happen so much anymore. So we still do a procession, but we do it around our chapel grounds just outside of the city instead of through the city streets. It's kind of a neat thing. 

The Lehigh Valley Italian American Band comes back every year on Saturday night, and they play. There was a song called "#9" that was composed by the leader of what was the predecessor of the Italian American band led by a guy named Charlie Perello. That song has persevered so much that we still play it today at our festival. When it goes on, people start to clap and sort of sway along with the song, and they know it. It's almost like the Notre Dame fight song; it's recognizable. But that's part of the tradition of the festival. It's part of connecting our roots. 

Lehigh Valley Italian American Band performs for Holy Cross Celebration attendees.

How are you reaching the next generation?

Every organization—whether it be our organization, Rotary, or Kiwanis clubs—is wondering what will happen with the next generation. And we have been extremely fortunate. Our children, who are now in their thirties, forties, and fifties, are getting involved. Their kids are now in the queen's court and learning about their heritage.

We give out higher educational grants to children who are from our lineage. And if we have money left over from that fund, we then extend it to students who are attending Catholic schools. 

One of our members, our former president, Nick Alfero, is very big on making certain that it's fun for the kids to be there, so they understand that it is not just a carnival. That's part of their heritage. And we serve all kinds of Sicilian food. We still have the tripe; we still serve the octopus salad.  

In addition, we have Christmas parties for the kids now. We'll do an Easter egg hunt, and for the first time, we're going to have a picnic just for the families. During the celebration, we're all working. So it's part of a homecoming, and we interact with people from the public, but now we're going to have a picnic just for us.

What do you hope to share with your members and community?

I think we share with the members that people came here as immigrants for a better life, hoping that most of them are living a better life (which I believe those who belong really kind of do), and reminding them of the hardships that their grandparents experienced to come to America and why they came to America.

My grandparents came over pre-World War I. And Sicily wasn't a great place to live then. My cousin, Pippo Torcivia, lives in Santo Stefano. He's a very successful ceramic artist. The town is known for its ceramics. So if you go there, there's a bunch of ceramic factories. 

Pippo and I are second cousins because his mother, my grandmother, and their brother, Uncle Santo, were siblings. Our great uncle and my grandmother came to America. Pippo's grandmother was left in Sicily because she was married. The other two were still single when they came here.

One night, when we were talking, Pippo told me that my Uncle Santo would come back to Sicily. He was a bachelor. He worked on the railroads. So, he did well for himself. And he didn't have a family. He would go back and forth and buy people shoes. He would give his sister money to live on.

As Pippo is telling me this story, he's crying. He pulled me aside and very seriously said, "Can I ask you where Uncle Santo was buried?" I said, "Yeah, I know what the cemetery is."

He says, "Would you take me there?" And I said, "Sure." And on the way, he turned to me and said, "Can we buy flowers somewhere?" So, I took him to a greenhouse that was not far from the cemetery. 

I took him to the cemetery and showed him the grave. He went with these flowers, sat there, and sobbed like a baby.

To me, that brought it all together, how we're two cultures that are really bound. So you have to tell those stories to the kids about where they came from. And we have some pretty darn good young adults who are coming in and joining the organization.  

If you enjoyed this article, consider subscribing to my newsletter for more content and updates!

With 19th-century roots as a fishing village of immigrants from Genoa and Sicily, San Diego's Little Italy came into its own in the 1920s as a vibrant neighborhood and tuna capital of America.

Fishing was plentiful, but so were opportunities for seafood processing and marketing. Other Italians chose to open restaurants where they served the fish that locals caught.

But World War II brought change.

Italian residents without U.S. citizenship were labeled "enemy aliens." And in San Diego, fishermen (like their peers on the East Coast) were restricted from their livelihood. In some cases, boats were requisitioned for military use.

The city's tuna clipper fleet would shrink nearly 30% by 1959, and when Interstate 5 opened, it sliced through Little Italy. But while families were displaced, many held onto their businesses and places of worship, like Our Lady of Rosary Church.

Today, Little Italy stands as downtown San Diego's oldest continuous neighborhood business district, supported by civic and heritage organizations, including Convivio, founded in 2003.

Executive Director Tom Cesarini grew up immersed in Italian culture and language, with parents who emigrated to the United States from Aspra, Sicily, in the 1960s. He launched Convivio with a focus on preserving and promoting his heritage and its contributions to San Diego.

We discussed the factors that informed that decision, the key challenges he and his team have faced, the most impactful programs they have developed, and their plans for the future, including the establishment of a new Italian-American cultural center and museum.

Men stand in the racks along the edge of the boat, three-pole fishing for tuna in rough seas.  The larger tuna often ranged between 100 and 200 pounds, requiring two to three men to pull the fish on board. (Courtesy of the Portuguese Historical Center)

What led you to launch Convivio?

Our Little Italy in San Diego was getting redeveloped at the time, after having almost disappeared altogether through the 1980s. The Merchant Association brought that back, but culture and history were disappearing rapidly.

I had volunteered in San Diego for several arts and cultural groups, all promoting Italian culture. But there was a lot of infighting. And so as a volunteer, I was left in the cold, wondering, "What just happened?"

I decided to give it a go myself. I had enough knowledge as a volunteer and was self-educated on nonprofits in general, but I looked at the gaps in knowledge that I had to fill to do it properly. I applied to a nonprofit leadership program at the University of San Diego, got accepted, and that opened up the doors.

Between 2003, when I founded Convivio, and 2005, when I started the program, I was just putting it together—events and programs—and looking for support slowly but surely.

Two years of the Master's program really helped a lot, and for 22 years, we've done a lot. We have a great track record. I'm really proud of it.

We have a good volunteer team, and it's still growing. We're always trying to get to the next level in the nonprofit world.  

Washington Elementary School was architecturally modeled after the White House. When this photograph was taken in 1940, the interior was made predominantly of marble, and lion heads originally marked the front entrance but were later removed. The school served the entire Italian community. Sadly, the original building was torn down in 1980. The school, however, was rebuilt for another generation of young San Diegans. (Courtesy of Fran Marline Stephenson)

Describe Convivio's focus.

One of our core components is our heritage preservation program. We establish digital archives to save those stories through photographs and oral histories. It's one of the things we do, but it's a very important one.

We do a lot. There's something for everybody. Films, author presentations, a book club, a film club, concerts, Italian classes… You name it, we are open to it. The goal is to provide a space for people just to come together, congregate, and build relationships.

Why is creating a community space so important?

Other ethnic communities have cultural centers and shared spaces. We had Little Italy, we had the neighborhood, and we had the church that served as an anchor for a hundred years. But I wanted to do something a little bit different, expand our vision for the community.

I asked people, "What are your ambitions as an Italian-American, as a leader, as a community member? What are your aspirations? What are you looking for?" And across the board, they all said the same thing: we need a home.

It aligned with what I already knew, but I needed that data. It's not just me saying it, it's the entire community saying it, and this is what we have to try to deliver. So we try to fill in those gaps in programming.

Processions were of vital importance to the parishioners, and remain so to this day. In this image, circa 1945, the San Diego County Administration building is prominent in the background. The procession is heading toward the wharf, as was customary, culminating in the return to the church. (Courtesy of Our Lady of the Rosary Parish)

How does collaboration play a role?

We're all about collaboration. Who can we work with? How do we leverage each other's strengths, and how do we better our community and work more efficiently?

Instead of saying all the time, "I'm Sicilian" or "I'm Tuscan," let's also unite and not be so competitive. We saw many San Diego clubs competing for resources. I said, "We're not going to get anywhere this way. We've got to really focus our efforts on coming together."

We've partnered with San Diego Opera, San Diego Symphony, and non-Italian arts and cultural groups. With those, it's about "How do we leverage their power? How can they best work with us to benefit both us and them?"

That component of what's in it for us often has a negative connotation, but it's important. We have to look at ourselves if we want to keep going. It's almost like that self-care notion of if you don't take care of yourself, you can't take care of anybody else.

So, how does it benefit both our organizations? If we can look at that and come up with something, it's win-win literally for both parties involved in the project.

What have been your challenges to date?

The biggest lament is funding for all nonprofits, especially in the arts. We're constantly struggling to deal with either budget cuts or grant cuts.

We have private donors who support us. On the grant side, we have fee-for-service programs to raise money. We have retail that we try to raise funds for, so we're always exploring new funding streams.

As far as heritage goes, a big challenge has been overcoming stigmas with the community, and overcoming the fact that Italians can be very private. For example, we published a couple of books.

There were pictorial history books on the community. One was on San Diego's Little Italy, and a couple of years later, we did one on the fishing industry, which was huge in San Diego.

I was out knocking on doors, trying to collect photographs. That was a challenge. Some people donated photos, but others were concerned about what we would do with their photos.

We're trying to educate the community at large about the importance of our organization, mission, and vision. Our vision is to create a museum and a cultural center on a large scale. And so now we're introducing that in many ways and trying to gather everybody together.

It's getting better now. New generations have come into the existing organizations. We're seeing a lot of partnering with events with different organizations that you wouldn't have seen before. If the Italian community is going to prosper and move forward, we have to come together eventually.

The fishing canneries employed many of San Diego's residents, especially women, during the 1920s and 1930s. This group of young women worked for the Westgate Cannery and is pictured outside the company in 1936. Sarah Gangitano Bono is seen kneeling in the front row, on the left; others in the photo are unidentified. (Courtesy of Marie Bono Sohl)

Which program has had the most significant impact?

The Heritage Preservation Program. We've amassed thousands of images, done oral histories, and now, we're putting together a repository, moving toward an actual physical museum for San Diego and an arts and cultural center space.

I think that's the most important one, because that was severely lacking. We have other groups doing spaghetti dinners and fish fries, and similar events. We do a lot of those things, too. But as far as a more academic bent to organizations, that was lacking. 

Is there a success story that stands out from your initiatives?

We had a donor buy property in Little Italy and donate the use of it to us. So we will be establishing a larger cultural center and finally a museum.

We have a small space we work out of now. It's a little cottage, a little fishing home that's been preserved, and it serves its purpose well for us now, but we want to expand and create a larger museum and cultural center.

We're in the planning stages right now. So after 22 years of knocking on doors and saying, "This is important," it's coming to fruition, and people are starting to buy into it.

My philosophy is essentially the Lao Tzu mantra: a leader is best when people barely know he exists; the people will say they did it themselves. When all is said and done, the goal is to get the people to do what they need to do. It's a huge deal for San Diego's Italian American community.

AMICIBAR in Little Italy, Convivio's current space

What do you ultimately hope to share?

It goes back to why I started the organization, which was to create and sustain a space where people can come together, put their phones down, sit at a table with strangers, start a conversation, and just learn from each other. That's what our space is meant to be.

There's this notion of a third space or place. The first place is your home. Second place is your work. Where's your third place? Where do you go for community?

That's really what Convivio is about in a nutshell: where you go for community. That's what we try to cultivate.

I ultimately hope to share a place where people can do that and learn about Italian culture, but also learn about each other.

When I chose the name Convivio, I was looking for a name that represented that, and hopefully it does. I can't find a better one. Uniting and coming together. That's what I hope to share with purpose. 

Discover Convivio in person and meet me for this special book event.

If you enjoyed this article, consider subscribing to my newsletter for more content and updates!

August 16 marks another trip around the sun.

It has been a year of firsts, unforgettable experiences, and reconnection. My last birthday was spent on a two-week research road trip for Beneath the Sicilian Stars, visiting the WWII internment camp at the Historical Museum at Fort Missoula, paddling Oregon’s Lost Lake, and seeing Glacier National Park’s few remaining ice masses.

Four months of nonstop writing followed as I finalized The Last Letter from Sicily. Although my debut was published in January, the hometown launch came in February with a front-page feature in Racine’s Journal Times, bookstore events at Vintage and Modern Books and Boswell Book Company, and reunions with friends and family.

Since then, I have finished a third novel, taught writing workshops, attended the Historical Novel Society North America conference in Las Vegas, and celebrated Beneath the Sicilian Stars' release with a virtual launch party and a Railroad Book Depot appearance.

Now, just over a month after my second launch, it is incredible to see reader reviews and hear about the ways people connect with my work.

What a remarkable trip around the sun it has been. Thank you for your friendship. Here’s to another year of adventure together!

Anthony Campanella spent four decades serving in some of America's most vital and sensitive roles, with tenures in the Marine Corps, the Defense Intelligence Agency, and the Department of Homeland Security. His work spanned intelligence analysis, crisis management, and international security cooperation, including deployments to active war zones. Yet no matter how far he traveled, he remained deeply rooted in his Sicilian heritage—something he says shaped his identity and perspective throughout his career. That connection has guided him to a quieter, more grounded chapter: an off-the-grid retirement as a self-described povero contadino (poor farmer) in rural Sicily.

