ITALIANS
OF LOS ANGELES
An Historical Overview
by
Gloria Ricci Lothrop, Ph.D.
W. P. Whitsett Professor Emerita
CSU Northridge
The
story of the Italians of Los Angeles is a relatively unexamined
chapter in migration history made more challenging by the dearth
of archival sources. This largely unknown chronicle is at once fragmentary,
diverse and, above all, unique.
It is, however, an aspect of local history deserving considerable
attention for several reasons. It provides an opportunity to examine
Italian settlement in a hospitable Mediterranean environment offering
familiar opportunities for rural enterprise. In a community, which
even when small, reflected a cosmopolitan mix, Italians with their
southern European culture and Catholic heritage, were welcomed in
a land deeply influenced by its Hispanic colonial heritage as allies
aligned against a minority of Asians and indigenous residents. As
a result, there was no widespread discrimination which forced Italians
to live in segregated communities. Their consequent dispersal facilitated
a marked degree of assimilation.
A second factor which distinguishes the history of Los Angeles Italians
is the distinctiveness of its waves of immigration. Italian explorers
and adventurers and agriculturalists, largely from northern Italy
constituted the pioneer community. The second half of the nineteenth
century witnessed the influx of Piedmontese vintners and a few Tuscan
entrepreneurs, along with a cluster of fishermen from Ischia and
Sicily, constituting the a transmigrant vanguard to the Pacific
coast.
In the decade following World War I the Italian population of Los
Angeles nearly doubled from 9,650 to 16,851, reflecting a broader
diversity of regional groups and a wider range of educational and
economic backgrounds. Some emigres achieved comparative prosperity
in sales and manufacturing; others were members of southern California's
growing film industry, and yet others were political activists protesting
Italy's Fascist regime or government functionaries advancing Mussolini's
message of Italianita' to the --generation. The fate of some became
entangled in the acts of war as the migrants found themselves declared
enemy aliens and restricted, removed or interned in isolated concentration
camps.
The postwar growth of Los Angeles had a significant impact upon
the Italian community. By 1960 it had grown to include Italian war
brides and first- and second-generation Italians making their way
west from New York, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Ohio and elsewhere.
In more recent years the community has included a new type of Italian
sojourner representing Italian business, fashion, and cinema. The
ties of these newcomers to Italian culture is concerned and vital,
though their ties to the community's earlier history are marginal.
They represent yet another perspective to the unique and multifaceted
Italian American community of southern California.
Further Reading on
ITALIANS
OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
Anonymous. "Biographical Sketch of Frank Sabichi." Historical
Society of Southern California Annual Publication 5, 1899.
_____. La Patria di Los Angeles. Los Angeles: n. p., 1915.
Baroni, Cleto. "Chi Siamo Nella California del Sud." Los
Angeles: L'Italo Americano, 1932.
_____. "Gente Italiana in California." Los Angeles: L'Italo
Americano, 1928.
Cassigoli, Bertholdo R. and Hector Chiariglione. Libro d'Oro
Degli Italiani D'America. Pueblo, Colorado: n.p., 1904.
Crosby, Rosalind. "The Italians of Los Angeles, 1910," In Struggle and Success: An Anthology of the Italian Immigrant
Experience in California, edited by Paola A. Sensi-Isolani
and Phylis Cancilla Martinelli. New York: Center for Migration Studies,
1993.
D'Amico, Rita Antonella. "La communita' Italiana di Guasti:
esempio di una felice integrazione nella societa' americana." Masters thesis, University of California at Los Angeles, 1986.
Del Giudice, Luisa. Preliminary Survey of Italian Folklife in
Los Angeles. Los Angeles: Folk and Traditional Arts Program,
Department of Cultural Affairs, 1990.
De Maria, Sister Saverio. Mother Francis Xavier Cabrini.
Translated by Rose Basile Green. Chicago: Missionary Sisters of
the Sacred Heart of Jesus, 1984.
DiStasi, Lawrence. Una Storia Segreta: The Secret History of Italian American Evacuation and Internment during World War II. Berkeley: Heyday Books, 2000.
Fante, John. Dreams from Bunker Hill. Santa Barbara: Black Sparrow Press, 1982.
