The Fonda Blog

Immigrants viewing Statue Of Liberty from Ellis Island

Many recent Italian immigrants with the Fonda surname have been included in the American Fonda database… first to differentiate from the original Dutch-American line… then as a separate project to try and establish some descendancy lines.  Although tradition holds that the Dutch line was originally of Italian descent, a direct link between the two lines has yet to be found.

According to available census records, about 100 individuals named Fonda immigrated from Italy to the United States between 1890 and 1930.  Most of them settled in the eastern cities working as entrepeneurs or laborers, although some made it out west as miners or railroad workers.  Those that stayed and made it into the census were productive, working-class families, who integrated quickly into society.  In most cases, the father immigrated first, establishing employment, followed by the rest of the family a year or two later.  10 such immigrant families are listed below, each with five or more people… most with children born in both Italy and the US… as first generation Italian-Americans.

Journey of opportunity for peasants escaping strife in Southern Italy

Here is a short explanation of what led to the surge of Italian immigration to America around the turn of the century:

The Great Arrival
Most of this generation of Italian immigrants took their first steps on U.S. soil in a place that has now become a legend—Ellis Island. In the 1880s, they numbered 300,000; in the 1890s, 600,000; in the decade after that, more than two million. By 1920, when immigration began to taper off, more than 4 million Italians had come to the United States, and represented more than 10 percent of the nation’s foreign-born population.
What brought about this dramatic surge in immigration? The causes are complex, and each hopeful individual or family no doubt had a unique story. By the late 19th century, the peninsula of Italy had finally been brought under one flag, but the land and the people were by no means unified. Decades of internal strife had left a legacy of violence, social chaos, and widespread poverty. The peasants in the primarily poor, mostly rural south of Italy and on the island of Sicily had little hope of improving their lot. Diseases and natural disasters swept through the new nation, but its fledgling government was in no condition to bring aid to the people. As transatlantic transportation became more affordable, and as word of American prosperity came via returning immigrants and U.S. recruiters, Italians found it increasingly difficult to resist the call of “L’America”.

Ellis Island immigration point

This new generation of Italian immigrants was distinctly different in makeup from those that had come before. No longer did the immigrant population consist mostly of Northern Italian artisans and shopkeepers seeking a new market in which to ply their trades. Instead, the vast majority were farmers and laborers looking for a steady source of work—any work. There were a significant number of single men among these immigrants, and many came only to stay a short time. Within five years, between 30 and 50 percent of this generation of immigrants would return home to Italy, where they were known as ritornati.
Those who stayed usually remained in close contact with their family in the old country, and worked hard in order to have money to send back home. In 1896, a government commission on Italian immigration estimated that Italian immigrants sent or took home between $4 million and $30 million each year, and that “the marked increase in the wealth of certain sections of Italy can be traced directly to the money earned in the United States.”

The columns in the table below include first and last names, age, place of birth, immigration year and occupation.  Some of these lines have been linked to individuals living now.  The American Fonda database is periodically uploaded to rootsweb, but the on-line listing strips out anyone born after 1930 for privacy purposes.  You will need to download the main PDF file to view the full listing.  Any help in putting together family lines is much appreciated (e-mail to webmaster@fonda.org).

Disclaimer: Many immigrants modified their names to simplify or anglicize the pronunciation.  It is possible that some of these family names could have originally been something like Lafondiano, LaFonda, LaFontano or Fondacaro in native Italy. There are also some listings that are very difficult to read in the census records which could actually be spelling variations like Fondi, Fanda, Funda, Fondo, etc. All of the records below were indexed by Ancestry.com under the pure spelling of ‘Fonda’ and in fact some that were listed as possible were discarded after looking at the actual census scan images.  Further research on the Italian side would be necessary to nail this down for sure.  The US Census Records in these years did not show the city or region of origin, only the country.  Since recent phone records indicate the pure Fonda surname is concentrated in northeast Italy (around Trieste), and the early 1900’s Italian-American immigrations were more from southern Italy, it would logical to assume that some of these names were altered upon immigration.

written by admin \\ tags: America, Census, Immigration, Italy

Internet café opens at Utica veterans center

By Emerson Clarridge, Observer-Dispatch

Posted Nov 07, 2009 @ 08:31 PM

William Fonda of Utica mingles during the grand opening of the Central new York Veterans Outreach Center’s “The Bunker” internet cafe in Utica, Saturday, November 7, 2009. Dave Londres / Observer-Dispatch

UTICA — When he returned from Iraq in early 2005, Army veteran Gary Matt was quickly caught in labyrinthine bureaucracy.  Medical appointments often sent the 30-year-old Utica man to Syracuse.  “Even just going out to Rome is a pain,” he said.

