It is, of course, a pleasure to stand before family, friends, and a sea of
Italians tonight to speak, as Mr. Adolfo Caso suggested, about my pride
in my Italian roots. When I began to write my remarks, I paused to
consider when I do feel pride. Immediately I latter has to be present for
the former to emerge. It is barely a leap, then, to understand why I am
proud of my Italian roots, for love abounds when Italy and Italians are
in my view, and Italy and Italians have rested comfortably in my vision
since the moment of my delivery, when I was placed in my mother's
arms and rewarded with my first glimpse of an Italian angel.
An Italian mother is a concept that is preciously and assuredly linked to
destiny and glory and mission. An Italian mother is the gold standard.
She is the human counterpart to the German automobile, the Cuban
cigar, the Egyptian pyramid, the African spirit, the Irish sweater, the
Russian vodka. When a child has an Italian mother, he or she is the
envy of the world, because life is filled with warmth, music, and foods
that make souls dance. Life is filled with a sense of history,
achievement, culture, and unparalleled love. Life is filled with life.
Such was my introduction to the world of Italy, and I would imagine
for many of you, such was yours, through the eyes of a first-generation
mother, whose parents were torn, out of necessity, from their old
homeland, to settle in their new homeland, to exchange hardship for
possibility. Beatrice Rubeo, my nonna, my mother's mother, was born
high in the mountains of Abruzzo, into a cramped one-room home in
Campo di Giove, in the shadows of mountains whose beauty tried to
soften the tribulations of her existence. At least five Rubeos lived inside
four walls, without running water, without light, and without modern
heating. While the men worked the fields and shared the livestock
duties with the women in the family, the women collected firewood,
made clothing, and hiked up into the hills in the early morning to gather
grain. Together they tried to maintain a home, construct a hope, be a
family, build a community, and just survive, and despite the urgency of
that last motivation, they did what Italians do, and invited the aesthetics
of life to enter with wild abandon; it was a custom of living that had
graced the Italian way for centuries.
Despite that inclination, however, that understanding of the intellectual
and emotional gifts of our existence, when Nonna stepped off the boat
at Ellis Island, it was noted that she could neither read nor write. So in
her new land of potential, she started to carve her exalted personal
goals, by committing herself to acquiring the English of the learned,
minimizing the Italian nuances of her pronunciation, and insisting on
proper grammar. She was determined to embody the refinements of
scholarship, and while her personal goals were lofty, the goals for her
children were loftier, and the goals for her children's children were
loftier still. That was the immigrant way. My nonna, and all of our
ancestors, expertly orchestrated a path to their futures, and our futures,
that married the lessons of their youth to the freedoms of their
adulthood. They turned the skills of hard work, the challenge of
language, the fear of hunger, the pain of cold, and the closeness that
such distress inspires, into a shrine of determination, power, will, and
family-above-all-else. It was that very combination, that very
consciousness, that very essence, that fueled their imagination for our
fates and invited us into the realm of achievement, comfort, and a
future that we were allowed to design and realize for ourselves.
Antonio Ragonese, my nonno, my mother's father, was born in Tusa,
Sicily. He, too, was enriched by a landscape of magnificence, for he
lived high in a hill town that looked over the Tyrrhenian Sea. From that
vantage point over the years, he could have watched scores of warriors
stake their claims over Sicily, affecting language, architecture, and the
appearance of the island's people. He could have watched the nearby
African sunshine and the peaceful ships, farmers pacing their crops, and
mules making the nine kilometer climb to the village summit. And he
could have watched Sicily suffer the hardships of a harsh economy and
an arid island interior, both of which were further weakened by a
debilitating and relentless drought that, during Nonno's youth, strove to
thwart all attempts at survival.
Italians tonight to speak, as Mr. Adolfo Caso suggested, about my pride
in my Italian roots. When I began to write my remarks, I paused to
consider when I do feel pride. Immediately I latter has to be present for
the former to emerge. It is barely a leap, then, to understand why I am
proud of my Italian roots, for love abounds when Italy and Italians are
in my view, and Italy and Italians have rested comfortably in my vision
since the moment of my delivery, when I was placed in my mother's
arms and rewarded with my first glimpse of an Italian angel.
