[airport chatter] ♪♪ Woman 1: I’m the type of person that likes to be around people, and relationships are really important to me.

♪♪ My family is important to me because um, it's how I feel connected.

♪♪ Lise: Deanna Lamadrid-Jensen lives with her husband and young daughter in Savannah, Georgia, where she is a stay-at-home mom.

She is embarking on a journey to learn about her great-grandparents who died in a house fire in 1931.

♪♪ Deanna: My great-grandparents saved my grandmother's life by throwing her out of the window in the fire.

♪♪ It was about 11 days before she turned a year old.

♪♪ Usually when you have questions about your ancestors, then you, you ask someone that was close to them.

Well, because my great-grandparents died when my grandmother was such a young age, she doesn't have any memory or recollection of them at all.

And so that makes it difficult to really know anything about what their-- what their lives were like, or what type of people they were.

♪♪ I think as we find out about our ancestors, it gives us a greater sense of self-identity and we understand a little bit more of who we are and, and where we came from.

And if I could know, you know, personal stories, and their specific talents, that would help me feel more connected to them and understand why I am who I am.

Lise: All families face tragedies of one form or another.

Some are small and affect a few people; others are large and affect generations.

And while tragedies can be devastating in the moment, with time, they can become stories that inspire us and eventually become the reason people remember who we are.

From the studios of BYU Television in Provo, Utah, this is The Generations Project.

♪♪ Hi everyone, I’m Lise Simms, and each week on our program we bring you the story of someone who, for one reason or another, wants to connect with an ancestor or an entire generation of their family tree, and we help them do just that.

We're an ongoing project, helping to connect people across the generations and today that person is Deanna Lamadrid-Jensen.

I’m so glad you're here.

You have an amazing story.

This little nugget of family history that's so moving.

Will you tell me that story now?

- My great-grandparents lived in St. Louis and... they had an eleven-month, almost one-year-old daughter and their house caught on fire.

And they tried to get out of the house, but they were unable to, but they were able to save my grandmother's life by throwing her out of the window.

And she survived, but they did not, unfortunately.

Lise: And was it this story that compelled you to search out your family history?

Deanna: Yes, because they had died so young I, I've never knew anything about them really, and, and neither did my grandmother because she was so young when they died.

Lise: Who raised your grandmother?

Deanna: Her grandparents.

Lise: Oh, and have you been close to your grandmother all your life?

Deanna: Yes, I have.

Lise: So, is this somehow connected to her, you know, what you want to do here?

Deanna: Yeah, I, I wanted-- since she never knew her parents I wanted to find out information, not only for me, but also for her so that she could feel more connected to her parents since she never, she never knew them.

Lise: Deanna, she must love you for that.

As if she didn't love you already.

Right?

Deanna: Yeah, hopefully.

Lise: Was she proud and honored that you would want to do this?

Deanna: I think so.

Lise: Did she talk about that all?

- Yeah, a little bit.

Lise: What did she tell you?

- She is just so happy that, that we're doing this and that, you know, it's, it's about her family and she gets to learn new things.

Lise: Yes.

And you are a mommy.

Tell me about that.

Deanna: I love it, I love being a mom.

It's, it's the greatest thing.

Lise: You have a two-year-old daughter?

- Yes.

Lise: And some other news?

- We're also expecting our second baby.

Lise: So, as a mother, did this story affect you more since you have had children?

- Yeah, as I was there at the scene of the fire-- Lise: Mm-hmm.

- and, and thinking about the thoughts that went on in my great-grandparents' minds as they, you know, threw her out the window and knowing that-- not actually probably ever knowing that she did survive or that she was going to.

Lise: Right.

- And as a mother, to try to save your child's life and know that you wouldn't be able to-- Lise: Amazing.

- to raise them.

- So, I want to clarify a few of the people in your amazing story because they go by a lot of names.

Your grandmother's name is?

Deanna: Rosalie.

Lise: And you call her?

Deanna: Nonna.

Lise: And she's the baby that was thrown from the fire.

And her dad was?

- Vincenzo.

- Who also goes by Vincent.

Who is your?

Deanna: Great-grandfather.

- And your great-grandmother was?

Deanna: Francesca.

Lise: Also Francis.

If you can keep it all straight.

And then, um, who is Serafino?

Deanna: He is Vincenzo's brother.

Lise: And he lived in the house and he also goes as Sam-- Deanna: Yes.

Lise: right?

So you start your journey in California.

Are you excited?

Deanna: Yes-- Lise: Are you glad you were picked?

Deanna: Yes, I was so happy that I was picked to be on the show because I’ve always wanted to know about them, and I just got to go and find out all these great things.

Lise: And give your grandmother this beautiful gift of her history, which is your history.

So, let's take a look at your first steps.

Deanna: Okay.

Lise: Okay.

Deanna is beginning her journey by meeting with her nonna, Rosalie.

Rosalie was the child who was saved from the house fire, which claimed the lives of Deanna's great-grandparents Vincenzo and Francesca Sardo.

Deanna: Tell me a little bit about what you remember about Francesca's personality.

- Oh, she loved to dance.

Loved to dance, and she was walking down the street with my grandmother and uh, they were putting finishing touches on this building and uh, she turned to my grandmother and she said, Oh mama, she said, I hope that's a dance hall because she said, I want to be the first to dance in there.

