Memoirs of Zi Pre'

Foreword

The present booklet treats of a few doctrinal points unavoidably omitted in a former tract bearing the title of " Polemic Chat/' When these Memoirs began to appear serially in the Peoria Cathedral Calendar, a friendly critic remarked : " The Bishop is utilizing his parochial experiences among the Italians ' to point a moral and adorn a tale.' " Precisely. Our chief aim in the present chronology of events is to instruct the people, " to preach the word in season and out of season, reproving, entreating, rebuking in all patience and doctrine."

Several anachronisms as well as changes in the names and occupations of the characters have been purposely introduced, so that the ingenuity of even a Sherlock Holmes might be baffled should he attempt to identify them with certain individuals of the Italian colony.

Some may deem Pasqualino too clever for his tender age. Unusqiiisque abundat sensu suo. Please consider, friendly or hostile reader, as the case may be, that our youthful polemist had completed three years of classics with unusual success before encountering his adversary. The

FOREWORD

children of sunny Italy develop much earlier than those of northern climes. Youthful prodigies bud forth occasionally in the realm of literature, poetry, painting, music and mathematics. Why should they not blossom also in the field of polemics? Besides, were Pasqualino a youth of mediocre talent, his utterances would not be worth recording. At any rate it is upon them and not upon his personality that we wish to focus your attention.

Pasqualino's father represents indeed no particular individual, but rather the composite embodiment of reprehensible traits which Zi Pre' had ample occasion to reprove among the male members of his flock. The exemplary Christian virtues of the mother have not been overdrawn. The most elaborate portrayal of maternal solicitude and self-sacrifice falls, as a general rule, immeasurably below the reality.

The tactics of Evangelical zealots to wrest Italian children from the One True Fold, are melancholy facts familiar to the hundred or more Sunday School teachers of Guardian Angel Mission. The conversion of the proselytizer, his subsequent public reparation and edifying death are true in every detail.

The Author.

Contents

CHAPTER PAGE

I Italian Quarter i

II Italian Customs 13

Chapter I

ON the south side of Forquer Street, Chicago, and nearly midway between Desplaines and Halsted, there stands an unpretentious brick structure with a Romanesque fagade surmounted by a Roman cross. It is the Chiesa deirAngelo Custode. The mellow tints of sea and sky in the decoration of the interior from vestibule to sanctuary are unmistakably Italian. The stained-glass windows of St. Michael, St. Raphael, and of the Guardian Angel, carry the thoughts of the onlooker back to the basilicas of Rome and Florence and cause him to murmur the names of Italian masters. The statues of San Vito, Rocco, Lucia, and Sebastiano, recall vividly to mind those Christian martyrs especially dear to the Italian heart, while Raphael's Madonna della Sedia tenderly clasping her Di-

1 Zi Pre' is an abbreviation of Zio Preute meaning "Uncle Priest," a familiar title given the clergy in Southern Italy.

I vine Bambino seems to look down with maternal solicitude upon the congregation gathered in reverential attitude to assist at Holy Mass and hear the word of God in their native tongue.

The sacred edifice and its humble surroundings are redolent of Italy. Forquer Street is an insignificant, narrow thoroughfare jutting east from Canal, making a slight jog at Halsted, and terminating west in Blue Island Avenue. It might easily pass for any one of the crooked lanes in lower Naples. In fact, when the visitor hears the itinerant peddlers shouting: " Ecco donne, le palate I i cavoli! le cipolle!" it requires quite a mental effort to realize that he is in the heart of Chicago and not upon an Italian border of the Mediterranean. Guardian Angel Parish comprises emigrants from nearly every province of the Italian peninsula as well as from Sicily. The representation from Modena, Milan, Piedmont, and Genoa is rather small ; but the natives from Naples, Salerno, Bari, Basilicata, Abruzzi, Calabria, Catanzaro, le Marche, Lucca, Messina, and Palermo, are as plentiful as the English sparrow. A parish averaging annually over a thousand baptisms cannot be even remotely suspected of race suicide. The Northern Italians are generally well educated, while their brothers of the South are quite illiterate. For fully onehalf of the latter the confessor is obliged to recite the Atto di dolor e and have them repeat it after him. Yet even these are not so ignorant of religious truth as might be inferred from their inability to recite a set formula of prayer. One individual who could not decipher his name in letters two feet long on a sign board was told that he could not communicate on a certain morning. The priest did not wish to delay the Mass by hearing his confession.