He recently shared more about his professional and ancestral background, what inspired his move, his challenges, his favorite places in Sicily, and advice for those wishing to settle down on Italy's largest island.

Tell us more about your professional background.

It goes back 40 years after high school. I joined the Marine Corps and was an intelligence specialist, which is a precursor to coming here, because my last two years in the Marine Corps, I spent on a Navy ship in the middle of the Mediterranean. It was summertime—no wars, no conflicts. It was basically a Liberty Cruise, where we just visited 11 countries in the Mediterranean and enjoyed the heck out of it—great weather, great people, beaches, and food. The cost of living was cheap.

After the Marine Corps, I went back to college, finished my degree, and was hired by the Defense Intelligence Agency in their crisis management shop. We dealt with all current operations around the world, whether it was Haiti, Somalia, Iraq, or wherever there was a hotspot. We were the ones who provided national-level intelligence support to the warfighters.

I have deployed three times to "active" war zones. The first was for six months in support of Bosnia at the NATO Combined Air Operations Center in Vicenza, Italy. While my colleagues were being sent to places like Tuzla and Sarajevo, I was out of danger and safe and sound in the land of pizza and vino.  

After that, I was given a Cuba assignment, which didn't amount to anything, so we never even made it to Cuba. We made it as far as Norfolk, Virginia.

The third one was in Brazzaville, Congo, because of a coup in Zaire. They thought we might need to evacuate the embassy staff and American citizens. But again, that fizzled out.

While I was in Brazzaville, I was selected to be the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) representative to the White House. So, I spent two years as a staff member of President Clinton's National Security Council in the White House Situation Room.

It was a 24-hour operation center monitoring worldwide events. You think you'll live the glory when you brief the president on a major event, but when something does happen, obviously, it's in the moment, and you don't have any answers and get yelled at.

Really, a great job. It was very exciting. The best two years of my life, I think, professionally.

After that, I left government service and went into consulting, working for the Joint Chiefs of Staff on September 11 in the Pentagon. When the plane came in, I was the luckiest man in America. I was on the opposite side of the building and didn't see, hear, feel, smell anything. So I was never, ever in danger. Just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time or the right place at the wrong time because I was on the opposite side of the building and had nothing there.

After that, the Department of Homeland Security was formed in response to the terrorist attacks. I went to work in the intelligence section for General Hughes, who used to be the director of DIA. He became the first assistant secretary for intelligence at DHS.

I helped them form what became the DHS intelligence apparatus. I did that for a few years, and then I left and went to do foreign military sales and security cooperation with foreign governments on behalf of the U.S. government. I traveled extensively in Europe and Asia to support the U.S. government in providing material solutions to foreign governments.

It was interesting for a kid from Everett, Massachusetts. I always have to reiterate: Never, at one point in my life, have I ever seen a shot fired in anger. Nor have I ever been in any kind of danger zone. I've been extremely lucky to have spent that long of a career in and around international crises, but never once has it touched me.

 Anthony took his mother and aunt to Pietraperzia for the first time in 1997.

What is your connection to Sicily?

All four of my grandparents were born and raised in Sicily. My father's parents were from Messina, and they immigrated in 1906. My mother's parents are from Pietraperzia, which is in the dead geographic center of the island. I always say it has more sheep than people. My maternal grandfather came over in 1911, and my grandmother came over in 1913.

What inspired you to move to Sicily?

My grandparents romanticized the island: fig trees on every corner, apricots whenever you want them, and prickly pears by the dozens. This is true, but I also knew there was a reason they left, so I took it with a grain of salt.

I had never come as a kid or as a young adult. My first time here was in 1988, but it was only a short visit while I was in the Marine Corps. But I had spent a lot of time in the Mediterranean during the summer, so that was when I first started saying, "This is going to be a great place to retire."

It's a great launch point for any other place in Europe or Northern Africa if you want to travel and explore. But it was always kind of a pipe dream. Alfred Zappala of You, Me, and Sicily! used to own a little food store in Lawrence, Massachusetts, called All Things Sicilian. So, after I had gone home for some vacation, my mother and I took a ride up there to check out the shop.

There was a book, Many Beautiful Things,  written by Vincent Schiavelli, an actor in Ghost, Fast Times at Ridgemont High, and Night Shift. He had made the transition from the States to retiring in Polizzi Generosa. The book was just so captivating, and he made it sound so seamless.

In hindsight, I probably should have said, "Of course, they all welcomed you, Vincent Schiavelli; you're a multimillionaire actor." But that was when I started to put it into motion.

Why not? I mean, I had basically lived away from my family since 1984. So it wasn't like I was living with my family on the street and then taking off and replanting myself. I was used to communicating via texts, phone calls, emails, and whatever it was, and seeing them once or twice a year for holidays and summer vacation. So it wasn't a major transition for me.

I said, "Now's the time. You're not getting any younger; enjoy your life—what's left of it."

Anthony moved to Sicily with just three bags.

What challenges did you face settling in Sicily?

First, I wanted to exercise my right to Italian citizenship, and that's a nightmare. Even when you follow the rules, it's a nightmare. Well, I didn't follow the rules because I had a top-secret security clearance with the government, and I couldn't apply for a foreign citizenship while the government was entrusting me with their precious secrets. They don't take it kindly if you're pledging allegiance to a foreign government when they provide you with this. So I had to wait until I retired.

I had two options. I could stay in the States for two years and go through the long process of getting my citizenship, but then I would be living in the U.S. with the U.S. cost of living, which would drain resources. Or I could come here and wing it, which is what I did.

It got done. And I'm legal. Everything's legal now. I pay my taxes, I do everything. The Carabinieri are not coming to the door.

The strange thing is that when you apply for citizenship, you do so at the city hall here at the Comune, which is unheard of in the States. You wouldn't just go to your city hall to apply for citizenship.

When I applied for citizenship, I went to the Stato Civile and they told me, "We can't accept your application because you don't have residency here. You need to go to the Anagrafe and get residency."

So I ran over to the Anagrafe and said, "Hey, I bought a house. I live here. I need to get my residency." They said, "OK, well, where's your long-term visa?" I was like, "Oh, I don't have one. I'm here on my tourist passport."

They said, "We can't give you residency. If you only have a tourist passport, you need to go to the Questura in Syracuse and apply for a long-term, elective residency visa. They'll give you your one-year elective residency visa, Signora Izzo will accept your application, and everybody goes home happy."

So I went up to the Questura and told them the story, and they said, "No, no, no, no, you don't need to do that at all. You go back and tell Signora Izzo to accept your paperwork because she will fill out a form as soon as she accepts it. It comes to us, and we give you your long-term visa because now you're awaiting adjudication."

So, basically, A told me to go to B, B told me to go to C, and C told me to go to A, and nobody was budging. We finally broke the logjam because the guys in the Anagrafe Office did me a solid favor, and I was able to obtain residency without the long-term visa.

It ended up working out. Two weeks later, I got my citizenship, and everybody went home happy, especially me, and probably Signora Izzo in the Comune, because I think she was sick of seeing my face.

I moved to Avola, Provincia di Siracusa. I had visited here three times before, in the 1990s, in 2011, and then again in 2015. My requirements were that I wanted to be 10 minutes from the beach and an hour from the airport.

This zone is beautiful. It's close enough to Syracuse, close enough to the airport, and right on the beach. So it met, checked off all the checkpoints, and I'm glad to be here.

Good Friday in Pietraperzia

Describe your lifestyle.

I call myself a povero contadino, a poor farmer in terms of both money and the quality of my stuff.

A British friend of mine here was renting from this woman who owned this farm up in the mountains. She said, "Hey, you know everybody. Can you come look at this place? She's trying to sell it. It's been in her family her whole life. She's 81 years old, and she can't care for it anymore. She has three kids and 10 grandkids, and they don't want it."

So I said, "Sure, I'll come up and look at it."

I went up to the mountains and saw the place. There is a house there, but the house is not supposed to be there. So they've kind of let it go astray. But it has a beautiful brick oven barbecue area, 120 trees, and about two acres of land where I can plant my fruits and vegetables in the ground.

I asked my friend, "Well, what is she asking for?" She said, "10,000." And I bought it right away.

The owner is now 86 years old, and whenever I collect anything from the trees —whether it's apricots, pears, peaches, figs, quince, or cherries —I always bring a big cestino, a large basket, to the woman. After all, I figured she's had this her whole life. She didn't want to sell it; she was forced because she couldn't keep up with it.

So I give her all that stuff, and she's very, very thankful all the time. But if I plant something in the ground—lettuce, zucchini, eggplant, or tomatoes—and I bring it down to her, she says, "Non voglio," I don't want it. And I'm like, "Why don't you want it?" She says, "Not mine."

The trees used to be hers, so she has an affinity for the trees, but if I put something in the ground, she doesn't want it. She'll accept the tree stuff because she knows that she's responsible for those trees being as productive as they are.

I was not looking for a farm. I was not looking for some land. I had no real desire, certainly no skill.

I keep learning every day, but I don't sell anything. I give everything away. I get about 135 liters of olive oil a year and just hand it out. I use that as tips to my barber, butcher, and folks who won't accept tips. And then I give the rest away to family, friends, and visitors.

I do the same with all the fruits and vegetables. I just give what I can't eat to my neighbors here. It's definitely not a money-making scheme!

Anthony practices a new farming technique. 

How did you prepare yourself for this lifestyle?

I winged it. For somebody who, at work, is very fastidious in planning everything, I figured it out when I got here, and that's literally what I did.

I have one cousin who lives in Pietraperzia and speaks English and Sicilian fluently. He's been a godsend whenever I've needed assistance trying to meander through some kind of bureaucracy or vehicle issue or something like that. So he's been very, very helpful. So I did have a support system here—a support system of one, but that's really all I needed. And I had traveled to probably 60 or so countries before I moved here, so I think I'm very good at assimilating.

I wasn't worried about coming in and not having my Starbucks or my McDonald's. So that stuff was never a problem. The bureaucracy is the bureaucracy.

Citizenship was really the hardest thing. I had told people that I think the motto for Italian bureaucrats is, "As long as I've done nothing, I've done nothing wrong. So you can't tell me I messed up. I didn't do anything, so I didn't do anything wrong."

That was my biggest headache, because I'm a get-stuff-done kind of guy. But I just kept telling myself, "Hey, you're paying a euro a kilo for fruit. Settle down, suck it up, and go with the flow." Other than that, there were no transition problems whatsoever.

When I bought this house here, I technically didn't even know I had bought it. I had come here on a Friday night, and we looked at it with a realtor, and I made my offer. They said, "We have to talk to the owners." I said, "Sure, no problem."

We were leaving town 15 minutes later, and he called and said, "They accepted the offer. Can you come back on Monday to do the paperwork?" I said, "Sure."

I thought the paperwork was writing out the formal offer, but they tossed me the keys after I signed. I didn't even give anybody a penny.

So, even buying the house was simple. Obviously, no homeowner's inspection, no insurance. Because two days later, I called my cousin. I was like, "Filippo, we forgot to get insurance." He said, "What do you need insurance for?" I said, "I bought a house. What if it catches on fire?" He goes, "What's going to catch on fire?" I said, "Well, if somebody breaks in and steals something?" He goes, "You buy a new TV; what do you care?" I was like, "Well, what if somebody falls down my stairs?" He goes, "They fall down your stairs. Who cares?"

I've lived in this house for more than seven years and have never paid a penny in insurance, which is crazy to me, but that's the way it is.

What are your favorite places in Sicily and why?

I absolutely love Agrigento's Valley of the Temples. That's my favorite tourist spot. Other than that, I just love to go into the center of the country, go to Valguarnera Caropepe, or one of these small towns that have been abandoned by those who have had a mass exodus to the States, because it still has that look, that feel, that flavor of 1947.

Pietraperzia is a grand example. You go into the piazza in the daytime, and there are 200 men out there playing cards, drinking beers, and yelling at each other. They're there every single day.

There are no women; I'm not saying that's a good thing, but just that mentality that they're still in 1947. And I'll often ask my cousin's wife, "Why are there no women in town?" She goes, "Why would we want to go down there? That's where all the guys are." That's kind of their mentality.

There's a peace in that where there's no hustle and bustle. Being in D.C. for 30 years, that's a major transition. Obviously, I like Ortygia or Ragusa. I'm not a big fan of Taormina because I always tell people that it's not really Sicily. I'm not much of a fan of the big, big cities on the island. I just prefer a laid-back vibe.

A scene from the Pietraperzia Piazza

What advice do you have for those considering a move to Sicily?

First and foremost, be patient. Understand that you're a guest in this country. Even once you get your citizenship, you're still a guest here. Understand that, and then just understand the processes and work within those processes.