Deanna: [chuckles] Rosalie: Come to find out it was a mortuary, and she was the first to be buried from there.

Lise: Rosalie has a copy of a newspaper article that describes the night of the fire.

Deanna hopes to learn more about the fire and how it may have started.

- This is about my mother and father and the uh, fire.

Deanna: "Fire, home destroyed.

"Vincent Sardo jumps from second story window, "runs back into burning building "and loses life trying to save mate.

"He drops baby to brother below.

"Child seriously injured on body, head and arms.

"Blaze on Shaw Avenue apparently started near stove under stairs."

Lise: After Rosalie's parents died in the fire, she was raised by her maternal grandparents, Nick and Anna Filipello.

Rosalie once asked her grandmother how the fire started.

- I asked her one time, I think I was about ten and I said, uh, "Ma," 'cause I called her ma.

I said, "How did my parents die?"

And, you know, my grandmother was a beautiful woman, never said anything bad about anybody and she said, Well, Ro, I think a rat must have chewed on a, on a match.

But I think personally, my father's brother lived with us and he was a heavy smoker and I think he started the fire.

Not intentionally, of course, but-- - But with his cigarette?

- that's what happened.

Yeah, I believe so.

Deanna: And to imagine how, how difficult it would, it would be to know that, you know, you were gonna die basically, and the anxiety of, of getting my nonna out of the house and I’m just so grateful though, that, that her life was saved, so that um... so that I could be here today.

♪♪ [Italian folk music] Lise: Deanna is hoping to learn more about the fire by visiting the place where it happened in St. Louis, Missouri.

♪♪ At the time of the fire, Vincenzo and Francesca were living in the Italian district in St. Louis known as The Hill.

This neighborhood still boasts a strong Italian influence as it did at the time when Deanna's ancestors lived there.

♪♪ Having found the address where her great-grandparents lived, Deanna is meeting with Pauline Sciuto, a distant relative who lived across the street at the time of the fire.

Deanna hopes to learn more specifics about the night of the fire.

Deanna: So, tell me where the house used to be.

Pauline: Back there.

Deanna: Okay.

Pauline: Because-- Deanna: Oh, it was back there where that shed is?

Pauline: It was right back there, right back there.

Deanna: What do you remember about the fire?

- Well, we were all asleep and we heard the fire department, and we all got up, and this was all full of people.

Lise: When Pauline arrived, the fire had already spread to unmanageable levels and the fire fighters would not let anyone near the house.

Unbeknownst to the crowd, Rosalie had already been thrown from the window and landed in a pile of hay that lay below.

♪♪ Pauline: So, when the firemen went there to put the ladder up there to get to the window, he stepped on her and that's how they knew she was there.

Because they-- they thought she was still in the house too.

[breathing shakily] And at the funeral home they had these, you know, pictures, and she looks like Rosalie, doesn't she?

Deanna: She does, she does.

Kind of looks like my mom, too.

[sniffs] Pauline: She was a very jolly person, very friendly.

Deanna: "Pray for the repose "of Mr. and Mrs. V. and F. Sardo "who died tragically in a fire at their home "on January 30, 1931, St. Louis, Missouri.

"Vincent Sardo was born in Casteltermini, Italy, "on February 12, 1895.

Frances Filippello was born in Independence, Louisiana."

Pauline: [crying quietly] Deanna: It's crazy, it's crazy to be here 'cause I’ve, I've heard that story from my nonna and then to actually be here, I just feel a lot of, a lot of admiration for them to know that... my great-grandmother, Francesca, was always laughing and always happy and always singing, and you know, you just have this thought of what, what that was like but to know that she walked right here and that I just walked right there where she walked.

It's touching.

♪♪ ♪♪ Lise: Deanna is visiting Santina's hair salon on The Hill.

There, she's arranged to meet with several long-time Hill residents from whom she hopes to learn about rumors that have circulated for years about the house fire.

Man 1: I used to go to Rosalie's house for singing lessons on Saturday and the grandmother and grandfather was there.

I always thought it was her mother and father, and my mother told me, No, that's not her mother and father, she said, that's her grandmother and grandfather.

Then my mother told me the story about the fire.

- Uh, what I heard was that it was uh, bootleg related, the fire.

Woman 2: Well, the thing I heard, uh, that, uh, a still blew up in the house, they were making moonshine.

Whiskey.

You know what moonshine is?

Man 1: White Lightning.

Woman 2: And it was-- yeah, 100 proof.

And people were poor back then, and that's how they made their little bit of money, was moonshine, but then they said there was a lot, a lot of people making moonshine and it was competitive, you know, so they wanted you to buy the moonshine from certain people.

But I heard it blew up the still, that's all I know.

But then I hear stories that mafia might have blown it up, but I don't know, I'm too young.

Deanna: Were they involved-- with the mafia?

- I don't think so, but back then...

I don't think you really had to be-- Yeah, you just had to do-- Woman 3: If you were doing it-- Woman 2: You had to do it their way-- Woman 3: If you were in their turf, I think that's how the bombings happened, because it was a lot of bombings going on back then.

These are just stories I heard.

Woman 2: Yeah.

Woman 3: I remember a lady, one of my customers, she was uh, pregnant with twins and they bombed the house next door and she lost her twins.