" E perche non si puo communicare ? " he demanded.

" Perche non ci sono particole in numero sufficiente," replied the priest.

" Potete f rangerle," persisted the poor fellow. Needless to say his confession was heard.

The Southern Italians compensate in their working knowledge of the Ten Commandments for what they lack in secular education. They are honest, industrious, and temperate, pure in their domestic lives and law-abiding in their civic relations. Some of them are generous even beyond their means and imbued with a deep sense of gratitude. The Socialists among them are few but ferocious. At heart they are really anarchists. It is characteristic of the Latin races that they are never content with halfway measures. The Southern Italians have a keen sense of right and wrong. They are scrupulously faithful in keeping their word.

Abortion, the limitation of the size of families by unlawful practices, deliberate murder for lust or gain, are crimes practically unknown among them. Black Hand tactics were unheard of among the inhabitants of the West Side colony until that travesty on justice in Omaha where the kidnapper was acquitted. His success has apparently encouraged blackmailers of all nationalities throughout the country.

The idea prevailing among not a few Americans that the chief occupation of Italians consists in pushing a banana cart, selling peanuts, or grinding an organ with monkey obbligato, is libelous. The street musicians hail with few exceptions from Senerchia, and seldom mix with the rest of the Italian colony. Occasionally the Italians may get excited over a game of morra 2 or boccia, 3 but it is rarely serious. The vast majority of the men are manual laborers. They are engaged in excavating, grading, mining, or sweeping the streets. The women make children's clothes which are sold in the department stores. The boys sell newspapers or polish shoes. The latter have Italianized their occupa-

2 Morra is a popular game in which the contestants usually gamble for the drinks by guessing the number of fingers the opponent throws out.

3 Boccia is a pastime in which the players roll wooden balls along the ground and the one bowling nearest to a given ball is declared victor.

tion and style themselves shinatori. Very few of the men are fond of whiskey. Many of the railroad laborers return in the Fall to the city where they spend the winter in enforced idleness. Some of them pass this period in drinking, carousing, and slashing one another, which of course benefits neither soul nor body. Many a family produces its own wine. This was impressed upon the pastor's memory in a rather unforgettable way. He had been preparing a young Italian couple for First Holy Communion. The parents of the bride kept a fruit store near the church. One evening while strolling by their door the priest dropped in to pay them a visit. The family happened to be quietly celebrating a birthday of one of the members. All arose in deference to " Zi Pre' " or Uncle Priest, as he is familiarly called by Southern Italians. The mother hastened to procure him a glass of the wine they were drinking, and assured him that it was very pure because home-made. As the priest was unfamiliar with the wine-making process, the good woman sought to enlighten him on the subject, and remarked incidentally: " Abbiam f atto chisto vino dalle uve che non si potevan vendere, perche comminciavano gia a guastare. Ecco ! " It was the first and last time " Zi Pre' " irrigated his thorax with home-made wine.

It has often been observed that at High Mass the congregation is composed mostly of men, whilst at the early Masses the women are in the majority. Undoubtedly more men than women emigrate from Italy to America. Most of the mothers cannot go to High Mass, because they must attend to domestic duties, look after the small children, prepare the dinner, etc.

Italian bishops and priests should try to dissuade husbands from emigrating unless accompanied by their wives. Whilst in some instances " absence makes the heart grow fonder," and remittances are kept up regularly for a certain period, with an alarming number it becomes a case of "out of sight out of mind." The division of the family usually proves disastrous. Everything here in America seems to conspire against the Italian immigrant so as to render him oblivious of both God and family. Ignorant of the language of the country, he is handicapped from the very moment of his arrival.

