The Oneida Daily Dispatch (Oneida, NY)
Celebrating Italian heritage
CANASTOTA, N.Y. >> The inaugural Canastota Italian-American Festival brought a little piece of Italian history to the village on Saturday.
“Just for today, everyone is Italian,” Lenox Supervisor Rocky DiVeronica said.
The festival featured live entertainment, Italian and American cuisine, historical displays and demonstrations, produce sales, local artisan booths offering custom merchandise, and beer and wine. Close to 50 people were walking Canal Street within the first hour taking in all the sights.
Those looking for a history lesson could visit the Canal TownMuseumor see a presentation on Italian history with Canastota Canal Town Museum President Joseph DiGiorgio.
“We go back in time, we have people who left Europe like Phillip Mazzei, who becomes friends with Thomas Jefferson,” said DiGiorgio.
Mazzei was a Florentine merchant, surgeon and horticulturalist who befriended Jefferson in the late 1700s, according to the Thomas Jefferson Foundation. He sailed to Virginia in 1773, andwas given a tract of land by Jefferson to settle in Albermarle County on the south side of Monticello.
“He’s the one who helped design Monticello, he brought fruits and vegetables that did not exist in the United States for Jefferson to plant,” DiGiorgio said. “They became politicians together. The Declaration of Independence says ‘all men by nature are equally free and independent.’
Those weren’t Thomas Jefferson’s words. Those were Mazzei’s.”
Besides the impact Italy had during America’s infant years, DiGiorgio also talked about his grandmother and grandfather — Italians who immigrated to the United States.
“Most Italians came here not to become rich, but to survive,” DiGiorgio said to a crowd of around 20 people. “My grandfather was a teamster, my grandmother was a farmer.”
Canastota Italian Heritage Committee Chairwoman Rosanne Warner said there’s already talk about next year’s festival.
“We’ve reached out to a couple of vendors and they’ve said they can help us bring in more vendors next year,” Warner said. “It would be fantastic if we could fill both sides of the street next year.”
Funds from the festival help go towards the next edition of the Italian Heritage books.
“An American Journey, Our Italian Heritage” is two volumes of books with history and compilations of stories from Italian families in the Canastota and Oneida area. The first volume was published in 1998 and the second was published in 2002.
This would be the third edition, containing more and updated stories.
When the original book was being written, the committee reached out to families of Italian heritage and asked to submit stories and pictures.
“It outlined how Italian families came to Canastota to settle,” Warner said.
Warner said her family, the Palamara family, has lived in the area since the 1920s. “There’s a lot of people of Italian heritage, between Oneida, Canastota and Chittenango,” Warner said.
To Warner, she feels it’s important because there’s a lot of residents in the village who are older, getting married and changing names. In the process, she said there’s something lost. With the book, there’s a way to record that history and keep it.
“A lot of people here came from Sicily and southern Italy,” Warner said. “They settled in Canastota because that’s where their family came from. The festival is a way to preserve our heritage a little for future generations.”
To learn more about the festival, how to contribute to the book, how to volunteer, donate or become a vendor, visit www.facebook.com/canastotaitalians
“It’s important to preserve our roots,” Warner said.