New LCNBios posts

[Pogo The Clown]

Updated with some good 1970s Lucchese stuff.


Pogo

[quadtree]

https://lcnbios.blogspot.com/2025/02/sa ... nanno.html

https://lcnbios.blogspot.com/2025/02/jo ... chese.html

New posts.

[Little_Al1991]

In regards to the post about Joseph Schiavo

“One of the claims Schiavo made to D'Arco was that the first LCN Family in the United States was in Newark. Known as La Chiesa (the Church), D'Arco stated the Lucchese Family was 'the descendant of that first group'. (Most sources agree that New Orleans was the first Family.)”

Was that the first LCN family or was it in New Orleans?

[B.]

We've discussed it fairly in-depth since the claim came out.

New Orleans was certainly the first US Family given that's where all the mafiosi first arrived and there is documented mafia activity going back to the middle of the 19th century. Scarpa was told by Joe Colombo too (who had just met the NO leadership) that NO was the first Family and as a matter of respect didn't have to report to the Commission.

However, D'Arco was not alone in his belief. DeCavalcante captain Anthony Rotondo testified that the DeCavalcantes were the oldest Family in the country and captain Charlie Stango similarly said the DeCavalcantes are the "oldest crew in the country" and "originated the Five Families". Stango's comment brings to mind what D'Arco was told about the Luccheses branching off from the New Jersey Family. Adding to this is that Gerry Angiulo was recorded telling Larry Zannino that Sam DeCavalcante's Family was "one of the fuckin' oldest Families out there". So there was a perception in New Jersey and Boston that the DeCavalcantes were either the oldest or one of the oldest Families.

So D'Arco isn't alone in thinking New Jersey relates to the origins of the American mafia but what complicates that is my belief that the DeCavalcantes started in NYC. There was a Riberese colony with mafia-connected surnames in NYC by 1892 at the latest and I personally believe this was the genesis of the DeCavalcantes, at least in the NYC/NJ area.

But it is hard to reconcile this with the overwhelming evidence that New Orleans was where the American mafia initially formed. However, we are missing the formal details on what was going on in NO back then. I wrote about this in my Alabama article but one way to reconcile these accounts could be that Riberesi or figures otherwise relevant to the DeCavalcantes initially lived in New Orleans and therefore the DeCavalcantes trace themselves "spiritually" to this group but that's entirely speculative. We also can't be sure if this New Jersey "La Chiesa" group D'Arco heard about was actually the DeCavalcantes or the separate Newark Family.

[moneyman]

Do we know if there was a large Riberesi community in New Orleans area when the NO family was being formed?

[B.]

Do we know if there was a large Riberesi community in New Orleans area when the NO family was being formed?

I don't know about Ribera specifically as New Orleans records are often vague when it comes to hometown origin but it's very likely there was a colony from Ribera. We do know there was a fairly large population from Agrigento province in general and we still see remnants of this among the few remaining members by the 1960s, with the Marcellos, Campo, the Gaglianos, and some associates being Agrigentino. The Gentile narcotics case also showed he had a bunch of contacts in New Orleans with Agrigento heritage in the 1930s.

But in terms of identifying a specific colony from Ribera in the mid-19th century, I'm not sure how to confirm given how sparse the details are. We at least know that many of the Riberesi who entered the US before 1898 came in via New Orleans and presumably some of them settled in New Orleans, even if temporarily.

[Doobeez]

That would make sense why the Lucchese's NJ crew had one of the more stronger presences in the Garden State.

[Doobeez]

Then that would make sense why the Lucchese's NJ crew had one of the more stronger presences in the Garden State?

[B.]

Their New Jersey crew split off from the Newark Family when it disbanded and along with the Colombos it does appear they absorbed a good chunk of Newark members, but if we're following D'Arco's story and trying to reconcile it with other facts, it would mean a New Jersey Family existed first, then the Luccheses branched off from them, then when Newark disbanded the Luccheses took on a crew of Newark's members. It would also mean "La Chiesa" predated and spawned the Morello Family given we know the Luccheses branched off from that Family in the early 1920s.

I think we all agree D'Arco's story is imperfect. Like most hearsay in the mob, I believe there is some element of truth to the story but we're hearing something that D'Arco was told when he was much younger by Schiavo who likely heard it secondhand himself, then D'Arco is relaying it decades later as a senior citizen. Who knows exactly what he was told by Schiavo originally. We similarly don't know the "chain of custody" or exact language used when Anthony Rotondo and Charlie Stango were told the DeCavalcantes were the original Family.

