Finding Family and Friends In Solofra, Italy

It all started with a love story. In June 1899, in the small town of Solofra, Italy, Francesco D'Alessio wrote a beautiful love letter to Antoinette Maffei, asking her to confirm her love for him.  They were married in November 1904,  moved to New York City in May 1907 and ended up having 13 children.  Over 100 years later their great-great grandson and his family went back to Solofra to see where it all began. That great-great grandson is Chris' dad and I was very happy to be a part of this adventure!

Francesco & Antoinette with their first two children: Josephine & Fred in front of their produce shop in New York City.

Antoinette & Francesco's eldest daughter's wedding. Here are 12 of the 13 children (1 child passed away at a young age).

Solofra, Italy is located approximately an hour southeast of Naples and 40 minutes inland from Amalfi.  It is not a typical vacation destination.  In fact, if you were to look up Hotels in Solofra on Tripadvisor, you'd find only one listing.  Yet, this town of about 12,000 people is one of Italy's most famous towns for the tanning of leather and it is said that some of Italy's best leather products originate here.  So it's not really a surprise that, in the old days, Chris' ancestors ran their own leather tannery. 

For about a generation, some contact was maintained with family who stayed behind in Italy.  But as the older generations passed away, contact was lost with family in the old country. Luckily, Chris' great great aunt Josie was extremely organized and kept many photos, letters, passports and other documents in immaculate condition. Therefore, we had a lot of clues,  so we decided to go check things out and see what we could turn up.  At the very least it would be fascinating to see the town where Antoinette and Francesco had grown up, been married, and lived many years of their lives.  

We thought the most logical place to begin was at the main church in Solofra, St. Michael's Cathedral. During his childhood, Chris' dad (also named Michael!) heard many stories about the beautiful cathedral so it was a real treat for him to finally see it in person. We arrived in town around 11am on a Friday and took a spin around the central part of town, then entered the cathedral to find a beautiful place:

Inside Solofra's St. Michael Cathedral, built in the 1500's with elaborate ceiling panels painted by local artist Francesco Guarino in the early 1600's

Looking back toward the front door

The organ dates back to the 1580's.

The carved main door to the Cathedral. The facade was covered with scaffolding as they were undertaking restorations.

After a few minutes of poking around, we were approached by a man speaking to us in Italian, which was partially understood by Chris' dad.  He introduced himself as Mario.  We soon found out that Mario also knew some Spanish, and between my Spanish and Chris' dad's Italian, we deduced that he was probably a priest at the cathedral.  We later learned that Mario was actually Monsignor Mario Pierro, who serves at St. Michael's along with two  priests. We described why we had come to Solfra, and showed him some of the old pictures and records that we'd scanned, as well as the old love letter written by Chris' great great grandfather to his great great grandmother in the late 1800's.  Since the love letter was written in Italian, Mario was able to read it and was clearly moved by the words.  He showed us around the cathedral, explaining its history which we tried to piece together with our combined Italian and Spanish. Chris' Latin and Mom Barbier's French also came in handy! 

With Monsignor Mario

While I was taking pictures of the church, a lady offered to take our picture with Mario.  She first spoke to me in Italian, to which I responded in Spanish.  Upon hearing Spanish,  her eyes lit up and she asked me in Spanish where I was from.  We got to talking and I learned that her family had left Solofra to move to Argentina, where she was born and raised.  She recently moved to Italy to be closer to the rest of her family. When I asked her for their last name I was amazed to learn that it was the same as as Chris' great great grandmother's - Maffei!  While Maffei is a common name in Italy, especailly in the town of Solofra, we still found this quite remarkable and immediately began comparing notes.  Since they spoke Spanish it was much easier for me to communicate.  We could not believe the coincidence and decided that our families must share some common ancestry somewhere along the line. 

With the other Maffeis!

We were soon shown all around the beautiful cathedral by Mario, including some of the oldest portions of the church, dating back to the 1300's, where many people do no get to visit.  The Argentinian Maffei's accompanied us, which was super helpful because they spoke fluent Italian and Spanish. Therefore they translated Mario's Italian into Spanish and then I could translate the Spanish into English.  It was great teamwork and we had a lot of fun! We spent almost an hour talking to Mario, the other Maffei's, and touring around the church.

The old section of the first church built here, dating back to the 1300's

It's hard to see in the picture but the paintings along the border are about the lives of Moses and Jesus.

A close-up of one of the paintings. Notice the ears on the angels' wings.

Small chapel that was once used for the nunnery. The nuns would sit and pray behind the screens on the top right.

In the old days, people with unwanted babies could anonymously place them in this window in the church. The babies would either be adopted or raised by the nuns. In the latter case, they took the last name Esposito which means "placed outside" in Italian.

After heading back outside, we met another man passing by, who Mario engaged in conversation.  It turned out that he had known one of our distant relatives in Solofra, whose picture we had brought along.  A few minutes later, he came back with a lady who currently lives at the address we had found from ages ago, and is actually the niece of one of our relatives from Solofra, a few generations removed.  Solofra is indeed a small town.  

At one point, Chris was going to leave to feed our parking meter since our time was up.  He was stopped and told that he didn't need to pay for parking in Solofra because he was family. I guess word travels fast in Solofra! 

We spent some more time talking to our new friends.  While the other family of Maffei's had to get going, Monsignor Mario invited us to have lunch with him.   We immediately accepted and accompanied him to his home in the back of the church where he prepared a feast for us! We had spagetti (al dente of course), homemade sauce, fresh olives, locally produced pepperoni, an amazing eggplant appetizer, marinated artichoke hearts, fresh mozzarella, homemade white wine, fresh bread, olive oil and an amazing dessert. I was so full from lunch that I couldn't eat dinner that night! 

Getting ready for lunch in Mario's kitchen

Stirring the sauce

Mario, serving dessert that just arrived fresh from the bakery.

My favorite dessert in Italy!

We spent many hours with Monsignor Mario enjoying great food and conversation, and even got to meet some of his friends and family who stopped by for a bit.  The next thing we knew, it was around 5pm and we had to head back to our home base in Minori.  Before leaving, Mario gave us 3 bottles of home-made wine and a few mementos from the church.  We couldn't thank him enough for his hospitality. All we could say is Grazie Assai Assai Assai (Assai means very in Italian). We never could have imagined what a great day we would have had in Solofra, and how many wonderful people we would meet.  This was truly a highlight of our trip.

I think Francesco and Antionette are probably smiling somewhere up above ;-)