Maria Carriero
Italian Immigrant
Conte Biancamano
November 11, 1954
Left Italy 2 November 1954, All Souls Day, arrived in Canada 11 November 1954, Veterans Day.
The war had left all farmlands barren, nothing to harvest. After the war landowners were taxed heavily and forced people to emigrate to find work to make a better life for their children. With the division of land, high taxes because of the war, and the Americas opening the gates to all for a better life, everyone emigrated. All my uncles immigrated first to Venezuela and later to Canada mostly to Montreal.
My mother’s parents had lived in Cleveland, Ohio from 1900 to 1914 and returned to Italy with three children just on time for the First World War for which my grandfather served in Italy and was prisoner for eight years “another story”.
Two of the older children died because they didn’t want to go back and died heart broken. The little one, Anthony, was only one year old. He survived but when he was 16 years he left Italy to go back to his country and live with his Aunt Teresa in Cleveland, Ohio. After the war two other children were born, my Uncle Giuseppe and my mother Filomena.
When my mother’s other brother (Giuseppe) immigrated to Montreal in 1952, Uncle Anthony Mandato said to Uncle Giuseppe “come to live in Windsor, so it will be easier for me to visit you”. One year later Giuseppe sent proxy for his wife and children to immigrate to Canada and six months after that sent for his widow mother, widow sister (my mother) and daughter (me) to reunite the family in Canada near Uncle Tony in Cleveland. Usually brother and sister proxy requests would take two years but because of my grandmother being part of the group it was expedited to 7 months.
We visited often by bus, trains and later in 1958 I purchased a car and traveled by car.
On November 2nd 1954 All Souls Day my Grandmother, 73 years old, my mother 33 years old and myself 12 years old left beautiful Naples on the ship Conte Biancamano and arrived in Halifax at Pier 21 on November 11, 1954 Veterans Day. We had a nice cabin for 4, the 3 of us and another girl. Some people weren’t that lucky they were in a great big room with hundreds of people, if one got sick so did everybody else.
My mother never got sick on the ship, she met 2 ladies whom each had a young boy. They had never left the little town and were going to reach their husbands and were terrified. My mother reassured them that we were going to Windsor as well and she would help them.
After three days at sea, one day I surprised her on deck and found her crying and I asked, “Why are you crying?” She cleaned the tears and told me she was not crying. She never wanted me to see her crying because she believed it would make me grow up sad. But I didn’t give up asking so finally she said “I know what I left in Italy but I don’t know where I am going. Three women without a man in a strange land, my brothers have their own families”.
When we got off the ship at Pier 21 my mother was listening and watching other people open luggage and having a hard time closing them again. She also heard an official ask for Italian cigarettes and cheese. My mother went up to him and said “I have the cigarettes and cheese. Please give me a hand. I have my senior mother, young daughter and two terrified women with children. If you open the luggage who is going to close them for us”? After my mother assured him that they only had personal belongings, oil and cheese he marked the trunks with a check mark and away we went on the train. Of course it wasn’t the whole truth because my grandmother was loaded with liquor bottles sewed inside the coat she was wearing.
We didn’t know that it would take us 2 days to get to our destination. The officials gave us $20.00 a person. The total for us was $60.00. My mother said “what a beautiful country, they give us money for nothing”, but we didn’t know we had to buy food for 2 days.
When we were on the train they served us wonder bread. Today we would say “very fresh”, back then I took a slice squeezed in in my hands and said” look Mom it’s not cooked”. The next day we got to Montreal where we met my Godmother who had emigrated 3 years earlier and experienced the same thing. The train stopped for 30 or 40 minutes where we greeted each other and she shoved us a luggage. “Take take it, we’ll talk later”. When we opened it there was a loaf of homemade bread 20” in diameter, 2 L of white wine and a stuffed Capone (castrated young rooster) which we shared with the ladies my mother was helping.
Along the way we saw all these little homes we called sheds (barracche) and regretted leaving the beautiful buildings in Rome and Naples. Little did we know that the little sheds inside were cozy and comfortable and much better than what we left behind.
After two days we arrived in Windsor to a train station that looked as big as Pier 21 all painted black in the shape of a tent at the foot of Ouellette at Dieppe Gardens today. To greet us was my grandmother’s brother that she hadn’t seen for over 35 years and her son Uncle Anthony she hadn’t seen for 26 years with the wife Sarah and children all from Cleveland, Ohio. Of course Uncle Giuseppe and wife Virginia and children from Windsor were there also.
In Italy those days a 12 year old was a Signorina and I was already promised in marriage to a young man 9 years older who was an engineer with a future. My mother had bought me a wool suit and high heel shoes, when I climbed the wood steps at Dieppe my heel got caught and I was very embarrassed. The next day my Aunt Sarah took us shopping and she bought me 10 dresses, shoes, boots, coat and bobby socks that was the in thing that time. The transition for me was mediocre because the family filled the emptiness of my home country and our beautiful music. For years when I would hear our music it would make me cry, I felt like my insides were crumbling. But I missed my friends, the language, the holidays and the orchestra in the middle of my piazza playing symphony music 5 times a year and I would be walking arm in arm with my friends from one side of town to the other.
