LEVINE:

Okay. Today is the 19th of July, 1996. And I am here in Hackensack, New Jersey, with Mary Parachini. Mrs. Parachini came to the United States as Maria . . .

PARACHINI:

Istria.

LEVINE:

. . . Istria.

PARACHINI:

Yeah.

LEVINE:

When she was sixteen years of age, in 1917. So that makes you ninety-five years old.

PARACHINI:

Yes, I was, in May.

LEVINE:

Yes. And you look wonderful. You look wonderful. And I want to, I'm going to start by asking you about your life in Italy.

PARACHINI:

Yeah. And you want me to share, I started, I come in in this country . . .

LEVINE:

Well, first let's talk about Italy. First give me your birth date. What was the day you were born?

PARACHINI:

May 8, 1901.

LEVINE:

'01. Uh-huh. And where in Italy were you born? Just relax.

PARACHINI:

That's a small village.

LEVINE:

Okay.

PARACHINI:

And they call it Camania[ph], Camania Monferrato[ph]. The nearest city is Cazzali[ph], the secondary, you know? And the province is Alessandria[ph]. Alessandria[ph].

LEVINE:

Okay. Well, why don't you just sit back and relax, and we'll have a nice little talk.

PARACHINI:

I never, I never relax. I always stay, always.

LEVINE:

( she laughs ) Okay. So, now, did you live in the same place, in that little village, did you live there right up until you were sixteen and you came to the United States?

PARACHINI:

Till sixteen. And you want to know how I start, how suggest me to come here?

LEVINE:

Well, first let me ask you, like, up until you were sixteen, tell me about your life. What kind of a life did you have in Italy?

PARACHINI:

In Italy, in Italy my father, he was in agriculture, very, very, the best one, you can say, in the place. So he have quite a few vineyard. You know, we have to go to work, you know. And I don't like to go to work in the vineyard, you know, I don't like to work.

LEVINE:

You don't?

PARACHINI:

No. So, but I was going to work, you know. So . . .

LEVINE:

What were you doing, like, when you went to work in the vineyard, what did you do?

PARACHINI:

Oh, what you do? You plant the seeds and this or that, and beans, tomatoes, carrots, whatever, you know, whatever you have to eat, you know. But they cooked it, the grapes, they used to make wine. The only resource we have was knowing those three. No, not, because it was a very small village on the hill, you know. So we have, the wine to sell in the end, yeah. When we pick the grapes in the end of September, then they make the wine, and then you put them, not in the bottle, a big bag, and you keep it clean until you've got to, somebody come, taste, and if they like it, you sell the wine, you know? So then, that's why you got a few dollars. That's, you know, you got no resource. My father used to have a little horse, like a pony horse, and he used to go to the city. The people used to hire the horse with the carriage, and they used to make, you know, pay, say, to go Cazzali[ph] then, it was three lire, and to go Alessandria was four lire. In fact, some time they used to go both place in one day, the people I, you know, I'm talking about when I was very young, and my brother used to be older than me. That's, he used to go with the horse, you know, with the people, you know. And that's how we always have a few dollars, like, not dollars, lire. But we have, well, it was a good life if you like, you know. But, uh, so I was going to stay there, and then . . .

LEVINE:

Well, tell me your father's name.

PARACHINI:

Francesco, Frank.

LEVINE:

And his name was Istria.

PARACHINI:

Istria, yeah.

LEVINE:

And your mother's name?

PARACHINI:

Angela, Angelina, Angela Cattna.

LEVINE:

Is that C-A-T . . .

PARACHINI:

C-A-T-T-N-A.

LEVINE:

Okay.

PARACHINI:

My mother's maiden name.

LEVINE:

And your sisters and brothers that you had in Italy?

PARACHINI:

