Sunday, September 17 at 2:00 pm. 6821 Fair Oaks Blvd Carmichael CA. Admission $15 • Refreshments Included • Doors open at 1:30 pm. In this presentation, Author Phyllis Cancilla Martinelli examines the lives of immigrant women from Northern Italy in mining communities spanning the years from 1870-1930. In the old mining towns of the American West, mining companies sometimes provided the housing, but the women provided “the home.”

These women became the heart of the families in the mining camps. While the first wave of immigration to the United States was from northern Europe, the second wave was from southern and eastern Europe. Italian Americans were the largest group to go into mining during the second wave of European immigration. Italians did the heavy labor in the coal towns of Iowa, Ohio, and Texas and the copper towns of Michigan and Arizona.

An earlier wave of Italians came to California from Northern Italy during the California Gold Rush of the 1840s and 1850s and into the 20th century, heavily from the region of Liguria, and became one of the largest groups of miners in the hills of the California Mother lode where their descendants still reside.

The story of the Italian miners is an important one as they changed the face of the mining communities they settled in. This is part of their story.

Phyllis Martinelli is Professor Emerita St. Mary’s College in Moraga California and the granddaughter of Italian immigrants. She is a third generation native of San Francisco, California.