_____. The Road to Los Angeles. Santa Barbara: Black Sparrow Press, 1985.
Fine, David. "Down and Out in Los Angeles: John Fante's Ask the Dust." The Californians 9 (September/October 1991): 48-51.
Fiore, Teresa. "Frances Marline Stephenson's Promises, a Woman's
Bildungsroman: Contradictions in Growing Up Female and Italian in
San Diego," in Italian Immigrants Go West: The Impact of
Locale on Ethnicity, edited by Janet E. Worrell et al. New
York: American Italian Historical Association, 2003.
Gonzalez, Gilbert G. "Factors Relating to Property Ownership
of Mexican Americans and Italians in Lincoln Heights." In Struggle
and Success: An Anthology of the Italian Immigrant Experience in
California, edited by Paola A. Sensi-Isolani and Phylis Cancilla
Martinelli. New York: Center for Migration Studies, 1993.
Kirchner, Olive. "Italians in Los Angeles."Masters Thesis,
University of Southern California, 1920.
Kordich, Catherine J. John Fante. New York: Twayne Publishers, 2000.
Lothrop, Gloria Ricci. Italians of Los Angeles, Historical
Society of Southern California, Los Angeles: California, 2003.
Lothrop, Gloria Ricci. "California's Italians: A Promise Fulfilled." In Fulfilling the Promise of California: An Anthology of Essays
on the Italian American Experience in California, edited by
Gloria Ricci Lothrop. Spokane, Washington: 2000.
_____. "The Italians of Los Angeles"Southern California
Quarterly LXXXV, Fall 2003.
_____. "Shadow on the Land: The Impact of Fascism on
Los Angeles Italians." California LXXV, Winter 1996/97.
_____. "Stability Amidst Change: Los Angeles Italians."
The Californians 5, March 1987.
_____"Uno Sguardo al Passato: Life in an Italian Household
in Depression Days." Pacific Historian 27, Winter
1983.
_____. "The Untold Story: The Effect of the Second World War
on Los Angeles Italians" Journal of the West XXXV,
January 1996.
_____. "Unwelcome in Freedom's Land: The Impact of World War
II on Italian Aliens in Southern California." Southern
California Quarterly LXXXI, Winter 1999. Reprinted in Una
Storia Segreta: The Secret History of Italian American Evacuation
and Internment during World War II, edited by Lawrence Di Stasi.
Berkeley: Heyday Books, 2001.
Lovrich, Nicholas J. Yugoslavs and Italians in San Pedro: Political
and Cultural and Civic Involvement in San Pedro. Palo Alto:
Ragusan Press 1977.
Mormino, Gary and George E. Pozzetta. "Ethnics at War: Italian
Americans in California during World War II." In The Way
We Really Were: The Golden State in the Second Great War, edited
by Roger Lotchin. Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press,
2000.
Placidi, Edward I. Italians of Los Angeles 1979. Los Angeles: L'Italo
Americano, 1979.
Richardson, William C. "Fishermen of San Diego: The Italians."
Journal of the San Diego Historical Society , Fall 1981.
Rolle, Andrew: "Italy in California," Pacific Spectator IX (Autumn 1955): 408-19.
_____. "Success in the Sun: The Italians in California." In Westerners Brand Book, edited by Henry Clifford. Los Angeles: Los Angeles Corral of Westerners Int'l., 1966.
_____. Westward the Immigrants: Italian Adventurers
and Immmigrants in an Expanding America. (Niwot, Colo.: University
of Colorado Press, 1999.
Scambray, Ken. "Creative Responses to the Italian American Experience in California: Baldassare Forestiere's 'Underground Gardens' and Simon Rodia's 'Watts Towers." Italian American Review 8 (Autumn/Winter 2001): 113-40.
Speroni, Charles. "California's Fisherman's Festivals."
Western Folklore 14, April 1955.
Tuoni, G. M. and Guido Brogelli. Attivita' Italiana in California.
San Francisco: Mercury Press, 1926.
Wallace, George. Joseph Francis Sartori. Los Angeles: Security
First National Bank, 1948.
Whiteson, Leon. Watts Towers. New York: Mosaic Press, 1990.
_____. The Wonderful Towers of Watts. New York: Mulberry Books, 1994.
Now Available:
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Italian Los Angeles: The Italian Resource Guide to Greater
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