An Italian mother is a concept that is preciously and assuredly linked to
destiny and glory and mission. An Italian mother is the gold standard.
She is the human counterpart to the German automobile, the Cuban
cigar, the Egyptian pyramid, the African spirit, the Irish sweater, the
Russian vodka. When a child has an Italian mother, he or she is the
envy of the world, because life is filled with warmth, music, and foods
that make souls dance. Life is filled with a sense of history,
achievement, culture, and unparalleled love. Life is filled with life.
Such was my introduction to the world of Italy, and I would imagine
for many of you, such was yours, through the eyes of a first-generation
mother, whose parents were torn, out of necessity, from their old
homeland, to settle in their new homeland, to exchange hardship for
possibility. Beatrice Rubeo, my nonna, my mother's mother, was born
high in the mountains of Abruzzo, into a cramped one-room home in
Campo di Giove, in the shadows of mountains whose beauty tried to
soften the tribulations of her existence. At least five Rubeos lived inside
four walls, without running water, without light, and without modern
heating. While the men worked the fields and shared the livestock
duties with the women in the family, the women collected firewood,
made clothing, and hiked up into the hills in the early morning to gather
grain. Together they tried to maintain a home, construct a hope, be a
family, build a community, and just survive, and despite the urgency of
that last motivation, they did what Italians do, and invited the aesthetics
of life to enter with wild abandon; it was a custom of living that had
graced the Italian way for centuries.
Despite that inclination, however, that understanding of the intellectual
and emotional gifts of our existence, when Nonna stepped off the boat
at Ellis Island, it was noted that she could neither read nor write. So in
her new land of potential, she started to carve her exalted personal
goals, by committing herself to acquiring the English of the learned,
minimizing the Italian nuances of her pronunciation, and insisting on
proper grammar. She was determined to embody the refinements of
scholarship, and while her personal goals were lofty, the goals for her
children were loftier, and the goals for her children's children were
loftier still. That was the immigrant way. My nonna, and all of our
ancestors, expertly orchestrated a path to their futures, and our futures,
that married the lessons of their youth to the freedoms of their
adulthood. They turned the skills of hard work, the challenge of
language, the fear of hunger, the pain of cold, and the closeness that
such distress inspires, into a shrine of determination, power, will, and
family-above-all-else. It was that very combination, that very
consciousness, that very essence, that fueled their imagination for our
fates and invited us into the realm of achievement, comfort, and a
future that we were allowed to design and realize for ourselves.
Antonio Ragonese, my nonno, my mother's father, was born in Tusa,
Sicily. He, too, was enriched by a landscape of magnificence, for he
lived high in a hill town that looked over the Tyrrhenian Sea. From that
vantage point over the years, he could have watched scores of warriors
stake their claims over Sicily, affecting language, architecture, and the
appearance of the island's people. He could have watched the nearby
African sunshine and the peaceful ships, farmers pacing their crops, and
mules making the nine kilometer climb to the village summit. And he
could have watched Sicily suffer the hardships of a harsh economy and
an arid island interior, both of which were further weakened by a
debilitating and relentless drought that, during Nonno's youth, strove to
thwart all attempts at survival.