--

Going back to the LCNBios post, we discussed Schiavo not that long ago on here. It's not only interesting that he was one of the rare Castellammarese members outside of the Bonannos but also that he grew up in the Bushwick / Williamsburg area where the Bonannos dominated. He then sponsors other Trapanese members the Varios into the Luccheses. Paul Vario was very close to Bonanno members like Vinnie Asaro, Mike Sabella, and Willie Dara so I'd be curious if Schiavo too was close to members of that Family. The Bonannos did have members in that east Brooklyn / Queens border area so it wasn't like the Lucchese crew was the only show in town either.

[PolackTony]

Do we know if there was a large Riberesi community in New Orleans area when the NO family was being formed?

I don't know about Ribera specifically as New Orleans records are often vague when it comes to hometown origin but it's very likely there was a colony from Ribera. We do know there was a fairly large population from Agrigento province in general and we still see remnants of this among the few remaining members by the 1960s, with the Marcellos, Campo, the Gaglianos, and some associates being Agrigentino. The Gentile narcotics case also showed he had a bunch of contacts in New Orleans with Agrigento heritage in the 1930s.

But in terms of identifying a specific colony from Ribera in the mid-19th century, I'm not sure how to confirm given how sparse the details are. We at least know that many of the Riberesi who entered the US before 1898 came in via New Orleans and presumably some of them settled in New Orleans, even if temporarily.

FWIW, I haven’t seen a bunch of Riberesi in Louisiana; from what I’ve seen, at least, it doesn’t seem to have emerged as a significant hub for Riberesi, despite having had a number of other Agrigentini. When researching Riberesi in Chicago, for example, I don’t note many close familial ties to Louisiana the way that one will very often see for other Sicilians. Relatedly, Riberesi seem to have not begun to arrive in numbers to the US until the late 1890s, by which time NYC was rapidly overtaking NOLA as the prime port of entry for Sicilians in the US; and many if not all of these early arrivals from Ribera arrived via NYC. Again, just based on what I have seen. I’ve analyzed many thousands of records of arrivals pre-1900, essentially all available records of Sicilian arrivals to the US where hometown of origin is known, and very few Riberesi appear in these records until around 1898 (this also would seem to align with the demography of Ribera, where a large increase in population occurred between the censuses of 1881 and 1901, with a subsequent drop in population from 1901 to 1911 due to a big surge in out migration). I could be wrong, and of course there will be some outliers, but this is what I have seen.

You would be familiar with the trajectories of settlement of the people in Alabama, for example. I would wonder when they mainly arrived and if it were via NOLA or NYC.

[Little_Al1991]

We've discussed it fairly in-depth since the claim came out.

New Orleans was certainly the first US Family given that's where all the mafiosi first arrived and there is documented mafia activity going back to the middle of the 19th century. Scarpa was told by Joe Colombo too (who had just met the NO leadership) that NO was the first Family and as a matter of respect didn't have to report to the Commission.

However, D'Arco was not alone in his belief. DeCavalcante captain Anthony Rotondo testified that the DeCavalcantes were the oldest Family in the country and captain Charlie Stango similarly said the DeCavalcantes are the "oldest crew in the country" and "originated the Five Families". Stango's comment brings to mind what D'Arco was told about the Luccheses branching off from the New Jersey Family. Adding to this is that Gerry Angiulo was recorded telling Larry Zannino that Sam DeCavalcante's Family was "one of the fuckin' oldest Families out there". So there was a perception in New Jersey and Boston that the DeCavalcantes were either the oldest or one of the oldest Families.

So D'Arco isn't alone in thinking New Jersey relates to the origins of the American mafia but what complicates that is my belief that the DeCavalcantes started in NYC. There was a Riberese colony with mafia-connected surnames in NYC by 1892 at the latest and I personally believe this was the genesis of the DeCavalcantes, at least in the NYC/NJ area.

But it is hard to reconcile this with the overwhelming evidence that New Orleans was where the American mafia initially formed. However, we are missing the formal details on what was going on in NO back then. I wrote about this in my Alabama article but one way to reconcile these accounts could be that Riberesi or figures otherwise relevant to the DeCavalcantes initially lived in New Orleans and therefore the DeCavalcantes trace themselves "spiritually" to this group but that's entirely speculative. We also can't be sure if this New Jersey "La Chiesa" group D'Arco heard about was actually the DeCavalcantes or the separate Newark Family.

