A Short Family History
Nancy and Lou, prom at John Adams High
My father, David, was the second born child to Lou and Nancy Glorioso. Lou and Nancy both grew up on the east side of Cleveland, just past 110th and Woodland (where they were always warned not to stop because that’s where the mafia hung out). They grew up in the neighborhood together and started dating in high school at John Adams. I’m told Lou’s family was a little skeptical at first because Nancy’s father is Sicilian, but the families quickly grew to love each other. After high school, Lou joined the military and served state-side for a term during the Korean War. He then returned to Cleveland where they would marry and have three children. Living their lives out on the east-side of Cleveland, they first ad a duplex off of Woodland near the rest of the families, eventually they moved out to Bedford, and finally further south after their children were grown.
Lou’s Family
Antonita Capretta and Luigi Glorioso, 1922
My grandfather’s parents were Luigi Glorioso and Antonita Capretta. Luigi came to the US in 1913 on his own at age 16 to meet and work with his mother’s brother in Cleveland. Antonita came into Ellis Island on Christmas Eve 1909, just a few weeks after her 3rd birthday, accompanied by her mother and younger brother on their way to join their father who was already working here. Luigi and Antonita eventually met and were married in 1922 and raised five children together, Maria, Antimo, Serafina, Santina, and Lou (my papa). Luigi worked supporting his family here in Cleveland as a laborer.
My papa worked as a master plumber at the Cleveland Clinic. He loved it and was so well loved there. Sometimes he would take us to the big work parties (at the zoo or Sea World) and introduce us to people - he knew everyone. I remember even decades after he retired, I would go to an appointment and doctors or nurses would ask if we were related and talk about what a great person he was.
Nancy’s Family
Santo and Jennie Cannata with Nancy and Sam
My grandmother’s parents were Santo Cannata and Jennie Santarelli. Santo came at age 17 in 1920 meeting his brother in New York before the two quickly moved to Pennsylvania. Jennie Santarelli’s parents arrived with their oldest daughter in 1909 and moved out to Pennsylvania where my grandma Jennie was born a few years later in 1913. Both Santo and Jennie’s families worked as coal miners in a company town in Ellsworth, Pennsylvania. This is where the families met and were neighbors. Eventually Santo’s older brother Vincenzo married Jennie’s older sister, Cora. Because living and working conditions were so bad in the coal mines, the couple moved to Cleveland to build new lives and Santo and Jennie came with them and eventually they also married in 1932. They lived in Cleveland and raised three children, Nancy (my nonna), Sam, and Katherine. Santo, with only a 3rd grade education, found a partner and opened a successful paint factory. The factory, Cansto (‘Can’ - for Cannata), was in business until just a decade or so ago, living its final decades as a supplier for Sherwin Williams.
Santo Cannata, working at his factory, Cansto
My nonna worked from childhood onward with her brother running the paint factory their father started down on Woodland. I’m sure every person in our extended family has memories of working down at Cansto. For generations we’ve all glued on labels, stacked cans, and followed Julius around looking for nooks and crannies to hide out in. Even my eldest got the chance to spend a few weeks down there when we first moved to Cleveland and I spent some time in the office filling in for nonna. Cansto is long gone now, but we still like to drive past and wave to the building when we’re in the area.
Paint cans from the final days of Cansto
The Neighborhood
Lou and Nancy with their three children
Both of my grandparents love to tell stories about the close-knit Italian-American community they grew up in here in Cleveland. About how you didn’t know you were poor, because everyone was poor, but also that the community, the church, the neighbors all provided for needs that weren’t met. They tell me how Chef Boiardi (you may know him now as Chef Boyardee) would make big pots of soups for any hungry kids in the neighborhood to come get. They are so proud of their parents and their community, of the success coming from their struggle. But they also know it came at a price. When they talk about not being taught the language or hearing the pull of their parents missing the land, you can hear both the immense pride and also pain that comes with the choices of immigration. It’s in returning to these four homelands that I hope to learn and seek the connection that spanned across an ocean and many generations.