Postcard of the S.S. Romanic, created between 1903 and 1911
If you’re old enough to remember the popular ABC TV series The Love Boat which aired during the late ‘70s and early ‘80s, you will no doubt still be able to hear in your mind its melodic opening theme song (“the looooooove boat”) sung by Jack Jones. The show offered an engaging combination of romantic adventures, humor, and light drama, and was produced by Aaron Spelling (1923-2006), the most prolific producer in American television history. I don’t know what inspired Spelling to produce this endearing show, but I chuckled to myself when The Love Boat sprang to my mind in the midst of genealogical research!
While researching and writing a lengthy manuscript on Bostonians Edward J. Costello (1866-1926 [?]) and Mary Josephine Maloney (c. 1872-1943) who emigrated from Ireland, as well as their many descendants, I went beyond “kith and kin” to look into the life of Bobbie Brogna (1915-2009), longtime companion of one of their grandsons, Joe De Vito/DiVito (1915-2004). This led to the discovery of a short article in the Boston Post on the arrival of five Italian brides-to-be on the White Star liner S.S. Romanic on Sunday, Sept. 25, 1910, and their marriages the very next day in St. Leonard of Port Maurice R.C. Church in Boston’s North End.
I had never seen anything like this before. In fact, the shades of The Love Boat evoked by this story initially caused me to misread the name of the ship as Romantic! The more I thought about it, the more I was awed by the complex logistical arrangements put in place to bring about this multi-marriage caper.
Thanks to the Romanic passenger list, and St. Leonard’s marriage register accessible on the American Ancestors database, Massachusetts: Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Boston Records, 1789-1920, the essential elements of the newspaper story were confirmed. All five couples were joined in holy matrimony by Rev. Antonio Castellano, one after the other, on Monday, September 26 (the five last-listed marriages in register). Remarkably, the five grooms and their brides came from different places in Italy, and the men lived in different places in Boston, Framingham (20+ miles west of Boston), and Plymouth (40 miles south).
How did five young women from different areas of Italy manage to book passage aboard the same ship that sailed from Naples to Boston on September 13? Since all were married in the same church on the same day by the same priest, I wondered if Fr. Castellano might have orchestrated the multiple marriages. But the grooms who lived in Framingham and Plymouth would not have attended church in distant Boston, so it’s doubtful that the priest pulled all the strings. Kin networks among Italian immigrants and their communities back home sometimes arranged marriages, but that would not explain how young women from different areas of Italy were involved in this complex transatlantic medley of marriages.
Perhaps the grooms engaged the services of a local padrone? These labor brokers who recruited Italian immigrants and facilitated their employment were also known to arrange marriages, but again, how would such a “fixer” coordinate this multifarious group of young men and women from dispersed locations in eastern Massachusetts and in Italy? For now, it remains a mystery, and I invite readers to share any information or insights about such plural marriage pacts!
The background story of Costello descendants will bring us full circle back to the 1910 “Italian love boat.” Mary J. Costello (1893-1963) was the first of nine children of Edward and Mary J. (Maloney) Costello. She was born and raised in Boston, with one interesting exception. For reasons unknown, her family moved to Bolton, Lancashire, England in c. 1899 and lived there for five years before returning to Boston in 1904. In the 1910 census Mary’s family was living at 160 Liverpool St., and she and sister Annie were packers in a candy factory. Two years later, on 16 October 1912, Mary married 22-year old Guido De Vito (1890-1950), immigrant son of Vincenzo De Vito (1863-1941) and Filomena Viola (c. 1864-1939), in Most Holy Redeemer Church. Their civil marriage registration shows that Mary was 19 (actually 2 months short of that) and living at 27 Chelsea St.; Guido was a bricklayer living at 162 Liverpool St. Recalling the Costellos’ address in 1910, Mary literally married the boy next door!
Mary and Guido De Vito had at least five children: Francis, Joseph, Anne, Arthur, and Paul. Second son Joseph “Joe” Anthony De Vito was born in East Boston on 19 March 1915 and raised in Revere’s Beachmont section. A 1934 graduate of Revere High School, Joe served in the US Army for five years during WWII in the Pacific theatre. He married Eloise M. Willock (1917-1986), daughter of Charles T. and Marie E. (Parker) Willock of Winthrop, Mass. and had two children – Joseph C. “Joe” DiVito and Steven Thomas DiVito. [Notice that De Vito morphed into DiVito.] Joe worked for the US Postal Service for thirty-plus years, retiring in 1972. He was a life member of the Staff Sgt. Arthur DeFranzo Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 2346 in Saugus and the Saugus Disabled American Veterans, and Eloise was a member of the VFW Auxiliary. They moved from Saugus to Peabody and remained there for the rest of their lives.
Eloise DiVito died on 5 October 1986 in Lynnfield at age 69. Widowed Joe DiVito lived another eighteen years and died at age 88 on 2 January 2004. Joe’s obituary mentioned his late wife Eloise, two sons and their wives, three grandchildren, one great-granddaughter, and his longtime companion Bobbie Brogna of Saugus.
Amelia “Bobbie” (Caruso) Brogna was born in Dedham in 1915 to Giacomo (later Vincent) and Angialina (Bruno) Caruso. In the 1930s she married Joseph Brogna (1913-1962), son of Giuseppe and Emanuela (Capobianco) Brogna, and by 1940 the couple had three children – Manuella J., Joseph Jr., and Robert L. They moved from Boston to Revere, and then to Saugus in the 1950s, where Joseph died at the age of 49 on 3 June 1962. Bobbie later moved to Malden and retired from the Commonwealth of Massachusetts as a statistical bookkeeper. She served as chaplain for the Ladies Auxiliary of Staff Sgt. DeFranzo VFW Post 2346 in Saugus, where she probably met life member Joe DiVito. Bobbie passed on 15 June 2009 in Boston at age 94. By that time her son Robert and daughter Manuella were deceased and her survivors were son Joseph of Malden, nine grandchildren, and four great grandchildren.
While researching and disentangling various Brogna and allied families, I came upon Leonardo Giso (1887-1955). He was born in San Sossio, a town and comune in the province of Avellino, Campania, Italy, to Michele Giso and Francesca Giodice, immigrated in 1904, and married Giovanna/Giovannina Del Vecchio (c. 1889-1967). Giovanna (later Jennie), daughter of Angelo M. Del Vecchio and Emanuela Rinaldi, also hailed from San Sossio. In searching for Leonardo in online newspapers, I found the “Italian love boat” article naming him as one of the five Italian immigrant men whose brides landed in Boston on 25 September 1910 on the S.S. Romanic and married the next day. (The newspaper article erroneously reported the marriages took place in Sacred Heart Church in North Square.)
The marriage of Leonardo and Giovanna may have been arranged, but it endured for more than four decades and produced at least four children. Leonardo died on 20 June 1955 in Arlington, leaving his wife, sons Michele and Nick Giso, and married daughters Emma Brogna and Frances Fantasia. Giovanna lived another 12 years before dying on 5 May 1967 in Boston’s North End.
Bobbie (Caruso) Brogna was not kin on the Costello family tree, so I did a fair amount of “extraneous” research. But had I ignored her, I would never have found the “Italian love boat” story that spontaneously reminded me of The Love Boat! As for lessons learned, remember to search newspapers for your ancestral relations whenever possible—you never know what you’ll find!
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