Post War Italy

After the Second World War, the European economy was in a mess. Italy, having sided with the Axis, was probably in the worse shape of all. When you add this to the fact that my parents came from a region in Italy that already had a long history of exporting its young people to find work elsewhere, you can well understand my parents desire to emigrate to greener pastures. Being rather cautious folks, they chose to send my father over to Canada first; if he found work, my mother would follow him over. As part of that caution, or maybe being slightly paranoid, they decided not to get married until one of them had work. As it turned out, my father found work rather quickly, which meant my mother had to come to Canada. Not being married, and the cost of my dad coming back to Italy being prohibitive, they chose to get married by proxy. Thus, my father’s father stood in for dad in Italy, while my dad hung out in a church in Toronto. It might have been an odd start, but it seemed to work. They were together until my dad’s death in 1985.