What should be read next after the Informer 2014 edition and the Informer edition about Gentile? The two aforementioned editions touch upon what you have said I assume

[B.]

FWIW, I haven’t seen a bunch of Riberesi in Louisiana; from what I’ve seen, at least, it doesn’t seem to have emerged as a significant hub for Riberesi, despite having had a number of other Agrigentini. When researching Riberesi in Chicago, for example, I don’t note many close familial ties to Louisiana the way that one will very often see for other Sicilians. Relatedly, Riberesi seem to have not begun to arrive in numbers to the US until the late 1890s, by which time NYC was rapidly overtaking NOLA as the prime port of entry for Sicilians in the US; and many if not all of these early arrivals from Ribera arrived via NYC. Again, just based on what I have seen. I’ve analyzed many thousands of records of arrivals pre-1900, essentially all available records of Sicilian arrivals to the US where hometown of origin is known, and very few Riberesi appear in these records until around 1898 (this also would seem to align with the demography of Ribera, where a large increase in population occurred between the censuses of 1881 and 1901, with a subsequent drop in population from 1901 to 1911 due to a big surge in out migration). I could be wrong, and of course there will be some outliers, but this is what I have seen.

You would be familiar with the trajectories of settlement of the people in Alabama, for example. I would wonder when they mainly arrived and if it were via NOLA or NYC.

I can't remember coming across any Riberesi known to have actually settled in New Orleans either, especially early on. I would expect some to have lived there at some stage, even temporarily, but you're right that a lot of the immigrants from Ribera came during their paesan Crispi's term as Prime Minister circa 1890s when he encouraged it. Good thinking to check Ribera's population levels during that period.

Giuseppe Caterinicchia, a probable high-ranking member in Alabama, came via New Orleans in the mid-late 1890s. I recall some other Alabama Riberesi coming to the US via New Orleans but I'd have to double check. Pasquale Amari did come via New York and that was much later.

The "Maybe the DeCavalcantes trace themselves back to a Riberese/Agrigentino colony in early New Orleans" is a convoluted, crazy theory but it's seemingly the only way they could ever be reconciled as the first US Family. The likelihood that members of an NJ-NYC Family would see themselves as the heirs to an unknown, undocumented colony of pioneering mafiosi in New Orleans circa ~1850s because of campanilismo is beyond unrealistic even if a colony like that did exist. Another possible explanation is that the first Family in the NYC area was some early incarnation of the DeCavalcantes and the lore turned from "first NYC-NJ Family" to "first American Family" due to the importance of NYC in the American mafia.

More likely though is that D'Arco's hand-me-down story about "La Chiesa" in New Jersey and the DeCavalcante members' oral history are wrong, but then the question becomes why they were under that impression and if there are other elements of truth to it. We don't know either if D'Arco believed that this New Jersey "La Chiesa" group was the same thing as the DeCavalcante Family, if it was the Newark Family, or if he related "La Chiesa" to the existence of these other New Jersey Families at all. D'Arco would have been familiar with the DeCavalcantes but there's nothing to indicate he saw them as continuous with "La Chiesa". However, that high-ranking Lucchese members, two DeCavalcante captains, and a Boston underboss all believed variations of the "New Jersey Family = Early or First US Family" tells me they all heard variations of the same initial story or rumor and D'Arco was referring to the same thing the DeCavalcante members were, whatever that was in actuality.

Adding Gerry Angiulo to it, he says it was a shame Sam DeCavalcante was such a terrible guy because he ran one of the oldest Families in the country, like Sam didn't deserve that honor. Rotondo similarly testified it had once been considered an honor that the DeCavalcantes were the oldest Family. Sort of echoes what Joe Colombo told Scarpa about New Orleans, that they were given the honor of not reporting to the Commission (which certainly wasn't true for the DeCavalcantes haha). Angiulo doesn't say the DeCavalcantes are the single oldest Family but he believes they are "one" of the oldest. Even "one" of the oldest is a strange remark that's hard to fit into our understanding of where/when the American mafia developed.

Wish Capeci had followed up with D'Arco a little bit more to clarify whether or not he felt the DeCavalcantes fit into "La Chiesa". Would be great if eventually Anthony Rotondo comes forward. He was an intelligent witness who could give at least a little more context on the DeCavalcantes' own lore.