I try never to give advice. I tell people what happened to me. I won't give you advice because the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. That's the definition of normalcy here. You and I could do the exact same thing and have different results because you got a different clerk on a different day who is in a different mood. And so you can't say, "This is what I did, because you said you need these four documents," because they'll take those four documents and say, "Nope, you need two other documents." Or they'll say, "Why are you bringing me this stuff? I don't need it. I just need this one piece of paper."

For me personally, that's it. I would just ride the wave. It sounds weird, but what's going to happen is going to happen to you, and there's nothing that will prepare you for it. So, just have your Aperol spritz in the afternoon. Have a granita in the morning. If you're going to sit at the Questura for six hours, sit at the Questura for six hours.

Other than that, you just have to have the right mindset. You've got to be accepting of people and how they operate and work here. You have to have patience.

Just remember how lucky you are to be here. This is a beautiful, beautiful place.  

If you enjoyed this article, consider subscribing to my newsletter for more content and updates!

Wine has always been a part of Ottavio Angelico's life. He grew up amid generations of winemakers in Grammichele within the Province of Catania, Sicily. While he chose to embark on a different path, studying robotics engineering in Canada and finding work in the packaging industry in the United States, those roots drew him back. 

Three years ago, he and his wife, Lily, opened Angelico Winery in Lambertville, New Jersey, near the banks of the Delaware River. Visitors can pull up a chair at the 50-person tasting room and sip wines from familiar grapes, such as Barbera, Sangiovese, Cabernet Franc, Chardonnay, Pinot Grigio, and Riesling, as well as more unique varieties, like Baco Noir and Traminette. All are picked by hand from the couple's vineyard. The wines are produced using low-intervention, natural winemaking techniques that embrace the unique microbial environment of the Angelico vineyard, in contrast to the more technical, controlled winemaking approaches common in the United States. 

Lily and the two Angelico sons oversee most operations for the team of 10, while Ottavio continues to work as a full-time packaging manager for L'Oréal. Thus, the winery is truly a family business.  

Ottavio and I discussed his journey, unique winemaking process, challenges, rewards, and what he hopes to share along the way.

How did Angelico Winery get its start?

I'm an engineer in L'Oreal's packaging department. I would buy grapes from a local supplier and make wine at home. It was, for me, a passion, a hobby, something that expressed my culture.

I was buying equipment to the point where I had a mini lab in my basement. I read books, and my winemaking improved. One day, I just said to myself, "The wine here, in the United States, honestly is just waking up." I felt like it was missing somebody who could share some background or maybe share what the culture means for wine.

So it started from that, and I told my wife one thing we could do: stay working for a corporation for the next 20 years and retire or spend the next 20 years doing it on our own.

My wife is from China; it's a different culture, and she was born in the city. She told me, I see that you have the passion you spend every weekend or during your hobby time. She knew what I had in the basement. We had a cellar with over 2,000 bottles of wine, something crazy, all kinds from 2002 when I started until now.

She said, "This is your passion, so why not work for another winery instead of spending money on a winery?"

And I said, "Let me try to work for somebody and see if it's just a temporary fever that I got."

So I went to work for a local winery, went straight to the owner, and said, "I'm here just because I want to open my own winery."

He told me, "You know what? I see you have a passion. I see you want to open a winery, and I need somebody who works a little bit everywhere."

So I ended up working for 11 years, making wine with his staff members. I spent my vacations and my weekends working with them.

Six years ago, my wife and I said we were ready. We sold our house, and with all our savings from selling the house, we purchased this 10-acre land that we have here today with all the things you see here when you come to visit us: vineyards, the winery, and all the landscaping. And it was done by my family. 

Sons Antonio and Giulio started helping at a young age. 

Tell us about your unique winemaking process.

I started simply with Old-World tradition. I planted Italian grapes. When I purchased the vines, I selected Italian grapes that would adapt here in New Jersey. If they die because they're not comfortable in the environment, I try to replant different ones.

Our wines are, firstly, grown with New Jersey soil, on the original vine, so they're Italian. The second thing is what we call a low-intervention winemaking style. We try not to overkill the wines using sulfites. And my wine does not travel. I am not bringing my wine out of the state. I'm not bringing the wine across the world, so I don't have any necessity to buffer the wine with any preservative. Years from now, I don't know where we will be with my winery, but so far, I'm just embracing all the European techniques we used to do.

I met someone who makes wine here. They have a lot of equipment. They spend a lot of time making impeccable wine, trying to control the process. I agree with that. But if you look at the Europeans, they start from a basic winemaker style. The most important thing is to have the cleanest and healthiest fruit. Yes, we do sanitize. But when we splash the wine on the floor or when we splash the wine on the walls of the winery, we like to have the flavor left there.

When you ferment the wine from your own grapes, from your own wine in itself, it builds that kind of microbial step with the environment inside. Those microorganisms that might stay around the winery add a unique flavor or identity to our wine. We embrace what we call the natural fermentation of the wine, the natural yeast.

When you are a local producer, if you're making 5,000 bottles and you want to represent your local place, you better find out what kind of yeast your grapes catch from the environment where you live and if it is a good one. You want to embrace that yeast. 

Lily has roots in China. How have your combined cultures influenced the winemaking process and winery experience?

The culture of wine in China is not as well-known as in Italy, of course. My wife, Lily, has spent the last 20 years learning to enjoy wines, recognizing the quality of the product, and pairing it with food. She offers huge support to the family business today since her culture is really wired for running an effective and profitable business. She is a perfect combination that adds value to our winery.

She runs marketing and sales. I take care of the quality of the product, bringing my background and experience. She provides unbelievable hospitality and service to our guests, boosting the sales of our products.

I can make all the great wines in the world, but Lily can connect with people and deliver the product to their minds and hearts. She is an awesome hospitality guru!

Angelico wines: Grown, produced, and bottled in New Jersey.

What were your biggest challenges along the way?

The first and possibly the only major challenge is the "People Mindset." New Jersey has a reputation for having no wine at all or fruit wines. A lot of people need to be educated about what wine truly is, and that's one core value of our winery.

Great vines grow in any region of the world, producing unique grapes that represent the territory/area (terroir) where they are grown, so great wines can be produced with such grapes. It will take another five to 10 years to recognize New Jersey as a great AVA (American Viticultural Area) with great wines—a lot of tasting, a marketing campaign, and education. 

What are your goals for the future of Angelico Winery?

Based on our core values, we have determined our goals. Our core values are education, quality of the product, and outstanding hospitality for our guests.

One of our sons is studying and will soon graduate as a winemaker and viticulture expert. He is studying for an associate's degree at the Finger Lakes Community College and, hopefully, for a bachelor's Degree at Cornell University next year.

I've personally been taking classes as a winemaker, winery designer, wine connoisseur, etc., at Texas University and UC Davis.

Our team, led by our tasting room manager and Lily, focuses on wine education for the whole staff so they can relay their knowledge to our guests.

Lily is continuing to network and take classes/lectures about hospitality.

We keep investing in more sophisticated equipment, machines, and buildings to improve the quality of our wines and hospitality.

Overall, we still want to remain a small winery; we prefer small but unique with our own identity. We believe that once a winery becomes big, it starts losing contact with its guests and fails to deliver excellent hospitality.

The Angelico sons have first-hand experience in viticulture.

What do you hope to share?

Italians, especially Southern Italians, are all about hospitality and connecting to people. I am already doing it. When people come to see us, it's more about what we express in our wine, who we are, and how the wine can embrace in that little cup who we are, what I have, and what I'm trying to do here: talking about wine and sharing how it was made and what it's about.

This is what I know, and this is what I make for you, and you can be proud of it because I put in part of who I am and part of who you are, because this is coming from your own soil. This is coming from New Jersey; this is coming from the United States.

I also want to teach people and eliminate skepticism about making wine in New Jersey. I want to tell them that grapes, wines, and human beings adapt wherever they go. For every region in the world, there is always a wine grape that is the most suitable for the soil and microclimate.

My wife and I are really, really into hospitality. Hospitality is not just a service for us. Hospitality is more about embracing culture between people. That's what I'm trying to do.

Everyone who comes to our place does not leave until they have met us and the team. We don't just shovel a cup of wine and walk away. We don't want that. We want people to come, experience the place, and experience the wine as a good time, while somebody pays attention to them and educates them, telling them about what we're trying to do with the wine.

Wine is more like a chain of connection between our culture and the world and their culture. So that's what I'm doing. This is not a rich business. It's more of a passion and labor of love.  

If you enjoyed this article, consider subscribing to my newsletter for more content and updates!

Post-World War II, Italy was a nation in recovery, rebuilding its economy, infrastructure, and identity under new democratic leadership. In June 1947, the United States drafted the Marshall Plan, a program designed to provide financial assistance to Western European countries devastated by the war. As the third-largest recipient, Italy received 10% of that aid. In turn, U.S. government agencies, organizations, and business groups expanded their efforts to build strategic partnerships with their Italian counterparts. That collaboration led to the formation of civic organizations committed to cross-cultural and educational exchange among Italians and Italian Americans. And it paved the way for the 1956 launch of the America-Italy Society of Philadelphia (AIS-Phila).

Since its inception, AIS-Phila has embraced arts and education while continuing its commitment to the Italy-U.S. friendship. Meanwhile, in Italy, AIS-Phila has participated in restoration projects, such as the Committee to Rescue Italian Art in the aftermath of the 1966 Arno River flood, and built a center in 1980 for survivors of an earthquake east of Naples.

As the collaboration continues, AIS-Phila remains focused on deepening the understanding of contemporary Italian culture as it exists in Italy and moving beyond stereotypes. Chief among its offerings is a language school, offering 45 courses to around 350 students in person and online. The community can also participate in AIS-Phila lectures, films, concerts, and art exhibitions. 

AIS-Phila Executive Director Elisa Schwab Clewis grew up in Brazil and Italy before moving to the U.S. She's lived in Philadelphia since 2006, working in the non-profit sector and gaining over 16 years of experience teaching Italian culture and language in higher education. 

Elisa shared more about AIS-Phila, its unique offerings and mission, upcoming collaborations, and her leadership goals.

What new initiatives have you taken on as the organization's third director?

My mindset is that I will consider everything we get in. I never say no to anyone until I first talk with them.

It was maybe my fifth day here when we received this email from the Philadelphia Museum of Art inviting us to get tickets for the craft show in November, where Italy would be the guest country. I said, "This is interesting. We need to get deeper on this."

I found out who the artists were and decided to write a letter inviting them to a party here. They told me, "We cannot really talk to you directly. You need to talk with our curator. But he's actually amazing." So, I talked to him and began collaborating with him, and they came here. Some did not have enough money to stay in a hotel, so we arranged for them to stay with host families. And we had a welcoming dinner.

It was totally made up on the spot, but it went well. It was great.

AIS-Phila teacher Cristina Vea holds up a peace sign while posing with her language class.

Share more about your school.

The school seriously started about 11 years ago. The former director did an amazing job of building the basis of the school from one that had just a couple of courses. The board decided to bring in an executive director and a director of the school, and we are working together to take it to the next level. We are offering cultural courses, accelerated courses, and pronunciation courses. Our teachers are the heart of it. Several have PhDs in literature, one is a sociologist, and we have a film studies person. We have such expertise among our teachers.

Study abroad with AIS-Phila in Todi, Italy. 

Tell us about your study abroad program.

We've been doing this for about 15 years, every June for one week in Todi, which is in Umbria. It is a very nice medieval town. Our students would take classes from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m., and then in the afternoon, we do sightseeing. The cool thing is that they can pick between homestays—a family home, a hotel, or an apartment. I will say that 70% of them want to stay in a home with a host family, which is great because you really get the best.

Anna Kraczyna spoke to AIS-Phila members about translating Pinocchio for Penguin Classics.

What events and activities do you offer, and what is their role in the mission?

The mission is to really bring Italian culture to the U.S. We are not a heritage organization, so we are a little bit different. Our events are getting deeper into aspects of Italian culture through history, art, music, and lectures.

We have been historically involved with the restoration of art in Venice. We do a series of conferences on Venice. It can be any aspect, like literature in Venice or the environmental situation of Venice, with the water rising. We just hosted Anna Kraczyna, the translator of Pinocchio into English for Penguin Classics. She presented the real meaning of the book, and it was absolutely wonderful. The event could also be seen on Zoom because some people are not in Philadelphia or have mobility problems. If you offer the event on Zoom, you open up to the entire U.S., so we will be looking into doing that more.

AIS-Phila's Amerita Chamber Players Concert Series

Can you share any memorable moments or success stories?

The November show with the artists was quite amazing. We ended up receiving art from three of them who decided to leave their art behind and donated it to us so that we can do an auction and a joint fundraiser. So I will try to sell it and pay them a fair amount. But then I can also do some fundraising with "100% Made in Italy" art pieces.