Deanna: Oh.

Woman 2: I heard there was bushels of money.

I remember hearing that and that... Woman 3: Treasures.

- Yeah, treasures and "went with the fire."

That's what I heard.

Man 1: I heard that.

Woman 4: Yeah, I heard that too.

Man 1: ...another basement.

- Yeah, I heard that too.

Woman 3: Probably the strangest story I heard though, was that it was an insurance job, which I hardly think so, 'cause they died, the poor people.

But that was the strangest story I heard.

Deanna: An insurance job?

What do you mean?

- Like they did it-- they burnt their house down, their own house.

Which-- Woman 2: Yeah, but they died.

- is unlikely.

- Right.

Woman 2: Did they even have insurance back then?

Woman 3: I’m not sure, I don't know.

It was Depression-- Woman 3: That was in what, 1930?

Woman 2: '31.

Deanna: '31.

♪♪ ♪♪ Lise: Deanna doesn't know what to make of the rumors she's heard about the fire.

So, she has decided to change the focus of her investigation and learn about Vincenzo and Francesca's personalities and lives.

So, Deanna's first stop is to visit St. Ambrose Church, the Catholic church on The Hill that was the center of her great-grandparent's religious and community lives.

♪♪ She knows that her great-grandmother was a talented seamstress so she has arranged to meet with Monsignor Bommarito, the parish priest, to see the sort of clothwork her great-grandmother would have worked on.

♪♪ - Deanna, you said that your great-grandmother probably worked on some sort of a cutwork.

Let me show you the cutwork she may have-- This, maybe not this particular one, but something similar to this.

We call this the Italian cutwork.

Let's take it over to the table.

I'll show you what it, what it, what it looks like.

First off, this is absolutely incredible-- Deanna: It's beautiful.

Monsignor: workmanship.

The ladies would design this and then also, this is all by hand, it cannot be-- Deanna: Oh my gosh.

Monsignor: duplicated by, by any kind of machine.

And then they would put, you know, various symbols, the cross, the symbol of the Eucharist, you know, the various flowers.

And what they would do is they would make three sets, one for the main altar and two for the two side altars.

And we only put this out at special occasions now because we want to keep it for the next generation to show the next generation this is what's been passed on to us by the, the people who had this talent, who used their talent to make this church a beautiful church.

You know, they wanted to show forth how proud they were of who they were as Catholics and they wanted their churches to reflect it.

♪♪ Deanna: This church meant so much to my family and, and to be here is, is just incredible.

They uttered prayers while they were there for... for their children and their children's children.

And-- I’m sure that they imagined their posterity and wished well for their posterity.

And to be the posterity and be there where those prayers were uttered in their heart is, is amazing.

♪♪ ♪♪ Lise: Deanna now knows a little bit more about Francesca but has yet to learn anything about Vincenzo.

So Deanna is turning to the U. S. Census.

She's found a 1930 census that shows Vincenzo, Francesca and Rosalie living together at 5126 Shaw Avenue.

This census was taken just months before Vincenzo's death in the fire and therefore becomes a valuable resource to help Deanna learn more about his entire life.

- It says that his occupation was a wholesale grocer, which I didn't know.

It says that he fought in World War I, which I was not aware of.

I did not know that.

So not knowing much about him, but knowing he was willing to serve in World War I for a country that wasn't really his and the fact that he saved his daughter from the fire, I think that says a lot about the kind of person that he was.

Lise: In addition to helping Deanna learn about Vincenzo, the census also raises a question.

As Deanna does some math, she realizes that Vincenzo and Francesca waited an abnormally long time to have children.

She was 17 when she was married, and she was 23 when she had Rosalie, which is six years so that's a long time.

Maybe they did want to wait, and maybe they were just going against the norm of that time.

Maybe she had fertility problems.

Maybe they couldn't get pregnant or maybe they had some secret.

[chuckles] I don't know.

♪♪ Lise: In order to find out why Vincenzo and Francesca waited so long to have children, Deanna is talking with her grandmother via video chat.

Deanna: Hi Nonna.

- Hi sweetheart.

Deanna: How are you?

- I’m fine.

Deanna: Good.

- How are you dear?

Deanna: I’m doing well, thanks.

So, I read the census and I noticed that after your parents were married there was-- there's six years before you were born.

Do you know why that is, or why did they wait?

- I was told that my father went to jail for his brother, the brother that, you know, lived with us-- Deanna: Uh-huh.

- during the fire.

And since my uncle belonged to the mafia they didn't want him to go there, to jail, because they were afraid they were going to kill him.

So they sent my father instead and he served six years, like you say, and then came home.

Deanna: Wow, I never knew that before.

- Yeah.

♪♪ Deanna: It's news to me, I had never heard that my great-grandfather was in prison, and that he served time for his brother.

It's admirable that someone would be willing to do that.

I mean if, I don't have a brother but if my sister had done something really bad and she was gonna get sent to prison I don't know if I would say, Hey, I'll serve time for you.

If he really were in prison for six years, that's a long time.

And he had just gotten married.

I mean that's-- that would be horrible.

I wish that I could know if it were true or not, if he really did serve the jail time or if, I don't know, is that just another rumor?

Did that actually happen?

And what exactly it was for.

Like, what were-- what was the charge that he was sent to serve time for?

