Italian Research in Philadelphia
Whether you're researching Italians who lived in Philadelphia, in other US cities or states, or in Italy, or whether you're looking for scholarly analyses of the Italian emigrant experience, you can find something in Philadelphia.
Italians immigrated to Philadelphia in almost two distinct waves between the mid 19th and early 20th centuries. During the 1850’s and through the early 1870’s hundreds of Italians from the Piedmont, around Genoa, and other Northern Italian regions came into the city. The second wave of Italians began to settle Philadelphia during the 1880’s, continuing steadily through the early 1930’s. But this second group of immigrants was largely Southern Italians from areas such as Calabria, Abruzzi and Basilicata.
Many – though by no means all -- Italians settled in South Philadelphia. But no matter where they settled within the city, as they married, bought homes, found employment and opened their shops, these milestones were recorded in the records of various Philadelphia city departments and agencies.
As is true for all other Philadelphians, Italians and Italian-Americans can be found in the city's birth, marriage, and death records, deeds, wills and administrations, and naturalization documents. All are available for research at both the Philadelphia City Archives, located at 3100 Market Street, and Philadelphia City Hall, just blocks from the Convention Center. See http://www.genpa.org/RepositoriesPhilaGen.html#PhilaRecords for a summary of which records are housed at which repositories for which time periods.
Records housed at the Historical Society of Pennsylvania (HSP) can help researchers gain a broader perspective of how the Italians learned not only to cope, but even to flourish, in their adopted city of Philadelphia, from the earliest documented arrivals through their acculturation and assimilation well into the 20th century. A simple search of “Italian” in the HSP OPAC catalog will return hundreds of entries from HSP collections -- including many written in Italian, and many pertaining to areas outside Philadelphia and even outside Pennsylvania. See http://opac.hsp.org/cgi-bin/Pwebrecon.cgi?DB=local&PAGE=bbSearch.
HSP provides a useful online lesson plan “Rural Roads, City Streets: Italians in Pennsylvania” -- http://www.hsp.org/default.aspx?id=669 -- by Joan Saverino, Assistant Director for Education at HSP.
The Balch Institute for Ethnic Studies, which merged with the HSP in 2002, has an impressive collection of Italian materials, including those from various Italian associations and societies. See the guide to Italian records in the Balch collection at HSP -- http://www2.hsp.org/collections/Balch%20manuscript_guide/html/italian.html.
The overwhelming majority of Italian immigrants to Philadelphia were Catholic and the Archdiocese of Philadelphia did its best to accommodate the newcomers with parishes of their own and with priests who spoke their language. If you are interested in finding sacramental records for these parishes, or in tracing an specific priest or religious who was educated or served in the Archdiocese, contact the Philadelphia Archdiocesan Historical Research Center -- http://www.rc.net/philadelphia/pahrc/. Note that PAHRC sacramental registers are not open to the public but will be searched by the excellent archives staff for a reasonable fee. Other materials at PAHRC (including parish histories, and Catholic newspapers and directories from around the country) are available to the public.
And finally, if it’s a taste of “Little Italy” you crave, be sure to visit the Italian Market around 9th Street & Washington Avenue, decide if you prefer the cheese steak at Geno’s or Pat’s steaks, and be sure to pick up a mouthwatering delicacy from Termini Bros. Bakery, an outpost of which is conveniently located in the Reading Terminal Market, just steps from the Convention Center.