Success stories? There are a lot. We've been doing a lot of backstage work with the financial part of the organization. I was with an official at City Hall, welcoming high school students from the sister cities, one of them being Florence. The reception was wonderful.

It's such a rich job, yet so natural to me because that's what I am. I've always been between the two countries.

What upcoming projects or collaborations are you particularly excited about?

We are going to collaborate with Robert Campana, who has built Stop Italian Sounding. What is that? It's when someone approaches the supermarket in the United States and wants to buy a product. Often, products use Italian-sounding language, the colors of the flag, or the Tower of Pisa to show that the product is actually authentic, but it's not.

He wants to educate the public about this. He's been doing a terrific job to the point that when I was teaching at Arcadia University, I offered a course titled "Made in Italy," and part of my course focused on stopping Italian sounding. We went to his website and looked at his videos, and then my students had to build an advertisement to educate the public on that. So, Robert and I want to start offering master classes at AIS-Phila. Then, we'll have a tasting so you can also taste the product. We are looking into collaboration with restaurants or places where you buy Italian products.

We haven't really done much with food because I didn't want to fall into the "Let's cook together!" This Robert Campana collaboration is so perfectly in line with us; it's our way of, "Let's talk about food, but let's talk about it in an educational way. Let's give you some options so you can decide." For me, it's a great accomplishment that we will collaborate. 

Philadelphia has the World Affairs Council of Philadelphia, the oldest nonprofit that deals with the international environment in Philadelphia, and we are officially collaborating. We are already organizing the welcoming event for the new general consul from Italy, who is coming this summer. We want to do an official welcome between us and them.

We are also collaborating with an organization that helps people get Italian citizenship. Especially now, we get a lot of requests. We absolutely do not give any legal advice. So, I decided to collaborate with an organization called Italiza. They're based in New Jersey, but they work with the entire U.S., and their legal office is in Rome, so they can really help people with that. We help people with translations. 

AIS-Phila presents Vittorini awards to University of Pennsylvania students who study abroad and encounter sights such as Ravenna's Basilica of Sant'Apollinare Nuovo.

How do you hope to impact the community?

Sometimes, the understanding of Italy is very romantic. It's very, "Wonderful wine!" and "Bella Vita!" My underlying mission is to really bring Italy and the understanding of the complexity of a country with a huge culture, history, and diversity. So, I am just really going beyond what people might superficially think and trying to really educate the public. And sometimes, Italian Americans are the ones who need to move away from their stereotypical idea of Italy and move to "This is a country that lives today. Things didn't stop 60 years ago."

We have 20 teachers, including the director of the school. We are from Italy, so that's what we are, right? That's what I like to promote.

I hope to share the complexity of Italy and the reality of today. I'm happy some of our students want to travel to Italy. The fact is that most tourist places don't really represent the country, so really, it's all about this authenticity.

If you enjoyed this article, consider subscribing to my newsletter for more content and updates!

In many ways, Elise Magistro's work as an Italian language and literature professor influenced her trajectory to olive growing and oil production. 

"Daily contact with Italian language and literature reinforced the prominent role that food (or lack of it in poorer regions) has played in Italian life over the centuries," says Professor Magistro. "Olives and olive oil are woven into the fabric of Italian culture—the literature, art, and cuisine—much like the olive trees that grace the Italian landscape. Although the route wasn't direct, literature led me to connect with many facets of Italian culture, and olive oil was simply one of them. When I knew that my teaching career would be winding down, I found myself heading in that direction as a way to remain connected to Italy."

Drawing from a childhood shaped by her Sicilian paternal grandfather's cooking and memories of her French-Basque maternal grandparents' farming, she left the classroom behind after more than three decades to plant an olive grove in California's Santa Ynez Valley. She has since embraced olive oil production and elevated her region's reputation with internationally acclaimed, award-winning Luretík certified organic extra virgin olive oils.

We talked about her journey and influences, the challenges she's faced, how she chose her olive varieties, the story behind the Luretík name, what sets the brand apart, her advice for business owners, and more.

What inspired your transition from academia to olive growing and oil production?

My relationship with Italy and Italian culture is deeply personal and goes back more than 50 years. When I was young, my grandfather was a constant presence in our home. He was a shoemaker and did not speak much English, but he was an impressive cook and often prepared our daily meals. The dishes were not elaborate, but the quality of the ingredients was excellent, and the food was always prepared with great attention to detail. However, other than our grandfather's cooking and his conversations in Sicilian with my father, there was nothing particularly "Italian" about life in our house. If anything, my mother's Basque traditions figured more significantly in our upbringing. With grandparents who had immigrated from Sicily and France, my siblings and I were aware of our foreign roots but raised to be very American.

I went to Italy for the first time when I was 19 years old. That is where the personal link with my grandfather's linguistic and culinary influences took a surprising turn into a new and exciting cultural territory. In Tuscany, it was a head-over-heels, fall-in-love Stendahl moment: the architecture, the food, the fashion, the daily rituals, the slower pace of life, the intimate connection to a place, all so very different than anything in the U.S. The final leg of my sojourn that year was in Sicily, a visit that brought me full circle back to the world of my grandfather's kitchen. The experience left an indelible mark and was the start of an enduring love affair with Italy.

After completing my undergraduate studies and an M.A. in Italian, I went on to get a PhD, with a focus on southern Italian writers and Italian women's writing. There is often a very regional component in Italian literature, one that reflects the tendency of Italians to identify with their region of birth and to take pride in that identity. (When I first went to Italy, it was far more common for people to introduce themselves as "Siciliani, Toscani, Calabresi," or even with more city specificity as "Palermitani, Fiorentini, Romani" rather than as Italians.)

This regional identity is front and center in Italy's food culture, and olive oil, as everyone knows, figures centrally in Italian cooking. Whenever I was in Italy, I would inevitably end up in people's kitchens, where I discovered that olive oils (depending on the region I happened to be in) all had distinct flavor profiles. Tuscans tended to favor oils made from Frantoio, Leccino, and Moraiolo varieties that are native to the area, while Sicilians favored oils made from Nocellara del Belice, Cerasuola, Biancolilla, and Tonda Iblea olives.

As I would later discover, there are more than 1,200 olive varieties in the world, with roughly 700 found in Italy, most of which are autochthonous or native to a specific region. When I started out, I didn't know anything about growing olives and making olive oil, but the idea of growing different Italian varieties in California soils was very exciting to me. By the time I retired from teaching in 2019, I had already started taking coursework in Italy and at the UC Davis Olive Center in preparation for what was to come.

Luretík olive grove in Santa Ynez Valley. Photo by Jeremy Ball

What challenges did you face at the beginning?

My husband and I decided to buy a piece of property, knowing that we wanted to try our hand at growing olives and producing olive oil. We looked up and down the state, searching for the right spot, and landed in the Santa Ynez Valley, just north of Santa Barbara. 

The Santa Ynez Valley is one of the most fertile agricultural areas in California, so growing olives there wasn't so much of the challenge. The closest town to our grove is even called Los Olivos, and the area is blessed with a mild Mediterranean climate, ocean breezes, and ideal soils. Initially, not even water presented much of a worry since olives are fairly drought-resistant. For me, the greater challenge was navigating a world that was completely new, one in which I had zero experience. I talked to everyone, especially agronomists and olive oil experts, as well as to small producers who were having success with their olive operations. I continued to take coursework and read everything I could about soils, water management, tree pruning, pest control, harvest timing, and sound milling practices. And I spent a lot of time in the grove simply observing, something I continue to do today.

To draw a cooking analogy, one can start with the best ingredients and still not end up with a great result. Good soils, great weather, and optimal growing conditions don't guarantee that you will necessarily end up with high-quality olive oil. In the end, my approach to making olive oil was similar to the one I had adopted in my own study of Italian and one that I often shared with my students: "Immerse yourself in the subject and find a way to do so every single day. Repetition and daily contact are the keys to succeeding." At the time, I'm not quite sure I fully realized the scope of what is entailed in producing a high-quality olive oil, but I was committed and have not looked back.

Olives used to produce Luretík extra virgin olive oil are estate-grown.

Tell us about your olive trees.

We purchased our first 50 Nocellara del Belice trees and 50 Cerasuola trees, both Sicilian varieties, in 2012. We kept them in pots in our backyard until we were ready to put them in the grove in 2016. We gradually added more of each, along with other varieties, and nearly a decade later, we are at a little over 1,000 trees, comprising nine Italian cultivars.

I chose Italian varieties for several reasons, not the least of which were sentimental. Sicily and Tuscany were my touchstones, and Sicilian and Tuscan oils had always been my favorites. When we were getting ready to plant, however, I received some very good advice from two small producers in Italy who were guiding us through the process. They encouraged me to be open-minded and to plant a variety of cultivars so we could see which ones adapted best to our California soils. They also noted that the strategy made sense for the overall health of the grove, as pests that attack one variety may ignore another and diseases that strike some varieties might not show up in others. Finally, they insisted that biodiversity would not only help physically protect the grove but also protect my financial investment. It was the best advice I could have gotten. Our Coratina trees (a variety I had never intended to plant) began producing after only two years and have produced one of our most frequently awarded oils.

I continue to spend much of my time in Italy visiting small producers who grow the same varieties we do at Luretík so that I can better understand how to work with a particular cultivar, especially when it comes to timing the harvest and milling olives, as no two olive varieties are the same. Some cultivars in our grove are more sensitive to cold; others are less tolerant of heat. Some varieties come into production after just a couple of years; others take four or five. Some olive varieties mature early; others mature late. But more importantly, the same variety grown in a different geographic area will produce a different oil, and there are harvest timing and milling decisions that will also affect the final product. All these considerations must be taken into account when managing a grove and making a quality olive oil. Finally, I'd say that varietal diversity in our grove has opened up options for blending different oils to create oils with unique sensory profiles.
 

Olive oil production

How do you choose the blend of olives for each type of olive oil, and what makes them unique?

Italy has a comprehensive database of native cultivars that catalogs the chemical and sensory profiles of over 198 Italian varieties. The site has the additional benefit of tracking taste profiles of oils made from the same cultivar but not grown in the region of origin (important for me as I am growing Italian varieties in California).

I started out with the idea of producing monocultivar oils, but the problem in the beginning was that no single cultivar in the grove was producing enough olives to make more than 20 gallons or so of oil. Rather than simply milling all my olives together and producing a "field blend," which is what people normally do in this situation, I decided to take a certain percentage of olives of one cultivar and mill them together with an equal or lesser percentage of another variety that I thought would produce a pleasant oil.

I based my decisions on what I had learned about the different taste profiles of individual varieties and information gleaned from other Italian producers and databases. While the method was a bit unorthodox (oils are typically blended after having been milled separately), all three of the resulting blends we produced that year were recognized with the highest awards in international competitions. Now, as the grove nears full production, we will be able to mill our varieties separately and blend with more precision. With the help of a professionally trained, expert olive oil taster, I am learning more about this process, and the prospect of continuing on this path is very exciting.

Where does the name Luretík come from?

When it came time to plant the grove, I was looking for an Italian name or something that reflected both the Mediterranean roots of olive oil and the California provenance of our oil. And I was really struggling. My mother, who was Basque and whose parents farmed, suggested the name Luretik. Lure in Basque means earth. And when the suffix -ík is added (luretík), the word translates roughly to "what comes from this ground" or "from my own land." It just seemed perfect, because not everyone grows the olives that go into making their oil. Growing my own olives was a source of pride and important to me, so the name resonated. In the end, the name Luretík was a nod to my mother's Basque farming roots, while the Sicilian cultivars that make the oil honor my father.

You've won numerous international awards. What sets your oils apart on a global scale?

On the one hand, what sets our oil apart is what sets every good oil apart: they are produced with care and attention to every detail in the journey from the grove to the mill. Fruitiness, bitterness, and pepperiness are the three positive characteristics of a quality oil, and in a perfectly crafted oil, these characteristics will be in balance, with one sensory trait never overpowering the other two.

How you arrive at that balance, again, is a combination of many factors, with perhaps the most important being healthy olives that are harvested at the optimal moment, then milled by a knowledgeable miller within 12 to 24 hours of picking. 

On a more personal level, I would say that our oils have been recognized because we adhere to the highest standards when making Luretík olive oil. Although we are quite small, we are fully certified organic with an eye on becoming certified sustainable. We have earned the trust of our customers by being principled and transparent about how we make our oils, and maintaining that trust is key for me. In a very real sense, it goes back to the work ethic instilled in me by my parents, and particularly my father. He never told us, so much as showed us, that if you are going to take the time to do something, you need to work as hard as you can. I think that philosophy has paid off for us.

What business advice would you give?