For my mother it was another story. She was an independent woman and wouldn’t think of leaning on her brothers. She had to work to feed the three of us because my grandmother told her when we left Italy, ”I am old and I am going to depend on you. If you starve, I starve. I will not live with my boys. Remember, in America father and son are distant relatives”.
In 1954 work was scarce in Windsor. My mother had to do terrible jobs. There was a Jewish junk collector near our house and my mother would help him collect this junk and he paid her .25 an hour. Later she found a job with a Doctor ironing their clothes, they had 10 children! What a let-down, in Italy she had a house lady that helped her with the chores and other people working the land. Later on she got lucky and found a job washing dishes for a very luxurious Chinese Restaurant and she was paid $20.00 a week for which we banked $15.00 and shopped with $5.00 but that didn’t last long because they got a dishwasher and laid her off. When I went home from school I found her crying because she had lost her job. I told myself that I will do whatever it takes to get my education so my mother will never have to worry about a job again.
The day after we arrived I was registered at St. Angela School, where I would attend with my three cousins. They put me in Grade 7 to observe and later that afternoon the teacher and another girl that spoke Italian would translate for me and another girl from Sicily. I remember walking to school and I said to my cousin, “Look a negro”. My cousin said, “Be quiet, he can understand you”. I had never seen another color before I didn’t mean anything by that I was shocked.
When school closed we went to Cleveland for the summer to spend time with Uncle Anthony, when we came back Uncle Giuseppe had changed house. When school started again we registered at St. Clair School near the new home and that was good because by this time I spoke English and people didn’t stare as much.
I really admire the Americans around the holidays. They really get into the spirit of the season whether it’s Halloween, Thanksgiving or Christmas. Christmas 1955 we went to Cleveland to spend it with Uncle Anthony. Well first of all the houses were all decorated so beautiful, a lot more than Canada, then my Aunt Sarah took us to the May Company downtown. I was in awe. I had never seen anything so beautiful; the lights, the music and the smell of perfume. In fact, after a while we got separated from each other. I was with my head into the perfumes and they couldn’t find me until my cousin Nick said, “She is probably in the perfume department”.
Things were better that year; I made friends, Elvis Presley was very popular and I was a big fan of his music. In 1956 things were better for my mother too. The Nuns were hiring widows and young girls to work at Hotel Dieu Hospital. She was hired to work in the laundry and during the summer vacation I was hired as well for 2 months.
The first 2 years were terrible, we wanted to run back to Italy but later we got used to this life, learned the language and became part of another Italian community around St. Angela Merici Church. After a few years we went back to Italy, but things were not the same. Our friends, our farms and house just didn’t do it anymore. We were unhappy in Canada because we felt home sick and yet back in Italy it wasn’t the same. As a person said one time, we are cursed people and don’t know where to call home.
In the meantime, the young man that I was promised in marriage immigrated to Cleveland, Ohio. He was a very jealous and possessive man and insisted we move to Cleveland where he could see me. Since my Uncle Tony lived there as well we moved to Cleveland but only stayed 8 months. In Cleveland you had to become a melting pot, I felt as an outsider and since Uncle Joe was in Windsor I said to my mother, “Let’s move back so we can keep our culture and not feel out of place”. We did move back but lived and worked in Detroit, Michigan, and weekends we would spend with Uncle Joe and his family.
I had the car, my mother used to roast a couple of chickens, buy a case of beer and we would fit 7 people in the Chevy and go to the park or go visit places of interest.
I refused to marry the young man I was promised to because he was a mama’s boy and 9 years older than I. I fell in love with a young man from Windsor. He was a romantic young and a dancer. He said, “When you are 40 your friend is an old man, he won’t take you dancing anymore”. In those days dancing was the only entertainment and very important. The only problem was he didn’t want to come live in Detroit. He said, “If you want to marry me you have to move back to Windsor”. One year later we moved back on 5 August 1960 and another year to the day on 5 August 1961 we got married and eventually had 3 children. We’ve celebrated our 50th wedding anniversary this year.
When I moved back to Windsor I got a special pass to work in Michigan so I commuted every day for 30 years. I was doing accounting in a manufacturing firm but I got tired of commuting and was too young to retire so I changed career. I am working in Windsor as a travel agent. I love traveling and organizing travel for people so I organize groups and accompany them on their vacations. People my age and older feel better when there is somebody to look after them. I help fill out declaration forms on the plane as well as tourist cards or help at the counter in check in etc. I check on them every morning and every afternoon by making my rounds with almonds or candies.
Back in 1988 when I started working at Dante Travel on Erie Street East in the heart of little Italy near the Italian Church people were going back to Italy to visit their parents. Today people go back with their children and grandchildren. The next generation wants to discover their roots, where their parents and grandparents were born. My family and I, 16 ofu s, went back in 2006 and I was very proud and happy to show my grandchildren our roots. Us Italians in Windsor still think about our region such as: Molise, Arburaai, Tuscany, etc. The next generation will be happy with “I am Italian”.
There is so much but I guess I need to stop somewhere.
