Portraits: Steve Dellapolla, Rose Mastroserio Grant, and Angela LaRocca

In the southern Italian province of Puglia, a series of droughts at the turn of the twentieth century forced immigration of many agricultural workers who did not have enough water to drink when working in the fields. Food was just as scarce throughout the region, sparking a massive immigration to the United States. By the early 1900s, more immigrants had come to the United States from Italy, particularly from the southern region and Sicily, than from any other country.

Steve Dellapolla’s father, Amato Dellapolla, was from the southern part of Italy in a town called Avalino and worked as a farm laborer.  Amato’s brother, Joe Dellapolla, was the first to leave Italy for New York, and wrote back to his family, encouraging them to join him and work for the railroad on Long Island.  Amato Dellapolla arrived in the 1910s and was slowly able to bring his wife and children as the Quota Act allowed.   

Rose Mastroserio and her parents, Michele Mastroserio and Angelina Grittani, left Naples for New York in 1920.  First her father came, and then she and her mother were able to follow a few months later when Rose was seven.  Rose and Angelina spent a week on Ellis Island for processing, while her father sent them packages, such as fruit baskets with bananas, a wholly foreign fruit for the Italians.  After a month staying with relatives in New York City, they moved to Watertown to settle down.  

Angela LaRocca’s father arrived in New Rochelle in the early 1900s by himself, following his sister and her husband.  His wife and four children remained in Italy because of the limitations imposed by the Quota Act.  They were gradually able to reunite over a few years.  Angela’s father was a farmer in Italy and, in order to feed a family with nine children, he supplemented his lumberyard income in New Rochelle with a large, productive vegetable garden.