A Sicilian in East Harlem By Salvatore Mondello

Robinson of the American Federation of Labor founded the Rockmen’s Union and the Excavators’ Union. Hundreds of Italians joined and many more were sympathetic to the goals of the unions. On May 1, 1903, a strike was called by the unions demanding higher wages. At first, the Italians refused to accept a settlement giving them less than was originally demanded. Violence erupted. Each morning Italian strikers appeared near the excavations and attacked strikebreakers with stones and knives. A group of Italian strikers and their wives assaulted Irish workers laying track on Third Avenue. The Italians finally settled for a smaller increase in wages than they had demanded. The Rockmen’s and Excavators’ unions didn’t survive the Depression of 1907, when many Italians returned to Italy. But the 1903 strike proved to union leaders that Italian unskilled workers could be organized.¹ Years later, I attended an exhibit of mosaics Sicilian artisans had created for some of the New York subway stations. Mosaics were introduced in Sicily by the Arabs during their occupation of the island. The exhibit was held at the Brooklyn Museum of Art.

The South Italians were not welcomed with open arms by American journalists during the mass migration to the United States. For example, in The World’s Work a writer deplored in 1914 the tremendous influx of South Italians in America. The United States did not attract many North Italians, whose “brains and ability” made Italy a progressive country, the author asserted. Instead, America received “the undersized, illiterate overflow from half-medieval Naples and Sicily.” This commentator called for a discriminatory law against the admission of South Italians, similar