On the lower level of the CCI building, near the kitchen and the Genealogy Station of the Claire Martoche Learning Center, is the CCI Story Booth.

This room is dedicated to extracting stories from the children and descendants of our immigrant ancestors about their trials, tribulations and successes in their journeys from 'the old country' to 'the promised land' of America and specifically to Buffalo and Western new York.

While, sadly, it is generally too late to hear these stories first hand, we know that many of our members had these tales instilled in them as children, and the Story Booth is now the venue to preserve them for posterity.  If you have stories, memorabilia, documents and such that tell of your ancestors' lives, the Story Booth staff can record your memories, photograph your memorabilia, and scan your documents, to create an electronic archive for future generations.
 
Below is an example of the type of story line that can be archived, as described and presented by CCI's director of Genealogy, Angelo Coniglio, about his father Gaetano and his family.  It starts with an image of his father's original record of birth with Angelo's take on the event, followed by records tracing the family's Odyssey to America.

We hope to archive similar stories from our members.
 
 

My Father's Birth

La Nascita di ma Papà

Coniglio reports "This is my interpretation of what happened at the registration of my father's birth, in English and Sicilian."
      In Serradifalco, Sicily, on Friday, 26 April 1889, the sun rose at 5:04 AM and set at 6:39 PM. 
     But my grandfather, Gaetano Coniglio the elder, never saw it rise or set, because he was down in the bowels of Stincone, one of the local sulfur mines, working to earn a meager living for his wife Maria Carmela Calabrese and their family. 
     Maria Carmela had borne him eight children, but Raimondo, the eldest, had left for Argentina, and three others had died in infancy, including little Leonardo, three years earlier. 
     Gaetano had entered the mine long before sunrise, and as the hour approached eight in the evening, he packed his gear and made the long, slippery climb out of the mine.  He trod on footholds barely carved in the rock, slippery from the sweat of the labors of the carusi, the mine-boys who toiled all day, carrying the raw sulfur to the furnace outside the mine.
     The moon was new, and invisible, but even so, as he left the black mouth of the mine, by comparison the starlit sky shone like dawn.  His cumpari, pick-men like himself, were the brothers Vincenzo and Salvatore Barile.  They accompanied him as he walked the three miles to his humble home at Via Migliore number ten.  Like them, he was virtually exhausted, but his thoughts were about Maria Carmela. 
     She was in her final days of pregnancy, and it had not been an easy one.  He knew that his only daughter, thirteen-year-old Maria, not only would be tenderly caring for her mother, but also would have a bowl of hot minestrone ready for him when he arrived, perhaps even with a shred of the lamb they had relished on Easter, the previous Sunday.
     But as he approached the corner of Via Roma and Via Migliore, he saw Maria anxiously pacing there.  When she spied him, she ran to him, shouting "Pap
à, Papà, sa veni, sa veni, lu bamminu arrivà!" (Papa, Papa, come sir, come sir, the baby boy has arrived!)
     He and his friends hurried into the building, scattering the family livestock kept on the ground floor - two hens, a rooster and one remaining lamb. Gaetano rushed upstairs to the living quarters to see Maria Carmela calmly suckling a red-cheeked, black-haired cherub.  A stoic who did not often show his emotions, Gaetano laid a tender hand on his wife's cheek and muttered "Ha fattu beni, cara."  (You've done well, dear.)
     Carmela took the praise and jokingly responded "Unn'ha statu? Era natu a li cincu. Iddu antura si mpara a parlari!" (Where have you been?  He was born at five o'clock.  He already knows how to speak!).
     The rest of the evening, into the early hours, was spent in an alcove of the living area by Gaetano and his friends 'Cenzinu and Turiddu, made somewhat festive by the decorations and baskets of palms Gaetano had woven two weeks earlier.   The cumpari nursed a small bottle of wine that Turiddu had magically produced from his pack, while Gaetano sang the praises of his new son, not omitting the fact that he had fathered the child at age fifty-three!  Home-made bread dipped in the wine helped to sustain their revelry, as his friends cried "Tanuzzu, tu puru ha fattu beni!"  (Gaetano, you, too, have done well!)
     The night deepened, and they realized they must return to the mine that morning: each found a warm spot on the floor and napped as best he could, while Maria tended to the needs of her mother and her new baby brother.
     As Saturday morning approached, the men shook themselves awake, grabbed crusts of bread and their packs, and began the walk back to Stincone.  Dawn was staining the sky, and they approached the mine with trepidation.  The mine owner was Mastru Licalsi. They called him 'Mashu Babbu', 'Master Dummy'.  He was standing arms akimbo in the mine's entranceway, and he berated them for being late, saying he would dock them for the lost time.
    Emboldened by his new fatherhood (and perhaps by last night's wine), Gaetano retorted "Go ahead, and while you're at it, you can dock me for a half-day, because this morning, I'm taking my son to the municipiu to have his birth registered!"  
     Before Mashu Babbu could sputter a response, 'Cenzinu and Turiddu piped up "You can dock us, too, because we're going as his witnesses!"  And they turned on their heels and trudged back into town.
     So it was that at ten that morning, 27 April 1889, 'Cenzinu and Turiddu, with Gaetano gingerly cradling his baby boy, took the short walk to the town hall on Via Duca di Serradifalco. 

