MOZZICATO, Antonino
Antonino Mozzicato, 78, of Rocky Hill, formerly of Wethersfield , husband of Cora (Failla) Mozzicato, passed away peacefully, Saturday (October 6, 2012) at Hartford Hospital with his family by his side. He was born in Canicattini Bagini province of Siracusa, Sicily and is the son of Sebastiana (Amenta) Mozzicato and the late Santo Mozzicato. He was a mason for Local #1, a partner in Connecticut Masons for 30 years and a member of Marconi Enterprise. Antonino was a longtime member of the Canicattinese Society. Nino enjoyed his Wednesday lunches with his friends and playing cards at his social club along with being passionate about watching soccer. He will be dearly missed by his devoted family and many friends. He was predeceased by his first wife, Paolina (Carbone) Mozzicato and his sister, Lucia Amenta. Besides his wife and mother, he is survived by his two daughters, Lucy Joile and husband, Fran of Hebron and Marinella and Jack King of Glastonbury; two loving grandchildren, Rachel and Johnny Russell.
MOZZICATO, Sebastiana (Amenta)
Sebastiana (Amenta) Mozzicato, 98, of Hartford, beloved wife of the late Santo Mozzicato, passed away peacefully on Monday (December 10, 2012). Born on Jan. 29, 1914 in Canicattini Bagni, Province of Siracusa, Italy, she was the daughter of the late Santo and Lucia (Buccheri) Amenta. After coming to America, Sebastiana lived her entire life in Hartford, working as a seamstress in Hartford for many years. Sebastiana was a member of the Society of St. Anthony and the Canicattinese Ladies Society. In addition to her husband and parents, she was predeceased by her son, Antonino Mozzicato and her daughter, Lucia Amenta. She is survived by her devoted granddaughters, Paola Dumeer and her husband David of Glastonbury, Lucy Jolie and her husband Fran of Hebron and Marinella, and Jack King of Glastonbury; and four adored great-grandchildren, Jonathan and Olivia Dumeer, and Rachel and Johnny Russell.
A Mass of Christian Burial will be held Thursday Dec. 13 beginning at 9 a.m. at St. Luke's Church, 66 Bolton St., Hartford. Everyone is asked to go directly to the church. Burial will be in Cedar Hill Cemetery, Hartford.
Joe Miano, nephew of Donna Nanedda, gave the eulogy at her funeral. Here are his remarks which I found as touching as any ever spoken.
Good Morning to everyone and thank you all for attending this morning’s funeral for Sebastiana Amenta Mozzicato, or better yet a celebration of her life. Sebastiana Mozzicato is also known as a Signora Mozzicato or Cumare Mozzicato to all her friends from her the social clubs of which she belonged, such as The Canicattinese Ladies Society, Societa’ Di San Antonio and the Italian American Ladies Society, Her Grandchildren as well as her Great Grandchildren know her simply as NONNA, All of whom are in attendance this morning and therefore will be recognized. Grandchildren Marinella, “Marinia, Lucia “Chuisida” & Paola, Great Grandchildren Rachel “Rachee”, Johnny, Jonathan Figilo Beddo, & Olivia Figlia Bedda”. On Behalf of myself, my family and everyone who is in attendence this morning, I extend to you our deepest condolences for the loss of such a wonderful person. And for the rest of us she us simply known as a Zia Naneda. For the One or Two of you here today that do not know me, My name is Giuseppe, I am a nephew of a zia naneda, “u fidio speciale”, my grandfather and a zia naneda are Brother and Sister. Zia Naneda was just less than 2 months shy of turning 99 years olds. So there fore I am here today to remind you all of what a great person a zia naneda is and will always be in our hearts. Unfortunately I was only give about 3 minutes to give a eulogy for a person who has lived 99 years. So what I decided to do is recap the last 36 years of her life as I know it to be. Zia Naneda is the Youngest of six children, the one that lived the longest, was born in Canicattini Bagni on 29 Jan 1914, who used to live in a section of town called U PIZZO MURRO and immigrated to the United States in 1965. A zia only spoke Italian, but she understood everything, especially the soap operas, the American and Spanish ones. I am going to refer to a zia naneda as the iron chef of the todays food network channel. She was always cooking, she was known to evenyone as a nonna dei puppeti, she made the best baneties Schattei, Spinash Pies. She loved to make pizzelle, totos and S cookies. She loved her garden, she would always compete with my father to see who grew bigger and better tomotoes that year, She has a pear tree in her yard that produces more pears than she knew what to do with, she would call me every year when it was time to pick the pears. She would even make her own hand soap, outside in a 5 gallon pal. As a kid I remember sleeping over a Zia Naneda house, in the morning when it was time to wake up, a zia naneda would sing a song, not just once, but as many times as it would take until u would get out of bed. As PAOLA could attest the song go like this,
READY PAOLA,
DORMI QUANDO VOI, PERCHE SEMPRE SUSITI TAI, C’ERA UNA VACCA CHIAMATA REGINA, CHE BELLA LA MATINA, CHE BELLA LA MATTINAAAAA…….
