“I let my mind wander where it wanted to go, spooling through my life and adventures, relishing the subtle threads that seemed to link all my experiences and that had combined to bring me here, into the heart of Basilicata, perched on the cusp of something wondrous…”
- David Yeadon, Seasons in Basilicata
How does one describe in words an indescribable series of events?
I stepped out of one world and into another about a month and a half back, and time stopped.
Taking the next step in my search for living distant relatives in Italy, I drove 900 kilometers (560 miles) south to Marsico Nuovo, the small mountain town of just over 3,000 inhabitants in the region of Basilicata where my Italian heritage began. It was from this tiny town, blanketing the hill where it sits like a patched quilt, that my great grandparents left everything they had and everyone they knew in 1890 to head to the unknown - America - the land of hope “where the streets are paved with gold.”
View of Marsico Nuovo from agriturismo
They left along with millions of other Italians from the region, a significant amount during the period of 1880-1920, convinced after years of suffering from natural disasters (earthquakes, volcanic eruptions), poverty, and disease in the region, that the only hope of survival was to leave everything and everyone behind, not knowing whether you’d ever see those relatives and family again, and board a ship in horrible conditions for three weeks to arrive in a country where another language was spoken, only menial labor was available, and your nationality was amongst the most vilified of immigrant groups to ever come ashore in America.
Hardly streets paved with gold.
And in a cruel bit of irony, it was most likely those Italian immigrants doing the actual street paving upon arrival in America.
I drove down with Magdalena, an Argentinean friend who I met in Florida in early ‘07, who’s currently teaching in Rome, herself also in search of long lost relatives in a small town only about 20 minutes from Marsico Nuovo. Our plan: one day in Marsico Nuovo to hopefully find any existing distant relatives of mine, half of a day in Pignola to hopefully find any of her distant relatives, and half a day in Potenza, the region’s capital and a city of about 75,000 people, visiting a mutual Italian friend’s family (he teaches and is doing his PhD in Florida, where I also met him).
So, armed with my great grandparents’ names and their dates of birth, we descended on a quiet and unsuspecting Marsico Nuovo town on a Sunday night, eagerly anticipating a Monday spent scouring every nook and cranny for anyone who knew my great grandparents.
Monument of the fallen soldiers, outside town hall
I had reserved a few nights at an agriturismo in town days before, and upon arrival from Rome Sunday night we noticed that the street on which the agriturismo was located was not coming up on the navigation system in the car. Needing help, we stopped at the first open bar we saw, which had a decent crowd (15 or so) intently watching an Italian Serie A soccer game on the TV hanging from the ceiling.
Usually not much will distract an Italian watching soccer, but two obvious non-locals walking through the door that night did the trick (remember that we’re talking about a town of 3,000 where not only everyone knows everyone, but everyone knows everything about everyone).
This is also a town and a region that is used to people fleeing, especially youth, for more job opportunities to the north. Their curiosity as to why two young adults with funny Italian accents were there that night took over, and they started inquiring about our presence.
We explained that we had both come down from our adopted homes to the north to spend a few days in search of distant relatives, hoping to bridge generational gaps going back 100+ years.
A group of four men detached themselves from the game and wanted to know more. Upon revealing my last name (shared by quite a few families in this small town) and what I knew about my great grandfather, they were already convinced I’d be leaving with a few more relatives in hand, and they immediately named different families who were likely possibilities. One of the men, Gianni, took a step closer to us. He looked me in the eyes and said in his rough southern Italian, “I see it in the shape of your nose, and your eyes, your eyes… I already know who your distant relatives are here.”
And in the end he was indeed spot on.
Gianni describing to me the Val D’Agri, the valley surrounding Marsico Nuovo
More chatting followed and then we realized it was past 11pm, and we had not yet checked in to the agriturismo, nor eaten dinner. No worries, Gianni assured us, his best friend Pino owned the agriturismo, and he’d lead us there in his car and make sure everything was all set. Michele, another interested party at the bar, said he’d take care of the dinner part. A quick phone call to his buddy who ran the restaurant up on the hill made sure they’d stay open past midnight for the two weary and hungry travelers.
Just two hours into our stay in Marsico Nuovo, and they were already moving tiny mountains to accommodate us in any way possible. And starting early Monday morning we were about to have our understanding of the word ‘hospitality’ completely redefined.
Our day started with a trip to the comune (town hall) to initiate some research. We climbed the stairs of the municipal building, walked down the corridor to the room with voices, and found ourselves in the town ‘library.’
And by library, I mean a room that rivals the size of my living room, boasting a selection of books perhaps equal in number to the selection sitting on my bookshelf at home.
But what the town library lacked in actual reading material, it was more than made up for by its librarian Giovanna, an absolute saint of a woman who committed herself to being the best host imaginable for Marsico’s two new guests.
Giovanna the town librarian
After briefly explaining our stories to Giovanna, she proceeded to introduce us to every human being who entered the town hall that morning, including Giovanni the area psychologist, Gino the town cop, and all their colleagues in the various municipal departments. Just about the only person we didn’t meet that morning was the town mayor.
We didn’t meet Mayor Domenico Vita until the afternoon.
But back to the morning, because at around 10am Giovanna proposed a little sight-seeing tour of Marsico Nuovo with her as a guide, apparently safe in assuming that the town library was unlikely to get swamped that morning with patrons.
We ran into Gianni outside town hall, the man who led us to the agriturismo the night before, and he joined us on our tour. They were intent on showing us two churches in town, one which also served as a small museum. Being Monday morning, however, both churches were closed (along with stores, this is very common outside of the big cities).
But we had connections. Gianni called up Gino, the town cop we had met earlier, and Gino came up to drop off the keys.
And so Gianni opened the church for us.
Our tour continued, down to the town’s main strip, stopping every time Giovanna wanted to introduce us to someone new, which was every 11 seconds. We stopped at the bar for caffé, then when leaving Giovanna spotted the town doctor walking to his office. She yelled out.
Mario invited us up to his office, through the waiting room and past waiting patrons, through the analysis room with assistants busy transporting samples, and into his office where he reached into a cabinet to pull out two copies of a rather thick book. He proudly showed us a 400-page book of photographs on the history of Marsico Nuovo and its people, assembled and written by him. Overall, at least a thousand photographs inside cover all aspects of Marsico, its history, and its people since the beginning of the 20th century, all of which have been scanned and are available for viewing online.
Mario opened each copy of the book, and wrote short dedications to Magdalena and I, and signed and dated each copy. A pretty nice gesture from someone who didn’t know either of us until just 10 minutes prior.
And so we slowly meandered back to the town hall. It was approaching lunch time, and Giovanna had another great idea… She would cook both of us lunch at her home about 200 feet from the town hall. After all, she said, the pasta sauce was already made.
Well, if the sauce is already made…
Giovanna in her kitchen
An hour preparing and an hour or so eating and drinking local wine filled us to the brim with fine food and drink, and also provided us a further glimpse of day-to-day life in this forgotten region of Italy.
Some more research at the town hall that afternoon revealed the neighborhood where my great grandfather grew up, and with that information Gianni was convinced at which family I would be soon calling distant relatives.
So it was time to go a-knockin’.
Part 2, new relatives galore, coming soon…
Click here for more pictures from the morning.
