A labor shortage in the Delta brought Italian families to Chicot County in the 1890s. They resided on Sunnyside, a plantation farmed by other immigrant groups and African-Americans. The use of Italians was a poor experiment at Sunnyside. Man y Italians, not used to the harsh climate of the Delta, died of malaria. Workers endured poor conditions such as unsanitary water, substandard housing, and inadequate and expensive medical care. After a federal investigation of the treatment of those living at Sunnyside, very little was done to help the Italians living on the plantation.
Families who were able to amass enough money bought their own farms in Chicot and Lonoke counties. In the late 1800s, they were joined by other Italian families from their homeland and Louisiana. Workers remember suffering from ethnic prejudices in the Delta. Dan Fratesi remembered that as a young boy, "they [Americans] weren't friendly at all. We'd go to school, and they'd call you [names] and they'd try to fight you and try to chunk a rock, try to throw a brick at you, and other things. ...So one of the Italian boys [took hard] bread they cooked in the oven…it'd get just like a brick. So when he got angry…he got that piece of bread and knocked the fool out of the other boy just like a rock." Other Delta citizens wrongly assumed that the Italians were engaged in organized crime or the Mafia. Family unity provided cohesiveness in Italian communities. Baptisms, weddings and parties were all events that brought Italians together to celebrate.
In Northwest Arkansas, an Italian priest named Pietro Bandini arrived to protect foreign immigrants from exploitation. Several of the Sunnyside immigrants went to this area of the state where they founded Tontitown, a community that flourishes today.
Italians from Palermo, Sicily, immigrated to Helena in the late 1800s. They originally arrived to settle in New Orleans, but a yellow fever epidemic sent them looking for a safer place to reside. At least 50 families arrived where they engaged in a variety of mercantile activities and peddling. Successful mercantile businesses could be found in Helena and some of these families continue to run businesses in the Delta today.
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