♪♪ Lise: Scott Biondo is a private investigator and genealogist who is taken an interest in the myths surrounding the Sardos.

He's been looking for prison records that would validate the story that Vincenzo went to prison for his brother.

Deanna is meeting with him at his house in St. Louis.

Scott: The first person I spoke to, the deputy clerk of the 22nd judicial circuit which is the St. Louis city circuit court, and unfortunately there is no case um, involving either Vincenzo or Serafino recorded in the city of St. Louis between the years of 1913, which is the immigration year we've determined, and 1931, which is the death of Vincenzo.

So, that turned out to be a dead end as far as the circuit court goes.

It is possible that there was an arrest made and that the arrest might have been um, for another agency and they would have a booking record.

So, I then made contact with Sharon Browning who runs the records department for the Metropolitan Police Department here in St. Louis and once again unfortunately um, using those names that I gave you before, there are no recorded arrests or anything like that in the city of St. Louis, between those years for either one of these individuals.

Deanna: Hm.

Scott: So that really is the crux of my investigation and unfortunately, Deanna, at this time, um, I’m sorry to tell you that I’m not able to find uh, that either one of the brothers was ever incarcerated.

A small caveat to add to that would be that does not mean it did not happen, and here's why.

Had this offense occurred in Cleveland, Ohio or Miami, Florida or Denver, Colorado we're looking in the wrong places, but we do have to start, at least at the beginning, focusing on the most likely places.

It's a very big country and we would have to check an awful lot of circuit courts and federal courts to make a determination that this never happened, but at least dealing with what we know, there doesn't appear to be any record of this occurring.

- There was a possibility that um, you know, they had a still in their house, at that time there could have been some competition making the moonshine, and, you know, to, to put someone out of business so they could get more business, they could have set the house on fire to get rid of 'em.

Scott: So, commit a murder to eliminate competition?

Deanna: Right.

- The home still was, was a very, I think probably a very popular thing for producing small amounts of alcohol for yourself and for others.

Um, the home still would not have been capable, in my estimation, of producing quantities that would have created any concern by, by some organized group or by some rival faction.

Deanna: In one word, if I could describe what just happened, it would be anti-climactic.

I was just under the assumption that, that Scott had answers for me, and so it's just a little disappointing, like I said, that, that the questions still remain and, and there is, there is no answers.

I’m a firm believer that, that things happen for a specific reason, even bad things and had my great-grandparents not died in that fire then clearly my nonna's life would have been different, you know, in good ways, possibly bad.

That would have changed the way my mother was raised and that would have changed how I was raised and who I am and my experience, so obviously that happened for a reason.

Their death at such a young age, I’m obviously not sure exactly why it had to happen that way, but I know that it was obviously something that, that needed to happen for other things to happen.

Lise: Okay, how frustrating that the investigator can't confirm or deny this potential jail sentence?

Um, do you have an opinion about it yourself?

- Um, when I told my nonna about it, her reaction was that... it still happened, she thought, because she thought that the mafia just kind of, you know, eliminated records and covered it all up, and-- - Oh, sure.

Deanna: So.

And I think the aunt that told her about that was a good source for her so she feels like it, it's still true.

Lise: I, I kind of tend to believe my family history above what someone else tells me, too.

Right?

Deanna: Yeah, I mean, I just, I don't know what to think, 'cause I had never heard that before, that he had served time, so both things are new.

So hearing that he did and hearing that there's no evidence, it's like, Well, I’m not really sure what to make of it.

Lise: Well, and in fact, at this point in time, you kind of hit a couple of dead ends um, because you start to hear in the beauty parlor about all these rumors about it could be a still, it could be the mafia, what set the fire, right?

Deanna: Yeah.

- And, what was that like, had you ever heard any of those things before?

- I never heard about the still, um, the story that I had always heard was that it was Sam's cigarette that he accidentally, you know, lit off, not intentionally, but-- Lise: Right.

- that he smoked in the house a lot and it was probably his cigarette that lit off.

Lise: Did he survive the fire?

Deanna: Yes, he did.

- Can you imagine what he must have felt, if indeed he was the cause of it?

- I’m sure he felt horrible.

Lise: Had-- Did your grandmother ever talk about her relationship with him?

Deanna: Um, briefly.

I think they had a good relationship.

She said that he would bring her gifts and stuff whenever he would travel somewhere that he would bring her gifts back, so.

Lise: Aw, like any good uncle.

Um, so what was your feeling when you hit these kind of snags that don't really answer these burning questions?

What were you feeling at that time?

- I was disappointed because I was, I was thinking that I was going to, to find the answers to these things and then... Lise: More questions.

- Right.

So, it was like, Well, we still don't have answers.

Lise: Oh, swell.

[laughs] Deanna: What do you do?

- Did you feel at any point in time, I’m done, I want to just stop?

Or did it just compel you to discover more?

- Um, I, I felt like I-- it wasn't that necessary to find out the details of, you know, maybe how the fire was started or did he really serve jail time or did he not.

That those particular questions that I had, that wasn't the main-- you know, that wasn't of the main importance to me.

Lise: So, what was of the main importance?

Deanna: Just to learn the stories of them, what their personalities were, what kind of people they were so that I could-- Lise: Aww.

- feel connected to them that way, and not so much how, how exactly they died, but just... Lisa: Right.

