There have been many comments and questions about the conditions our forebearers experienced on their ocean voyage from Italy to the U.S...
For your info, "The Ambassador" magazine, published by the National Italian American foundation (NIAF), Winter 1997/1998, has a very informative feature article on the subject. Authored by Rodney H. Mills, the article is 8 pages long, with photographs interspersed.
Other articles include: Il Carretto Siciliano, New York's early Italian Restaurants.
For copies, write to NIAF, 1860 19th St., N.W., Washington, DC 20009
web page: http://www.niaf.org

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Here are a few books that have been recommended to us. Please feel free to contact us about your favorite books and any comments you may have about them.

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• Italian-Americana Journal: A Cultural and Historical Review is published twice a year in connection with America's University of Rhode Island. Each issue contains fascinating info on Italian heritage. To subscribe write to:

  Editor
  c/o University of Rhode Island, CCE Division
  80 Washington St.
  Providence, Rhode Island 02903
  Tel. (401) 277-5306
  

• A Passage In Time (The Ships that Brought our Ancestors)
  

  Author:	Diane Ptak, 1992
  Publisher:	Diane Ptak 12 Tice Road Albany, N.Y. 12203-9721

• The Morton Allen Directory of European Passenger Steamship Arrivals for the years 1890 - 1930 at the port of New York and for the years 1904 - 1926 at the ports of New York, Philadelphia, Boston and Baltimore
  

  Author:	Morton Allen, 1993
  Publisher:	Genealogical Publishing Company, 1001 North Calvert Street Baltimore, Maryland 21202

• Immigrants to Pennsylvania from 1641 - 1819
• Immigrants to the Middle Colony
• New World Immigrants
• Passengers to America
• Passenger Arrivals at the Port of Philadelphia
  

  Author:	Michael Tepper
  Publisher:	Genealogical Publishing Company, 1001 North Calvert Street Baltimore, Maryland 21202

• The Famine Immigrants
  

  Co-authors:	Michael Tepper & Ira A. Glazier
  Publisher:	Genealogical Publishing Company, 1001 North Calvert Street Baltimore, Maryland 21202

• Passenger Ships of the World Past and Present by Eugene Smith, has been out of print for a long time. There are less than 150 copies left.
  The book purportedly has "information about the name of the line, the company that built it, dimensions, construction, date launched and maiden voyage, any alterations to the construction, number of passengers in each class, date wrecked, scrapped or decommissioned, names of sister ships, and more...."
  The book costs $35 plus $4 for postage and handling from:

  George H. Dean Co.
  140 Campanelli Dr.
  Braintree MA 02814
  Attn: David Morris
  tel. (617) 356-4100
  

• A good source for heraldry and seeing if your family has any blue blood is Dizionario Storico-Nobile compiled by G.B. di Crollalanza in 1866.

• A History of Sicily by Finley, Smith and Duggan (Viking, 1987). This is a short 246-page version of their 3-volume study with maps, pictures, chronology, bibliography and index.

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