    
     Gaetano presented the child for Town Secretary Pasquale Vaccari to see, while a clerk recorded the details:

     "Your name?" - "Gaetano Coniglio"

     "Age?" - Gaetano, with obvious pride, replied "Fifty-three!"

     "Occupation? - "Sulfur miner."

     "Date and time of the birth?" - "The twenty-sixth of this month, at five in the afternoon."
     "Address?" - "Via Migliore number ten."

     "Mother of the child?" - "Carmela
[her common name] Calabrese, my wife."

     "What do you name the child?"
    
     There was a rigid naming convention in Sicily, requiring the first and second child of each gender to be named after their respective grandparents.  This tradition had already been met with Gaetano's earlier children, so he responded "I'm not likely to have any more sons. I'll give him my own name, and the name of my grandfather, Gaetano."
 
     "Have you brought witnesses to this registration?" - "Yes, my friends Vincenzo and Salvatore Barile. They're sulfur miners, too."

     "Can any of you write?" - "If we could write, would we be sulfur miners?"
      A Serradifarcu, in Sicilia, lu veneri, 26 aprili 1889, lu suli si spuntà a li 5:04 e afunnà a li 18:39.
       Ma, ma nannu, Gaetano Coniglio maggiori, nun lu vitti; ne a spuntari e ne afunnari, pirchi era tuttu lu timpu intra li vudedda di lu Stincuni, unu di li minieri vicinu di zurfu, travagliari pi guadagnarsi nu pocu di sordi pi la muglieri Maria Carmela Calabrese e la so famiglia.
       Maria Carmela aviva ottu figli, ma Ramunno, lu chiú ranni, si nni ji a l'Argentina, e nantri tri muriru bammini, macari lu picculu Liunardu, tri anni chiú primu.       
       Gaetano ci ji intra la miniera tantu timpu primu di la spuntata di lu suli, e quannu l'ura s’avvicinava al li ottu di sira, si piglià i sò cosi, e fici la lunga e sciddicusa chianata pi jiri fori di la miniera. Acchianava adaggiu, adaggiu, ncapu li scali scavati ‘ntra li petri, sciddicusi di lu suduri di lu travagliu di li carusi (li ‘piciutti di li minieri’) ca travagliavanu tuttu lu jiurnu, purtannu lu zurfu crudu a la furnazza fori d’la miniera.
       La luna era nova e nun si vidia, ma puru accussi, mentri lassava la vucca niura di la miniera, ci pariva ca lu cilu stiddatu brillava comu l'alba. Li so cumpari, picuneri comu iddu, eranu li du frati, Vincenzo e Salvatore Barile. L’ avivanu accumpagnatu mentri caminava li cincu chilometri finu a la so casa nica, nica, a Via Migliore numeru deci. Comu iddi, Gaetano era troppu stancu, ma li sò pensiri eranu pi Maria Carmela.
      Chidda era in l’urtimi jurna di esseri gravida, ca ha statu veramenti difficili. Gaetano sapiva ca l’unica figlia so, Maria di tridici anni, nun sulu dava a denzia  a so matri, ma puru aviva anchi preparatu ‘nu piattu callu di minestra pi iddu, fursi anchi ccu ‘nu muzzicuni d’agneddu c’avivanu mangiatu a Pasqua, duminica scursa.