Uh, my sister, my brother, when I left there, he was in the army, you know, in the First World War. And my sister, she was a couple of years older, she was not home. So she went, see, my father bought a sewing machine, a Singer sewing machine, because they used to make clothes for the soldier. So it was a tailor, he said to my father, he said, "Frank," like, you know, "if you buy the machine, I make you, you know, you pay for it, like I use your horse and, you know, you pay, you pay the machine with that." So then my father have three girls then, my father and mother. And then when we bought the machine, the company have, they gave a chance for one daughter of the family to go and learn how to use the machine. So, and then my sister was the older one, so she went. She went a couple of weeks Cazzali, you know, was like a place for the, to learn how to use the machine. And then it snow, instead two weeks, she stay a month. All right. So, and then, then we was, one day we was working in the vineyard. Near home was a vineyard my father having, near home. And he told me, he said, "Maria," he said, "some day I got to write to Uncle Angelo." Because my uncle, my great uncle, my mother's uncle, he was here, and he was very close to my mother, because there was not too much difference of age. He used to be very close. He used to come often. Because his family come one, like me, first one, then all the family. So my uncle was here, he said, "Some day I got to write to Uncle Angelo, and you want to say a few words?" That's what make the picture, you know. I say, "All right." So after lunch, it was in the dining room, he wrote the letter, he got it right. Then he come in the kitchen, it was wash the dishes, and he say, "All right, Mommy. I finish. You want to go to write?" I said, "Oh." I dry my hands, and i went to write. I didn't see what my father write, you know, he was not a lot, not even think, you know, it was not our business, you know? So, and, uh, nobody was next to me to dictate, to tell me what to say. So I say, "Dear Angelo, Dear Uncle." I said, "I'm a niece, Maria, age sixteen." I say I was sixteen because before I was ready, you know. So I said I was sixteen. "Tell me what to do. I want to come in America. I want to come in America." So my father read the letter, he didn't say, "Why you read," you know, write the letter, why. He close the letter, and he mailed it. Pass one week, pass two weeks, and three weeks, then he used to take time, you know. I want to say this guy, he forget all about me. One day we was going back to, we used to start to learn how to sew. We used to go to a lady to, you know, to start, to make a trousseau.

LEVINE:

Oh!

PARACHINI:

So we was going back from lunch, we just left the home, and I saw the mail man's son, Alla[ph]. "Istria, Istria, ten cents fine." ( they laugh ) Because my uncle, he make the affidavit, supposed. Then I find out after, you know. It was too late to mail it, and he, you know, it was a big thing, you know. He put a regular stamp, five cents stamps then, and he mailed it, because the post office was closed. So when it get there, we have to pay ten cents fine. So the guy, Alla[ph], ten cents fine. So we went back, me and him, because it was, say, like this from there, and so I give it to my father. My father read the letter. And my father was tall, I was short, and I look. And I saw something. Then after he read the letter he look down, he say, "You really wants to go in America?" And I say, "Yeah." He doesn't say boo. So I start, because he used to go, I only went for the picture. Otherwise that, you know, all the people, they went, because I was a minor, like. So my sister got to go another place where's my grandmother was born. See, the mother of my uncle was born. You have to get that name. So my sister went to pick it up. And then so, and they make a paper, so then I got that then. I got ready, so I went for the, for the picture take, you know, the picture.

LEVINE:

For the passport picture.

PARACHINI:

Yeah. And, uh, then we left, we supposed to leave March 1st, and then we went to Genoa and there was a strike in the coal. So, and then we, so in the coal, we can't leave. So my father says if I know when they leave I can stay here, but he don't know the strike, how long it last. I say, "I go home, then I come back, I know I don't come back. You know, it was too far." So we stayed there ten days. After ten days we left. Dante Alighieri. That's the name of the boat. The man, he formed the Italian language, Dante Alighieri. That's the name of the boat.

LEVINE:

Were you traveling by yourself?

PARACHINI:

I was, a lady was introduced to my father in the agency when we went to the agency, next town was an agency for the, you know. And my father went there for something, and this lady, she was there, was coming from another town, she have two daughters, she was going to come and meet her husband, daughter and a son, they was going to go Bridgeport. So I was under supervision, you know.

LEVINE:

Now, how did your mother and father feel about you going to America?

PARACHINI:

My father, the day before, he called me on one side, and he said, my mother, she was full, so congest, like, she can't, she can't talk, she can't say now. She was crying, my mother. But my father, he called me to one side, and he said, "Maria," he said, "you're going to America." He said, "Remember, you might find somebody offer you money." He didn't say for what, but my aunt was, you know, that's stupid. So he said, "Remember to be always a good girl." I was a good girl even if he didn't tell me, but, you know, my father told me that. And then he told me, too, he said, "You know there is a war going on with the Germans, this and that?" I say, "Yeah, sure." "Suppose this boat be, you know, sunk, with the submarine, you know, this. Who you blame?" my father asked me. He wants to know, you know. "Who you blame?" I say, "I don't blame nobody." That's destiny. That's a suggestion from God. Nobody never, we never talked for me to go in America the way I told you, you know. So here I am, and we takes. So we left the March 10, yeah. And we, when we reached the (?), we stopped for coal for a couple of days, and then we pick up, you know, the voyage again, and we get here I think the 26th.

LEVINE:

Uh-huh. Was your father satisfied with your answer about who would you blame if . . .