Poverty, poor crops, and excessive taxation drives him here, like the Irish, German, and Slav, to better his condition. The others came with their clergy; the Italian did not. Anxious to secure employment, he easily falls a prey to the schemers of his own nationality. They batten upon his ignorance and inexperience. Once a poor fellow came to " Zi Pre' " for a letter of recommendation to the Mayor in order that he might obtain work in cleaning the streets. " I don't want to ask so-and-so, a saloonkeeper and ward heeler," he said, " because if he gets me the job, I shall have to pay him so much a month. Failing to do so, he will have me ' fired ' in order that some other unfortunate may be fleeced." Work is promised him perhaps with a section gang, but on condition that he pay the labor agent five or ten dollars for the privilege. It is aggravating to hear flippant individuals speak of " the lazy, shiftless Italian." His first and consuming desire is to get work not only for himself, but also for every member of his family able to become a wage-earner. Many of the Italian children are remarkably bright, and if only allowed to pursue their studies might become prominent in professional, commercial, and political life. Nobody will question the necessity of a child labor law. Those enforcing it, however, should be endowed with discretionary power. The Illinois statute regarding child labor has apparently done more harm than good in its application. The requirements, calculated to prevent all possible deception, closely resemble the measurements employed in the Bertillon system.

One might infer that the factory inspector was dealing with criminals rather than with the offspring of honest parents. The only thing lacking in the demands is that of a wax impression of the applicant's hands and feet. To state the age and sex of the child may pass, but when it comes to defining the color of his complexion and hair, his weight, stature, and other peculiarities of his body, the requirements of the labor certificate border on the impertinent as well as ridiculous. To be thoroughly appreciated, this law, fathered and promoted by the much-advertised social uplifters, must be seen in action. A poor Italian widow, the mother of four children, came to the rectory one day seeking a labor certificate for her oldest boy of sixteen, so that he might continue unmolested at his work. He was the sole support of the family. His employer told him he would have to quit unless he obtained an affidavit from the Board of Education. We repaired to the Juvenile Court thinking to obtain there the necessary permit. The judge's heart went out in sympathy to the unfortunate mother, but he was powerless to act. He could only give an affidavit as to the boy's age. That alone would not suffice. The boy should furthermore have an affidavit from the Board of Education, which positively refused to issue a certificate to any child unable to read and write the English language! This the youth could not do, as he was only a few months in the country. What relief then was in sight for this unfortunate family? None. The mother could be sent to the poorhouse, the younger brothers and sisters might be placed in orphanages. The oldest boy was too big for the orphan asylum. Nothing was left for him but to beg or steal. He should not dare to earn his living by the sweat of his brow because that was illegal! When a law forbids work to those who are eager to work and forces them into pauperism, " white slavery," or other disreputable methods of gaining a livelihood, the sooner it is repealed or radically amended, the better for all concerned.

Near the church lived an old man who had become violently insane. One morning he tried to slit his niece's throat with a potato knife. She ran across the street to the rectory for protection. A half hour later the affrighted niece and her demented kinsman in the custody of two policemen were conveyed in a patrol wagon to the detention hospital, while the priest proceeded thither in a street car. The occupants of the patrol wagon breathed a sigh of relief upon reaching their destination, for their trip was far from being a " joy ride." All the way the unfortunate man had kept up a rambling denunciation of everybody in general and of " Zi Pre 5 " in particular, whom he designated as the prince of devils. After the maniac's commitment, the judge, having another Italian case on the docket, requested the priest to remain and act as interpreter. A clean-shaven, intelligent-looking man of about thirty, and dressed as a waiter, had been arrested in the loop district for having expectorated in a lady's face! The prosecutor maintained that the waiter was a dangerous paranoiac who imagined that all women were trying to ensnare him. This he vigorously denied when questioned by the priest. " It is only that painted street- walker," he exclaimed ; " she has visited the restaurant repeatedly. Yesterday she kept dogging me with her importunities in a crowded thoroughfare, and to show my disgust I tried to spit in her face. Unfortunately I missed her and struck someone else. The officer allowed her to escape and arrested me.

" Are you a Catholic ? " asked the priest.

