“I came to America because I heard the streets were paved with gold. When I got here, I found out three things: first, the streets weren’t paved with gold; second, they weren’t paved at all: and third, I was expected to pave them.”
- Anonymous Italian Immigrant, Ellis Island
This past Monday was a holiday for many of us. Schools, banks and many public and private offices are closed on the second Monday of October. In many places, the holiday is still known as Columbus Day. In Newburgh and other communities, the holiday is known as Indigenous People’s Day, to honor the native peoples whose presence here long predates the Europeans who started arriving here in the 17th Century.
We know the story. The anti Columbus Day movement began in Denver in 1989, when the late Native American activist Russell Means led an American Indian Movement protest, pouring buckets of fake blood over the Columbus statue in downtown Denver while Italian Americans paraded in the streets. (Columbus Day was inaugurated in Denver in 1907.) The city’s parades were canceled for a decade.
There are many myths about Christopher Columbus beginning with his birth. His achievements are a source of pride among Americans of Italian, Spanish and Portuguese descent, but at the time of his birth, the Italy that we know did not exist. His native Genoa was an independent Republic with its own language, currency and colonies. He married a Portuguese noblewoman, Filipa de Perestrello and he sailed under the flag of Spain.
He never thought he had reached India, but believed he had arrived in “the Indies,” or what is now known as Indonesia. That may be why portions of the Caribbean are today known as the West Indies. And, scholars note, the Spanish pronunciation of “indigen” sounds like “indi-hen”, which is close to “Indian”. Either way, he was not the first European to visit the Western Hemisphere. That honor should have gone to the Vikings who came to North America some 500 years earlier.
There is also debate over whether Columbus committed genocide. Historians do agree that he engaged in slave trade for profit, a contradiction for anyone who professes to be in the service of his God and his King.
There are other explorers from that part of the world who we might rightfully celebrate. Giovanni da Verrazzano is renowned as the first European to explore the Atlantic coast of North America between Florida and New Brunswick in 1524, including New York Bay and Narragansett Bay. The Verrazzano Narrows, and subsequently the Verrazzano Narrows Bridge are named for him. And without Florentine Amerigo Vespucci, there would be no America.
We should also remember the struggle and triumphs of scores of Italians who came here in search of opportunity. They built roads and bridges and worked in the steel mills and coal mines. Like so many others who came here before and after, Italians were not always welcome. Help wanted ads in newspapers warned that “Italians need not apply.” Italian Catholics were early targets of the Ku Klux Klan, even in places like Walden, where white-robed Klansmen protested Italians taking all of the good railroad jobs. The largest mass lynching in U.S. history (March 14, 1891, New Orleans ) was of 11 Italian Americans for their alleged role in the murder of police chief David Hennessy after some of them had been acquitted at trial.
We might remember the contributions of Italians in the service of America.
Membership in local chapters of Veterans’ organizations is filled with Italian surnames. More than half a million Italian Americans served in the U.S. Military during World War II, including many who helped to liberate their ancestral homeland from Fascist tyranny.
Other Italian Americans who contributed with distinction include:
- Enrico Fermi, the Nobel prize recipient who escaped the regime of Benito Mussolini, and later oversaw the first controlled nuclear chain reaction;
- Frances Xavier Cabrini (Mother Cabrini) who heeded the call to serve the millions of Italian immigrants who came to America. Her call to service included the founding of 67 missionary institutions to serve the sick and poor, beginning with an orphanage in West Park, Ulster County.
- Antonin Scalia, the first Italian American named to the United States Supreme Court.
- Geraldine Ferraro, who spent park of her childhood in Newburgh before her career as a criminal prosecutor, member of Congress and the first woman and Italian American to earn the vice-presidential nomination on a major party ticket.
Scores of athletes and entertainers including Frank Sinatra, Joe DiMaggio, Dean Martin, Robert DiNiro, Tony Bennett and Al Pacino.
The story of Italians in America is a rich and vibrant one. It should not be lost in a modern recast of history.