PARACHINI:

He didn't say nothing.

LEVINE:

He didn't say anything.

PARACHINI:

He didn't say nothing. Like when he read the letter, when I ask my uncle, he read the letter. If he don't want me to go, he say, he don't even make the letter. He making out the letter, or he say, "Why you say that?" He didn't say boo. And that's it. Here I am.

LEVINE:

What did you know about America? Before you ever came here, what was your . . .

PARACHINI:

No, I never came here. But, now my daughter's mother-in-law, that's the daughter of my uncle. You know, he make the Affidavit of Support for me. So she stop, and she marry a third cousin, you know, and so on. She came here before, like me. She was about sixteen. I don't know what year that one, because she was ten years older than me. I remember my mother once, I was about six years old, and she ask me, say, "Maria, you want to come with me?" I go and see Aunt Marietta, because this morning Ernestina, that's the daughter, left for America, was the first one came in this country. And my uncle don't have nobody family here. But he had some friend of, from another town, live here. And he wrote to this friend, he says, "So and so, my daughter got there, go and pick her up." And she was a, she was a doll, you know, sixteen years old, blonde, curly. She was the first one to come here.

LEVINE:

Do you remember that when you were six years old?

PARACHINI:

Yeah. That's my mother, she told me, she said, "You want to come with me? I got to Aunt, you know." It was not too far, you know. I said, because her daughter left, and she (?), you know. So we went there, we stay over there, and she left in the morning. And then I think after one year, a son was come like an agent to go in the army, like, you know. After a year or so, she called a brother. And then, and then they call, after they would see her, they call the mother and two sons, yeah. And then the call the father, that's my uncle, and the last son. And she call everybody. So I did, I came here in, uh, 1917, and 1921 I call, I call my sister, because I know through somebody came down, I went to see them, they knew my mother, and said, "Oh, by the way, when your sister come?" I said, "I didn't know nothing. She never mentioned nothing." I say, "I don't know when come." And she say, "But she said that soon she's going to be here, too." So on the way to work, when I left this friend and I went to work, I went in the bank, and I make a money order, and I send the money for her. And I didn't send to her, because if I send it to her, my father was afraid, you know, he buy property, like, he don't use it for, for her. I send it to an aunt. And I said, and we blame, we send the money through a cousin who went home from here. So, and, uh, I said to my aunt, "Here the money for my sister." I said, "If my father gave me the money, all right. If my father gave the money, you put this in the bank for me. If my father says he don't want to give the money, you know, to pay the trip, and then he use it. So, when my father here, say, "Oh, he going to America." He say, "Are you going?" I said, "Well, don't worry about that." She was drunk, because she knew the money was laying to my aunt. So when he hears that, he paid the expenses, so she came 1921. I know, he don't want. Her or my husband, they come through San Giovanni and San Giorgio, two boat. But they was not big as . . .

LEVINE:

As the Dante . . .

PARACHINI:

As the Dante Alighieri, you know, like Conta de Savoy when they went home, you know?

LEVINE:

Yeah, yeah.

PARACHINI:

So, uh . . .

LEVINE:

Tell me what your father was like. How do you remember your father from when you were a little girl?

PARACHINI:

Oh, my father, he was a very hardworking man, very. He was going to church, you know. He was, uh, very family, good family man. We used to, my father used to, my mother used to make a little stew, like, with the rabbit. She used to raise the rabbit, you know, because we don't have the money always to go to the butcher that time, you know? And so she used to raise the rabbit. So when she used to make the, you know, the dish, we used to eat one meal, then it was something left over, and so I used to say, "Give it to this, to the children." And he used to eat plenty of salada, salad, and my mother used to make polenta. Some time she cook hard boiled eggs, and you smash it in the salad, it give it a little flavor. And that's, we eat very, very, uh, you know, plain, plain. A lot of fruit, a lot of vegetable. We used to have a nice, old, we used to call Bella Vista. It was the best home in the town, I tell.

LEVINE:

What did the town . . .

PARACHINI:

I have pictures now . . .

LEVINE:

When we finish you can show me. But what did the town look like?

PARACHINI:

Huh?

LEVINE:

What was the town? What did the town look like?