- how they lived.

- Aw.

I love that.

Your nonna said something at the very beginning of that segment that just destroyed me, and I wonder what your experience was.

She said she heard the story of her mother telling her mother that she hopes that building that's being built is going to be a dance hall and then your grandmother says it turns out it was a funeral parlor and she was the first person to be buried.

How did you feel?

Had you heard that story before?

Deanna: I hadn't.

She told it so nonchalantly, you know-- Lise: I know.

- And so I wasn't sure how it was going to end and then she said that and I was like, Oh, that's horrible.

Lise: I know it broke my heart, and I thought-- I wondered what your reaction must be at the moment.

Did you ask her anything further about that or just sort of take it in and... Deanna: Yeah, we didn't ever finish talking about that at all, but-- Lise: I mean, what a-- There's a beauty to her saying I’m gonna dance in this dance hall and in a way she did dance in that dance hall, you know?

So interesting.

Um, you've told me personally that who you are has something to do with this fire.

Can you tell me more about that?

- Well, thinking about it, if, if they had never saved, you know, her life, if my nonna died in that fire then I wouldn't be here right now, and so, um, you know, but had they, had they lived, had they survived, and my nonna was raised by her parents, instead of her grandparents, you know, I’m sure she would have had lots of siblings, and that would have changed the person that she was.

She would be a different person, and consequently my mother would be different.

She would have been raised differently and then I would have been raised differently.

Lise: Yeah.

- I would have been a different person.

Lise: Absolutely.

What was it like going to The Hill in St. Louis?

I happen to know that area very well.

Deanna: It was so fun.

- Was it?

Deanna: I’ve loved it.

I, I never knew that there was this, you know, community of Italians that was still thriving and it was just so fun to go and know that that's where my grandmother grew up and that's where my great-grandparents and great-great-grandparents lived.

Lise: Ah.

- That's a fun place.

Lise: Did you feel like, the history in the streets and feel connection?

Deanna: I did.

It was, it was just a great spirit there, that I felt really connected to be there.

Lise: Aww.

Um, you were really a good sport, because you had your hair done on camera.

Both: [laugh] Deanna: Teased.

Lise: Teased to within an inch of your life.

And you looked darling the whole time.

Deanna: Oh, thanks.

Both: [laugh] - I can see you don't agree with me.

That was a great uh, bonding of stories.

Tell me about hearing these first rumors about the still and the mafia and all sorts of things you've told me.

- I had always heard that there were some um, mafia connection with my Uncle Sam, that he was involved in the mafia, so that wasn't news to me, but you know, I'd never heard about a still and um, some of the other things that they told was just, you know, just kind of soaking it all in, and it-- and they knew that it was just hearsay as well.

Lise: Sure.

- And so it's kind of like Well, what of this is true, what's not true?

Lise: Take it with a grain of salt.

Deanna: Right.

- Right, and how stories change over the years.

Deanna: Right.

- And everyone embellishes.

You said there were some embellishments that were sort of beyond your imaginings, like what?

- Well, um, the people that lived in the house, um, said that they saw ghosts.

Lise: Oh, you mean later?

- Yeah, that-- Lise: Oh.

- that bought the house after my great-great-grandparents um, had died.

Lise: Mm-hmm.

- Um, that they saw ghosts of either my great-great-grandparents or my great-grandparents so that's kind of strange to hear, and then-- Lise: Yeah, you'd never heard that within your own family history?

Deanna: No, because I doubt my that nonna had ever-- - Right.

Deanna: known that-- Lise: That that had been-- - That they had seen ghosts, but it was multiple people that had confessed to have seen this ghost so.

Lise: Oh, fascinating.

Everybody wants ghosts in their family, don't they?

Do you?

What did you think about these almost like skeletons?

I happened to have a still in my family history, and mafia situations as well, and I know we all dream of, you know, royalty, and you know, and-- I don't know, Christopher Columbus was my blah blah blah.

And here you're hearing stills and mafia and ghosts.

Um, disappointing?

Interesting?

Surprising?

- Um, interesting.

I mean, I’m, I'm not really disappointed.

I guess maybe I should be, but I'm not-- Lise: I don't think so.

- I mean it was, you know, it seemed like everyone in the '20s had a still.

Especially in that community-- Lise: Yes.

- and I mean-- Lise: It was cultural.

- They didn't feel like it was morally wrong to do it, and you know, that was just their way of life.

Lise: My family from Slovenia did the same thing.

I think it's very European culture.

It's very common in the old country to have made your own booze, so not unheard of.

So, here you are, no definitive answers.

Feeling what?

Deanna: At first disappointed, but then you know it's okay.

That's, that's not how-- that's not the reason I came on the journey, necessarily, Lise: Right.

- specifically for that.

- So you're still feeling like you want to know who they were when they were alive?

Deanna: Right.

Lise: Did you have any impressions of that at this point?

Of who they were as people?

Because I know Pauline, who's a distant cousin, who you met right where the house was, shared some uh, pictures about, you know, sort of that your great-grandma was rather spunky.

Deanna: Yeah.

To me, that was one of the highlights of my journey was talking to Pauline because she helped me paint a picture in my mind of what Francesca was like.

Lise: Mmm.