" Yes," he replied, at the same time producing a rosary from his vest pocket. His answers to the queries convinced the judge of his sanity and he was released. He fared much better than another Italian who spent eleven months in a federal prison for supposed complicity with a gang of counterfeiters. He might yet be languishing in jail, had not his pastor in the old country become interested in his case. The granting of a bonus for every conviction is not

ITALIAN QUARTER n

always free from the danger of flagrant injustice.

Shortly before the completion of Guardian Angel Church the priest was summoned to attend a poor Italian named Giuseppe Lio, who was shot down in cold blood by a murderous policeman. Some teachers of the Polk Street School had complained of the side-walk being obstructed by Italians. Giuseppe was seated with a couple of companions on a garbage box in front of his boarding-house. The policeman ordered them to move on. Giuseppe pointed to the lodging-house and tried to explain that he lived there, and then the shooting followed. Immediately after, this uniformed assassin was seen by several witnesses to enter a hallway and close the door. A few minutes later he emerged with his coat all slashed, evidently for the purpose of creating the impression that his unfortunate victim had assaulted him with a stiletto! Giuseppe carried no weapon of any kind. Nothing was done to this guardian of the peace. He was simply transferred to another precinct. Such injustices could be easily avoided or at least greatly diminished in number by appointing more Italians on the police force. At the time of the above-mentioned occurrence there were but two Italian policemen in the City of Chicago with an Italian population of about sixty thousand!

Many Italians are prevented from joining the force because unable to pass the physical examination. Surely something more than girth and stature is required in an efficient policeman. What some of the Italian aspirants to the force lack in physical measurements may be counterbalanced by intelligence and courage. Petrosino, the New York detective, who was assassinated a few years ago in Sicily, was in the front rank of his profession.

Chapter II Italian Customs

THE peculiar custom of having both a civil and religious marriage ceremony in Italy causes many bridal couples to fall easy victims to the wiles of justice-shop solicitors who prey upon their credulity and their supposition that the marriage laws of this country and Italy are practically the same. Are the justices of the peace in collusion with these individuals? Are the latter paid a commission for deceiving Italian immigrants? We are inclined to think so. Why should they drum up trade for a justice of the peace unless there be some remuneration in sight ? Some of the " runners " speak Italian and have very persuasive methods. It is among the Italians that they reap the most abundant harvest. " Wouldn't you like to be married according to the laws of the state the same as in Italy ? " they ask of the prospective bridegroom and bride. u It only costs $3.50, and for an extra half-dollar you will receive a beautiful marriage certificate with a picture of the Bible and the matrimonial bark drawn by two immaculate swans. This you can frame and hang up for an ornament over the domestic hearth." Che bellezzal Many Italian couples, like unsuspecting geese, are thus deluded. Even were they aware that the civil ceremony is not required in this country, it does not take much to persuade them that returning to Italy with a certificate only from the priest, the Italian government will not recognize their marriage as valid. The imposition usually succeeds with the relatives of the bride, and they insist upon the performance of the civil ceremony before a judge. When upbraided for their folly by the priest, they reply that they were simply following the Italian custom. He tells them that, being now in America, they should follow American and not Italian customs. In Italy no marriage is considered legal unless a formal ceremony be performed by a state official. In America the state grants the same authority regarding the marriage ceremony to priests, judges, and justices. Bridegroom and bride require only a marriage license from the County Clerk, who exacts a nominal fee for his trouble. They should bring this document to the parish priest who is authorized both by Church and State to marry them. Within thirty days after the ceremony he is obliged in Illinois under penalty of a hun-

ITALIAN CUSTOMS 15

dred dollars' fine to fill out the license and return it to the County Clerk for record. If the Italian peasants could only be induced to follow this counsel, they would save themselves a great amount of annoyance, expense, and ridicule, and, above all, they would avoid the commission of a sacrilege.

In spite of the blunders occasionally made anent civil marriage, the Southern Italians cling tenaciously to many of the old-country customs which emigrants of other nationalities might do well to imitate. Chief among these customs is the good old-fashioned practice of chaperoning their daughters. Seldom do you hear of an Italian girl going astray. Italian maidens are never permitted to attend evening entertainments, balls, or receptions, unless accompanied by their parents. When the daughters reach the age of seventeen or eighteen, it is difficult to keep them under restraint. The parents prefer then that they marry, and be under a husband's care and protection.