PARACHINI:

Oh, my town, I used to have a postcard when I moved here. They took, you know, I guess my daughter take it. It was a very small town in here. When I used to go to school they used to say, you know, they used to say, "My town in a place like in a colina[ph], in a colina[ph]," like in the mountain, like, you know? Between the two lake, you know, Rotado[ph] and Grana[ph]. But it was very, not even three thousand people in my own town where I was born. Another thing. When I left to go to the train, I leave, I was leaving the town to come here, and my father said to me, there was still a chance to see, he said to me, "Maria, turn back once more you can see the church bell once more, because God know when you're going to see him again." I remember this thing. So, and I went back after ten years, married with my daughter, two years old, and my husband. I went home. May 28th, and I come back October 4, 1927.

LEVINE:

Do you remember anything you took with you to America that first time when you were sixteen, anything that you brought with you when you . . .

PARACHINI:

When I brought here from the other side, I guess, you know, a couple of dress, I guess, and shoes, and underwear. I know they brought the valise, you know, the suitcase. Because it was, we went in third class, because that lady, you know, she was supervise me, she went in third class. My father said to me, "Look, I was going to pay you in second class, but you got to go with this lady." So we went in third class. So we used to bunk bed, you know, there was a lot of people there. So they bring the suitcase, and they took everything. In fact, I have a couple of polo shirt, my uncle likes to have, and he told me to buy and bring them over, and they took it. And they took a razor, somebody gave it to me to bring it to their son here, and they took it. So that's all I remember.

LEVINE:

Where did they break into the suitcase? Where did they take the suitcase?

PARACHINI:

Where they take it?

LEVINE:

Where?

PARACHINI:

In the cabin.

LEVINE:

Oh, they went into the cabin.

PARACHINI:

It was like a basement.

LEVINE:

Oh, it was like steerage, with a big . . .

PARACHINI:

Oh, like two, three hundred, you know. I know. Who knows. So they break the suitcase and they take the things. I haven't got much, but anyway they on the way. Money, no. Money, no, because my father, he give the money to her to hold that money if I need something on the trip.

LEVINE:

Right.

PARACHINI:

Then I didn't leave, I didn't see her no more after we left the boat. I went to the Customs, and they gave me a book. I remember it was a big, it was a big counter like a bank, you know, around. They send me to, you know, that place. There was a man, he lent me a book, Italian book, to read, and I start to read. I was going like fast, and he said, "Basta, basta. That's enough!" ( they laugh )

LEVINE:

So you passed . . .

PARACHINI:

I remember, I remember.

LEVINE:

So you passed the reading test.

PARACHINI:

Eh?

LEVINE:

You passed the reading test.

PARACHINI:

Uh, passed. He said, "That's enough, that's enough." Because, because if somebody in alphabet, they don't like to pass.

LEVINE:

What else do you remember about the examinations, about Ellis Island?

PARACHINI:

I don't have no examination in Ellis Island, because they examine in the boat. They give you a vaccine, and there was a doctor. It was nice and clear. And, see, you have no examination in the Customs.

LEVINE:

Do you remember . . .

PARACHINI:

I remember I sleep one night, because I told you we get there after, must be after five, and they did work on the dock, so we sleep no the boat, and then in the morning we, we, I don't know, far from . . .

LEVINE:

From Battery Park, in New York.

PARACHINI:

Yeah. But I remember I see a lot of lot of light. I say, "Oh, my God." In the town there was such a small, you know, light.

LEVINE:

Do you remember anything else about Ellis Island, anything that you remember besides the, uh, reading test?

PARACHINI:

They don't give you nothing, no. When you get there, you just pass the reading, and then you come out. That's the last. Because if you reach there, you're all right, because otherwise they don't, they don't, you know, keep you there.

LEVINE:

Right. Did somebody meet you at Ellis Island?

PARACHINI:

Yeah, this uncle, my great uncle, my mother's uncle. It was seven years he was here. So when he was, I was in the case, it must be, and he was outside, like on the window. And I remember I show him, so they ask me, "You know, this man?" "Yes, he's my uncle." "What's the name? How old he is? How many years he's here?" What else they said? So that's my mother uncle, come to, he asked me a lot of questions, and then, and then they let me off. That's the last.

LEVINE:

And where did you go with your uncle when they let you in?

PARACHINI:

Oh, my uncle, I went to his house, 37th Street, New York, you know . . .

LEVINE:

West? West 37th, right?

PARACHINI:

Uh, New York, Ninth Avenue.

LEVINE:

Ninth Avenue, uh-huh.