I would say start with the product, because everything else is secondary. If you can find a way to make beautiful oils, all else will fall into place. Before introducing our oil to the broader market in 2022, I wanted to be as informed as possible about all aspects of what I was doing and selling. That is why I still spend much of my time talking with experts and visiting small producers who have been successful over time in maintaining the quality of their oils. Ideally, one should have a sound business plan in place, but I was admittedly a little slower on that front as all my energies were geared towards learning how to farm the olives and make the oil. 

Olive oil is having a moment. It seems we read about it everywhere: chefs interested in food pairings, fitness enthusiasts touting health benefits, and marketers looking to create gorgeous packaging for a product that is on everyone's mind. And that is all good for olive oil, but producers should be cautious about feeling the need to get involved in too many areas at the outset. I would argue for a slower approach that is focused on the product.

Elise Magistro - Photo by Jeremy Ball

What do you hope to share?

The world of olive oil is as vast, and for that reason, a lot of what I do is education. Part of my mission is to help people make informed decisions about their choices, especially because there is a great deal of confusion around olive oil. Labeling, for example, has become a minefield of misleading terms. For starters, I try to walk people through the essential terminology on a label so that they can feel more confident about their choices. People have been very responsive about becoming more knowledgeable about olive oil, and that has been gratifying for me.

An equally important part of what I want to share about olive oil, however, is tied to my love of Italy and the historic role olive oil has always played in Italian culture. While almost every trip to Italy still includes stays in Tuscany and Sicily, I am always happy to visit other regions, to learn something new that I can share with others. This olive oil venture is part of a longer journey that started decades ago, and it happily keeps me connected to a country and a culture that I have never ceased to love. I feel very fortunate that I was lucky to do something over the course of my life that kept me so engaged. I could do it forever. 

If you enjoyed this article, consider subscribing to my newsletter for more content and updates!

Giulia Civello pulls a worn hardcover book from her shelf and flips through it, revealing little scraps of paper marking various pages. It's a cookbook, and one of the bookmarks is labeled "Franco" for her father, marking his favorite recipe.

"What's amazing about these old Italian cookbooks is that so many of the recipes assume such a high base level of cookery compared to the recipes you see now," Giulia says as she looks down at the book. "It's just 'Cook the fruit; make the pastry.' There's no explanation of what that means. And there's no oven temperatures or anything like that. You just have to know, which I think is totally wonderful."

The cookbook belonged to Giulia's great-grandmother and was passed down through generations with Sicilian recipes and food traditions. Today, Giulia shares that knowledge through Gourmet Girls, a series of pop-ups and supper clubs she and her team host in venues and homes across Brighton and Hove, a seaside community in southeastern England.

Giulia's father came to the UK from Catania, Sicily, where her family spent summer holidays. Drawing from that heritage, Italy travels, and her background as an environmental consultant, Giulia serves food stories and sustainably sourced Italian fare with meals celebrating various regions such as the Dolomites, Puglia, and, of course, Sicily. 

Giulia shared more about her business and passion for Italian food, memorable events, favorite dishes, challenges, and what she hopes diners take away.

How and why did you start Gourmet Girls?

I thought about doing it for a long time before I actually had the guts to launch. I started in ecology and then migrated into the environmental sector. I've always been a foodie and interested in sustainable food and farming. 

I was always getting my grandma to teach me recipes. My grandma grew up with her mother, father, and grandmother in the house, so she wasn't actually the main cook in the house; it was her mother.

I worked in London five days a week, commuting up, which was incredibly stressful. I thought, "What am I doing? This isn't what I want to do." Then other things happened in my personal life, and I thought, "If I'm going to do it, I just need to do it now." So, I went for it. 

It started as—and mainly still is—supper clubs, which are a great model for me because I host these pop-ups at venues. I don't have my own catering kitchen, but I go into places, cook in their kitchens, and invite people over for an evening. Everybody sits together, and it's all very much about community. I come out and tell them about the dishes and the heritage of the dishes. But the real thing for me is cooking Italian food that people don't get in an Italian restaurant here. I want to cook regional Italian food, which is what Gourmet Girls is all about—everything from the Dolomites to Sicily to Tuscany to Puglia.

Many friends say, "Oh, we don't go out for Italian; we just go out for Asian. You can just cook Italian at home, can't you?" And I say, "No, no, there's so much more than what you get in your High Street pasta/pizza restaurants." And so that's what it's all about, really.

Guests enjoy a Gourmet Girls supper.

What makes Brighton and Hove a special place to offer events?

Brighton is a brilliant place. It's very multicultural and open. It has a very big LGBTQ community, and you get a lot of people who come down from London, love it, and stay from all over. You get people interested in trying new stuff and lots of different groups. It's interesting to see the kind of people who attend my events. You get all age groups, people who are learning Italian online, who are really obsessed with Italy, real foodies who just want to try something different, or people who have just heard about it. It's a nice mix of loads of different people coming together, who are joined by their interest in what the food will be like.

Suppers are served with stories to complement the courses.

Share a memorable Gourmet Girls event.

The biggest one I did was a Roman street food pop-up. That was challenging. There were 70 people, and I was churning out the Roman version of arancini (supplì).

Every time I do an event, I get anxious in the lead-up—that's just my personality. But then I come away feeling so warm inside because people just love it. They love that you can tell them interesting anecdotes and the heritage of what they're eating. 

I had a job in a cheese shop when I was studying at university. People would love it if you told them how cheese is made and the story about the people making it. It's just that connection with food, isn't it? It's totally different. And that's what the supper clubs and catering are all about, really. It's about sharing my love of the dishes and the heritage of the dishes.

Pasta alla Norma

What are some favorite regional dishes you introduce?

I always do pasta alla Norma, which people have sometimes heard of, but often the aubergine is so badly cooked. People try to bake it. It's like, "Get a pan of oil and fry it!" That's the way to get the best out of an aubergine. I make a really good pasta alla Norma, with a lovely ricotta salata, which I get from a really amazing Italian cheese guy in London.

That recipe comes from Catania, so I'm particularly fond of it. It's named after the famous opera by Bellini. As the story goes, playwright Nino Martoglio said, "Chista è 'na vera Norma!" when he tried it for the first time.

I also enjoy serving granita, traditionally a breakfast food, as a dessert. I serve it with a little brioche just as you would have at breakfast time in Sicily. I do an almond granita with a little shot of espresso that the guest can pour on top. When my dad has granita, it's always alla mandorle with caffè on top. It's just the most divine combination of flavors, so that's another favorite as well.

Giulia Civello in the kitchen.

What were some of the biggest challenges you've faced?

The challenge I find is that Italian dishes are based on the quality of ingredients. The UK climate is so different from that of Italy, especially Sicily. If you try to cook pesto alla Trapanese, which has almonds, tomatoes, and basil, you won't get the same flavor. A lot of British chefs who cook Italian food throw everything at it to compensate. You end up with these pasta dishes with 17 ingredients, which you never get in Italy. I seek out really high-quality ingredients to try and replicate those Italian flavors, which is not all that easy. And so I have to kind of tailor the menus around what I can get. Staying true to the authenticity of the dish is key for me.

Another challenge has been marketing and learning to spread the word about the events. Fortunately, I have a good family network and friends in Brighton and Hove. So my events initially were filled with friends and family, but once they've been once or twice, you need to move on to the next set of people. It's like, how do you reach them? That's been a big learning curve.

I attended networking events and posted my event on all sorts of random event websites, trying to get the venues where I was hosting to post it on their socials. That helped a lot. I'm lucky my best friend and her husband have a branding agency. They did all my branding, which was amazing. 

Giulia Civello adds the finishing touch to a Gourmet Girls meal course.

What are your future plans?

Probably not immediately, but I would like it to be my full-time job. The supper clubs are great because they allow me to test recipes. It's quite a friendly setting to do it. I haven't had to make huge investments financially in terms of catering equipment and things like that. The venues also have staff that I can rely on. But the plan is to eventually transition to having my own prep kitchen and all my own kit and doing much more private catering—not mass wedding catering though; I'm not interested in doing 250 plates of food for a wedding. I want to do small things, where it's still very much about the food I'm cooking. It's not just the event; it's about food. That's what I'm all about, really.

Gourmet Girls guests typically sit at a long table for a communal dining experience.

What experience do you hope to share?

I hope my guests will come away having eaten something new and learning about Italian regional food.

This winter, I'm planning a Dolomites menu. After university, I spent a ski season in Italy, where I lived in the Dolomites in Val Gardena for six months. It was a glorious experience.

The food there is just wonderful. It is quite Austrian in terms of its influence because where I was, it actually used to be Austrian; the border moved during the war. When you're skiing there, you see these beautiful mountains, and they've got all the holes where the soldiers would be hiding and fighting. It's an amazing place, and it's all dumplings, polenta with sausages, and strudel. It's so different from anywhere else in Italy; really hearty mountain fare. So I think that will be nice around Christmas.

I hope people come thinking, "Wow, this is Italian food? I don't associate this food with Italy!" That's the kind of reaction I like. It's just a voyage of discovery.

If you enjoyed this article, consider subscribing to my newsletter for more content and updates.

With fewer than 2,000 residents, Independence, Louisiana, may be small, but its devotion to its Italian—largely Sicilian—roots runs deep.

It all started in the late 19th century when a large influx of Sicilian immigrants arrived in the state, many taking jobs as sugar cane laborers. A contingent moved to Independence, where they worked the fields of strawberry farms. The rich heritage they brought with them is celebrated at the Independence Italian Cultural Museum. The institution, which is committed to preserving Sicilian and Italian culture, music, art, and language, hosts a variety of fundraisers throughout the year.

I spoke with Lesley Vullo, an Independence resident and Italian dual citizen who volunteers with the museum, to learn more.

Tell us about the significance of the museum's building.

The building was originally the Mater Dolorosa Catholic Church, built in 1908 by Sicilian and Italian immigrants. My great-grandparents and grandparents actually attended church there. When my dad was younger, it was still in use. Then, they built the new church across the street and turned the old building into the museum.

What are some of the events organized by the museum?

Each August, the museum hosts "Cucuzza Day," where people bring their cucuzzi and compete in cucuzza-growing and cooking contests. There are also contests for kids, and seeds are available for purchase.

Then, in September, we have "Sotto Le Stelle," which is essentially a night under the stars. It's an opportunity to bring back the Sicilian spirit of outside dinners and the evening passeggiata. We turn the street outside the museum into an outdoor family dining experience.

We also have holiday cookie sales and spring stuffed artichoke and muffuletta sales. Throughout the year, we offer Sicilian language classes. 

Cucuzza Day celebrates the fruits of the giant squash harvest.

What can visitors take away from their museum experience?

The community has donated a lot to the museum. We have everything from wedding dresses and Sicilian musical instruments to a hand-painted Sicilian cart and St. Joseph altar. There's a lot of history here and an opportunity to reconnect with ancestral roots. Independence is a small town, and having this museum here to connect us all is a big deal. 

A handmade Sicilian cart is among the displays.

If you enjoyed this article, consider subscribing to my newsletter for more content and updates!

The bulk of Italian immigration to the United States occurred between 1880 and 1920, with approximately 4 million Italians arriving during this period, mainly from Southern Italy and Sicily. That means most Italian Americans are at least four generations removed from their Italian heritage.

Traditions fade along with those connections. It's no wonder that one of the most pressing concerns among cultural organizations is how to reach and inspire younger audiences.

At 27 years old, Patrick Ross Campesi bucks the trend. 

While many of his peers may feel distanced from their roots, he's spent the past five years leaning in. It all started with the passing of his Sicilian grandfather in 2016 and a desire to better understand and embrace his legacy. He began researching his genealogy, learning more about his great-great-grandparents, who emigrated from the Trapani area to the United States in the 19th century and found work as sugarcane farmers in Louisiana. 

About five years ago, Patrick decided he could do more and help other Italian Americans connect with their heritage. He's since taken on leadership roles with St. Expedite Lodge Order of the Italian Sons and Daughters of America, American-Italian Federation of the Southeast, and Italian American Future Leaders. In 2023, he founded the Louisiana Italian American Heritage Foundation, for which he serves as president. 

Patrick shared his experience, present and future challenges, and what he hopes to give back to the greater Italian American community.

Patrick Campesi's great-grandfather Joseph Campesi with parents, Vincenzo and Gaetana

Tell us about your background and connection to your heritage.

My great-great-grandparents Vincenzo and Gaetana came to America in 1890 from Sicily because there were not many job opportunities for them in Sicily. 

Some of the families stayed in New Orleans, and not long after that, the other half went up to what's called Iberville Parish, where I was born and raised. We moved up there probably in the early 1900s. 