| A DAUGHTER OF AN ITALIAN ANGEL A DAUGHTER OF ITALY Dante University Foundation Dinner Dance 2002 |
| My mother, Antoinette Ragonese Cummings, with her father, Antonio Ragonese 1948 |
| My grandfather, Antonio Ragonese, with his grandchildren 1954 |
| My grandmother, Beatrice Rubeo Ragonese, with me, Martha T. Cummings 1959 |
 | |  | |  | |  | |  | |  |
At the same time, the gifts of America were making themselves known throughout Italy, and particularly in
Sicily, so my grandfather and three younger siblings bid a permanent good-bye to Tusa, their parents, two
brothers and a sister, to light upon the shores of America. When my nonno reached his new country, a better
economic life and education for all, or the reasonable hope for such an existence, were everywhere to be
found. America spread out wide and deep, houses seemed palatial, jobs were relatively well-paying, and the
spirit of newness and discovery rang out in the land that, by European standards, was still freshly-settled and
for Nonno was pushed into a wall of bigotry against Italians, both because of a pecking order that plagues all
civilizations and because of society's preoccupation with the unfortunate aberrations of a culture rather than
the exhilarating innovations. He was armed, though, with an unwavering pride and belief in his background
and in his ability to change their narrowness of thought. As a result, Nonno embraced the character of his
new land, but he was determined to celebrate the nuances of his old one. Opera rang out in his home, his
humor countered the parochial characterization of a Sicilian temper, and his mandolins and guitars were
strummed lightly and with skill. And most of all, perhaps, he learned English with an impassioned Italian
accent. His speech embodied the reality of the immigrant existence for it reflected the truth of what they were
straddling. Through the cadence of his accented words, my grandfather was saying: I am happy to be in
America. I will be American. But make no mistake, I am Italian, too, and I will not strip my core to be
accepted. And so my nonno, like many of your beloved ascendants, lived his life with one literal foot in
America and one figurative foot back home, and in doing so, he taught my mother, who passed it on, one
admired but elusive truth - that our backgrounds, our stories, and our nationalities, make us interesting and
different and particular, and that culture should not be eradicated in the name of conformity - because truth is
truth. We are what we are; we are not what others say we are, and we should spend our lives, patiently and
firmly, making that known, about us, and about others, to as many who will listen and even to those who will
not. It was a lesson of foresight. It is a lesson of hope. It is a lesson that expanded the minds and attitudes of
his family to follow, and it is a lesson of an Italian grandfather and a Sicilian island that gave birth to such
clarity and vision.
From Beatrice Rubeo and Antonio Ragonese came Antoinette Frances Ragonese, my mother for the first 43
years of my life, until June 16, 2002, when she slipped away from us all in the middle of the night. My
mother was my core, and her passing has rendered my heart heavy, to the degree that talking about her
remains too difficult; so tonight, I offer only this glimpse: The spirit of my ancestors, the awareness of their
experiences, and the aesthetics of Italy, wove their way to my mother's mind and soul - for she had a
wisdom, an omniscience, that spanned the years and eclipsed her short time on this earth. My mother pulled
threads from her parents' pasts: threads of Italy, threads of determination, resolve, scholarship, the
mountains, the seas, threads of humor, opera, threads of culture, generosity, and open-mindedness, and
threads of warmth, a warmth like no other, that allowed her to knit a bridge that summoned her children to
cross, and to climb, up, up, up, and to soar beyond her own self. That was the immigrant way, and although
my Mum was not an immigrant, that essence was inside of her and was proof of the rivers and the blood that
flow from one generation, one mind, one life, to the next.
So from a great-great-grandfather born in 1803 in the mountains of Sicily, whose hands worked sartorial
magic on his clients' fabrics, to a great-great-grandchild in the early 21st century, whose hands invent words
that imagine the magic of those skills, I look down at my olive-colored fingers as they lead me through the
notes of my history, and I nod to myself and smile to myself as a realization warms me. My pride in my
Italian roots is most certainly about Boccacio, Dante, and Petrarch, or gelato, fighi d'india, parmigiano, e
pomodoro, or mountain ranges, sculpted coast lines, olive groves, and vineyards, or Puccini, Rossini, and
Verdi, or fashion, brilliant hair, and flawless skin, or Fermi, Galileo, and Leonardo. But more so, much more
so, my pride is about our ancestors, and my ancestors, Antonio Ragonese, Beatrice Rubeo, and most
especially, Antoinette Frances Ragonese. For to feel pride, I have to feel love. And I feel love, immeasurable
love, for their gift of freedom, for staring down the face of despair, for their spirit of possibility, and for their
capacity to dream. And for nurturing an appreciation of a history, my history, that allows me to sing and
swing and laugh and sigh for knowing, each day of my life, that I am proud, so proud, to be the daughter of
an Italian angel, to be the daughter of Italian pioneers, to be a daughter of Italy.