The misinterpretation of Italian names is something awful, and largely due to the negligence of American school-teachers, who seem to be totally indifferent whether or not they grasp correctly the names of their pupils. Vincenzo, Vincent, a young Italian boy, assured me that his name was Jimmie. Assunta or Assumption, the name of an Italian girl, was erroneously rendered Susie. In the Sunday-school Lucy was falsely given for Leontina; Charlie for Egidio, Tom for Domenico; Gus for Costantino; and Mike for Pasquale! The pastor once encountered the keeper of an ice-cream parlor who presented his card with the inscription: Sullivan N — . " What is your baptismal name in Italian? " asked the priest. " Salvatore," replied the man. It took a long argument to convince this usurper of the Hibernian title that the English equivalent of Salvatore was not Sullivan, but Salvator or Saviour. Italian children are usually named after the feast day on which they are born. Hence when you hear them called Natale, Pasquale, Annunziata, Assunta, or Concetta, you may safely presume that their birthdays fell respectively on the feast of Christmas, Easter, Annunciation, Assumption, or the Immaculate Conception.

It is not unusual to see infants wearing earrings and bedecked with jewelry when brought to the church for baptism. Like the rabbit's foot with the " darkey," the ornamentation of a Neapolitan bambino would be incomplete without a charm of coral to protect it against the malign influence of the jattatura, or evil eye.

The Southern Italian is passionately fond of music and pyrotechnics. Within its boundaries,

ITALIAN CUSTOMS 17

Guardian Angel parish can boast of at least forty incorporated benevolent societies named after various titles of the Madonna or after some saint held in special veneration by the members.

A lamentable feature of the societies is that most of them hold their meetings Sunday morning. Every society celebrates annually the feast day of its patron with a Solemn High Mass and a panegyric. The latter to be effective must invariably conclude with a fervent prayer invoking the protection of the heavenly patron upon all the members of the society from every imaginable evil, temporal as well as spiritual. " Zi Pre' " fancied that upon one occasion he had delivered a very masterful discourse on the Blessed Virgin; to be precise, it was the feast of the Madonna di Monte Viggiano. He was, however, speedily disillusioned by the caustic criticism made by a poor woman upon leaving church at the end of the Mass. " Cosa ve ne pare?" she was asked in regard to the sermon. " Nemanco una preghiera," she replied. " Not even a prayer ! "

The church function is preceded by a parade with a brass band and fireworks. The hiring of a brass band is an indispensable feature of every society. We recall the case of a laboring man who retained membership in five organizations. He had five brass bands at his funeral. The cost of those five bands of music might have paid the house rent for his widow for at least a year. The brass-band habit will of course eventually die out as the people grow more enlightened. A still more lamentable feature of these societies is the fact that they are occasionally controlled by the very worst element in the Italian colony. We remember one organization bearing the name of a saint, and having for president an adulterous saloon-keeper who abandoned his wife and children in the old country, and raised a second family in America. A Sicilian society, the largest of its kind in Chicago, had for its leader a most notorious scamp who spent two years in jail for counterfeiting. The amazing part of it all is that even when such characters are imprisoned, no matter what their felony may have been, they do not forfeit their membership in the society. It is high time that these poor people be taught more self-respect, and not allow themselves to be guided by such miscreants.