- And to hear her say those things in the exact place where she lived, like the exact place where she would have walked was just, it was so great.

You know, she said she was always smiling and she was always happy and she loved to sing and I felt like that memory of her was now my memory that I could have.

- It made her relational to you.

Do you see any aspects in your grandmother or yourself that are like that?

- Yeah, um-- Lise: Like what?

- We, we all love to sing and so that's fun that that has been passed down.

Lise: Historic.

So, no answers.

You decide at this point, change of plans.

You're going to search out more information of their life, right?

Deanna: Right.

- [whispering] Let's watch that.

- Okay.

Lise: [chuckles] ♪♪ ♪♪ For now, Deanna has learned all she can about Vincenzo and Francesca and the fire.

So now she wants to learn about her more distant ancestors who lived and died as peasant farmers in Sicily.

♪♪ She's arranged to meet with Gene Mariani and Nick Riggio.

Gene is the former president of the St. Louis Italian club.

Nick's family comes from Palazzo Adriano, the town where many of Deanna's ancestors lived in Sicily.

♪♪ Nick: In Palazzo and that area there, it was an intercultural-type area.

What they grew over there, they grew for themselves.

Your relatives, which go down to the Sardos and Fili-- uh, Filipellos, they were in a Sicilian area in the early 1800's.

They were very poor.

Deanna: So, just from what you both were saying about why specifically my family left Sicily.

Gene: Bottom line Deanna, for a better life.

Deanna: Better life.

Gene: All of them left because they think they would have a better life here.

- Just more opportunity?

- Just all the way around.

Nick: That's, that's true.

Gene: That's the bottom line.

Nick: And that's why most people leave any country.

For a better life.

Lise: At the turn of the century, the U.S. had become an industrialized nation, but Sicily was still dependent on agriculture.

Deanna's ancestors were part of a large exodus of impoverished Sicilians immigrating to the U.S. Where they could make more money working in factories than they could on their family farms.

♪♪ Now that Deanna understands why her ancestors left Sicily, she wants to learn what it would have been like for them to come to the United States and start new lives.

♪♪ To answer her question, she's meeting with Joe DeGregorio, a neighborhood tour guide, at The Hill's famous immigrant statue.

- This is a statue that is now de facto the symbol of The Hill.

This statue truly depicts what the Italians looked like when they came over from the old country as a family.

If you notice, [clears throat] one suitcase.

That's all they were allowed uh, uh, on the steamship.

And you notice the small child with the mother here, uh, with the look of anticipation in their faces.

On the lapel, of the gentleman here, I mean, he has a sign.

That signifies first, the town he came from, in Italy, and also his family name, and then thirdly, the city of St. Louis, Missouri.

And the reason for that is obviously they did not understand English, okay?

So, coming off of Ellis Island they would be met with some people who would see this sign on the lapel, and then direct them, uh, to the right train station onto the right train to get them to Union Station to get here to St. Louis so they can meet their family and friends.

Deanna: So, why St. Louis of all places in the United States that they could come?

Why, why St. Louis?

- It's a matter of connection.

A lot of people stayed in New York because it was convenient.

However, St. Louis started because you had people coming from a small town, and then making the connection with the relatives back in Italy and saying this is a nice place to live, lot of good work here, come on over.

- Okay.

- And that is a typical midwestern immigrant pattern.

Coming here because they had other connections-- - Right.

- uh, in this neighborhood.

- I assume that when they came here from Sicily that they were able to uphold their traditions very well because there were so many Sicilians here.

Is that a fair assumption?

Joe: Yeah, now that's not only a fair assumption, that is the absolute truth.

In actuality, this was Sicily transported from the old country here.

With all the cultures, all the language, all the traditions in their own little world.

♪♪ Deanna: To come to a new country but to still be surrounded by so many people that were Sicilians and that spoke Sicilian, and you know, just the same, the same people, the same culture, the same language, just how great that would be.

Just how nice that is, and that just makes me happy for them that... you know, even though it was a new place they still had that familiar spirit and so that would have eased their transition here.

So that makes me happy that they had that.

♪♪ ♪♪ Lise: One of the traditions that was important to Deanna's Sicilian ancestors was cooking.

Deanna has heard that her great-great-grandmother, Anna Filipello, loved to cook a dish called pasta con sarde.

She's arranged to meet with Suzanne Miramonti, the founder of Adrianna's, one of The Hill's Sicilian restaurants, to learn how to cook this dish.

♪♪ Suzanne: Okay, we're going to turn it down just a little bit so I can show you... what we're doing.

All right, once we get the-- you just want like a minute.

Let the oil release from the garlic, let it get going.

When it gets that smell that makes me crazy 'cause I love that smell.

We want some seasoning.

So, we're going to go some salt.

I’m going to put these sardines in, that's one can.

So, I can show you.

I did this perfectly.

Let's just put a little bit in there.

Way hot.

Deanna: Mmm.

Delicious, love it.

So how important is this dish to Sicilian culture?

Suzanne: This dish is very important because it's eaten all over.

You have to remember Sicily's an island.

So fish is the main staple of the diet.

- Right.

- Um, food, it's a Sicilian thing.

Very passionate about food.

Food is every holiday, you know, you have the occasion and then you have the food, and I’m talking an abundance.

- Oh yeah.

- An obnoxious abundance of food.

- Oh, I know.

