y great-grandmother, Giorgina Jennie immigrated to the US.

Her sister, Lucia, never left and Zeni came to the US in 1896 from many descendants still live in Val di Fiemme and Rome. Panchia, Val di Fiemme. Her family has long roots in Val di Fiemme and Val di Giorgina married in Pittsburgh in 1898 to Federico Fassa. Her grandfather, Giorgio Zeni, moved to the area Trentini, who came from Val di Giudicarie. He left to in the early 19th century from Faedo, a small village to avoid the Austrian army and poverty. Federico dug tunthe south overlooking the Val dAdige. Many Zeni fami- nels throughout the Eastern US backbreaking work lies still live in Faedo. We surmise that it was Giorgio who though he made little more than subsistence wages. established himself Giorgina was a homemaker and took in boarders. There in the family home was no money. My grandmother, Flora, recalled one toy that still stands on growing up a pair of roller skates, but her brother, Via Nazionale, Max, took one of them to build a cart. Floras sister, though nothing Helen, said that one year the Christmas gift consisted of remains of the his- an orange. Giorgina lost at least one child as an infant toric interior. and a daughter, Lena, who was struck and killed by a Giorgio had 10 chil- streetcar in Lynchburg, Virginia in 1909. dren, including a priest, a midwife Giorgina and Federico were typical of Trentini at that and an engineer, my time in that they returned home multiple times throughgreat-great-grandfa- out their lives. Helen was actually born in Panchia during ther Valentino Zeni. a 1904 visit. My grandmother, Flora (born in New York He is known for a in1910), contracted pneumonia as a child; the family bridge in Panchia returned to Panchia perhaps the cool mountain air that still stands healed her. She was playing in her grandfather today and has Valentinos room when he died in 1913. Attilios family weathered many storms. The Fiemme was a relatively returned to Austria in the 1910s. They lived across from prosperous area at the time of my great-grandmothers the Via Nazionale home above the cheese cellar. When birth in 1870, evidenced by oil portraits of her parents they returned to the US a few years later they brought and her grandmother, Candida Trettel, which have with them a portrait of Lucia Delugan, deceased since descended in various family lines. Sadly, her mother, 1874, which sat in Valentinos home all those years. Lucia Delugan, died not long after her younger sister, Lucia, was born. Valentino remarried and had ten more children. Giorgina went to school in Merano for a time; she supposedly immigrated to the US because she was in love with a cousin but one wonders if the burden of caring of 10 much younger siblings under the watchful eye Georgina died in 1936. Though not elderly, a photo of a stepmother was taken shortly before her death shows a sick woman, sufficient motivation. worn down by the years. She had a difficult life, but her Old family letters sugchildren and descendants have done well by her. We are gest discord among proud parents, bankers and lawyers, a physician and a Giorgina, her half-sibpsychologist, a pilot and a world traveler and more. lings and her full brothWritten by James Bulen. Washington, DC er, Attilio, who also 12

Family Stories: Giorgina Zeni