John Cavallone

John Cavallone is a Chicago area genealogist specializing in Italian genealogy. He is the author of “From Sassano to 48 th & Federal Street: An Italian Migration at the Turn of the 20 th Century,” Contributing author to “Reconstructing Italians in Chicago: 10th Anniversary 2021 Edition,” contributor to “The Sassano Project” and manages his own website www.sassanochicago.org.

My Sassanese sojourn

Between 1893 and 1940, hundreds of Italians from Sassano, a small commune in the region of Campania in Southern Italy, settled on Armour Avenue (now known as Federal Street) between 47th and 51st streets in the Bronzeville neighborhood of Chicago. My sojourn began in 2002 when my oldest daughter, Elizabeth, received an assignment from her eighth grade social studies teacher, Dan Wall, to “Find out which ancestors came to America, when and why.” My father’s sister, Rosemary Cavallone, and her husband, Rosario di Miele, told the tale of Francesco “Thethen Cheek” Cavallone and Rosa Libretti, who were among the first …

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