They were peasants stuck in medieval socioeconomic relations, while others were proletarian sharecroppers and migrant farmworkers, all without skills beyond agriculture. Most were motivated by jobs in the booming US Industrial Revolution, with plans to earn money to return to Italy and buy land or start businesses.
Their children were often refused access to schools, and adults were turned away from public places and labor unions, and even in church, forced to sit in segregated church pews set aside for Black people. Employers often preferred light-skinned Slovaks and Poles to Italians. In the mining industry, English-speaking workers held the skilled and supervisory positions while Italians were hired as laborers.
Even those who were educated and skilled were unable to secure any jobs besides manual labor. Only in the s did Italians become more integrated into the workforce. More Italian immigrants were employed in semiskilled jobs in factories as well as skilled positions, but a third remained in unskilled positions.
Even Italian American union members faced prejudice with meetings held in English, and Italians were not elected to official positions. Three years after the Chicago fair, a group of Italians in New York formed the Sons of Columbus Legion to celebrate future Columbus anniversaries, mingling with the Irish and the Knights of Columbus who had succeeded in getting the seventy-six-foot Columbus Monument installed in the center of Columbus Circle in New York in Columbus himself.
His voyage to America opened the door to the founding of the United States, thus was blessed by God, too. How intertwined Columbus is with this American vision is evident in the number of monuments to him; according to researchers at the Monument Lab, he ranks third behind Lincoln and Washington. The controversy over what to do with all those statues likely will play out for years.
Sicilians were targeted for lynching in part because they worked the same jobs as African Americans and often lived in their communities, leading Southerners to consider them more Black than white. The New Orleans lynching was roundly praised. Eleven of his Italian assassins lynched by a mob. The Italian government was not so sanguine. It broke off diplomatic relations with the U. Nevertheless, that proclamation ultimately set the stage for a federal Columbus Day holiday , created in So why should we keep referring to Columbus as an Italian hero?
History already is moving us to a better place. If I were to nominate a new role model for Italians, it would be Mother Frances Cabrini, an Italian immigrant who in became the first U. Cabrini, like many immigrants, faced many obstacles and a lack of resources when she arrived, but persevered to help immigrants across the country. It was her work in the American West that prompted Colorado to designate the first Monday in October as Cabrini Day , replacing the state observance of the Columbus Day holiday.
Waxman at olivia. By Olivia B. Related Stories. America Needs to Get Back to Facts. Already a print subscriber? Go here to link your subscription. Need help? Visit our Help Center.
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