The Pisciotta connection

By Bob Cudmore, Focus on History 

   Last month the City of Amsterdam recognized Pisciotta as a Twin City.

   Many Italian-Americans who settled in Amsterdam’s West End came from Pisciotta, a small, southern Italian hilltop community in the Campania region of Salerno province.

   One of the Pisciottani who settled in Amsterdam was Aniello Robusto, who migrated when he was sixteen in 1904.  He became an American citizen in 1913 and married Michelina Pucci, also from Pisciotta, two years later.

   Aniello opened a barber shop and paint, print and glass shops on West Main Street.  He and his wife learned how to set type for the printing business.  Michelina worked sewing dress gloves in her home for a local glove manufacturer.

   Aniello taught himself English words with the help of the Sears catalog, looking at pictures and putting the names together.  He found that education was free and he took night classes in English.

   He was able to buy a two story house behind his shops.  They raised their family in the house and expanded the building, renting two flats and five garages.

   The family of eight lived in that house until building a new house on Stewart Street in 1941,

   St. Agnello of Naples, also known as Aniello the Abbot, is venerated as a saint by the Pisciottanni in Italy.  His feast day, December 14, also was celebrated in Amsterdam and there was a St. Agnello’s Club in the Mohawk Valley city.

Thanks to the donors for The Historians Podcast fund drive.  But we still have a long way to go.  Please donate online here: https://www.gofundme.com/f/the-historians-podcast  Or send a check made out to Bob Cudmore to 125 Horstman Drive, Scotia, NY 12302. 

   The Robustos and many other Italian-American residents in the city’s West End tended vegetable gardens on the fertile flat land between the railroad tracks and Mohawk River/Erie Canal.

   They built poles for pole beans and lattices to keep tomatoes off the ground. They grew lettuce, zucchini and dandelions, much as their ancestors had done in Italy.  They bought boxes of grapes and made their own wine.

   Aniello Robusto’s name is inscribed on an altar at a church in Pisciotta because he raised money at Amsterdam church festivals for the Italian church.

   A great believer in education, Aniello was proud his oldest daughter, Rosalyn Robusto Murphy, became a school teacher.  The family’s four sons all served in World War II: Ralph, Jerry, Alfred and Richard.  They are now deceased.

   Rita Robusto Mucilli, the youngest daughter, who worked at St. Mary’s Hospital, provided information for this article.  Rita’s late husband was Frank J. Mucilli.  They had five children.

   In his later years Frank Mucilli provided weather data to local media, including my Amsterdam morning radio show.

   There are many Amsterdam residents descended from Pisciottani.  One I should mention is my high school classmate and high school reunion organizer Vicki Petrosino Sollecito, whose father was from Pisciotta.

       Others include Mayor Michael Cinquanti, the Isabels, Capuccios, Sansalones, Catenas, Tambascos and Pepes.

   The Pisciotta connection even led to theatrical hijinks in 1967 during the Amsterdam recreation department production of “My Fair Lady.”

   According to Jahnn Swanker-Gibson, who was there, actor Eddie Schwartz, as Zoltan Karpathy, was supposed to say to Phil Bracchi, playing Henry Higgins, “I have made your name famous in all the great capitals of Europe: London, Paris, Rome.”

   Swanker-Gibson said, “Instead Schwartz changed one word and said, “I have made your name famous in all the great capitals of Europe: London, Paris, Pisciotta.”

   The audience roared.  The director, the late Bert DeRose, was in stitches backstage.

   When asked if he recalled the incident, DeRose later said, “Yes I do and I gave them both you know what. I always stayed with the script, in respect to the playwrights.”

   DeRose was well aware of Amsterdam’s connection with Pisciotta, although his own family came from the province of Benevento.

Monday, September 18, 2023-Story behind the story-The Pisciotta connection. Bob tells the story in 7 minutes. By the way, all Historians podcasts are 29 minutes.

Tuesday, September 19, 2023-From the Archives of Focus on History from the Daily Gazette-Benedict Arnold buried in Amsterdam

Wednesday, September 20, 2023-From the Archives- May 5, 2023-Episode 473-Bob Cudmore provides a Focus on History podcast with topics including an eccentric philosopher, the Demskys of Eagle Street, Amsterdam’s agile mayor Burt Deal and how boxing flourished in 1930s Amsterdam.  Dave Greene remembers boxing great Jake LaMotta.

Thursday, September 21, 2023-From the Archives of Focus on History from the Daily Gazette-Amsterdam Post Office murals

Friday, September 22, 2023-Episode 493-Scott Shane, author of Flee North- A forgotten hero and the fight for freedom in slavery’s borderland.  The book traces the life of Thomas Smallwood, an African American who named the Underground Railroad.

Episode 493-Charles Yaple, Professor Emeritus at SUNY Cortland, has written Jacob’s Land, a history of an immigrant family and of the native tribes who populated the land in New York State in the 1700s. Yaple has also written The Tree of Us following the lives of three men, from Richford, New York, including John D. Rockefeller, once the world’s richest man, and Gurdon Wallace Wattle, a friend to five U.S. presidents.

Mohawk Valley Weekend Weather, Sunday, September 17, 2023

51 degrees in The City of Amsterdam at 5:55AM 

Leader Herald Make Us A Part Of Your Day

https://www.leaderherald.com/