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Oral history recording with Antonio Di Giacomo. Recorded as part of the Italian Memories in Wales project (2008-10), delivered by ACLI-ENAIP and funded by the National Lottery Heritage Fund. Part 1 of 5 (AV 11394-11398)

00:00:21 Antonio Di Giacomo was born in Calatafimi, Trapani on 26th October 1947. Initially Antonio talks about the roots of the Di Giacomo name. His maternal grandfather was Salvatore Todaro, his grandmother’s maiden name was Caparotta but she died young and his grandfather remarried. His sister Josie was born in 1955. His Uncle Silvio Lentini was captured in North Africa and brought to England as a Prisoner of War. He returned to Sicily to marry Maria Di Giacomo after the war, and then moved to England. Their son followed for work; Antonio explains difficulty on finding work in Sicily, mostly agricultural work for landowners. His grandmother and father followed; his father working for a farmer outside Wrexham on a four year contract. The family joined their father in 1959. He talks of the journey in detail.

00:06:20 Antonio moved over at 11 years old and went to St. Mary’s primary school not knowing any English. He describes his experiences there and a teacher who was fond of him; she felt sorry for him as he had contracted Polio at four years old. He talks about the disease being common in Italy; he had a limp though others couldn’t walk because of it. In Wrexham Phillip York was a big landowner - he owned the farm where his father worked, they rented a house from him in central Wrexham- he talks about the move. He went to St. Joseph’s secondary school and went to college to study Television Engineering.

00:10:42 Antonio recalls a time when his father picked mushrooms in Wales when they had just moved over; his mother got food poisoning and Antonio recalls sounding the alarm with difficulty as he didn’t speak the language. In Sicily, where he had grown up, there was a lot of poverty, families ate what crops they could find. His parents couldn’t afford a bar of soap to wash clothes, they argued over his father wanting to buy cigarettes in order to socialise with other men in the piazza. Poverty was one reason they moved, also because of Antonio’s Polio; as he couldn’t work the land being the first son and future breadwinner. He recalls visiting doctors who for his Polio who recommended blood transfusions, his mother gave a lot of blood to him. Lack of medicine was one of the pushing factors to emigrate to England.

00:16:15 Antonio’s grandfather worked on the roads, he remembers that because of his nickname cellentrino due to the machines he used to drill the roads. He goes on to talk about other interesting nicknames. He recalls his granddad coming home from work having hidden a piece of cheese under his hat, having been given for lunch whilst working on the roads. They also had babbalucci, small snails Antonio would pick, boil, and eat with sauce.