A Time To Weep

                     
     

Maryellen Scirrotto (Sulimay) 1941-1992

             The most painful experience in my life was when I had to say goodbye to my sweet mother. She had just turned fifty years old. She left us three months to the day of the diagnosis. She was my rock. She had late stage liver cancer and she accepted it. She chose not to go through chemotherapy. Through her faith, she was able to take that final walk with strength and dignity. This is something that I continue to take with me. Vincenza Meli was thirteen years old when she experienced great loss. The summer she arrived in Philadelphia would be one of the hottest on record. My relatives spoke of a comment Vincenza would often make that her mother died of a broken heart. It was the clue that would help reveal her story. Guiseppe age three, it seems, never made it to Philadelphia. Maybe that was the reason for their detention at Ellis Island but I am not certain. I can only speculate. I am sure though that he never was mentioned again.

Nicoletta Genchi death notlce

           On July 2,1901, Nicoletta Genchi died. There with her husband Giaocchino, and three surviving children Vincenza thirteen, Vincenzo age seven, and Antonette age nine months. I cannot imagine what that must have been like for the children watching their mother slip away and seeing their fathers' grief in this small tenement house on Seventh Street.  All prisoners of the stifling heat! Was Vincenza holding Antonette as she screamed for her mother? Did she have to stay with the children and the body of her deceased mother as her father went for the undertaker? Vincenza now without her mother in this strange land was left caring for her baby sister and little brother. As cruel and unforgiving the world could be, this small Sicilian family was dealt another terrible blow. The baby Antonette died twenty days later July 22, 1901 from cholera.
                                                                                                                         

Antonette Meli death record

               Gioacchino had made that decision to come to America, to settle in Philadelphia to give his family a better life. Within three short months, he had lost his wife and two of his four children. In that era, it was common for men to give their children up in these circumstances but Gioacchino kept his family together. I can't help but feel that it was Vincenza's character and willingness to care for young Vincenzo that helped keep the family together. The family survived and within three years a widow named Anna Prestianni from Castelbuono, arrived at Ellis Island with two young daughters. On her ship manifest she listed her future residence as Seventh and Clymer street, Philadelphia which was the home of Gioacchino Meli.

7th street circa 1900