The Sites of EXIT STRATEGY – Little Italy

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New York City has a colourful history. What began as New Amsterdam, a Dutch settlement in the 17th century, then became an English town, and finally a 19th and 20th century draw for people from all over the world including Ireland, Germany, Russia and Poland. And, of course, Italy. 

Life in Italy in the mid-19th century was hard. Poverty, political strife, an overwhelmingly agricultural lifestyle, high taxes combined with low wages, and a lack of land pushed whole families, even sometimes entire villages, to emigrate. The United States was a desirable destination as it was not only known for its available land, but for its lower taxes and higher wages for skilled labour, as well as its growing industrial age businesses.  

Italian immigration started as a trickle in the 1860s. Those who settled in Manhattan took up residence in perhaps the most dangerous area of the city—Five Points. They filled tenements on the south end of Mulberry Street, an area called Mulberry Bend, clinging to their original family and village groupings, maintaining the insular lifestyle to which they were accustomed in Italy. But Mulberry Bend was the city’s epicenter of poverty, crime, and gang life with a growing population squeezed into multi-family single room lodgings. In fact, at one point, this area of Five Points was designated the most densely populated area of the entire city, and was infamous for its disease, crime, and murder rates, far outnumbering any other part of Manhattan. As a result, in 1897, the city tore down the tenements and created Mulberry Park, known today as Columbus Park. Displaced Italian residents moved uptown, finding their homes further north on Mulberry, as well as on Mott, Elizabeth, Prince, and Grand Streets, to name a few. It is this area which is still known as Little Italy today.

The Italian community flourished, even more so as additional immigrants moved in. It is estimated that between 1880 and 1920, over four million Italians immigrated to America, and thousands flocked to the community in Manhattan that came to be called Little Italy. At its peak in 1910, 10,000 Italians lived inside this two-square-mile area.  

The residents of Little Italy re-established their familiar lifestyle, and, in doing so, introduced it to New York City. Restaurants, bakeries, delicatessens, and food carts and shops opened. Churches were community centers of engagement. Organ grinders could be heard throughout the streets. And in 1926, the first Feast of San Gennaro was celebrated. Now an annual 11-day street festival each September, festivities include mass at the Church of the Most Precious Blood on Mulberry Street, as well as parades, live music, shopping, and, of course, food. However, with the good, came the bad as the Mafia moved in and established itself in Little Italy in the early 20th century, including the Morello, Gambino, and Genevese crime families. Almost seventy years later, New York City native Mario Puzo set his novel, The Godfather, with its Corleone crime family in Little Italy as a representation of that Mafia presence.

Now down to a handful of blocks from it’s original fifty square block spread, Little Italy contains few Italians, but remains a tourist destination in New York City. However, it maintains some of its colourful roots. If you visit the area, you can still get a taste of the late 19th and early 20th century charm in some of the original shops, still run by the founding families: 

Alleva Dairy—Makers of fine cheeses, specially known for their ricotta and mozzarella; the oldest continually run shop in Little Italy since its opening in 1892.

Parisi Bakery—From 1903 through three generations of Parisis, an authentic Italian brick-oven bakery and delicatessen.

Di Palo’s Fine Foods—A specialty Italian grocery store opened in 1903 and currently operated by fifth generation Di Palos.

Piemonte Ravioli—Creating traditional fresh and dried Italian pasta since 1920. 

This is the world in which Gemma Capello was raised. Her nuclear family may have lived in Brooklyn, but her Italian grandparents lived on Elizabeth Street, once the Sicilian bastion of Little Italy. It is here she learns her family’s history. It is here she retreats following the death of her mother, to her grandmother’s care, where she learns to cook all the traditional Sicilian family favourites. It is here where her best friend Frankie and Frankie’s father run their bakery/café. And it is here she comes when she needs to save lives, including her own.  

On Friday, we’ll look at the site of the book’s climax, Little Italy’s early-19th century St. Patrick’s Old Cathedral, a site rich with history and which contains a series of hidden catacombs underneath. 

All photos from The Library of Congress.