[PolackTony]

FWIW, I haven’t seen a bunch of Riberesi in Louisiana; from what I’ve seen, at least, it doesn’t seem to have emerged as a significant hub for Riberesi, despite having had a number of other Agrigentini. When researching Riberesi in Chicago, for example, I don’t note many close familial ties to Louisiana the way that one will very often see for other Sicilians. Relatedly, Riberesi seem to have not begun to arrive in numbers to the US until the late 1890s, by which time NYC was rapidly overtaking NOLA as the prime port of entry for Sicilians in the US; and many if not all of these early arrivals from Ribera arrived via NYC. Again, just based on what I have seen. I’ve analyzed many thousands of records of arrivals pre-1900, essentially all available records of Sicilian arrivals to the US where hometown of origin is known, and very few Riberesi appear in these records until around 1898 (this also would seem to align with the demography of Ribera, where a large increase in population occurred between the censuses of 1881 and 1901, with a subsequent drop in population from 1901 to 1911 due to a big surge in out migration). I could be wrong, and of course there will be some outliers, but this is what I have seen.

You would be familiar with the trajectories of settlement of the people in Alabama, for example. I would wonder when they mainly arrived and if it were via NOLA or NYC.

I can't remember coming across any Riberesi known to have actually settled in New Orleans either, especially early on. I would expect some to have lived there at some stage, even temporarily, but you're right that a lot of the immigrants from Ribera came during their paesan Crispi's term as Prime Minister circa 1890s when he encouraged it. Good thinking to check Ribera's population levels during that period.

Giuseppe Caterinicchia, a probable high-ranking member in Alabama, came via New Orleans in the mid-late 1890s. I recall some other Alabama Riberesi coming to the US via New Orleans but I'd have to double check. Pasquale Amari did come via New York and that was much later.

The "Maybe the DeCavalcantes trace themselves back to a Riberese/Agrigentino colony in early New Orleans" is a convoluted, crazy theory but it's seemingly the only way they could ever be reconciled as the first US Family. The likelihood that members of an NJ-NYC Family would see themselves as the heirs to an unknown, undocumented colony of pioneering mafiosi in New Orleans circa ~1850s because of campanilismo is beyond unrealistic even if a colony like that did exist. Another possible explanation is that the first Family in the NYC area was some early incarnation of the DeCavalcantes and the lore turned from "first NYC-NJ Family" to "first American Family" due to the importance of NYC in the American mafia.

More likely though is that D'Arco's hand-me-down story about "La Chiesa" in New Jersey and the DeCavalcante members' oral history are wrong, but then the question becomes why they were under that impression and if there are other elements of truth to it. We don't know either if D'Arco believed that this New Jersey "La Chiesa" group was the same thing as the DeCavalcante Family, if it was the Newark Family, or if he related "La Chiesa" to the existence of these other New Jersey Families at all. D'Arco would have been familiar with the DeCavalcantes but there's nothing to indicate he saw them as continuous with "La Chiesa". However, that high-ranking Lucchese members, two DeCavalcante captains, and a Boston underboss all believed variations of the "New Jersey Family = Early or First US Family" tells me they all heard variations of the same initial story or rumor and D'Arco was referring to the same thing the DeCavalcante members were, whatever that was in actuality.

Adding Gerry Angiulo to it, he says it was a shame Sam DeCavalcante was such a terrible guy because he ran one of the oldest Families in the country, like Sam didn't deserve that honor. Rotondo similarly testified it had once been considered an honor that the DeCavalcantes were the oldest Family. Sort of echoes what Joe Colombo told Scarpa about New Orleans, that they were given the honor of not reporting to the Commission (which certainly wasn't true for the DeCavalcantes haha). Angiulo doesn't say the DeCavalcantes are the single oldest Family but he believes they are "one" of the oldest. Even "one" of the oldest is a strange remark that's hard to fit into our understanding of where/when the American mafia developed.

Wish Capeci had followed up with D'Arco a little bit more to clarify whether or not he felt the DeCavalcantes fit into "La Chiesa". Would be great if eventually Anthony Rotondo comes forward. He was an intelligent witness who could give at least a little more context on the DeCavalcantes' own lore.

I have a sample of >30,000 Sicilian entries to the US from 1880 to 1900. where comune of birth was recorded. I believe that I've discussed some of this with you before, but not on the board here. While missing data due to hometown not being recorded on passenger manifests reduces *sample size*, I don't see any strong reason to believe that it introduced a significant *bias* (unless, say, people from one town or province were more likely to not have their hometown recorded as compared to people from another town or province, which I doubt would be a serious issue here).