We were sugarcane farmers there until the 1927 flood, which pushed us more toward the river. Once that flood happened, the levee broke, water crested, and my family worked with the Army Corps of Engineers in our little town to rebuild the levee. Half of the men in the family used the mules and the donkeys to help rebuild the levee with whatever forming equipment we had. The other half went down to some smaller towns in Louisiana to trade fur and provide for the family. It wasn't long after that, after the Great Depression, my family moved further south, about 15 minutes by car now to White Castle, and that's where I was really brought up. 

My connection to all of this was my grandfather Ross Joseph Campesi. He was born in 1925. He grew up farming sugarcane, but he was the one who really took the family from tenant farmers to owning the land. He started building businesses from there, and with only a high school education, achieved the American dream.

Poggioreale, Sicily

I was 18 when he passed, so I knew him for a good portion of my life, and he always would talk about how we're Sicilian. We're from Poggioreale, and there's an organization called Poggioreale in America. I didn't realize that there were other Poggiorealesi in America outside of my family. We grew up in what they called the Campesi Compound. I was with my uncles, cousins, and everyone in that area. I was just so confined to that little box. But then I found this organization, and this opened my world up.

My grandfather would say, "Family first, always." It is something that stuck with me and was very impactful to me.

Once he passed, and as we entered the pandemic, I started learning more about the family, genealogy, and history. My dad was telling me more and more stories; I was just more interested in it.

Not long after that, I reached out to a gentleman named Charles Marsala, who is very involved in Louisiana. He's been my mentor and has brought me through the ranks, introducing me to people like Marianna Gatto, Basil Russo, and John Viola, the Italians pushing to get young Italian Americans involved again. And I've been very lucky because of that.

I was instituted as President of the St. Expedite Lodge of the Order ISDA. That was my first foray into any type of nonprofit cultural leadership position. From there, I was elected Vice President of the Federation of the Southeast. Then, two years ago, I started the Louisiana Italian-American Heritage Foundation. Lastly, from 2024 to 2025, I was Chairman of the Italian American Future Leaders. It's been a busy four years, but I wouldn't change it for the world.

Tell us about St. Expedite Lodge Order ISDA and your role.

St. Expedite Lodge of the Order ISDA is a local chapter of ISDA. I was put in as vice president in 2021, and then the president ended up stepping down. He said, "Look, you're really the one who's pushing to get the younger people into it; you should take the presidency."

I had to bring together people that I knew at the time, four years ago, to help create an organization. Some of the roster has changed; now, it's just an amazing group of people. They're hardworking.

A group of us went to the Italian American Future Leaders Convention. We typically go down to New Orleans a couple of times a quarter, and we'll see Louis Prima's daughter Lena Prima perform and maybe go to an Italian restaurant. Our focus is on social events for young professionals. But we do have events like a Christmas event at a place called Houmas House, where we have people of all ages. We want anybody who is Italian or Italian-loving to celebrate the culture with us here. 

Patrick's great-grandparents, Margherita and Joseph, in the sugarcane fields where the family worked

How did the Louisiana Italian-American Heritage Foundation start, and what is your vision as President?

I started that in December of 2023. It began as a political action committee, but because I'm in finance now, I can't be involved in any PACs. We pivoted straight to a nonprofit, and we focus more on fundraising and some lobbying, but not directly like a PAC.

One of the main things we're focusing on right now is fundraising for a monument to the Sicilian sugarcane harvester. So my family obviously came over here and did that. A lot of Sicilians came over and contributed to the growth of sugarcane production, not just in Louisiana but across the country and the world.

My grandfather worked with Louisiana State University to go around the world teaching third-world countries how to actually cultivate a better crop and to have a better yield. We lucked out in that, being here in Louisiana with such great soil. So he was teaching those practices, but that's a direct contribution just for my family, not to mention all the other Sicilians who came here and did that.

Another thing that we're doing is the Heritage Commission. New Jersey has established the New Jersey Italian American Heritage Commission, a piece of legislation that gets passed. It's a commission that the New Jersey State government established. It's not appropriated in any funds by the state. They have internal fundraising or grants from the Italian government. They create coursework that they can provide for schools to teach Italian contributions and Italian history here in America. One of the videos is about the relationship between Italy and America, as far as Amerigo Vespucci (we're named after an Italian), how the American government is mimicking the Italian Republic, our accounting system, and all these everyday different contributions with an Italian root. That's something we want to bring to Louisiana. 

Share more about your involvement with the Italian American Future Leaders.

It is like a melting pot and a mastermind group where people come from all different walks of life, from 21 to 35, with all different experiences. Whether they run organizations or are members of them or have ideas for social media, it's a way for all of us to come together and say, "Hey, I was dealing with something with my lodge in Louisiana; how did you do it in Indiana?" And that's real-life experience. There's a guy who does amazing festivals up there, and he's helped coach us on how to do some of the feasts we do down here. So it's just a great way for us to connect and network.

What led me to want to get involved with it? I'm a people person. I like to be connected. I like to network with people and to share in our culture. It's something that's so beautiful but will die out if we don't pass it on to the next generation.

As far as leadership was concerned, I saw something great and wanted to be a part of it. But it wasn't just me. There was a team of people that I was working with, and even while I was chairman, a lot of people helped us put together that conference that we have every year. But just to be a part of something like that and to learn from all the Basil Russos, John Violas, and Pat O'Boyles of the world, who have done so much for the community in their lifetime, but even more so with IAFL, has just been an amazing experience. 

Attracting younger generations is a challenge for cultural organizations. How are you working to overcome that?

It's difficult across the board. One of the things we've found is that having leadership positions available for the younger people makes a difference. Representing the young Italians of Louisiana and having the positions I have shows others that if you are active in this, this is also something that you can attain.

In many of these older organizations, the old guard doesn't want to hand over the baton; it could be more vanity or ego. As Italians, we're sometimes guilty of that; we're also competitive. When you have an older organization that's strong but won't allow younger people to participate, well, they're going to start their own thing, and now you're splitting the community you're trying to bring together. So it is not really fruitful for anybody.

It's important to have good mentors who help bring you up through the ranks and introduce you to the people that you need to know if you were to take that position, so you're not thrown to the wolves. I've mentioned Charles Marsala because he's just been such a huge part of my life in the Italian world. Working with him was the first time I'd ever been in a nonprofit and working in any type of leadership. So I had to learn a lot of stuff, but he taught me the ropes. He had somebody who taught him the ropes, so it's like them reaching out that hand.

Many younger Italian Americans looking for that identity, and our culture and community will take that offering, that olive branch, if you will, and get more active. One thing that we do is just have events that people want to go to. We want to keep an air of tradition and culture while making it modern and attractive for a young Italian professional to actually want to come to the events, keeping it upbeat but still maintaining that central tradition and culture we all collectively share. 

What initiatives or programs are you most proud of implementing or supporting?

I'm a very proud Italian American from Louisiana. When people think of Italian Americans, they think of New Jersey and New York, but they forget about California, Florida, and everybody across the country. But we're here, just a different flavor of the Italian American pie. So one of the things I'm most proud of, outside of just seeing the growth of IFL last year, was the Louisiana delegation that we had come in. Some people I was very close with, and some I didn't even know were from Louisiana, and they showed up there. Now, we've got our group, which has experienced IAFL, and we represented Louisiana very well.

Outside of that, locally with the St. Expedite Lodge, it's just the growth that we've had, not only in total membership but also with leaders who want to take action, take part, and take responsibility in the development of this organization. We now have a marketing department that works on social media, whether it be Instagram posts, Instagram Reels, or Stories, trying just to have content continuously put out there, not just something to put out there, but something meaningful. We have an event coordinating department as well, which is planning the Spring Serata. 

Patrick's grandfather Ross with cousin Grace Cannizzaro

What do you hope to share with your community?

It's multifaceted, for one, as I look back to the little enclaves here in Louisiana. We used to have the little Italys across the French Quarter. It used to be called Little Palermo. There were so many Sicilians and Italians there, but as people age, they move out, die out, or become more successful because their families saved enough money to send them to school. They wanted a better life, and when they moved out, that community disappeared.

I want to bring that community back, not just locally, but on a national scale where it's a national enclave, not just limited to Louisiana. I think IAFL is the perfect breeding ground for that.

I got stuck in New York two years ago on a flight back from Italy. I had some friends I met from IAFL who drove in from Massachusetts, and I had people who stayed with me for one day, took me around, and showed me around the area. I would never have known them and never would've been able to experience that had I not been at IAFL. Another example was when I was in New Orleans last October. Two friends, one from North Carolina and the other from New Jersey, came down for our film festival. Sure enough, we met another guy who happened to be in New Orleans and had attended IAFL the year before from Texas. We all just got coffee and beignets in the French Quarter.

It's just bringing that community together. And I think outside of just the local sense of things, we're in a digital age where network is just so much more expansive, and that's something that I'd like to bring for us here is not just in Louisiana, but being able to help a friend who wants to maybe move to New Orleans or who wants to open a business or has a connection that I have here that could benefit them. I'd like to be able to expand that. We will bring that back together, but on a national scale.

If you enjoyed this article, consider subscribing to my newsletter for more content and updates! 

When and where did the U.S. first enter World War II in Europe? If you said D-Day, you'd be forgiven, as much has been said and produced related to the invasion of Normandy.

What most people forget was that the Allies' first European landing was actually in Sicily from July through August of 1943. So-called Operation Husky began as a massive amphibious and airborne campaign followed by a six-week-long land operation involving more than 150,000 ground troops. 

Coverage of the event was carefully choreographed, with the media releasing photographs and newsreel footage of crowds cheering, women handing out flowers, and soldiers giving chocolate bars to children.

While writing The Last Letter in Sicily and Beneath the Sicilian Stars, I had the opportunity to tour Catania's Museo Storico dello Sbarco in Sicilia 1943, where I gained a deeper understanding of this event from the Italian perspective. In truth, there was a fine line between liberation and invasion. Yes, these soldiers brought food and pushed out Nazis. But the campaign also cost the lives of 135,000 Italian troops.

Later, I stumbled on a fascinating project called "Food, Hunger, Migration and the American Myth in Sicily at the Time of the WWII Allied Landing," produced by Teresa Fiore, the Theresa and Lawrence R. Inserra Chair in Italian and Italian American Studies at Montclair State University, and students at Montclair State University. The team conducted a series of interviews with individuals with memories of the arrival of the Allied Forces in Sicily in 1943, the late phase of Fascism, and the post-war period.

It's a reminder that the history of war isn't written by battles alone, but also by hunger, nourishment, and the stories passed down around the table. From these quiet legacies, several scenes in my historical novels were born.

If you enjoyed this article, consider subscribing to my newsletter for more content and updates! 

Step through the door at Zaffiro's Pizza at 1724 North Farwell Avenue in Milwaukee, and you'll find yourself immersed in the past while perfumed by the scents of garlic, tomato sauce, fried seafood, and freshly made pizzas. It's a classic 1950s pizza joint with red-and-white checkered cloths draped over tables with salt, pepper, and Parmesan shakers. 

Set in the Brady Street neighborhood—one of Milwaukee's three historic Italian enclaves—the restaurant has been family-owned for 71 years. Its story began with Librorio "Bobby" and John Zaffiro, whose parents arrived in the United States in 1913 from Santo Stefano di Camastra, Sicily.

The brothers opened Rock-a-Bye Tap in 1951, just a few years after the end of World War II, when American soldiers returned from Italy with newfound cravings for pizza. The bar was located in another historically Italian neighborhood, the Third Ward, which was hungry for familiar cuisine. So, the Zaffiros decided to start serving pizza.

As Italian food grew in popularity, so did the Zaffiros' business. Bobby opened Zaffiro's Restaurant on Farwell in 1954. It had just a few tables and a service bar. Bobby used his mother-in-law's recipes to prepare pasta dishes and lasagne. But the star of the menu was his super-thin crust pizza. 

By 1970, it was clear Zaffiro's needed more space, so Bobby acquired the barber shop next door and added a dining room and a full bar. John made the pizzas while the more extroverted Bobby worked front of house. You could often find him making people laugh from behind the bar.

John retired in 1988, and Bobby passed away a year later. Bobby's wife, Rose, and their two sons, Mike and Joseph, took over Zaffiro's until Joseph left the business in 2007. Rose passed in 2008, and Mike and his family have held full ownership to this day.

The restaurant has weathered economic downturns, neighborhood shifts, and the COVID-19 pandemic, but for 71 years, it has remained standing, retaining its original decor and recipes. Sure, there have been changes, like its partnership with Marcus Theatres, which introduced regional theater-goers to the Zaffiro's brand, and expanded delivery service, which became necessary starting with the pandemic. But at the end of the day, Zaffiro's mission remains intact. It's all about building a community around good food.

Mike shared Zaffiro's history, business growth, challenges, and more. 

Quite possibly the world's thinnest pizza crust

What inspired Zaffiro's super-thin pizza crust?