Matt’s experience is typical of the disarray that meets former military men and women once they’ve left the battlefield and returned home, said Army veteran Vincent Scalise, who served with Matt.  “The government does what they can,” he said.  Yet often, he said, the assistance falls short.

To ease the transition to civilian life, Scalise began year ago to head an effort to convert the former 87,000-square-foot YMCA building on Washington Street in Utica into a single-stop veterans’ service clearinghouse that offers advice on legal matters, employment assistance and counseling.  Many of the services already are available at the Central New York Veterans Outreach Center, and construction began last week on 15 transitional housing units – apartments for veterans struggling to find a place to live – that Scalise said he hopes will be ready in mid-2010.

The center’s most recent addition is a first-floor coffee shop and Internet café called The Bunker, which celebrated its grand opening Saturday night to a steady flow of patrons.  Computers will be available from early morning to late at night so veterans can fill out online forms for Veterans Administration assistance and access the Internet for other purposes.  The space will be open to veterans and nonveterans.

“I want people from all different walks of life,” Scalise said.  Jessica Perusse, the center’s head social worker, said “it’s a very relaxing, calm space.”  A formal flag-raising, ribbon-cutting and open house is scheduled for Wednesday, Veteran’s Day.

written by admin \\ tags: Armed Forces, Events, Government, Oneida Co.

I had my DNA tested a few months ago, using the Paternal Lineage Y-46 method through Ancestry.com. I compared my results to some info I found on the Frisian peoples and to a couple of other individuals who joined my Fonda DNA Group on Ancestry.com. There is not yet enough DNA data to find any direct relatives, and the test only applies to males using the Y-chromosome method. I know there is mitochondrial DNA testing which works with the female DNA components, but of course genealogy is based on male heredity.  Note: I have now entered my data in GeneTree, Y-Search, and SMGF which are all free access.

From what little I know so far it seems that it is a question of probabilities, because every geographic or ethnic area has a mix of different genetic types (haplogroups). If I were to make a strict interpretation of my (our) DNA profile, being Haplogroup I1, widely known as Anglo-Saxon… as opposed to the predominant Frisian DNA profile, being Haplogroup R1b, widely known as Basque… I would say that we were not indigenous to Northern Holland, at least not as far back as the main Frisian population.

Jan Van Goyen (1596-1656) – River Landscape With Fishermen

This is consistent with all that we have known, since tradition holds that the Fonda’s were not native Dutch… and lends support to the latest theory presented in the new book, “Famous Frisians in America” on pages 111-112, which states that:

“This means that the trail leading to the origins of the name Fonda ends in Eagum. In the Genealogysk Jierboek. (Genealogical Yearbook), the village historian D. F. van der Meer from Reduzum has suggested that Jilles Douwes could be the son of the Eagumer farmer Douwe Everts. This possibility presented itself after he had been informed by the author of the present contribution that there is a marriage certificate of Jilles Douwes and Hester Douwes in the Amsterdam Municipal Archives. However, there was no Jilles among the children of Douwe Everts originally tracked down by Van der Meer in the archives. In his publication in the Yearbook, he himself took the liberty of inserting the name of Jilles among those of Douwe Everts’ other children. In this way, the notion was created that the forefather of the Fondas came from Hornemastate in Eagum, Douwe Everts’ farm. In 1988 the same notion also found its way into the article ‘Amsterdam Records of the Fonda Family’ by Robert C. Cooney Jr. in The New York Genealogical and Biographical Record. However, that finding – that Jilles was the son of Douwe Everts – has been recorded with far too much certainty. A number of facts speak against this suggestion. Douwe Everts was a farmer with voting rights. This means that he was almost certainly a member of the Dutch Reformed Church. However, Jilles Douwes and Hester – given that they chose Old Testament names for two of their children (Abraham and Sarah) – may well have been members of a non-conformist denomination. In this connection, it is also striking that Hester does not appear in any of the church registers in New Amsterdam.”

