Granite History: Monument retailers were essential to Barre's growth
Toolbox
By PAUL WOOD - Published: November 2, 2009
This is the first of two monthly columns on monument retailers by the Vermont Granite Museum.
Alessandro comes to America
Alessandro Aimetti immigrated from Bisuschio, Italy, in 1902 on the steamship Philadelphia from Southampton, England. On arrival at Ellis Island, he was listed as a 23-year-old unmarried stonecutter with $20 dollars in his pocket. Bisuschio was a small village in Northern Italy near the Swiss border (about 35 miles north of Milan) and is in Italy's granite region. Twenty-four years later his son Arrigo returned to America and found a successful retail monument business in , Conn., which will be the subject of next month's article.
The Aimetti homestead was a three-story stucco building with ceramic tile roof. It had a large main section with a two-story wing at each end that projected out toward the road in a U-shape and formed a courtyard. There was a second-floor balcony from which one could see the mountains of Switzerland. A wrought iron fence and gate ran along the road and enclosed the courtyard. Behind one of the wings was a large vegetable garden. The need for such a large house becomes clear when it is learned that Alessandro had eight siblings: Clodoveo, Giovanni, Luigi, Teresa, Angelo, Ida, Adele, and Giuseppe.
Before coming to America, Alessandro learned the stone cutting trade at the granite quarries in Viggiu. Three years after he arrived in America Alessandro could be found listed in the 1905 Barre City Directory as a stonecutter living in a house on Humbert Street owned by stonecutter Louis Aimetti. Louis, an older brother and probably the Luigi Aimetti who arrived at Ellis Island in 1893 at age 21, was likely the first Aimetti to settle in Barre. Alessandro married Marianna Rossi on Jan. 5, 1905, and since Marianna was from Quincy Mass.,, it is likely that Alessandro may have worked in Quincy's granite industry before coming to Barre.
Aimetti & Company
Initially, Alessandro earned his living as a stonecutter in the Barre stone sheds but by 1909-1910 he was listed in the report of the state geologist as operating a quarry on Millstone Hill under the company name Aimetti & Co. Alessandro briefly, circa 1908-10, leased a small quarry in the quarry district at the north end of Williamstown near the Barre town line. The 1908 Williamstown Grand List shows Aimetti & Co. with $100 stock in trade, $639 money/debts due, and $311 offset. The 1910 Williamstown Grand List lists Aimetti & Co. with machinery (but no land) assessed at $500. The machinery no doubt included a derrick, air compressor and quarry drills.
The 1910 U.S. Census lists Alessandro as a granite manufacturer and 32-year-old head of household married five years to Marianna with three children, Edea (age 4), Arrigo (age 3), and Argeo (age 1-1/2). Alessandro and Marianna are listed as English-speaking aliens born in Italy who rented a farm in Williamstown and she was listed as taking in boarders. The 1910 Census also lists in the Aimetti household brother-in law Frank Ruvera (granite manufacturer and probably co-manager of the quarry), sister-in-law Josephina Ruvera (Frank's wife and Marianna's sister), nephew Harry Ruvera, and three stone cutter borders who probably worked in the Aimetti quarry.
Concerned about his health, Alessandro decided later in 1910 to return with his family to Bisuschio. As little as five years working in America's dusty granite sheds without adequate ventilation could result in the first symptoms of the debilitating illness silicosis. Upon his return to Italy, Alessandro again worked as a stone cutter in Cuasso al Monte – a town with granite quarries adjacent to Bisuschio. At this time, Italian granite companies did not commonly use dust producing pneumatic tools and operated in better ventilated open-sided sheds.
Arrigo's Childhood in Bisuschio
At age three, Arrigo returned with his family to Italy and spent his childhood years in the village of Bisuschio. Bisuschio apparently gave Arrigo plenty of scope for his adventuresome spirit. His mischief in school, for example releasing a bird in the schoolroom hidden in his shirt, led the teacher to offer to pay for him to be sent to reform school, an idea that his parents rejected. One time he and a group of friends were caught stealing fruit from a farmer's orchard and later in anger they rolled a large boulder down a hill toward the farmer's house! He and his friends stole from the church poor box and rang the church bells at odd hours surely angering the local priest!
Arrigo was his mother's favorite but when she refused him a red sweater which he badly wanted he ran to the top of a nearby cliff and threatened to jump unless his mother bought him the sweater. Fearing for his safety, his mother called "Rigin Rigin come down. I will buy you the sweater." His brother Argeo had built a small cart which he harnessed to the family cat. Arrigo hid a heavy stone in the cart and his brother was puzzled that the cat seemed to have lost strength and could no longer pull the cart. Arrigo recalls "I had the best childhood of anyone I ever knew."
Although surrounded by granite quarrying and cutting, apparently this was not the career Arrigo and his parents chose since he was apprenticed to a butcher. Possibly a career in granite was decided against due his father's illness, due to his lack of interest in school, or perhaps Arrigo felt that his injured hand would prevent him becoming a stone cutter. (As a child, he had picked up an unexploded piece of World War I ordinance that exploded in his hand and blew off half of one of his fingers.)
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