       Ma mentri s’avvicinava a la cruci di strati Via Roma e Via Migliore, vittí a Maria, cu camminava di cca e di dda, tutta nirvusa. Quannu lu vittí, ci currí, gridannu "Papà, Papà, sa veni, sa veni, lu bamminu arrivà!"
       Iddu e sò amici curr
íru intra la casa, spartiri li bestii di famiglia tenuti a lu pianu a terra: du addini, ‘n’addu, e l’urtimu agneddu. Gaetano vulà susu, a la cammera di famiglia, pi vidiri a Maria Carmela, c’allattava carma, carma nu picciliddu cu na facciuzza russa e li capiddi niuri, comu ‘na cerba. Stoicu ca nun mostrava tantu li so sentimenti, Gaetano pusà ‘na manu tennera a la faccia di so muglieri e murmurà "Ha fattu beni, cara".         
       Carmela accettà lu cumplimintu, e rispunni, cu rídiri, "Unn'ha statu? Era natu a li cincu. A st’ura si mpara a parlari!"
       Lu restu di la sira, finu a li primi uri d’a mattina, fu trascursu in un'alcova di soggiurnu di Gaetano ccu Cenzinu e Turiddu,i so amici, fattu nu pochu 'festusu cu li decoraziuni e li vaschetti di pasqua ca Gaetano aviva ntessutu du simani prima. Li cumpari vivívanu di ‘na buttiglia di vinu ca Turiddu aviva magicamenti tiratu fori di lu so saccu, mentri Gaetano cantava li lodi di so figliu novu, senza tralasciari d’aviri fattu un figliu a cinquantatri anni! Lu pani fattu di casa ammugliatu ni lu vinu aiutà a sustenirli e a divertànusi, mentri l’amici gridivanu "Tanuzzu, puru tu ha fattu bonu!"              
       La notti si fici chiù profunna e si ricordaru ca ni la mattina avivanu turnari a la miniera: ognunu truvà nu postu callu n’terra e sa drumisciru comu putivanu, mentri Maria dava attenzia a so matri e a lu so nuovu fratidduzzu.
       A l'avvicinarsi di sabatu mattina, l’omini si rivigliaru cu na trema, affirriannu li crosti di pani e li sacchi e accuminciaru lu viaggiu di riturnari a Stincuni. L'alba stava macchiannu lu cilu e s’avvicinaru a la miniera cu nu scantu. Lu proprietariu di la minera era Mastru Licalsi. Lu chiamavanu "Mashu Babbu", (Mastru Cretinu). Stava cu li brazza ncapu li fianchi a l'ingressu di la minera e ci bastemiava pi essiri tardi, diciennu ca li duvissi attraccari pi lu tempu perdutu.
       Incoraggiatu cu la so nova paternità (e forsi di lu vinu d’arsira), Gaetano ci rispunni "Avanti, fallu, e puru mi po attraccari mezza giurnata, pirchi stamattina portu a ma figliu a lu municipiu pi fari a registrari la so nascita!"
       Prima ca Mashu Babbu putissi murmuriari na risposta, 'Cenzinu e Turiddu gridaru "Po attraccari anchi nuantri, pirchi nni iammu comu li so testimunii!" E si vuntaru i carcagni e si strascinaru intornu a lu paisi.
       Fu accussì, ca a li deci di la matina, 27 aprili 1889, 'Cenzinu e Turiddu, cu Gaetano, ca teniva cu tennerizza lu so bamminu, ficiru na passeggiata curta allu municipiu, a la via Duca di Serradifarcu.