My father and my uncles took a road trip to New York, and they saw how big pizza was. At that time, there might have been one pizza place in Milwaukee. My dad said, "I'm going to put pizza on the menu at the bar."

He worked tirelessly to figure out how to make our crust, which is the thinnest crust in the world. It was through a lot of trial and error.

He wanted thin and didn't want it to droop. My dad always said about the pizza they tried out East, "Some of those pizzas are falling down."

They serve in eight slices with mostly triangular cuts. We do 16 with square-cut slices. It's known in Chicago as "tavern pizza."

Why has it been so important to preserve the original recipes?

It comes down to this: When I'm behind the bar, and someone comes in and hasn't been in here for 20 or 30 years and says, "It tastes the same," that's what I want. My father really stressed that you don't mess with the recipe.

Tell us about your partnership with Marcus Theaters and how that came about.

They came to me in 2008 and asked if I was interested. At that time, I was looking to open another place, but I decided to take the jump. They know what they're doing and have been terrific with us.

They do everything. It's a licensing agreement, so I don't have to worry about anything. They've got my name and my recipe. They were selling our pizza at Miller Park for three years.

They sell our pizzas in their theaters throughout the Midwest. They have three regular sit-down restaurants, and then in all the other theaters, they have it so you can bring your pizza into the theater with you. 

What challenges have you faced?

The recessions over the years and 9/11 really hit us. All you can do is keep plugging away. Thank God we were able to stay in business and make enough to keep it afloat.

During COVID, we had to close the dining area. We had been delivering to downtown businesses during the day and decided to start delivery from the evenings until closing time to keep the business alive. We now deliver during all opening hours, and it's a big part of our business.

Mike Zaffiro worked behind the bar crafting Wisconsin Old-Fashioneds and more for decades.

How has your location on Farwell, near Brady Street, benefited you?

I've always wondered how it would have worked if we were somewhere else. When people say "Location, location, location," I believe that. We have location, location, location, but with a terrific product. You can have the location, but it's no good if you don't have a product that goes with it.

We've been in the community for a long time. With the area's apartments, you have turnovers. So people will be there for three years, and then you don't see them for a couple of years, and then all of a sudden they're coming in with kids. And they keep coming back.

Rebecca, Mike, Rose, and Michael Zaffiro

What is the future of Zaffiro's?

Both of my kids are working here, so they're the next generation. That'll be the third generation.

The restaurant hasn't changed much since we've been here. We've often thought about remodeling, but customers say, "Don't do that." And I agree with them. 

Take your pick from deep-fried appetizers and old-school pasta to sandwiches and, of course, pizza.

What do you hope to share with customers?

We'll just keep continually giving them a good product and good service at a reasonable price. I think we're Milwaukee's oldest pizza place now. We've gotten great press throughout the years, but it all comes back to the quality of the food. 

If you enjoyed this article, consider subscribing to my newsletter for more content and updates! 

The history of Vermont's Italian American community was shaped in stone and later bulldozed in the name of progress. But in the end, those were only structures, for its spirit lives on, thanks in part to the efforts of the Vermont Italian Cultural Association (VICA). 

Starting in the 1880s, skilled stone cutters and carvers from Northern Italian cities, including Carrara, emigrated to the state, pursuing high-paying jobs in a place with hills and lakes reminiscent of their home. Many found work carving headstones at the Vermont Marble Company, which had operations in Proctor and Rutland. Later, more Italian immigrants settled in Washington County's Barre, the self-proclaimed "Granite Center of the World," where they worked the quarries and carving sheds.  

As the Italian immigrant population grew, families gravitated toward Vermont's largest city, Burlington, and formed what would later become known as its Little Italy. However, starting in the 1960s, the city embraced a philosophy of urban renewal and razed over 140 homes, businesses, community centers, schools, and gardens in favor of new commercial developments.

While the Greater Burlington Italian American community lacked a physical heart, its love and devotion to its heritage inspired VICA's launch in 1983. The group's passionate push to preserve connection and identity has evolved into a statewide network that partners with cultural organizations, such as opera companies, film festivals, music groups, and authors, to deliver Italian-themed events and programming.

VICA President Lisa DeNatale moved to the Green Mountain State 25 years ago. For her first 15 years, she was largely unaware of its Italian presence. Once she discovered the rich heritage and history, the descendant of Sicilians from the Enna Province town of Pietraperzia felt called to preserve it.

Lisa shared more about Vermont's connection to Italy, the organization's history and current offerings, and her leadership goals.
 

VICA President Lisa DeNatale in Venice, Italy

Tell us more about Vermont's Italian immigrant history.

To tell that story, I have to say a little bit about my own background because I'm half Sicilian; my grandparents came from Sicily. My father, Giuseppe Salvatore DeNatale, was born in the U.S. I grew up outside Boston, where there's a very large, prominent, and active Italian and Italian American community. It was common for us to get together with my grandparents for Pasqua, name days—you name it. And it was always a very important part of my life.

I met my husband and moved to Portland, Oregon, where we stayed for 10 years. We moved to Vermont 25 years ago, totally unaware that there was really an Italian community here, and stumbled upon it after being here for 15 years or so.

I guess it just never occurred to me that there would be an Italian community in Vermont. It was not the place you heard about Italian immigrants coming to. But as I've learned, it was an important destination for Italians, primarily those from the north initially.

In the late 19th century, Vermont had granite and marble quarries. When these were discovered and/or developed, they needed skilled carvers. A large population of Italian immigrants, mainly men, came here from Carrara and many northern towns, and then more came from the Naples area. They came to Barre (not to be confused with Bari, Italy) and the Rutland area, where the quarries were.

They had a very strong Italian immigrant presence in Barre, where they built the Socialist Party Labor Hall. One testament to the work of these men is Hope Cemetery, where many Italian immigrants are buried. It's also where many stone cutters cut their monuments and mausoleums, so it's really an outdoor museum.

From the late 19th to the early 20th century, there was a great Exodus from Italy; more and more people came here to support Italian families and businesses. Some came to Burlington and formed a tight-knit Italian neighborhood. They might have started as fruit peddlers and then opened markets and businesses.

There was a very strong Italian community here in Burlington, where Italian was heard on the streets. What has remained is this very strong Italian culture, Italian tradition, and an appreciation for what Italian immigrants brought to Vermont.

The Vermont Italian Cultural Association is the primary organization whose mission is to preserve and promote Italian culture so that we don't forget that Italian immigrants made many important, lasting contributions to Vermont and the country.

I was doing some research and discovered that Stanley Tucci's paternal grandparents first came to Vermont. They settled in Northfield. His grandfather learned how to cut and worked in the slate sheds. He came when he was 14 years old, which was when many came to this country, met his wife, married, and lived in Northfield, Vermont, until they moved to New York, where they opened a monument company.

I'm sure there are many stories like that of others who came here and since moved on to other parts of the country and became prominent carvers and stone cutters for many of the monuments you see throughout the United States. 

VICA members make pizzelle.

How and why was the VICA founded?

Some Italian Americans and Italians came to Vermont, some to teach at the university, and they were leaving places like Philadelphia, New York, and Boston. When they came here, there was no organization. They believed they were drawn to one another and felt it was really important to form a community and begin to recognize the contributions, culture, and heritage that preceded them.

We just celebrated 42 years since the organization was created. It didn't start as a nonprofit. It started with people getting together in someone's living room or a local community center. It's been about 23 years since we officially became a 501 (c) 3.

We're an all-volunteer organization. We don't have any paid staff. We don't have a building or a hall where you can have events. The organization was really founded by families and individuals in the Greater Burlington area. It's the largest city in the state and home to many colleges and universities. So it was started here, but our membership is statewide. We have members living outside the state because we offer virtual programming. We also have a number of business partners who are spread throughout the state. Those partners are a combination of Italians and Italian Americans who opened businesses producing or selling Italian products. Several native Italians here in Vermont make salumi and pasta, bringing all the Italian traditions and methods to Vermont. Because we don't have a physical space, these partnerships allow us to really have a large footprint in the state.

VICA Carnevale

What events and activities do you host?

Vermont is not a large state—we have fewer than a million people. It's easy to network, so we have been creating business partnerships and relationships with cultural organizations. We have several opera companies here, the International Film Festival, and Upper Valley Baroque. There are just so many cultural organizations that we partner with to bring Italian music, film, opera, food, wine, or history to our members and the greater community.

The music director of the Opera Company of Middlebury, Filippo Ciabatti, is also the director of Orchestral and Choral Programs at the Hopkins Center for the Arts at Dartmouth College. A native Italian, Filippo has presented several online lectures. We just did one on Puccini because the Opera Company of Middlebury will be performing La bohème this summer.

Our events really run the gamut. We host writers and have wine-tasting events, cooking classes, and Italian language conversation groups. We also have a very strong relationship with the Italian Consulate in Boston, which has jurisdiction over Vermont, so we've done events in partnership with them. In March, we celebrated Carnevale with a fundraiser for our scholarships and grants program.

The events can be completely tied to an Italian feast or a celebration, such as Liberation Day, or they could just be because we have something interesting to share with our community. There's really something for everybody. 

VICA members play a game of bocce.

What do you hope to share with your members and the community?

What we really want to do, first and foremost, is just remind people of the depth and the richness of Italian heritage here in Vermont. Maybe we don't necessarily appreciate or understand things about particular aspects of Italian culture—even if it's just wine tasting and hearing about the different regions of Italy and the wine.

More than anything, it connects to those things that are deeply a part of who we are. Whenever we get together, I always have a story, or someone shares a story with me, that we just immediately connect on. Maybe it's the way we had dinner at our nonna's house.

The most important thing is to connect as a community through those things that we share that maybe we've lost sight of because we are a little farther away generationally. Younger people, and we have quite a few younger members, are also seeking that kind of understanding and connection because they're farther away generationally from their ancestry. That's really what we want to accomplish. 

VICA members enjoy an Italian dinner together.

If you enjoyed this article, consider subscribing to my newsletter for more content and updates!  

Omaha might not be the first place that comes to mind when considering a community with a rich Italian heritage. However, Italians are, in fact, the Gateway to the West's fourth-largest ethnic group. Two-thirds of that population claims roots in the small Syracuse Province town of Carlentini, Sicily. Their ancestors first arrived in the late 19th century, pursuing opportunities with the railroad and in construction, smelting, and meatpacking. The Carlentini families brought their devotion to Santa Lucia, their town's patron saint, leading to the 1925 founding of Omaha's annual Santa Lucia Festival.

Within the waves of immigrants from Carlentini, a widow named Lucia Ciculla arrived in 1913 with her daughters in search of a better life. Her family has lived in Omaha's Little Italy for generations. Today, her great-great-granddaughter Sheri Kanger, director and co-founder of the Sicula Italia Association and co-founder of the Carlentini Omaha Association, is working on strengthening the connection to her ancestral home. After much coordination and trips back and forth to Sicily, Sheri hopes to see the two locales linked as sister cities later this year.

Sheri shared the inspiration for the Carlentini Omaha Association, its path to sister city status, their accomplishments, and what the organization hopes to deliver.

What led you down this path toward connecting Carlentini with Omaha?

My whole journey started in 2011 when I started asking my grandfather questions about his grandmother. He told me she was buried right down the street, a few blocks from my grandfather's house, up on a hill.

My grandfather told me how close he was to his grandmother, and that's the part that got me because I was so close to my grandparents. When he passed away in 2014, I told my husband, Ken, "Nobody's buying Grandpa's house. Let's buy it." 

So, we sold our 3,400-square-foot home and bought a 950-square-foot home. Shortly after that, I went to the cemetery and archdiocese offices and said, "I don't quite know where my grandmother's buried. Can you give me some information?"

The gal asks, "Well, when was she buried?" And I'd seen a photo from my sister, so I said, "On her headstone, it just said her first and last name, the year she was born, and the year she died." I showed the photo, and they said, "Well, we need to know what month."

It dawned on me that in 2011, when I was asking my grandpa questions about his grandmother, he said she was really sick and dying of cancer when it was close to the festival time. He remembered looking out the window with his grandmother on the edge of her bed. The saints were coming down the street, the band was playing, and the whole procession was going by. So I knew it was late August since it's been celebrated at the same time for years and years.

I said, "Let's start with August." So, the lady went and got these big books because they weren't in the computer system. She went down the list, through all of August and all of September, and found my great-grandmother's name and that she died September 29, 1939.

She got me the plot map, and it dawned on me: I remembered my grandfather saying he didn't like that her cameo was missing, that it must have fallen off and broken, and that it bothered him that her picture was not on the headstone anymore. So, I just blurted out, "Do you have a lost and found?"

The lady turned around and pulled a cookie tin from a file cabinet. She opened the lid and pulled out three cameos. One was a young soldier, the second was an old woman who didn't look Italian, and the third was someone who looked like she could be related.