A Zia naneda was a very active person, from gardening, to cutting her grass to shoveling the snow. We would always yell at her for going outside and shoveling the snow in the middle of winter, and especially during the snow storm. So one day her son finally took away her shovel so she couldn’t shovel the snow, so she grabbed to broom and swept the snow away until all the brissles on the broom were gone and she only had a piece of wood left, UH she showed him. A Zia naneda never drove a car, never had a drivers license, BUT ALWAYS WANTED HER DRIVEWAY CLEAR OF SNOW, she would call me during the storm to make sure I was coming to plow the driveway, I would tell her, si zia, I coming, perche chai tutta sta pressha, a ta USCITA cu a machine, a ta ira a ballare, SHE WOULD SAY “NO” se u driveway no e polito, e amici non puono venire a trovaremi, SO needless to say, a zia driveway was always the first driveway I would plow.
A Zia Naneda, without knowing taught Dave Dumeer (Marito di Paola) how to speak Italian, A Zia would call paola at home and leave her a message on the answering machine, and it would go something like this, Dave would you agree,
“ PAOLA , e a NONNA CHE TI A CHIAMATO, CHIAMAME BACKCHE, OK Bye,
And so, dave, having recited it to paola so many times, learned how to speak Italian from nonna.
During the last year Zia Naneda was at Ellis Manor Home on George Street in Hartford, I would go visit her almost every day on my way home from work, some days I would walk there on the weekends, she grew to like the place, the nurses and especially “ I VICINI DELLA CASA” or STRADA, her neighbors, she accepted that she didn’t have locks on the doors, she loved the cleanliness of the place, always wanted to make me coffee, thank god I don’t drink coffee, at first I would take her for a ride in the wheel chair around the home, then little by little we would walk around the home with her walker, as she got better she would go for walks with paola and ask her to take the walker instead. She had her own chair in the hallway in the conv home, she would sit there a watch everyone walk by, saying hi to everyone, and making small talk to whoever would talk back regardless if the understood each other, as we went for our walks around the home, she would comment on every one, that one sleeps with his mouth open, that one is talking to him self, The home actually became her home, as we went for our walks she would tell me what everything was, the cafeteria, the bingo room, the dining room, the beauty saloon, the kitchen, BOY did she love the food There, we used to fight about who was going to eat, me, her or the nurse. DO u want me to tell u wear the food ended up. Use ur imagination. …. But that’s ok, she still ate well, my mom, sa nipote, would bring her food two to three times a week, and on the other day Paola had a fridge full of food with her name on it, so the nurse knew when she ate and when she didn’t, they would bring out the private stash out of the fridge The Reserve’
A special thanks goes out to the nurses at the ellis manor home, they treated zia naneda extremely well, they made her feel at home, they included her in all the activities, she grew on them, they all loved her, they couldn’t believe the recovery she made a year ago.
A special thanks goes out to every one who visited her in the HOME, who didn’t forget about her, and who made her feel special, especially, cucmare Latina, Thank You!
Another Special Thanks goes to Grazielle, Grazielle “Grace” who gave a zia naneda about 20 years back to her life, regiovanita they went out to eat everyday, her favorite being the chicken nuggets at macdonalds, Hanging around with grace was the first time a zia naneda came down to the garage to visit us all at work, She used to call her son nino to see if he was coming over to visit, if not she was going out to lunch with grace.
For a person who never drove a car, she knew her sense of directions, everytime we would get off the brainard road exit she would tell me that when she came to America, this area was all Campania, nothing here, now look, natro muno che’
So, in lew of time,
This passed Monday 12-10-12 at about 5:15 pm Zia Naneda, surrounded by her 3 grand children and myself passed away leaving us here on earth to be reunited with her daughter, her husband and most recently her son, as well as her mother and father and 5 siblings, Zia naneda may you rest in peace, enjoy your holidays with your family and watch over us as you have always done so. Tell Zio Nino that we are going to his favorite restaurant Ficara’s after the funeral today to continue the celebration of your life. The Grandchildren would like to extend an invitation to everyone here today to join us after the burial for luncheon in Zia nanaeda’s honor.
On a final note, due to the holidays Zia Naneda would say the following
Merry Christamassa, & Happy New Haven
Thank You Everyone
Donna Nanedda
December 13, 2012 by Paul Pirrotta | Edit
Ok, don’t try to read the title unless you are Sicilian and can speak the dialect!
All it means is Ms Sebastiana ( female of Sebastian and then abbreviated in the local dialect to Nanedda ) and I am sure that will mean even less and confuse you even more! Good, mission accomplished!
Ok, now for some explanations. For the last several years a group of retired and working Sicilians( we all grew up within a few miles of each other back home and, for the record, I am BY FAR the youngest) have been getting together for lunch at Ficara’s restaurant on Franklin Ave. in Hartford every Wednesday.
One of our friends passed away a few months ago after an intense and short bout with cancer and couple of days ago his mother passed away as well. Her name is Donna Nanedda.
Donna Nanedda would have been 99 in January! She had been in a convalescent home about a year and had been doing remarkably well ( she had lived in here house alone until 2010 and her memory was better than mine) until she got the news that her son had died!
This fragile old lady was wailing ( in the old Sicilian style) the death of her son and, at any age, I cannot think of anything worse than that! Only worse to see a helpless 98 year old woman cry her eyes out!
I guess we can say that she lived a full life and reached an age most of us will not while being able to function normally.
Somehow I just don’t think that would be any consolation to Donna Nanedda!
