La Nostra Colonia

If ever there was a “Golden Age” for San Francisco’s Italian Colony, the year 1911 would undoubtedly be the quintessential example of that grand and magnificent period.   From its Gold Rush beginnings, through the building of the colony of …

In a recent column, we reprinted an open letter written by Carlo Dondero, which originally appeared in The San Francisco Call in 1903. The letter was written in response to public remarks made by Willis Paine, president of the Consolidated …

Born in Acero in the province of Genoa on November 26, 1839, Andrea Sbarboro first came to the United States in 1842 as a toddler.   He grew up in New York, but like so many others, he and his …

It was in 1891, at the age of twenty, that Domenico De Domenico left his home in Santa Lucia, near Messina, Sicily and immigrated to the United States.   He sailed aboard the S.S. Washington from Palermo, arriving in New …

Now that spring has sprung, the Italian Cemetery in Colma has once again begun to offer Italian Heritage Tours of their grounds. One of the biggest “aha moments” of the tour starts out as a simple quiz on local Italian-American …

I spend a considerable amount of time walking through North Beach. It’s San Francisco’s “Little Italy” and ground zero for our cultural and historical heritage. Certainly there aren’t as many Italians in North Beach as there were a hundred years …

Luigia Giuseppa Assunta Maria Pierina Tetrazzini was born on June 29, 1871 at 3 Via dei Renai in Florence. Her father was a military tailor who was not at all musically inclined. The girl, who would someday be the world-renowned …