       Gaetano presentà lu bamminu a lu segretariu comunali, Pasquale Vaccari, mentri nu’ impiegatu registrà li dettagli:


        "Lu to nomu?"
- "Gaetano Coniglio"           

        "Quant’anni ha?"
- Gaetano, cu cunfidenza, arrispunni "Cinquantatri!"

        "Chi e u to travagliu?”
- "Zurfataru."

        "Data e ura di nascita?"
- "Li vintisei di ‘stu misi, a li cincu di sira." ....        
...
        "Indirizzu?"
- "Via Migliore numeru deci."

        "Matri di lu bamminu?"
- "Carmela Calabrese, ma muglieri."

        "Comu lu chiami lu bamminu?"


       Allura, c'era ‘na cunvenziuni forti, pi nominari li figli a la Sicilia, ca diciva ca li primi e li secunni figli di ogni sessu, ciaviranu mettiri li nomi di li rispettivi nanni. ‘Sta tradiziuni era usata cu li primi figli di Gaetano, allura iddu rispunni "Unn aiu aviri chiù figli. Ci dugnu lu miu nomu, e lu nomu di ma nannu, Gaetano".


        "Ha portatu ‘sti testimuni a ‘sta registraziuni?"
- "Si.  Sunnu li me amici Vincenzo e Salvatore Barile. Anchi iddi sunnu zurfatari."
.
        "Sapiti scriviri?"
- "Siddu putissimu scriviri, fussimu zurfatari?"
         "It may not have happened exactly that way, but who can say it didn't?  On my father's Record of Birth, the clerk wrote down only the names and dates as reported by my grandfather.  The ‘meat’ of the story comes from my heart."
         "Pi casu un succidi giustu giustu accussi, ma cu lu po diri ca nun fussi accussi? Ncapu l'Attu di Nascita di ma patri, l'impiegatu scrivi suli i nomi e li dati comu dissi ma nannu.  La 'carni' di la storia veni di ma cori."

Note:  Vincenzo Barile was not only a co-worker of Gaetano Coniglio the elder, he was married to Giuseppa Migliore, who was the daughter of Gaetano's second cousin Giuseppa Montalto and her husband Michele Migliore.

 
 

         Because of high infant mortality rates, children were usully baptized as quickly as possible.  My father was baptized on 27 April 1889, the day after he was born.  His  baptismal record, in Latin, shows in the right margin the date of his and Rosa's marriage in church as November 30, 1912.  The main text is in Latin, but the margin note is in Italian, which uses '912' as an abbreviation for the year 1912.
 

From Serradifalco Registri Ecclesiastici Film No. 2012919, 1889 Baptisms, No. 164, Caietanus Coniglio     

 Coniglio
Caietanus
164

         Die 27 Aprilis 1889 
Caietanus Coniglio filius Caietani et
Carmelae
Calabrese, baptizatus est a me Sacerdote Carmelo
Cutrona.  Patrini fuere Paulus Damico, et
Rosa Milazzo, Conjuges
Sp. il 30
Novembre
912 con
Alessi Rosa
di Leonardo

The baptism record says:

Gaetano Coniglio
164

        Day 27 April 1889 
Gaetano Coniglio son of Gaetano and Carmela
Calabrese, is baptized by me Priest Carmelo
Cutrona.  Godparents were Paolo Damico, and
Rosa Milazzo, husband and wife
.
Married the 30th
of November
1912 with
Rosa Alessi
dtr. of Leonardo

