About The Strangio/Scarpati Families
Please sign in to see more. I have pieced together all the information I have about the Strangio and Scarpati families. Much of the Strangio family information was prepared by William Strangio and Elaine Soloway (Strangio- Cincotta) to whom much of the credit should go. Special thanks also to Susan Margaret (Kraus) Costa who did a lot of documentation on the Antonio Strangio (1870-1934) branch of the family and Maria Linders who put together the pieces of the Australian side of the Strangio and Ravesi families. I also would like to thank Elizabeth Garofalo and Anna Turney for a lot of information about the Scarpati family. There are many birth and death dates which are missing. Nevertheless, I hope that you will find this compilation of our family very interesting. I am adding new photos and information to the site regularly. For security, you will need the code word to access records of all living relatives. You may contact me for the access code (if you don't know my brother's early nickname). I hope that all of you will want to correct any of the information on your immediate family so please do let me know. Also if you have any photos of yourself or current or old family photos that you would like to share, please send them to me and I will try and include as many as I can in the website.
In 1880 my great grandfather, Vincent Strangio, came to America with his wife, Grazia Bongiorno, and infant son Fred. The trip back then took two months and must have been very difficult with an infant. I cannot imagine the courage that it must have taken to leave your mother country and take your family to a foreign land to start a new life. But, this is what he did. Over the next 13 years, six other children were born here in United States. When times got tough in America, Vincent, Grazia and the seven children went back to Italy (1893). Things got even worse in Italy. The family was considering going to Australia. Grazia's brother, who was already in Australia, told Vincent that things were tough in Australia too. So, in 1896, Vincent, Grazia and the seven children returned to America. My grandfather, Antonio, was one of those children. Unfortunately, I did not know him. He died on January 11, 1945. He was buried on the day I was born, January 15, 1945. I also did not know Isabella, who died in 1932. But I did know five of the children, Ferdinand (Uncle Fred), Vincent (Uncle Vincent), Catherine (Aunt Katy), Anunziata (Aunt Lucy) and Angelica (Aunt Julia). I am sorry that I was not interested in the family history when I was younger. It would have been nice to interview the oldest members of the family to glean from them stories about their parents and grandparents. Unfortunately, much of that lore has been lost. I hope this website will now make it easier for our children and grandchildren to enjoy their family heritage. Be sure to read The Strangio Family - A Genealogy by E. M. Soloway in the Stories section of this site. It gives a very nice history of the family name and distant ancestors back to 1398.
My maternal grandfather, Antonio Scarpati, was born in 1887 in Piano di Sorrento, Italy and came to America around the turn of the century. There is no record of his entry and it is alleged that he was a stowaway on a vessel on which a relative was a member of the crew. Antonio worked hard in the fruit and vegetable markets. Eventually he started his own banana business in the fruit market in the Bronx, New York. Antonio married Angelina Benedetto on February 16, 1908. He bought a house on Carpenter Ave. in the Bronx where he raised 8 children. Ill fortune struck the family in 1926 when Antonio Jr, only 17 years old, died after routine tonselectomy surgery. Tragedy occurred again in 1938 when Angelina died at the age of 49 from complications of diabetes. Antonio grew many fruits and vegetables in the backyard of his home on Carpenter Ave. He had a huge arbor which was covered with grapes. The arbor spanned the two car garage and the driveway. You could just pull the grapes off the vine and squeeze the insides into your mouth. They were delicious. Antonio also made his own wine, which he shared generously with family and friends and also enjoyed quite frequently himself. Antonio never remarried and raised the remaining seven children himself until his death in 1946.
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