She looked like my sister, and I remembered my grandpa saying my sister always reminded him of her. She's got these blue eyes—bright, light blue. My mom had those eyes, and it's a very rare recessive trait. In this black-and-white photo, you could tell that the eyes were light, so I took a picture of them. I sent the picture to my sister, and she said, "Where'd you find her?" And I said, "Is that her?" And she said, "Yes."

I said, "Well, I just left the archdiocese." She said, "Go back." I went back, and all three cameos were still lying out on the shelf on the counter. I grabbed my great-great-grandmother's and I left.

I had it remade because I knew retelling that story would be hard if I put that same cameo back on. I told my great aunt, who would be my grandfather's sister, and she insisted on paying for a new cameo.

We had a little ceremony with my great aunt and one of my cousins. My son, my niece, and my sister were there. We all went and put this thing back on with glue, and to this day, it's still on there. It's been there for almost 10 years.

I brought the original cameo back to my house. I have my grandparents' remains, so I put the cameo on the box of remains.

Sheri Kanger's great-great-grandmother's cameo

Tell us how and why the Carlentini Omaha Association formed.

I went to Carlentini with Ken in 2017, and our marriage was blessed in the mother church there. There was this instantaneous connection—just being in that city, feeling like these are my roots. I am half Italian and a quarter Carlentinese, but those are some strong roots!

It was so inspiring to me. I had been a member of the Sons and Daughters of Italy. But when I returned, I became part of the Santa Lucia Festival organization and the American Italian Heritage Society.

In 2018, Santa Lucia Festival's members wanted to take a trip to Carlentini for the 400th anniversary of the celebration of Santa Lucia in 2021. I stood up at a meeting before I even talked to my husband, and I volunteered to put the whole trip together. People were excited, and at that point, 100 people wanted to go. But when I told them, "There's a $500 deposit, and this is what the actual amount is," it changed. So, roughly 50 of us planned to go to Italy in 2021.

As I was putting this trip together, our mayor in Omaha was also working on a sister city relationship with France because Omaha Beach has that connection with Omaha, Nebraska. I thought, "There's got to be something we can do with all the Italians I've grown up with."

So, I contacted the Omaha Sister City Association (OSCA). When I finally got a response and met with them, they told me certain requirements were involved. They didn't think people in Omaha would be interested in having a sister city with Carlentini.

I said, "I think you're wrong about that. I just came back from there in 2017, and there are people here and there who would both be interested in formalizing this relationship because we've always had this sister bond." I mean, even symbolically, in my own family, the three sisters who were separated from each other, cousins who have been separated across the world for generations.

I met with a lady named Carmelita De LaGuardia, who has a similar background to mine. Once she found out I was putting this trip together for 2021, she said, "My family's out there in Carlentini; they want to know who you are." I told her my family history and that I was a Ciculla. She said, "I'm Ciculla, too. We're related!"

She and I decided to contact OSCA and set up a meeting. We met with them and shared information about the enclaves, the Italian population, and all of the things those people did to create the city as it is today.

The person from OSCA looked at both of us and said, "Why haven't Omaha and Carlentini already been sister cities? This is amazing information." They wanted to know more, so I wrote and submitted the application in 2020.

My husband was the deputy chief of police then and had cabinet meetings with the mayor of Omaha. Mayor Jean Stothert just happened to come across this application from OSCA, saying they wanted to establish a relationship between Omaha and Carlentini. And she said, "Why is Catania applying for a sister city when France is not solidified, yet?"

My husband responded, "It's Carlentini." 

The mayor asked, "How do you know?" And Ken responded, "My wife submitted the application for Carlentini to pursue the sister city connection."

She then said, "I'd like to go to Italy. This would be kind of a neat thing. Tell me more."

Our 2021 trip actually derailed because of COVID. The mayor then went up with my husband, me, and an OSCA representative in 2022. It was shortly after that that we formalized the "friendship agreement." It's like your engagement before your wedding ceremony, so to speak. In August, the formalization of Carlentini as a sister city will occur.

Mayor Jean Stothert signs the Carlentini-Omaha sister city "friendship agreement," while Carlentini Mayor Giuseppe Stefio simultaneously does the same.
 

In 2020, when we were all in shutdown mode, we needed somebody on the other side in Carlentini who could also speak English and help us facilitate and get this moving. It just so happened that my travel guides had to pivot while in shutdown and were doing these live feeds from different cities and places. They ended up introducing the world to a travel guide named Eleanora Formica, who would be my travel guide.

I contacted her on Messenger and said, "My family's from Carlentini; this is their name." She said, "I went to school with your younger cousin, Laura."

We started an instant friendship, teamed up with Carmelita, and started the Carlentini Omaha Association. We signed documents in Carlentini in October 2020. From there, our relationship was like a sisterhood, the three of us girls. We thought of all kinds of programs, projects, and events that could better strengthen that bond between our two cities moving forward. We've since had six different grade schools involved in pen pal programs. We've had three galas and have done all kinds of different things.

On this end, Carmelita, three others, and I started the Sicula Italia Foundation to help fund programs we would do with Carlentini. Then, it took a different route. Some of us found that it would be easier to do individual projects.

In November 2023, I got a call from an elementary school teacher and Eleanora in Carlentini. They wanted to do a physical exchange and bring elementary school children to Omaha for a week. I set up an itinerary and a place for them to stay.

I did not have any funds. Since the Carlentini Omaha Association was actually in Carlentini, this was going to be a challenge to do on my own. I contacted Omaha Public Schools with the signage at the bottom saying Carlentini Omaha Association. They sent me a contract back with Carlentini Omaha Association at the top.

I said, "I can't do this with just my name, so I went ahead and formed Carlentini Omaha Association U.S.A. Incorporated. That's how we were able to reach an agreement with the Omaha Public School system and have the kids from Carlentini come over.

The kids loved being in Omaha for the week. They met kids of Carlentini descent, which was a big plus for them. They started new relationships and friendships.

Two community events took place at the Sons and Daughters of Italy Hall, where they worked with me and hosted a potluck dinner one night and then a genealogy meeting another night with the kids. My husband helped me put together a big program with the Police Athletics for Community Engagement program (PACE). We had kids from Omaha who were of Carlentini descent playing with kids from Carlentini on a team called Carlentini Omaha Association, fully outfitted with soccer gear, playing against kids who were of primarily Hispanic descent with PACE, playing the game that's universal to the world: soccer.

Over 150 people attended this event. It's just something that's near and dear to my heart, and I want to continue strengthening that relationship.

Omaha kids welcome exchange students arriving from Carlentini.

What do you hope to share with your community?

I taught for 26 years and had a project in one of my classes where the kids had to show pictures of their families. I called it the "All About Me" project. Knowing who you are and where you come from is important, and diversity makes us understand and appreciate each other more. Those differences make us understand each other and not hide that we're not all the same.

Understanding different cultures and respecting, honoring, and continuing traditions is important. It's also important for the people in Carlentini and for us to be able to help fund projects and continue to work with them.

If you enjoyed this article, consider subscribing to my newsletter for more content and updates! 

When Sarah Campise Hallier's father unexpectedly passed away in 2012, she realized she didn't have much information about his side of the family or her Sicilian roots. It awakened a passion for genealogy, and in 2019, her research led her to a distant Texas cousin, Ross Todaro, Jr., who had recently co-founded a group called Poggioreale in America (PIA).

Ross invited Sarah to a reunion in College Station, Texas, organized for people like her, descendants of Poggioreale, Sicily. There, she encountered 300 people who shared her connection to the Trapani Province town.

Later that year, she traveled to Sicily on a Poggioreale in America-sponsored trip. Fifteen people stayed for nine nights in the 500-person town. Each day, the group was bused to a different Sicilian locale, allowing Sarah to see the island's western side. She also saw the remains of her great-great-grandfather's house at Poggioreale's original site, now a ghost town.

More than 200 people died in a 1968 Belice Valley earthquake. It decimated Poggioreale and forced the evacuation of about 4,000 residents. Some moved to a newly erected village just over two miles south. Others relocated elsewhere in Sicily. But many left Italy completely, heading to the United States and Australia.

Thus began a second major wave of Poggiorealesi emigration, seven decades after the first. About 4 million Italians—most from the south and Sicily—arrived in the U.S. between 1890 and 1920. Many fled rural poverty after Italy's Risorgimento; others followed family and job opportunities. The Poggioreale diaspora settled in New Orleans, Texas's Brazos Valley, and, in the case of Sarah's family, Fresno, California. 

After that first reunion and Sicily visit, Ross and co-founder Tina Anderson asked Sarah to join the PIA team. She's served on the board for five years and is currently the managing editor. It's a natural fit for the writer and Appetito magazine associate editor. But Sarah wears many hats.

In addition to managing the quarterly newsletter and helping oversee website and social media communications, she's helped with reunions and the college scholarship fund. The group raised $15,000 in 2022 and 2023 for college students who are also descendants of Poggioreale.

"The sense of community is important to me, especially with my dad not here anymore," Sarah says.

She continues to help grow the organization, hoping to strengthen the Poggiorealesi community across generations.

Sarah Campise Hallier with PIA co-founders Ross Todaro and the late Tina Anderson.

Tell us more about Poggioreale's history.

The town itself was established in 1642, and we can trace my family back that far. In 1968, a devastating earthquake in Sicily affected Gibellina, Salaparuta, and Poggioreale.

There's a lot of controversy surrounding that earthquake. It was pretty devastating in Poggioreale. When we interviewed the people in the town who never left, they said the government came in and decided that the town was uninhabitable. So, the government established barracks at the foot of the hill.

For the better part of 15 years, the families would sleep in the barracks at night, but during the day, they would travel back up to the town, go into their houses, cook, and just hang out in the piazza. There are still people in the town who lived through this and are still alive.

One Poggioreale resident told me, "The concrete unions came in and built a new town at the base of the hill." Many survivors of the earthquake still live in the new town, but the ghost town up on the hill is a reminder of the sadness from over 50 years ago.

Some say the town probably could have been salvaged had it gotten into the right hands, but the government is now helping the town turn it into a tourist destination. They've started a little museum and renovations in some of the buildings so that tourists can visit safely.

Sarah Campise Hallier and her brother, Dr. John Campise, in Poggioreale Antica in front of the ruins of their great-great-grandfather Mariano Campisi's birthplace. 

What are PIA's future plans?

Poggioreale in America, Junior is a subdivision of PIA. They worked with the board to create the college scholarship program, and they're trying to grow that right now. It's been stagnant over the past year, but recent donations have sparked an interest in revamping the program for this coming year.

A PIA 2023 calendar was sold to raise funds for the college scholarship program.

What keeps you involved?

I had my Italian citizenship recognized in 2021 through the San Francisco Consulate via the Italian Jure Sanguinis law. I've been an amateur genealogist for decades, learning it all from my mom. While I was growing up, I watched her traipsing through cemeteries—all of the stuff you did before the internet came around to find out your family history. So, the genealogical perspective is probably what I enjoy the most—being able to find your roots. I do a lot of work with expanding our family tree and helping others within the organization do that, too—just as a fun side project. But I just feel a connection to the part of it that brings us all together.

Reunion organizers Marilyn and Jack Henley, Jack Anderson (husband of late President Tina Anderson), Anna and AJ Tusa (owners of Briquette Restaurant), Cav. Pietro Maniscalco from Australia, Father Rigoli (Pastor Our Lady of Guadalupe Catholic Church), and Sarah Campise Hallier at the 2025 PIA Reunion in New Orleans

It's absolutely amazing that thousands of people all over the United States came from this small town in Sicily. My daughter attends UT Austin. She was born and raised in California, and did a blind roommate pairing during her first year in college. In the first couple of weeks of being in her dorm, she found out that her roommate's great-grandparents also came from Poggioreale. We've been trying to figure out if we are related or not.

Little things like that make you think, "Wow, it's pretty incredible," and to just be able to get together... I've been able to meet first cousins I never knew I had.

Sarah Campise Hallier's Campise cousins at the 2023 PIA Reunion in Bryan, Texas

If you enjoyed this article, consider subscribing to my newsletter for more content and updates!

Thanks to all who joined me for the release of my newest novel, Beneath the Sicilian Stars (Storm Publishing, July 2025). I'm also so grateful for our party host, Catherine Maita. July 8's party brought readers together from near and far (from across the United States to India!) to celebrate a tale of family, resilience, and the enduring ties that span an ocean and generations.

Beneath the Sicilian Stars is my attempt to bring overlooked history to light and honor the resilience of ordinary people during extraordinary times. I believe these stories matter—not just to remember the past, but to remind us how fear can too easily overshadow compassion, and how immigrant communities have historically managed to endure even through the darkest times. Thank you for watching, for reading, and for supporting my journey.

Click here to see a list of where and when you can catch my future appearances (many are virtual).