There are no entries for Riberesi recorded until the period between 1885 and 1890, when a very small number arrived to NYC. A tiny number, as in single digits, arrived to NOLA between 1895 and 1900. The great majority of Riberesi seem to have entered between 1900 and 1920, however, and mainly via NYC.

In general, Agrigentini made up a small proportion of early Sicilian arrivals, and their numbers began to rise in the 1890s. Earlier arrivals as a whole were primarily composed of Palermitani and, secondarily, Messinesi (who, in fact, composed the great majority of pre-1900 Sicilians in cities like Boston, Providence, and Philly, as well as considerable proportion in Brooklyn). Arrivals to NOLA were somewhere between 70% and 80% Palermitani, similar to Chicago, STL, Buffalo, and Pittsburgh in this period.

*Many more* Agrigentini arrived early to Manhattan (~18%),North Jersey (~15%), and -- most notably -- Brooklyn; in the latter, Agrigentini rivaled Palermitani in numbers, with each composing ~1/3 of the early Sicilian population. This was the only place in the US where this pattern played out (Boston Agrigentini were ~10% of the early Sicilian population, while in Chicago they were 3% -- in both cities, however, a great number of Agrigentini arrived after 1900, of course). In NOLA, Agrigentini were ~7% of the pre-1900 total.

The general trend, however, across the US, seems to have been that the influx of Agirgentini began to grow towards the second half of the 1890s, in both absolute and relative numbers. I have strongly suspected for some time that the origins of the mafia in the US -- talking about from like 1860 to 1890 -- were very strongly Palermitano in composition. In the cases where we know the origin of some early actors involved, we see this born out, as with the Monrealesi in NOLA and the Termitani/Trabiesi in 1880s Chicago and Pittsburgh. For these reasons, I have a hard time believing that the earliest manifestations of the mafia in the US -- from NOLA to STL, SF, Chicago, and NYC -- were likely to have been of significant Agrigentino origin or influence.

As noted, in the 1890s we do start to see the beginning of a larger influx of Agrigentini taking shape on the East Coast. This initial influx was very strongly composed of migrants from Sciacca, however, with other comuni in Agrigento seemingly only contributing comparatively tiny numbers until post-1900. We see this in the main early Agrigentino communities centered in NYC and Boston, as well as the small Sciaccatano colony in Norristown, PA (which seems to have been founded circa 1895).

Given the above, I would venture to guess (purely speculative) that sometime around 1890-1895, Sciaccatani may have founded a Family in the NYC area, which would probably have been based around Lower Manhattan and Northern Brooklyn, though likely with close ties to the smaller Sciaccatano community in North Jersey. We know that even several decades later, Nick Gentile still thought of the Masseria faction as the "Sciaccatani", which to me serves to underscore the likely strong early role that men from Sciacca would have played in founding the Agrigentino mafia network in the NYC area, a picture that closely aligns with the demography of early immigration to the US. I think it's very unlikely that this would have been the first Family in the NYC area, and certainly not in the US, of course, with the earliest organization around NYC presumably having been founded by Palermitani, same as in other early mafia phenomena in the US.

[B.]

Great analysis. It does seem increasingly unlikely Ribera or even Agrigento played a foundational role in the American mafia based on what you found.

1891/1892 is the earliest I can definitively say immigrants from Ribera and Caltabellotta were settling in NYC. There were Carubia and Gallettas among them, both surnames shared with important NYC DeCavalcante members, but no idea if there was a relation to the later mafiosi.

Some of the Spinellis who settled in Elizabeth were living in New Orleans circa 1900 but they arrived in the late 1890s. The Smeraglias of Alabama also initially lived in New Orleans for a few years after coming in the late 1890s. I did come across some other Riberesi who arrived via New Orleans after 1900 who had relatives living in New Orleans but nothing to suggest there was a substantial group earlier. I actually had no idea immigration from Agrigento was so delayed so that's great info.

[PolackTony]

Great analysis. It does seem increasingly unlikely Ribera or even Agrigento played a foundational role in the American mafia based on what you found.

1891/1892 is the earliest I can definitively say immigrants from Ribera and Caltabellotta were settling in NYC. There were Carubia and Gallettas among them, both surnames shared with important NYC DeCavalcante members, but no idea if there was a relation to the later mafiosi.