PARACHINI:

It was the elevated. I remember. When I came down the elevated 34th Street, I saw two, three store, vegetable and fruit store, and I said, "My God, I thought there was nothing here." ( she laughs ) And I see apple, orange, all the fruit. And my uncle was living 37th Street, 340 37th Street near Ninth Avenue, but he can't keep me because he have two son, unmarried. One he was working Connecticut in the silver, you know. And one he was a waiter, he was working Philadelphia. So they used to come home. He used to have three room, uh, say the bedroom and the kitchen and, say, if you want to call a living room, but he got two single beds. So I was there for a while, but I can't stay there, no. And then my cousins always the same one, the one she come here first. She was living 43rd Street, and she was still going in the drugstore on 40th Street. It was an Italian drugstore. And that teller, he used to look for a girl to mind the children, you know. And once he said, when she went there, he told her about it, and he said, "Oh, my cousin come from Italy." She was here, and I was just get here. And he said, "Why don't you bring her over?" So we went there, it was three blocks. We went there, so, and the next day we went home, and I stayed there three years. But not only mind children, do everything.

LEVINE:

Housework?

PARACHINI:

Except wife. ( they laugh )

LEVINE:

Uh-huh. ( break in tape ) END OF SIDE ONE BEGINNING OF SIDE TWO

PARACHINI:

In three years I never went out, believe me or not. I went, I came down I think once. I don't think twice, I'm not sure. But once, I remember, I come down to the city to see my cousin and, you know, and that's all. And then I came back to the city. My aunt was working in the Biltmore Hotel, keep the locker clean, sparkle, for you, whatever, they help people going to change where the locker was, the lady go to change, you know. So, keep the sink, you know, sparkle. Oh, she was something, out of this world, for cleaning. So she, she make me go there and work, you know. She look for a job for me, and I work nearly three years in the Biltmore Hotel. First we was served a hundred and fifty men, chef, cook, you know. The big chef, small chef, vegetable man. Any, any, all the room, was hundred and fifty. It was three girls. ( she laughs ) And then, you know, these men, they take advantage when there's young girl. He used to, there was one friend, he used to say something once, and I don't like it. I don't like it. I took a platter there, and knock it on his head. ( she laughs ) And it break the platter. He got so embarrassed. And another time another guy, a small guy, he was working in the kitchen, too, I don't know what he was saying, and so I have a, took a, it was a beer bottle there, I don't know if it was full or empty, I give it across that, I don't want no nonsense. I want serious. I was serious as can be. So, sure, they complain to the big shot, the big shot come up with him at first. He was Italian Swiss. He come up, he ask what's wrong, what happened. I told him. So I guess if he got out it was, you know, three young girls working with two many men. So then they make me go into the kitchen and the main kitchen I was a storeroom girl, make the appetizer, the salad, and I serve the cook. All the waiter, they used to holler the order, and we used to make it and serve all the kind, you know. And then once I, I, uh, I make the breakfast time, you know, different. But, anyway, we work together two-and-a-half years. And then I left there because my sister was out, she was make a few dollars more, you know? So I went to work in the Automat. You know, there was a lot of Automat.

LEVINE:

On 42nd Street?

PARACHINI:

Not, no, I didn't work on 42nd Street. Broadway, in the cafeteria. You know, not on the floor, no bus girl, no like pick it up. Just inside making sandwich, making salad, making, you know. I was near the elevator, used to see when the stuff come in. It was everything excellent. They used to have a vegetable soup, wonderful. Every day change the menu. One day roast lamb, roast leg of lamb, another day Virginia ham, another day roast chicken, another day, every day change. Everything clean, every, you know, and I worked there until, until 1924 when I was a, I was married, I got married, I think, '23.

LEVINE:

Did you ever hear of anything like the Automat before you came?

PARACHINI:

Before I came where? In this country? No. I never eat, until I went there. But there's a lot of Automat, you know.

LEVINE:

Yeah, there were, right.

PARACHINI:

Yeah. There was one on 42nd Street, near Bryant Park, big. Now it's no more.

LEVINE:

No. But the idea of putting the money in and getting . . .

PARACHINI:

Yeah. But I never, I never use. No, I never take that stuff in the machine, you know. I used to . . .

LEVINE:

Because you were in the back.

PARACHINI:

I used to be in the food business.

LEVINE:

Right, right.

PARACHINI:

You know.

LEVINE:

So how did you meet your husband?

PARACHINI:

( she laughs ) I used to have a friend. She was married. And she had a sister, she have a restaurant, on 29th Street. So, and she, and she used to have a friend that was going to go there, and he used to play piano, he used to play all instrument. In fact, they used to call him Mandolin, because he play everything. Without, he never studied music, I guess. But, anyway, he used to play. So she say once, she say, "Why don't, you never come out, you never go no place, work and go home. Why don't you come with me some time? You can come with me to my sister. She's got a restaurant." So one night, I think it was my sisters, too, and we went. So we went there, we went there, and after, after the job, you know. And he was, this lady with the baby was two years old, and there was a young man, it was, you know, it was a cousin that happened to be my husband. So, and her husband, he was the piano, you know, the one he was playing, so. So after when I got there we used to dance, you know. ( she laughs ) And then, so we danced once, and we danced twice, and then he walked me home, from 29th Street to 37th Street.

