After Generations of Community Building, East Sacramento Recognized as “Little Italy” • Sacramento News & Review

During a recent lunchtime rush, a small team of employees at Corti Brothers delicatessen placed orders as they were packing and bagging sausages, blocks of cheese and bantam containers from freshly prepared pasta. These grocers were dressed in Old School sophistication – collared shirts and formal ties under their long black aprons. This is a sign that the neighborhood market takes its quality of service as seriously as it did when Gino and Frank Corti founded the company in 1947. At the time, the brothers were determined to keep the company alive. Italian art of commerce – that ability to help customers with the freshest vegetables, best cut meats, and the perfect ingredients to make dinner a nighttime celebration.

By the time the Cortis opened the venue, Italian markets had been a mainstay of Sacramento for nearly a century.

On September 21, this cultural influence was finally recognized with an official designation of “Little Italy” for the city, an honor bestowed on the same eastern neighborhood where Corti Brothers, Talini’s Nursery, the late Español and other Italian businesses. -american flourished. over the decades.

Northern Italians began to land in the region almost as soon as the Gold Rush began. Some have tried their hand at mining, but most have succeeded in building a permanent community as merchants, farmers, ranchers and winegrowers. Then, in the 1870s, a dark period of famine and depression ravaged the districts of southern Italy between Naples and Sicily, causing another mass exodus to the United States. Some of these hopeful sailors arrived in Northern California to work in its industrial gold mines. They worked underground in operations such as the Kennedy Mine, Argonaut Mine, and Leland Stanford’s Lincoln Mine, all located about 50 miles east of Sacramento.

The Italian-American heritage was entrenched around Folsom Boulevard in Sacramento at the end of the 19^e Century. And it continued in contemporary life: for over 50 years – until recently – Restaurant Español was a culture carrier for long-standing Italian traditions on the avenue, having opened in old Sacramento. in 1923. The Talini Nursery and Garden Center is another Italian-American staple on Folsom Boulevard. Its founder, Pietro Talini, immigrated to the United States in the 1940s, spent years running a landscaping business in East Sacramento, and then opened the nursery in 1976. During this same period, the son by Frank Corti, Darrell Corti began to have a major influence on the California food scene. Between Darrell’s vast knowledge of international food imports and his scholarly abilities in wine appreciation, the young Corti offered essential advice to revolutionary chefs, winemakers and winegrowers in the Golden State and beyond.

On September 21, Sacramento City Council passed a resolution formally designating the area bounded by 48^e and 59^e streets, and J Street and Folsom Boulevard, as the historic district of Little Italy.

“The Italian heritage has played a big part in the formation of Sacramento since its inception,” said Councilor Jeff Harris, who introduced the resolution. “There were enclaves where people of Italian origin settled: mainly in East Sac, but also in Southside and Oak Park. But, over the years, it has truly become East Sacramento’s most concentrated enclave.

One person who advocated for the designation was Fabrizio Sasso of the Sacramento Central Labor Council. Proud Italian-American, Sasso says East Sac has been a kind of welcoming home away from home.

“I’m not from Sacramento, I’m from Stockton, which has a large Italian population,” Sasso said during the announcement. “I was drawn to East Sac, not knowing the story. It was just cozy – there was familiarity – and it felt like an Italian neighborhood. “

William Cerruti, director of the Italian Cultural Society of Sacramento, said there are more than 400 households in east Sacramento who receive his organization’s newsletter. For him, the official designation was a long time coming.

“In recent years, we have felt that the Little Italy neighborhood and the accomplishments of the people who created this thriving neighborhood should be recognized,” Cerruti told council. “Growing up in East Sacramento, there were so many Italian families, and there were whole blocks where, mostly, all the families were Italian-American.”

Referring to the fact that Masses at St. Mary’s Catholic Church have been held in Italian for years, Cerruit added: “I was actually alive when they built St. Mary’s Church; and it was in a field, and I was born in the last block where the farms were, when East Sacramento was mostly farmland … It’s time to claim that heritage and recognize it.