Dutch Poldering Mills

“According to Van der Meer, Jelle Fonda (Jilles Douwes) must have been a son of Douwe Everts. Eagum was a very small village. But that is by no means proof that he descended from Douwe Everts. The oldest register of births, deaths and marriages, the Quotisatiekohier of 1749 (a century after Jilles Douwes), says there were 47 people living in or near the village, and 19 children under the age of 13. They included five farmers and one independent woman farmer, a widow with no profession, a schoolmaster, and three working-class families. The latter category is particularly difficult to place in a historical sense, especially when it comes to the archives dating from before the French era. There is much to be said for the suggestion that Jelle Fonda came from this group. The fact that on the occasion of his marriage he is registered as a ‘journeyman smithy’ indicates that he was a craftsman, and thus did not belong to the group made up of ’tillers of the soil’. Mention is also made of the fact that his parents gave their written consent to the marriage. This means that they could read and write. As could Jelle Fonda and his wife Hester, in view of the signatures which appear at the bottom of the document. In the period 1632-1633, eight years before he married in Diemen, the lake known as Wargastermeer was impoldered. The primary financier of this project was the Amsterdam merchant Paulus Jansz Kley (1582-1655). Obviously he required an army of diggers and other workmen, including craftsmen. It is quite possible that Jilles Douwes was one of them. Indeed, it may well have been through the mediation of Kley that Jilles moved to Amsterdam, and he may even have helped him to get a job there. He was literate and he had a trade. Moreover, he was anxious to get ahead in the world.“

In conclusion, according to this account, here is what we know…  Jilles Fonda was a journeyman smithy, who hired on to a big earthworks project near Eagum in 1632-1633 (he would have been 16-17 years old)… he then moved to Amsterdam, got married in 1641 (age 25), started a family (he became an innkeeper and blacksmith)… and then took the voyage to America in 1651 (age 35) with his young family of five.

This still does not settle the question of the origin of Jilles Fonda, but at least it moves the ball forward a bit.

Albert Mark Fonda
admin
November 2009

written by admin \\ tags: America, DNA, Fonda Family, History, Holland

Bright Idea: The Compact Fluorescent Light Bulb

Since its creation by Thomas Edison in Menlo Park, New Jersey in 1879, the light bulb has undergone a number of changes. Many of the innovations that make the incandescent bulb what it is today came out of General Electric’s laboratory in Schenectady, New York.

Dr. Gorton R. Fonda (1884-1973) scientist for General Electric Laboratory in Schenectady, NY

The first major advance was crafting a tungsten filament, the wire the electricity heats to create light. When Edison first invented the bulb, he used a carbon filament which has a much shorter lifespan than tungsten. Although others attempted to make the thread out of tungsten, they found it too brittle to mold into the needed shape. However, working in the Schenectady laboratory, Dr. William Coolidge discovered how to increase the wire’s flexibility in 1909. To this day, manufacturers continue to use tungsten in incandescent lights.

Dr. Irving Langmuir, another scientist in Schenectady and a Nobel Prize-winner, made two other major discoveries. A significant problem with light bulbs was that they blackened as the filament burned, decreasing the amount of light produced over time. In 1912, Langmuir realized that if you filled the bulbs with a neon-like gas, you could prevent this effect. He also developed the technique of coiling the filament, which doubled the bulb’s lifespan.

In addition to incandescent bulbs, the Schenectady laboratory also played a role in the development of the compact fluorescent light bulb. Although the “spiral” fluorescent was officially invented in an Ohio General Electric laboratory by engineer Ed Hammer, Dr. Gorton Fonda** in Schenectady played a key cooperative role in its development. Unfortunately, when it was created in 1976, the company decided it would be too expensive to mass produce. Thanks to modern technology, fluorescent bulbs are now both economically and environmentally smart.

**For info on Dr. Gorton R. Fonda, see rootsweb and findagrave listings.

written by admin \\ tags: Achievements, Business, Schenectady Co., Science

Lightning Strikes – Suffolk County

Hudson River

ECOs Vernon Fonda and Jason Curinga were checking fishermen at a popular spot in Shoreham as a thunderstorm approached. The officers had separated in order to complete their checks before the storm arrived. ECO (Environmental Conservation Officer) Fonda was talking with a fisherman when a person ran toward him screaming for help. ECO Fonda ran to where he saw a woman lying on the ground. The womans family members said she had been standing in the water when lightning struck nearby. A quick check revealed that the woman was not breathing and did not have a pulse. Officer Fonda immediately began CPR and the woman began to breathe on her own. When ECO Curinga arrived to assist, the woman lost her pulse and ceased breathing again. ECO Fonda resumed CPR, assisted by an EMT who had just arrived. The two rescuers revived the woman, and she was transported by helicopter to Stony Brook Hospital.

written by admin \\ tags: Achievements, Environmental, Government