Dear Victoria,
How are you my beloved friend? I hope you remember me. I’m Theresa Gallo from Italy.
I am writing to thank you for
everything that you’ve done for my family and also to tell you my story.
It was 1916. Life in my native country was very hard. It was the world of
poverty and diseases, unemployment and tyranny. At that time my family decided
to get away from our country and seek refuge in America. There were millions of economic migrants who had faith in a better life abroad, just like our
family. I was only 12 years old and had
no desire to leave my home,
but my mother said that it would only do us good.
We took the most necessary things like clothes, shoes and food and set out. We were sailing for 3 weeks and we had to pass through
health and legal inspections at Ellis Island before we docked in New-York. I was a little scared,
especially when the «eye man» was examining me, but it was over quickly. After
we finally disembarked, we
went to our destination which was the Lower East Side. It was very crowded and vibrant place, but not so thriving. There were a
lot of people of diverse ethnic groups: Austrians,
Greeks and Jews. We were lucky to meet you. You helped us to get accustomed to living in new conditions. I remember
that you and your family came to America in 1913 and by 1916 your father had
his own workshop where he was making aprons.
From the first days of living in New-York
I had to undergo dramatic changes. First of all, my
parents decided that I should go to work instead of school because my family
needed money. You told me that the same happened to you. You left school and
started working at the workshop as a finisher. While my two brothers were
selling newspapers, my elder sister and I were working at the factory making
clothes. I got the hang of my work fast, although it was very
hard. Besides that, I had a lot of housework too. Everyone in our family did their bit with cooking and cleaning. My chores
were sweeping and mopping the floors and helping my mother with laundry.
Our apartment had only three rooms:
bedroom, kitchen and parlor. There weren’t enough beds for all of us, so I was
sleeping in parlor on the crates.
My family decided that the first
thing we needed to buy was a stove to have heat and cook. Cooking was one of
the most important things. It was such a pleasure to eat my favorite bumuelos
with honey.
You also told us about things we
could do for fun if we wanted to unwind a little bit. Although I didn’t have
much time, I was at Nickelodeon once
or twice. However, what I liked the most was my visit to Coney Island. The island was stunning and there were many fun things to do.
I liked being in the open air, walking on the beach and swimming in
the Atlantic Ocean.
My family had been through some
rough times at first, but we had never lost our hope that someday our lives
would change for better.
Hope to hear from you soon.
Kind regards,
Theresa