LEVINE:

Were you back with your great uncle?

PARACHINI:

Huh?

LEVINE:

Were you living with your great uncle again?

PARACHINI:

No, I was a boarder.

LEVINE:

Oh, you were a boarder. Uh-huh.

PARACHINI:

Yeah, I was a boarder to a family, with a family. No, my younger, you know, I was, you know.

LEVINE:

And he walked you home.

PARACHINI:

So he walked me home, I told my daughter, I said, "I have a man, but when he say goodnight he kiss me on the cheek on the stoop." He didn't come up. The first time he say, and you talk about us. ( she laughs ) The first time he walk you home, and so on. And then we went another time there, and this lady, the one she got the baby, she said to my friend, she said, "You know, your friend is just fit for my cousin." He was a first cousin to her. He was (?) there, and I was working, you know. So, uh, what they call, his (?) said . . .

LEVINE:

He called? He wanted to see you again?

PARACHINI:

And then, after a while, and then when he, you know, when I was working he used to come and wait for me. And he used to, some time he used to say he don't come, you know, and pick me up, you know, from work. But on the way home, I work on Broadway, one block, and then I get, you know, on the way home . . .

LEVINE:

Wait, just . . . I guess they went away. ( referring to noise outside room ) I'm sorry. So he, you, sometimes he wouldn't come to work and pick you up.

PARACHINI:

No. He used to come, but he didn't tell me. So he test me, like, you know, he come. I remember I used to see the moon, you know, when I used to work. I used to see the pizza, you know, the moon, you know, on the ground, and then it was him, and he left. He was following me, like. That's it. He was not sure, you know, if I have somebody else, like. We don't go too much. And we get married in August, you know, on August 4, 1923. So.

LEVINE:

And your husband's name?

PARACHINI:

My husband's name? Well, from Italy it was Pasquale, but when he came here, you know, he changed, Lino, short. L-I-N-O.

LEVINE:

Uh-huh. And was he from, did you know him, or did anybody know his family in Italy?

PARACHINI:

Oh, I didn't know the family before, no. I know, after I went home, 1927, when we was married we went home together. Only the father and mother died when he was young, very young. In fact, he have a stepmother, you know.

LEVINE:

Uh-huh. When you first got married, where did you go? Where did you move to?

PARACHINI:

Where I live, I live in the same apartment where I am. Oh, when my sister came, she don't like to be the boarder, you know. She was not too young, she was about twenty-three or twenty-four. So, and my uncle said, "Look, so-and-so cousin, he go to Europe, and it would be all right for you two if you could take that apartment, but he wants to sell the furniture." So, anyway, we bought the furniture, and we took the apartment. It was 4, 449 on 37th Street. So we lived there, me and my sister. And then when I start to know him, you know, my sister stayed with me three weeks, because after three weeks she got married, too. She came down, when we went to city all to get married, she said, she said, "Joey wants to come to see how they get married." That was her boyfriend, but I didn't invite them for the wedding, because I was a month, it was a friend. You know, she used to go and dance, you know? So I said, "All right." He come down. So they took a taxi, them two, and we took a taxi, us two, and best man and, you know, the lady. And we went to City Hall. So after we got married, after we took the license downstairs. So we was ready to go up, you know, to the, what you call it? The chapel, like. I thought there was a priest like, uh, you know, Catholic. Instead, now it was a Justice of the Peace. So, anyway, we got married in the City Hall. My brother- in-law was there, and my sister, when we took the license, and then he turned to her, and he said, "What do you say, we're going to take the license, too?" And my sister said, "All right." So they took the license, and three weeks after they got married. So, so we lived together three weeks after I got married, to my sister, and then she got married, so she live on 39th Street.

LEVINE:

Uh-huh. How did you celebrate your marriage?

PARACHINI:

Oh, celebrate? This man happened to be the one, the piano player, like, the cousin. He know, he know a place, those, those rooms, they have a room, and they have a restaurant on the bottom, what they call, uh, anyway, you know, this lady, she can take. So we, he advise her to go there, so we was about, uh, I don't know, sixteen, eighteen people for lunch.

LEVINE:

Oh.