 
 
Angelo continues "As I said, my grandfather was a 'zulfataru', or 'zurfararu', a miner in one of the several sulfur (zurfaru) mines around Serradifarcu. My father may have begun working in the same mine at age 7 or 8, possibly as a 'carusu', a 'mine-boy', carrying heavy baskets of sulfur ore, hacked out by the pick-men from the interior of the mine to the surface, to be smelted.  After a few years of this, he may have 'graduated' to being a picuneri, or pick-man.
          Below is a portion of a rule-book for the Mutual Aid Society of the Sulfur Miners of Serradifarcu, to which both Gaetanos belonged.  One of the founders of the society was my grandfather, indicated as
'Coniglio Gaetano, fu Raimondo", that is, son of the late Raimondo."
 

     "The group shown below is 'Li Ficudinia' (the Prickly Pears), playing and singing the song 'Lu Zurfararu' (the Sulfurminer)." Click HERE to listen.

 

 "The song 'Cu lu scuru vaiu' is a traditional sulfur miner's folk tune. 
It laments 'I leave in the dark, I spend the day in the dark, I return in the dark'". 

Click HERE for a version on

 
"My father worked in the sulfur mine until he was tewnty years old, from dawn to dusk in the dark, nearly unbearable heat of the bowels of the earth.  When he reached the age of twenty, he served in the Italian Army.  All male citizens were required to report when they reached that age.  He was in the 'leva di 1889', that is, the 'draft class of 1889'.  This is his discharge record.  The note on his birth record indicates that his father was illiterate, but Gaetano the younger did sign his Army papers, so he evidently was the first Coniglio in history who was able to sign his own name. 
        

After discharge, he married my mother Rosa Alessi (he called her 'Rosina') who also was born in Serradifalco."
 
 

        "My parents were married in the Chiesa Matrice (Main Church) of San Leonardo Abate in Serradifalco on November 30, 1912, and in the Municipio, or Town Hall of Serradifalco on 1 December 1912.  The civil marriage record is signed by both Gaetano and Rosa, who signed 'Alessi Rosina'.   My father Gaetano was a sulfur miner, and he married Rosa, daughter of a sulfur miner, which reflected the rigid class distinctions in Sicilian society at the time.  Rosa was the sister of Angela Alessi, the wife of my father's older brother Giuseppe."

Di la Anagrafe di Serradifalco, 2008      

From the Serradifalco Registry Office, 2008      

 
 
"The year my father entered the army, his mother Maria Carmela Calabrese died.  He served honorably in the Italian Army from 24 July 1910 through 15 August 1912.  While he was in service, his older brother Raimondo died, on 12 August 1910, and his father died, on 11 October 1910.  In 1912 his older brother Giuseppe left to work in the coal mines of Pittston, Pennsylvania.  These  family losses fueled my father's decision to leave Sicily for America.  Portions of his passport are shown below."
 

 
 
         "On 30 April 1913, four days after his 24th birthday, my father landed at Ellis Island on the SS Berlin (line 11).  He was evidently required to remain on the ship until the next day, as the arrival date on the manifest is 1 May 1913.  Listed as his closest relative left in Serradifalco was his wife Rosa Alessi.  His destination was his brother Giuseppe Coniglio at 76 Main Street, Pittston, Pennsylvania.  On the same voyage as my father was Angela Alessi (line 5), who left her father Leonardo in Serradifalco, and was going to her husband Giuseppe Coniglio at 76 Main Street, Pittston, Pennsylvania.  
       
