A Bay Tale
Motivation is perhaps the most valuable aspect to one’s personality, and its something that I believe you are born with. I support the idea that what you’ve got in your blood really does make who you are. Thats why I always take pride in representing my family and our heritage. Being brought up by dad, a classic Italian, I guess you could say I am a proud individual and I have got a decent set of morals. The Firenzi family, has gone through their fair share of trials and tribulations to end up where we are today.
Originally my last name was spelled Firenze with an ‘e’ at the end instead of an ‘i’. My dad said that when our ancestors immigrated here from Italy that the people working at Ellis Island had so many people to deal with that they disregarded how our last name was spelled and just threw an ‘i’ on the end. Translated to Italian Firenze directly translates to Florence which is a well known city in Italy. When interviewing my dad he did not know all too much about our family tree but he seemed to be sure that our family started in Florence. Since my dad didn’t know why the Firenzis initially immigrated to America, I did a little research and found some of the main motivators of italian immigration in the early 1900s. I discovered that a lot of Italy at that time was extremely crowded and there wasn’t much to hope for when it came to opportunities. If you had a job with a low wage that was probably going to be your job for life. Wages in Italy were noticeably much lower than those in America. A carpenter in Italy on average made around eight dollars a week while an Italian immigrant with the same job in America could make eighteen dollars week. Making double the paycheck was definitely a huge factor...
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...ted and the most inspiring part about it for me was that they didn’t even know if it would pay off or not. They could have completely endangered themselves and spent all their time and money to possibly find no gold at all. Another aspect that makes my grandfather much like the characters in Crown of Dust is that he went to place where making money was hot. Like in the gold rush every wanted to strike it rich.
Later in life when I have a job of my own I hope to become like my grandfather and get a job and make it my life. Also I hope that once I find my goal that nothing will stop like the miners in Crown of Dust.
Works Cited
Firenzi, Mike. Personal interview. Saturday, February 10, 2014
"Digital History." Digital History. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Feb. 2014.
"Italian American." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 02 Oct. 2014. Web. 14 Feb. 2014.
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