PARACHINI:

You know. And that people, they have a son, he was a photographer, he took the picture. And the album . . .

LEVINE:

Oh, good. We'll . . .

PARACHINI:

The album is the photograph. It's not that picture. I mean, from when we got married, you know. I went to the, you know, the photograph place.

LEVINE:

Yes.

PARACHINI:

Yeah.

LEVINE:

Uh-huh. So you had a big lunch celebration.

PARACHINI:

Yeah, we had a big lunch. I remember, I don't know much, it was three. Oh, my, my husband after said, "Look, I thought maybe Izeni[ph] can do the dinner, you know?" But there was not the proper place, you know, small place. And, uh, he said, when they decide, we make a, what you call, engagement, before. And he said, he said to me, "You buy the food, and I buy the wine, to make the engagement party a little before, you know, the wedding." And then over there, you know, he paid the dinner. And he, he told me, "If you go, if you want to go to the bank and get the money for the dinner, otherwise I close the book." He have no money. He was not two years he would see her. He come here at the end of '21, and '23 we got married, then you don't have much money, you know.

LEVINE:

Right.

PARACHINI:

So I went to the bank, I get a hundred dollars, a hundred dollars, pay the dinner then. And . . . ( she laughs ) And then the first hundred dollars I put it in my book. But when it came to Christmas time, the end of the year, so I change, and I put my book with his book, he got a couple of hundred dollars, you know. It was two years here, you can't have no money, you know. You can save money.

LEVINE:

What was he doing for work?

PARACHINI:

He was a busboy then. When I got married, he was a busboy. He used to make ten dollars a week. And I used to work in the Automat I used to make seventeen or eighteen or nineteen. So, and when I get married I have about, not a thousand, but about. But when we get married, to put up, to clean the apartment, because we kept the apartment, but we have to buy the furniture, the linoleum, you know. He have three hundred dollars, and he spend, you know, to clean that apartment. So I went, when it was time for the dinner, he said not much money. If I take the money in the bank. I said, you know, so I went to get it in my bank, the first two hundred dollar, I put it back. And then on New Year I get a book with the two name, that's all, with a few dollars. He was a good man. He was not a big talker, you know, and very little. I did everything. In fact, he never go in the bank, he never go no place. I always have to go.

LEVINE:

Did you become a citizen?

PARACHINI:

Oh, me? He became a citizen. I don't know. When he came, but he was failed the first time when he went for the examination. Because he don't remember, they asked the question, what holiday is the Fourth of July? I still remember, huh? And he can't say "Independence Day." I guess he studied but, you know, he forgot. So they said, "You better go home." And then three months they call him again, they don't ask the same question. He passed. But then I start my card, you know, I took that. So my citizen paper, I have June 1, 1936. Because I was going to Europe, and we took, I don't want to go Italian, you know. Because, I say, there was, like, a war, you know, I said I don't want to have trouble, you know, two kids with me alone, you know? And, uh, so, what you call it? I wait, I was on the way to get the citizen paper, and they make, I can make citizen, they can't make the passport without the citizen papers. The agency man, he wrote that, you know, for me to have the passport, no, the citizen paper to make the, because if you don't have the citizen paper you can't make the passport. So then I went home with two girls.

LEVINE:

How did you feel about becoming a citizen?

PARACHINI:

Oh, I'm the big boss, like, strong. Oh, when I reach there, it was the water, Abyssinian, you know, then, Spanish war, like, you know? And, uh, we was the first one on the boat with the cord, when they took, they take away the rope, we was there. It was, you know, sure. I was American. I was, me and my two daughters, first to get off to the boat, and the first to get in. Always, always be the first, never make way for nobody. If I had an appointment, you be sure, I wait for you. You don't have to wait for me. ( she laughs )

LEVINE:

Uh-huh. Well, um, how, what was it like being a boarder before you . . .

PARACHINI:

Ah, to be a boarder. Well, then you have the place to go and sleep, but you don't live there because I used to work on the food, like, you know, you used to eat there, you know. Used to go home and sleep, and then get up and go to work. And better, you know.

LEVINE:

You didn't have that much time, you didn't, uh, have a real social life, did you?

PARACHINI:

No, no, no. No social time at all. I'm telling you. Three years before I come back to the city I was in the Bronx in that place, you know, when I went to the nanny. So, I told you, I used to take the city back to school, three boy and two girls.

LEVINE:

Was that a hard time for you, those first three years when you were working as a nanny?