Angela Alessi was my mother's sister, and Giuseppe Coniglio was my father's brother.  No doubt Giuseppe convinced his younger brother to chaperone his (Giuseppe's) wife to America, while the pregnant Rosa waited in Serradifalco for my father to send for her.  76 Main Street in Pittston was an Italian-language bank, and rather than waiting there for my father and Angela to arrive, my uncle Giuseppe probably left cash, train tickets and directions for them to use, to get to Robertsdale, Pennsylvania, where he had found work as a coal miner.
         My father would join his brother Giuseppe, working in Robertsdale's coal mines.  He went from working in a hole in the ground in a mountain town in Sicily to a hole in the ground in a mountain town in Pennsylvania, where his family lived in a rented house owned by the company, and he was paid in company 'scrip' that could only be spent at the company store, where he had to purchase his pick and shovel, dynamite, and other mining equipment."
 

.

The Steam Ship Berlin.
Later it was re-christened the Steam Ship Arabic.

 The Italian-language bank
at 76 Main Street, Pittston, PA

 
        "My parents' first child, a son, was named Gaetano, not after our father, but after our grandfather Gaetano.  Guy's birth record, below, shows he was born at Via Prizzi No. 11.   My father had immigrated to the U.S. in 1913, and my mother was staying with her family on Via Prizzi (she was born at Via Prizzi No. 9).  Extended families often lived in two, three or more adjacent houses.  Here is my brother Guy's birth record, showing that he was born on 21 December 1913.
          My mother was identified by her  maiden name, Rosa Alessi, the custom in Sicily.  A woman went by her birth surname her entire life there, but acquiesced to the 'American way' after she immigrated, and became known by her husband's surname."
 

 
        "On 14 December 1914, Rosa, 19, and her son Gaetano, two weeks shy of his first birthday, landed at Ellis Island on the SS Patria.  Listed as their closest relative left in Sicily was her father Leonardo Alessi.  Their destination was her husband Gaetano Coniglio at P. O. Box 52, Robertsdale, Pennsylvania.  According to the custom in Sicily, my mother is listed by her birth surname, Rosa Alessi; her son is listed as Gaetano Coniglio."

 
        "Like many immigrants, my mother and my brother Guy, listed on their passenger manifest at page 62, line 8, were detained at Ellis Island because they did not have enough funds to pay their way to their destination.  The manifest shows that my mother arrived with $25. 
         The 'Record of Detained Aliens' lists
'Alessi, Rose and ch[ild]'   The code 'tel $' means they were being telegraphed funds.  A note states they were released on 16 December at 12 noon, and that they had been charged for two breakfasts, one dinner [lunch], and two suppers.  They had landed on 14 December, so my mother and her baby were held at Ellis Island for two days, until my father either came for them or sent money.  My mother had never seen snow in any significant amount before: she had never seen a banana, and threw away the bananas that were given to her by social workers in a food package.
        We can only imagine  what thoughts were going through Rosa's mind, after sailing through contested waters at the start of World War I, to be thousands of miles from her parents, who she would never see again, and hundreds of miles from her husband; just twenty years old with a babe in arms, and unable to speak the language of the strangers around her.  But she made it!!"
 

 
        "In 1917, at age 28, though he was not yet a citizen, my father was required to register for the draft for World War I.  He was never drafted, possibly because he was married with a wife and two young sons (Guy and Leonard), and worked in what was probably considered an essential industry, at the Rock Hill Iron and Coal Company in Robertsdale.
        The photograph shows the Robertsdale Italian Band, assembled for a performance on Columbus Day, 1917.  My parents Gaetano and Rosa, and my brothers Guy and Leonard may have been in the crowd that day.
"
 

 
"The 1920 U. S. Census (last line) shows 'Guy Comellia' living at 100 Spring Street, Robertsdale, Wood Township, Pennsylvania.  His wife 'Rosy Comellia' and their sons Guy (named after our paternal grandfather Gaetano), Leonardo (named for our maternal grandfather Leonardo Alessi) and Raimondo (named after our' father's eldest brother Raimondo Coniglio) are listed at the top of the next census page.  The Coniglios lived next door to Calogero and Grazia Asarese Butera, two paisani from Serradifalco who lived at 96 Spring Street.
Robertsdale was a classic coal mining 'company town', and the Sicilian miners were relegated to the neighborhood of Wood, which was called 'Africa' by the locals.
"
 

 
          "After Leonard (1916) and Ray (1918), Felice (Phil) was also born in Robertsdale, in 1920.  All three were baptized at the Immaculate Conception Church in Dudley, Pennsylvania, about four miles away."
 

