Italians in Chicago

By Dominic Candeloro

In over 200 images accompanied by an insightful narrative, this collection uncovers the trials and triumphs of migration, ethnic survival, and daily life.

Italians have been a part of the Chicago community
since the 1850s. The city's Italian immigration rate
peaked in 1914, and many of these new residents settled in neighborhoods on the north, west, and south sides of the Loop and in the industrial suburbs of Chicago. An intriguing visual tour, Italians in Chicago explores the lives of over four generations of the community's residents and experiences.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Arcadia Publishing
• Release date: Jul 12, 1999
• ISBN: 9781439618653

Dominic Candeloro

Author Dominic Candeloro is a professor, historian, and the executive director of the American Italian Historical Association. His extensive research on Chicago's Italian-American community and delightful historic images create a timeless record of this unique culture and its impact on the heart of the Midwest.

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Candeloro.

One

MIGRATION

Five million Italian immigrants came to the United States before 1914. Some of them were birds of passage, here to work a season or two, and then return to Italy. Many started on railroad jobs and were drawn to settle in their railroad’s winter headquarters—Chicago. Others were attracted to Chicago by the favorable labor market in one of the fastest-growing industrial cities in the world. Chains of migration linked Chicago with towns in northern and southern Italy. Some of the towns which contributed migrants to Chicago were the following: Alta Villa Milicia, Tesche Conca, Caccamo, Lucca, Ponte Buggianese, Pievepeligo, Sant’Ana Peligo, Mola di Bari, Amaseno, San Benedetto del Tronto, Castel di Sangro, Cosenza, Castel San Vincenzo, and scores of others. Though we often minimize the emotional cost of emigration when we recount three-generation success stories, separations caused by emigration hurt deeply. Even the considerable financial remittances sent back to Italy by the new immigrants could not erase that pain.

These 1920s ocean passenger liners brought fewer immigrants to the United States in greater comfort than was the case in the mass immigration era before 1914.