Beautiful, bright warm day. Arose 8 A.M. Breakfast etc. Chored around house. Dinner. Cleaned out pipes under stationary tubs. Up to Italian Mission after Ruth. Supper. Home in evening. Wrote letter to H.H. etc. To bed 10:30 P.M.
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The Italian Mission, where Ruth was apparently working, was a decades-long effort on the part of Schenectady's Protestant churches to lure the city's Italian immigrants away from the Catholic church. Click on this link to see a lengthy history of that effort. Below is an excerpt covering the early 1920s.
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The Italian Mission, where Ruth was apparently working, was a decades-long effort on the part of Schenectady's Protestant churches to lure the city's Italian immigrants away from the Catholic church. Click on this link to see a lengthy history of that effort. Below is an excerpt covering the early 1920s.
Because of "the disturbances of some recent years," the Presbyterians felt it wise to "make haste slowly." They adopted the policy of holding and training the Italian church members instead of attempting to secure large numbers of new constituents. Less affected by the departure of Neyroz and his fellow "opportunists," the work with the young people continued to be strongly emphasized, but steady growth was expected rather than "unusual advances." Gigliotti [a pastor who arrived in 1921] supposedly "produced truly amazing results" in his work with teenaged boys; he personally organized a gymnastic club, a bowling team, a band (the Garibaldi Band) and a social club (the Guiseppe Mazzini Club). (71)
However, the introduction of a comprehensive religious and social program in St. Anthony's new church hall caused the attendance to decrease at the Jefferson Street house. And since greater competition could be expected once Father Bianco's new church was completed, the Presbyterians closed the settlement house and transferred its activities to the Jay Street church. But as was expected, little improvement occurred, for Chiesa di San Salvatore was located in downtown Schenectady, and not in an Italian neighborhood, or far enough away from St. Anthony's. Special attention was thereupon given to the remaining settlement house on Cutler Street in Mt. Pleasant. Second only to the Front Street neighborhood in Italian population, but containing no Italian Catholic church, Mt. Pleasant became "the heart" of the Presbyterian work. (72)
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