 
          "Several factors led my father to pull up stakes from Pennsylvania and move our family to Buffalo: jobs in "king coal" were dying out in Pennsylvania resulting in layoffs and strikes, with violence against and by workers; his brother Giuseppe and my aunt Angela had returned to Sicily; paisani from Serradifalco had moved to Buffalo; and last but not least, the Ku Klux Klan was waging a terror campaign in Pennsylvania against immigrants and Catholics. 
          In 1921, shortly after the family moved to 18 Peacock Street in Buffalo's Canal District, m
y father petitioned for U. S. Naturalization as a U. S. citizen.  His first daughter, my sister Carmela (Millie) was born in that tenement, and baptized in the neighborhood's Our Lady of Mount Carmel Church.
"
 
 
          "My father Gaetano took classes in English and History, and his American citizenship was granted on 16 April 1924, after the family had moved to 309 Myrtle Avenue, directly across the street from the 'La Stella' laundry bleach factory.  The fragrance of bleach still awakens my memories of the East Side.  309 Myrtle was the birthplace of three more of my siblings, the twins Concetta (Connie) and Maria (Mary) in 1925, and Antonio (Tony) in 1927. They appear for the first time in the 1930 U. S. Census."
 
 
 

 
         "Both my father and my brother Guy were members of the 'Società di Mutuo Soccorso Serradifalco', the Serradifalco Mutual Aid Society, a combination labor society/social organization, as was common for emigrants from many other Sicilian towns'.
 
 
          "I came along in 1936, the only one to be born in a hospital, while our nation was in the midst of the Great Depression.  My father found work as a caretaker at Welcome Hall, the community center at Myrtle Avenue and Cedar Street, and as a bartender at the Magistrale family’s saloon, called Marconi’s, but the pay was slim, and to augment the family’s income, in summers the whole family would be loaded on a truck with other poor immigrant families, and be taken to Musacchio's farm, on Route 62, just outside the town of North Collins, New York." 
 

Tony top, Phil middle, Ray standing in road, 1937

 

"Me (with curls) in the arms of Angie Sciortino. My father Gaetano is at the rear ~ Musacchio's farm, North Collins, New York, 1939.

This is the only instance that I know of, with my father and myself in the same photo."

"In 1942, one day after his 53rd birthday,my father again was registered for the draft.

 Three of his sons were already in the military!"

 
          "At 'the farm', we lived in a one-room shack, with cooking and sleeping areas separated by sheets hung over wires spanning the room.  We got our water in buckets from the community pump, and used a smelly outhouse (baccausu) when we could "hold it" no longer.  We picked string beans, strawberries, and red and purple raspberries, depending on which crop was ripe.  Before I was born, my eight siblings, mother and father worked the fields, and were paid 3 cents for each quart of berries picked.  The kids picked about a hundred quarts a day, and my mother about a hundred-fifty, and my father, who came by Greyhound bus on weekends, also picked about a hundred-fifty a day.  So on a good day, the family might earn about $33!
 

GuyLen600w.jpg (137279 bytes)

Guy and Len, 1926

Tony with a ‘flat’ of raspberries, 1943

Ange, 1939

 
          "The number of Coniglio kids at the farm camp varied, as some would stay back for school or other reasons.  For example, my brother Leonard ran away with the circus in 1930, depleting the ‘crew’ until he returned the following year; and in 1936, the family became one worker short, as my eldest brother Guy had married a family neighbor, Maria Antonia (Mary) Modica, the year before and remained in Buffalo to work at a glass factory.  And another mouth to feed came along in 1936, when I was born.  I show up in the 1940 U. S. Census at 309 Myrtle. My brother Guy, married by then, appears on a different census page with his family, living nearby at 452 North Division Street.
 

