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    Maltese in Detroit
    Maltese in Detroit
    Maltese in Detroit
    Ebook208 pages46 minutes

    Maltese in Detroit

    By Diane Gale Andreassi and Larry Zahr U.O.M.

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    About this ebook

    Most Maltese immigrants came to the United States during the first decades of the 20th century after the discharge of skilled workers from the Royal British Dockyard in 1919 following the end of World War I. More than 1,300 Maltese came to the United States in the first quarter of 1920. Many people found work in the automobile industry, and with about 5,000 residents, Detroit had the largest Maltese population in the United States. Maltese in Detroit focuses on the many people of Maltese descent who made their homes in Detroit's Corktown area. By the mid-1920s, it is believed that more than 15,000 Maltese had settled in the United States. After World War II , the Maltese government launched a program to pay passage for Maltese willing to immigrate and remain abroad for at least two years. By the mid-1990s, an estimated more than 70,000 Maltese immigrants and descendants were living in the United States, with the largest single community in Detroit and its surrounding suburbs.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherArcadia Publishing
    Release dateSep 18, 2012
    ISBN9781439640814
    Maltese in Detroit
    Author

    Diane Gale Andreassi

    Diane Gale Andreassi was born in Detroit to Rita (Borg) and James Gale. Andreassi’s mother was from Sliema, Malta, and her father, James, was born and raised in Mosta, Malta. Both of them immigrated to Detroit and met in the city’s Corktown community, where they were married and started their family; with that, her father changed his name from Galea to Gale.

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      Book preview

      Maltese in Detroit - Diane Gale Andreassi

      Malta

      INTRODUCTION

      Maltese were among the many people around the world who heard about the job opportunities in the automobile industry that Detroit offered. The first immigrants had a wanderlust and adventuresome drive that took them to new shores. While the streets were not paved in gold, for most immigrants their new land provided a better way of life.

      Maltese immigrated in droves to Detroit after World War I. They grew in number from between 6,000 to 7,000, according to a December 12, 1920, Detroit Free Press article. They left the archipelago of six islands of which Malta, Gozo, and Comino are inhabited. Located in the center of the Mediterranean, Malta is 58 miles from Sicily and 180 miles from Libya. The Maltese islands are soaked in history with temples dating from 5,000 BC. The Phoenicians colonized the islands around 800 BC, and the Romans made Malta part of their empire in 218 BC. Malta was under Arab rule in the 9th and 10th centuries, which strengthened the Semitic roots of the Maltese language.

      In 1530, the king of Spain and the Holy Roman emperor, Charles V, gave Malta to the Knights of the Sovereign Military Hospitaller Order of St. John of Jerusalem. They survived a three-month siege by the Turks in 1565 and governed until 1798, when Malta fell to Napoleon. In 1800, the Maltese expelled the French with the assistance of the British Royal Navy, and in 1814 Malta became a British colony. It became independent in September of 1964.

      Malta was an important naval base, as it is strategically placed between Europe and North Africa. During World War II, the country was subjected to a long blockade and a five-month bombing raid by the Axis powers. Malta was devastated but did not surrender. The bombing raid during the war made Malta the most bombed country on the face of the planet. It had more bombs dropped on its people in two months than London had in two years. The George Cross was awarded to the island of Malta in April 1942 from King George VI to honor the Maltese people for their bravery during World War II.

      Maltese immigrants were proud of this honor—and their homeland—but they came to Detroit in an effort to improve their lives and the lives of generations that would follow.

      One

      EARLY IMMIGRATION TO DETROIT

      Maltese who came to the United States were pioneers willing to leave their families and homes to try a new life in a new land. From the tiny island nation, Maltese immigrants took with them the importance of values, loyalty to family and friends, and that Catholic faith, which they passed down to their children. Today these are the hallmarks of Maltese families in Detroit and its surrounding areas.

      After World War I, many people in the country of Malta were out of work. The Maltese naval dockyard provided work for 15,000 men during the war, and by 1919 it was decided that only 5,000 workers were needed to work at the dockyard. Other military branches were letting workers go, and unemployment reached over 20,000 people.

      According to The Great Exodus 1918–1939, written by Fr. Lawrence Attard, some 10,000 Maltese left their homeland to find work abroad, mostly in American cities, between 1919 and 1920. However, official census figures are thought to be low, considering some people entered the country illegally as stowaways or by crossing the Canadian border undetected. Those people, of course, would not have been included in the

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