Suzanne: [laughs] The food is just a huge part of everything, and that's, I mean, that's the way I grew up, obviously.

And I love cooking and I am just very proud of everything that I’ve learned growing up, and I hope to pass it on to my children and they're interested, so-- Deanna: I hope so.

Suzanne: we can keep going and keep going, keep going.

- Definitely.

- But yes, food is important.

Everything, family, food, faith.

Three f's.

Not necessarily in that order.

Deanna: [laughs] - I think family and faith are kind of hand in hand and then that-- Boom.

Food just jumps right in there.

- Yeah.

That's what it means to be Sicilian is, is to cook and enjoy a really great meal together as a family, and so learning a new Sicilian dish makes me, makes me feel more Sicilian.

I, I'm excited to make it for my nonna as well, I think that it will obviously bring back a lot of memories for her.

I don't know when she had it last or when she made it last, but I think that it will be fun to make that with her.

♪♪ ♪♪ Lise: Deanna's returning to California to tell her grandmother about all that she's learned in St. Louis.

Deanna: I’m really excited to be able to make the pasta con sarde and I know that that was a dish that-- well, specifically my great-great-grandmother would make a lot and so I don't think my nonna has had it for a while so I’m excited that, that we can all eat it together.

I’ve always felt proud to be Sicilian but now I think I feel even more proud of my heritage since I’ve, I went to The Hill and saw so many Sicilians and that they're keeping on the tradition of so many great things.

It would be nice to know how the fire started and whether or not those mafia myths are true or not but I don't think I will find the answers to those questions and that's totally okay with me because I’ve, I had such a great experience doing all of this, that-- And I feel closer to them so I feel like that's the most important thing for me.

- How was the pasta?

Deanna: It was delicious.

- [laughing] Was it?

Deanna: Yeah, it was good.

Lise: Had you ever made that pasta before?

- I hadn't, and I had never even heard of the dish either.

Lise: That's saying a lot for a pregnant mommy to say a pasta with sardines was delicious.

Deanna: [chuckles] Yeah.

- [shudders] [laughs] Deanna: I was glad that I didn't have any nausea attacks during that time, but it went well.

Lise: You gave it to your grandmother.

What was her reaction to it?

Deanna: She loved it, she loved it.

Lise: Had you ever cooked for her before?

- Yeah, I have and I love cooking for them because they've cooked for me so much, and so to cook their stuff for them-- course it probably doesn't taste as good, but-- Lise: Aw, I bet she didn't tell you that.

[laughs] Deanna: No.

- So, you have this different sense of yourself now, taking this journey.

Tell me about that.

Deanna: I just feel more connected to who they were, my great-grandparents, um, and I feel like I know what it means a little more to be Sicilian.

Lise: What does it mean?

- To, um... Well, I guess I had in my mind, you know, that it meant just cooking really good food and eating it together, and um, I mean, that's, that's still the idea that I have in my mind, but, um, just connecting those family history things together and making sure that they're, they're passed on.

- And are you going to pass them on to your children?

Deanna: Definitely.

- How?

Deanna: One thing that I'd like to do is to celebrate um, either Francesca and Vincenzo's birthdays or their anniversary and I’m just gonna make it like a family holiday, where we, you know, make Italian food together and eat it and maybe watch this video segment.

[chuckles] Lise: I love that.

- And just talk about, talk about their lives and... - Oh, I love that you want to do that.

Um... Did you find out what you wanted to know about the live people that they were?

- I wish I could have found out a little bit more, but I definitely found out things that I didn't know before.

And like I said with Pauline helping me paint that picture, and to me that was-- that's the most important thing that I feel like I have a memory of them even though I, I never knew them.

Lise: Absolutely.

Will you stay in contact with Pauline do you think?

Deanna: I hope so.

I, I hope that I can see her again because she was great.

Lise: You've told me since this time, you and your husband and your daughter actually took a driving trip through St. Louis again.

Deanna: Yeah.

We were only able to stay one day so we couldn't do a lot, but we did visit the cemeteries of where Francesca and Vincenzo were buried and also Anna and Nick and their children.

Lise: And that was something that you wanted to share with your husband and your daughter?

Deanna: Yeah.

- Were they touched by the experience do you think?

Deanna: Yeah, my husband was great because he's the one who found all the tombstones.

Lise: Oh, he did?

- He has a knack for that so.

Lise: Oh, that's helpful.

What do you mean he has a knack for finding tombstones?

Deanna: Well, just finding things.

I was searching all over and he's like, Oh, here they are.

It's like... Lise: Perfect.

- Okay.

Lise: That's what husbands are for.

There's an amazing story in this last segment-- no, it was actually in the first segment about Vincenzo threw the baby out of the window, we believe, and miraculously or by on purpose, the baby landed in hay?

Deanna: Yeah.

- And then tell me again how Rosalie, your grandmother, that baby, was discovered in the hay.

Deanna: Um, I’m not exactly sure, um, because there's-- Lise: But this is something Pauline told you.

- Yes, Pauline and then the newspaper article and some other, there's kind of contradicting information.

Lise: Okay, tell me those.

Deanna: Um, my nonna has said that it was her mother that threw her out of the window.

The newspaper article says it was her father.

So I’m not sure who actually did it, but-- Lise: Mm-hmm.