Sicily, so my grandfather and three younger siblings bid a permanent good-bye to Tusa, their parents, two
brothers and a sister, to light upon the shores of America. When my nonno reached his new country, a better
economic life and education for all, or the reasonable hope for such an existence, were everywhere to be
found. America spread out wide and deep, houses seemed palatial, jobs were relatively well-paying, and the
spirit of newness and discovery rang out in the land that, by European standards, was still freshly-settled and
for Nonno was pushed into a wall of bigotry against Italians, both because of a pecking order that plagues all
civilizations and because of society's preoccupation with the unfortunate aberrations of a culture rather than
the exhilarating innovations. He was armed, though, with an unwavering pride and belief in his background
and in his ability to change their narrowness of thought. As a result, Nonno embraced the character of his
new land, but he was determined to celebrate the nuances of his old one. Opera rang out in his home, his
humor countered the parochial characterization of a Sicilian temper, and his mandolins and guitars were
strummed lightly and with skill. And most of all, perhaps, he learned English with an impassioned Italian
accent. His speech embodied the reality of the immigrant existence for it reflected the truth of what they were
straddling. Through the cadence of his accented words, my grandfather was saying: I am happy to be in
America. I will be American. But make no mistake, I am Italian, too, and I will not strip my core to be
accepted. And so my nonno, like many of your beloved ascendants, lived his life with one literal foot in
America and one figurative foot back home, and in doing so, he taught my mother, who passed it on, one
admired but elusive truth - that our backgrounds, our stories, and our nationalities, make us interesting and
different and particular, and that culture should not be eradicated in the name of conformity - because truth is
truth. We are what we are; we are not what others say we are, and we should spend our lives, patiently and
firmly, making that known, about us, and about others, to as many who will listen and even to those who will
not. It was a lesson of foresight. It is a lesson of hope. It is a lesson that expanded the minds and attitudes of
his family to follow, and it is a lesson of an Italian grandfather and a Sicilian island that gave birth to such
clarity and vision.
From Beatrice Rubeo and Antonio Ragonese came Antoinette Frances Ragonese, my mother for the first 43
years of my life, until June 16, 2002, when she slipped away from us all in the middle of the night. My
mother was my core, and her passing has rendered my heart heavy, to the degree that talking about her
remains too difficult; so tonight, I offer only this glimpse: The spirit of my ancestors, the awareness of their
experiences, and the aesthetics of Italy, wove their way to my mother's mind and soul - for she had a
wisdom, an omniscience, that spanned the years and eclipsed her short time on this earth. My mother pulled
threads from her parents' pasts: threads of Italy, threads of determination, resolve, scholarship, the
mountains, the seas, threads of humor, opera, threads of culture, generosity, and open-mindedness, and
threads of warmth, a warmth like no other, that allowed her to knit a bridge that summoned her children to
cross, and to climb, up, up, up, and to soar beyond her own self. That was the immigrant way, and although
my Mum was not an immigrant, that essence was inside of her and was proof of the rivers and the blood that
flow from one generation, one mind, one life, to the next.
So from a great-great-grandfather born in 1803 in the mountains of Sicily, whose hands worked sartorial
magic on his clients' fabrics, to a great-great-grandchild in the early 21st century, whose hands invent words
that imagine the magic of those skills, I look down at my olive-colored fingers as they lead me through the
notes of my history, and I nod to myself and smile to myself as a realization warms me. My pride in my
Italian roots is most certainly about Boccacio, Dante, and Petrarch, or gelato, fighi d'india, parmigiano, e
pomodoro, or mountain ranges, sculpted coast lines, olive groves, and vineyards, or Puccini, Rossini, and
Verdi, or fashion, brilliant hair, and flawless skin, or Fermi, Galileo, and Leonardo. But more so, much more
so, my pride is about our ancestors, and my ancestors, Antonio Ragonese, Beatrice Rubeo, and most
especially, Antoinette Frances Ragonese. For to feel pride, I have to feel love. And I feel love, immeasurable
love, for their gift of freedom, for staring down the face of despair, for their spirit of possibility, and for their
capacity to dream. And for nurturing an appreciation of a history, my history, that allows me to sing and
swing and laugh and sigh for knowing, each day of my life, that I am proud, so proud, to be the daughter of
an Italian angel, to be the daughter of Italian pioneers, to be a daughter of Italy.