Chapter III

THE sects which infest the Italian district strain every nerve to wrest Italian immigrants and their children from the Church. The men are decoyed into the sectarian dens of these human spiders under the pretext of being taught the English language. The little girls are enticed by various trinkets and the prospect of learning how to sew. As a sedative to the unsuspecting a very Catholic-looking cross is placed over the entrance of the establishment, whilst upon the interior walls may be seen pictures of our Lord, the Madonna, and of those saints most popular among the Italians. Needless to say, these pious images are not intended for the veneration of the faithful, but for the purpose of deception. Such underhanded methods of proselytizing are most reprehensible. Instead of elevating, they degrade. They furnish a powerful incentive to dishonesty. Is it not a greater crime to bribe a man to change his religious convictions with the alluring bait of material gain, raiment, house-rent, or employment, than to purchase his vote with a few dollars in time of election? The best plan for these misguided soul-chasers is to expend their energy upon themselves and leave the poor Italians to the maternal care of the Catholic Church to which they belong. For twenty centuries her bishops and priests have been conducting the work of civilization among all the nations of the globe. One of the great problems confronting us at the present day is how we are to amalgamate that immense tide of immigration daily pouring in upon our shores from Southern Europe, Italians, Poles, Bohemians, Slovaks, and Slovenes, Croatians, Hungarians, Lithuanians, and Ruthenians. Here they annually flock in thousands, totally unfamiliar with our language, laws, and customs. They iurnish the brawn and muscle of our industrial centres. They have supplanted the Irish in our factories, mines, and workshops. The latter are superintending the factories, running the railroads, and the country generally. They have invaded the professions and are devoting their attention to law and medicine, police and politics. The Catholic Church alone, whose faith is not circumscribed by national boundaries, can fully realize the motto of our glorious country — " E pluribus unum," one composed of many. She is the best qualified to weld into one democratic brotherhood, one great American citizenship the children of various climes, temperaments, and conditions. In every diocese throughout the length and breadth of the United States these poor foreigners have cooperated most generously with their clergy in the erection of churches and schools where both young and old are taught to revere the laws of God as well as those of their adopted country.

Scarcely a year after his arrival in Chicago Archbishop Quigley opened at least a dozen churches exclusively for the Italians, to say nothing of the many he caused to be erected for other nationalities. To neutralize the pernicious effects of proselytizing zealots among the West- Side Italians, provision was made not only for the young in the way of a Sunday-school, sodalities, and sewing-circles, but also for the adults by means of a night school. The self-sacrificing zeal of the hundred-and-twenty Catholic young men and women coming weekly from every part of the city and even suburbs in order to teach catechism to the Italian children will furnish a lengthy chapter to the history of the wonderful growth and development of Guardian Angel Mission. Great credit is due the Catholic publicschool teachers who conducted a night school in the basement of the rectory during the winter months. It had an average attendance of about two hundred Italian workmen. They came with the sole desire of learning and were dreadfully in earnest. Hence the order and discipline of the school were excellent. One young fellow with an abnormal thirst for knowledge wanted to learn reading, writing, and bookkeeping inside of a week, so that he might obtain promotion at his place of work. He was a teamster on South Water St. for one of the commission houses.

The basement of the rectory having become altogether inadequate to the rapidly increasing needs of the night school, the classes were transferred to the Dante Public School located diagonally across from the Guardian Angel Church. This change deeply affected the editor of the Tribuna Transatlantica who availed himself of every opportunity to arouse prejudice against the pastor and his work among the Italian people. We submit a literal translation of one offensive paragraph which subsequently appeared on the editorial page of his wretched newspaper.

EVENING SCHOOLS AND IRISH PRIESTLY ACTIVITY

Last Monday night fully 500 Italian men attended the opening of the Dante Night School for the classes of English. For this we are indebted to the Very Rev. Irish priest, Father

Dunne who, rendered furious by the prosperous Evangelical missions and schools of the energetic Marquis Petacci in Ewing, Forquer, and W. Taylor streets, and other institutions frequented by Italians, has been able to obtain the Dante School for this purpose through his influence.

We implore our compatriots to continue frequenting the night school, so that Fr. Dunne may have no reason to complain of them. Thus they won't be obliged to go to hell, from which place this priest wants to save them at all cost. What bothers him indeed more than hell and incites him to labor among our countrymen is the threatened loss of fruitful customers.

In fact about a dozen new churches have been recently established in Chicago for the Italians, and entrusted to Italian priests who must pay for the cost of their construction by cruelly milking their compatriots, while the holy shops themselves (botteghe) remain the property of the Archbishop who has the largest real estate office in the city.