Some of the Spinellis who settled in Elizabeth were living in New Orleans circa 1900 but they arrived in the late 1890s. The Smeraglias of Alabama also initially lived in New Orleans for a few years after coming in the late 1890s. I did come across some other Riberesi who arrived via New Orleans after 1900 who had relatives living in New Orleans but nothing to suggest there was a substantial group earlier. I actually had no idea immigration from Agrigento was so delayed so that's great info.

A few points that I think are worth considering here to contextualize the trends that I identified in the pre-1900 arrival data.

Coastal Palermo province was, obviously, one of the more economically developed zones in Sicily and had longstanding commercial ties to Mainland Italy and other European countries such as Great Britain and France, due to the primacy of the citrus export trade, in the main part (though other agricultural produce such as wheat, wine, and olive oil were also important, of course). It's unsurprising that Palermitani were thus the majority of the early arrivals to the US, given ties to export markets and more ready access to transportation via the port of Palermo. Chain migration is always a significant factor in creating sort of path dependencies for migratory flows and inducing further migration from those back home; the earliest Sicilian migrants to the US were mainly Palermitani produce exporters, of course, who set up shop in major cities like NOLA, NYC, and Chicago etc in the decades prior to the Civil War (by which I mean not just those from Palermo City but also important towns such as Termini Imerese and Monreale). So the Palermitani also had a big head start here, which I think is important.

In the last decades of the 19th century, several economic and social crises sort of converged to provide significant "push" mechanisms that induced large-scale emigration from rural areas of Western and Central Sicily.

• Modest improvements in living standards from the 1860s on led to a notable population growth in the rural districts of Western Sicily.

• The moribund latifondia system in the agricultural zones was unable to absorb this growing population and was hitting the limits of what its inefficient production could sustain.

• An increasingly unbearable tax burden on the peasants and smallholders, as the "Honeymoon" period ended in the years after the Risorgimento and the new Italian state set about trying to squeeze as much revenue as they could from the Mezzogiorno.

• The devastation of the important viticulture industry, particularly important in Western Agrigento in places like Sambuca, Menfi, and the towns around Ribera/Burgio etc., due to an epidemic of phylloxera that killed many grapevines. These take time to regrow and this economic sector was basically devastated.

• The decline of the fishing industry in coastal Agrigento towns like Sciacca, in particular. Sciacca's port and fishing fleets were outdated and poor, and thus increasingly unable to compete with Northern Italian and other competitors in the fishing market and local, coastal trade of goods.

• The decline of the sulfur industry in Agrigento and neighboring Caltannissetta. Sicily had dominated the global sulfur market, but by the 1880s was facing stiff competition from foreign competitors; the sulfur industry went into a death spiral around this time, with mines closing and large numbers of rural workers displaced. While sulfur mining was not a local factor in Western Agrigento, the economy of the province broadly was heavily dependent on sulfur production and export, and there were various downstream effects as people migrated out of the sulfur-producing regions in search of work etc., in agricultural sectors that were not well-disposed at this time to absorb any such influx.

• In response to the above factors, there was a major rise of political organization and agitation by peasants and rural laborers in the interior of Western/Central Sicily in the last decades of the 19th Century. You mentioned Crispi already, but the 1890s was the peak of the political turmoil around the Fasci Siciliani, and the subsequent crackdown and violent repression of this movement in 1894. It should be noted that the prime bases of support for the Fasci Siciliani lay in exactly the agricultural zone spanning SW Palermo Province (Corleone, Lercara Friddi, Bisacquino, Contessa Entellina, Palazzo Adriano, Chiusa Sclafani) and nearby Agrigento comuni such as Ribera, Lucca Sicula, Burgio, etc. Many people fled this crackdown and sought refuge by emigrating, and we can note that the timing of this social crisis correlates very well with the rise of immigration from these towns to the US. We have discussed this before, but people from these towns in Agrigento and adjacent Palermo province can be readily noted as co-travelers in the US, settling in the same places, intermarrying, and engaging closely in social networks such as that of the mafia.

For obvious reasons, migrants from the fishing port town of Sciacca tended to cluster near major East Coast ports such as NYC/Brooklyn, Newark, Philly, and Boston. Early migrants from the rural zones of Western Agrigento such as Sambuca often came in via NOLA, and some went to the sugar sectors of Louisiana, but many of these then later decamped for more favorable opportunities in industrial cities like Chicago. Dislocated workers from the sulphur mining and adjacent zones naturally congregated in coal mining areas like PA, Southern IL, and CO, beginning around 1890, as well as integrating into the pre-existing Sicilian/Italian communities in industrial cities.