- but it was into a pile of hay, um, and Pauline said that the, when the firefighters came they didn't see her there and that they actually stepped on her.

Um-- Lise: Which meant they discovered her in that moment.

Deanna: Yeah, 'cause she cried, so.

But she was in the hospital for months and months after that, recovering.

Lise: Oh really?

From the fall?

From the stepping on?

From the smoke?

Deanna: From everything, of just-- She had burns and um, yeah.

Lise: And this is a baby, your grandmother, who's not even a year old yet.

Deanna: Yeah.

Lise: Going through this trauma, and her grandparents caring for her through this.

Does she have, um, she wouldn't have memories of it, would she?

Deanna: No, I don't think so.

I don't think that she does.

Lise: You talked to her about missing her parents?

Deanna: I know that she's always, you know, sad that she, she didn't know them, but she was always very grateful that she was raised by her grandparents and her aunt and uncles and so she did have a family that, that loved her, so I know that she's grateful for that.

Lise: And what's-- now that some time has passed and this whole journey's come to it's-- this moment, maybe not over, what's-- has it changed anything for her?

'Cause you said you wanted to give her this gift of knowing her parents better.

Do you feel like you did?

Deanna: I think by, by watching this and, and having this, you know, just recorded for her of, of The Hill and places that she grew up.

When she sees it she'll just be so excited and I think that that is just a gift that I can give to her.

- Aww.

I heard a tale that um, one of the ways you're passing this on to the children might be a name of the new baby?

Deanna: Yeah, if our baby is a boy we plan on naming him Vincenzo after his great-great-grandfather, so.

- Was that a direct result of this, you think?

Deanna: Um... Lise: Or had you always planned that?

Deanna: We, when we were pregnant with our first, if it were a boy we talked about the name Vincenzo because of him.

But now I feel, you know, I was planning on asking my nonna to compile some stories that she knew about her father just, you know, that she'd been told.

Lise: Uh-huh.

- But, but now it means even more because I’ve been on this journey.

Lise: So, you've always had this?

That's a powerful connection to a great-grandparent to want to name your child after that person, to honor them, right?

Deanna: Yeah.

I just like the name.

Lise: I do too.

I do too.

Time has passed.

How much time has passed since you, since we shot this together?

Deanna: About a month.

Lise: And um, is it the gift that keeps on giving?

[laughs] How's the month been?

Deanna: It's been good, it's been a great experience, you know, to look back and, and that I was able to be there and, and learn these things.

It's just been great.

Lise: Tell me, and our viewers, what it's like to learn these, or not learn, the things you hope to learn with cameras in your face, running from place to place.

Tell me a little bit about the experience of shooting the show.

Deanna: It's not really what I expected.

You know, I-- Lise: Okay.

What did you expect?

Deanna: Well, you think if you're going to be you know, on a TV show and you're in different things, you think it's going to be kind of more glamorous-- Lise: [laughs] Welcome to my world.

- than it is.

Lise: [laughs] Deanna: But I mean it was, it was, it was still a great experience, you know, learning those things, um-- Lise: Tough, physically?

Deanna: Yeah because of the pregnancy, being-- Lise: Ah.

- really tired.

Lise: Traveling.

- And, and nauseated and throwing up.

Lise: Ah, I don't see any of that in the result, do you?

- That's good.

Both: [chuckle] Deanna: Don't want that in there.

Lise: When the, when the gal's giving you a little head massage and you're hearing all these rumors, all I see is a very uh... pregnant woman, not very pregnant, a pregnant woman with a two year old gone who's in the zone.

It's like this is the best moment I’ve had since I got pregnant.

Was it?

Deanna: Yeah it's always nice for someone to do your hair.

Lise: [chuckling] To step away.

Were there any moments when you thought, Okay, I don't want the cameras to watch this, or were you aware of us being there?

Deanna: Yeah, um, I think it's sometimes hard to be articulate always and to express, you know, what's in your heart and what you're feeling on, on camera.

Lise: Right.

In fact, is there anything you want to speak to that maybe you didn't feel you were able to at the time?

Deanna: I haven't really reflected on that much.

Lise: That's 'cause you have bigger things in store.

- [chuckles] Lise: You're on to the next step.

Um, do you look like your, uh, that side of the family?

Deanna: I think so.

Lise: Yeah.

Do you see it in the pictures of them and-- - Yeah.

Lise: you mentioned that your mom looks like Rosalie's mom, at some point.

Deanna: Yeah, and I think I look like my mom.

Lise: Yeah, isn't that fun?

Deanna: It is fun.

- Like you said, to see the similarities not only in the looks but in the actions, the food pushers.

We've got that in my family too.

Maybe we're related.

- Maybe.

Lise: [laughs] Is this what you thought it would be?

- Yes, it is because I have, I have the information that I feel like I wanted.

Like I said, like, I feel more connected.

I feel like I know more about their lives now, Lise: Yeah.

- and that's what I wanted.

Lise: To know them better.

Do you feel like done, happy?

Lise: Yeah, I do.

Lise: Transformed?

- I feel like we accomplished what, what I wanted to, so yeah.

Lise: Thank you so much Deanna for sharing your story with us.

Deanna: Thank you for having me.

- And thank you for watching.

Please join us next time for another episode of The Generations Project.

♪♪