PARACHINI:

Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah. Very hard, very hard. Very, very hard. Now I know was very hard. Then I didn't know, because I was young, you know. And my boss, she was a piano teacher, a very good piano teacher, you know. And she used to shop, and she used to cook. Got no complaints, lot of food, but a lot of work. She used to give you concerts, with three pianos in the parlor. You got to keep clean, you got to, three flight of stairs in that house. Four bath to keep clean. Not nanny, baby, children, everything. I tell you, except not to be a wife.

LEVINE:

And what were you making at that job? Do you remember?

PARACHINI:

If I remember? Sixteen dollars a month I started, and then eighteen, and then they raised to twenty- two. I was not going to tell you, but, and then, you know, I was not thinking. I used to put the money there. I never buy clothes. I never go out. And, so only house, you know, clothes. I used to put my money there. So when it's time to come home, I have a hundred dollars. So when I came home I give it to my uncle. I say, "That's the money, I got it." And when I open the bankbook. So, he said, "Three years, so much? You should have five or six hundred dollars." In fact, he wants to look for a lawyer, my uncle. But the sons, he got a couple of sons around, he said, "Pop," he said, "don't start with lawyers, because it's not enough, you know, it doesn't pay." Anyway, three years I come home with a hundred dollars, a lot of work and a lot of scrubbing. A lot of washing. She don't believe in Clorox, she don't believe in laundry because they was dirty. I have to do it, and keep clean four beds. Them two, big bed, a boy, two girls, and mine. Four beds, and sixteen, seventeen, twenty now, not even. Huh?

LEVINE:

Do you remember when you first came here, when you first came to America, were there some things that you had never seen before? There must have been lots of things that were new to you and different, in this country, that you never saw in your little town or on your way to here.

PARACHINI:

I'm telling you the truth, in my country, I never went on the city around, before to come here, when I left, I leave from here, you know, to come over. I just went to the city for the passport, you know, and that's all. I don't know, we used to use the horse, you know, with the carriage. We used to go when we need it, you know. But I never went to, you know, no place, you know? And, uh . . .

LEVINE:

So a lot of things must have been new for you. A lot of things that you saw at first must have been different, and . . .

PARACHINI:

It's nothing, it's nothing. They knew, when I was, when I come here I have a low shoes like we have here now. When I came, my, from Italy. When I come here, in fact, I have a picture, if it's easy to see, and they bought me, no, they dress me up, you know, new clothes. And with the shoes with the laces, you know? They used to call it stivalli[ph], you know, like the boots. So being the style is backward here, it was more advanced over there than over here. That's true.

LEVINE:

Now, when you look back on it now, when you look . . .

PARACHINI:

It's the picture here but I, you know, I can't see, you know, exactly.

LEVINE:

We're just, we have a few minutes left on the tape. If you could tell me, um, what do you think now? When you look back, you were sixteen years old, you wanted to come to America and you came here and you lived out your life here. How do you feel about that? How do you think about . . .

PARACHINI:

Well, in the beginning I feel lonesome, you know, I'm feeling I miss my mother. When I used to go home from work, I work one month on Fifth Avenue, sewing. Every time I come home, I used to watch, look the letter box and, you know, I was crying, you know? And, so, and . . .

LEVINE:

And when did it change for you? When did you start liking being in America? When did you stop being homesick, and . . .

PARACHINI:

Oh, when I stopped homesick?

LEVINE:

When did your life get better here?

PARACHINI:

Well, when you got your own family, you know, the husband, the, you know, then the family. When my kids were small, it was like a flower, especially that first one, the mother of this one you're talking about, the older one. She was three months old, she was crying because I change, I used to feed, you know, breastfeed it, and she was crying all the time, I used to go to the doctor, I used to say this cry. Say, I don't care she cry, but the baby gain. So was crying. And then my aunt, well, my husband used to live boarder when he come in. That's his aunt. And she said, "Why don't you give some food to this baby, give some pastina Carusa[ph]?" You remember, now it's Ronzoni, but it's very fine pastina, very, very, very small. Say, "Why don't you make a pastina?" So I used to cook pastina, I used to make, say, a coffee cup, you know, say, maybe, half a cup, and with the spoon, I used to give her the tip of the spoon. Oh, she got, she was rosy cheeked. Everybody, you know, I was small, and the baby get so big, and the people used to carry in my arm, they used to get, "But what you give to eat this baby?" She was like a flower. I went to Europe. You've got to see! She was three, and my husband's family, they have, they got all stone plant in the entrance, like, you know, walker, like a sidewalk, all stone. She was tripping and falling down all the time. Mama, Mama, Mama. ( tape ends without slate ) - 1 -