 

 

Tony and 'Pa', 1943

Gaetano, 1943

 
          "My father is shown standing by the community water-well pump of Musacchio's farm camp.  I recently learned from Sam and Ross Markello (Marchello) of North Collins that he was assigned the responsibility of removing the pump handle each day at sunset and replacing it the next day before sunrise, to prevent unauthorized use of water by the resident laborers.  Because of this assignment, he was called "Marshu Tanu" (Master Gaetano).
 
          "As the youngest, I think I ate more berries than I picked, but some of my earliest memories are of 'the farm', and the other families that I got to know there: the Sciortinos from Efner Street and the Pepes from Myrtle Avenue.  Phil's friend Alphonse 'Foonzi' Pepe remembers that my father Gaetano loved to watch the camp's sandlot baseball games, in which Phil usually starred. We also met and were befriended by families from North Collins; the Fricanos, Elardos, Manuels, De Carlos, Di Ciccos; families from Valledolmo and especially the Volos, who also originated in Serradifalco, and whose son Al my sister Millie eventually married.
          
My older brother Phil was a young man at the time, and I remember his stories about he and his friends 'cabareting' in the 1940's at places like 'Speedys' in North Collins." 
 

 
          "In 1944, after years of scrimping and saving from his varied laboring and our three-cents-a-quart work, my father was able to buy the first home the family ever owned.  It was at 973 West Avenue, a few blocks from Bluebird’s Bakery, and right next door to the family of Calogero Butera and Grazia Asarese, fellow immigrants from Serradifalco, who had lived next door to our family back in Robertsdale.
         
.Sadly, our joy at being in our own home was cut short on July 4, 1944, when my father was struck and killed by a hit and run driver on the corner of West Ferry and Niagara Street.
 

Gaetano and Rosa, about 1940

   


Last photo of Gaetano, June 1944

   
 
          "But by buying that house on West Avenue, Gaetano had provided for Rosa and their family, and through his work ethic, frugality and passion to save, he had given us all a valuable example that we have tried to emulate throughout our lives.

 
          "Guy married Mary Modica in 1935.  By 1950, Leonard, Connie, Phil and I still lived with my widowed mother on West Avenue.  Millie had married Al Volo and lived in North Collins; and Ray had married Marion Cappellano.  The 1950 U. S. Census recorded the family living at varied addresses.  In the following years, Phil married Betty Hinton, Connie wed Don Miller; Mary wed Fiore Denisco, and after being widowed she married Frank Sowa; Tony married Franny Knickerbocker and I married Angie Bongiovanni.
 

 

Guy and Mary Modica Coniglio
805 East Delavan, Buffalo

Ray and Marion Cappellano Coniglio
125 Whitney Place, Buffalo

Al and Millie Coniglio Volo
Center Street, North Collins

Fiore and Mary Coniglio Denisco
351 Breckenridge, Buffalo

 
 
          To this date in early 2024, those two Sicilian immigrants, the only ones from their respective families to settle in the U. S., were responsible for a hundred and forty-five descendants as their heritage: many of whom attend the annual family picnics, which first were held seventy years ago."
 

1954 Family Picnic at Millie and Al's in North Collins

2023 Family Picnic at Akron Falls Park, after missing three years due to the pandemic

 

 
 
The Story Booth is still being staffed, and equipped with recording and scanning gear. 

Watch this space to learn when you'll be able to arrange an appointment at the CCI Story Booth, to have YOUR ancestors' story preserved for posterity.

Meanwhile, if you'd like to be placed on a waiting list to give your family's history when the Story Booth is ready, leave your name and contact information with CCI Board President Maria Foss at mefoss2870@yahoo.com
 

 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 










































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