Trupo Family

Telford Street

Pop had bought a lot a few doors down from Aunt Stella in Newark, New Jersey. She had a house, and her husband had an ice and coal business on Telford Street. So Pop and his partner Joe built our two-family house on Telford Street. Pop had gone to trade school in Italy and was a carpenter and builder by trade. We had been living in a two-family house about ten minutes from Aunt Stella, and were thrilled we were going to have our own house. We moved to the first floor and rented the second floor to some distant cousins.

We had a big party when the house was finished and we moved in. We always had a garden during the summer months. Mom planted tomatoes, peppers, lettuce, cucumbers, squash, string beans, radishes and cabbage (which I hated). We had a cherry tree and an apple tree, and later Mom finally got a fig tree to grow.

A lot of the Albanians who came to America about the same time we did moved to Jersey City, Long Island, Brooklyn, etc.

The Albanians who lived on our block and within 10-15 minutes from us were primarily my Aunt's family. She had nine children – seven boys and two girls. All the children married and had sons and daughters. Her sons Tony, Pete, Gus and Joe all lived on Telford Street. Sal lived about 10 minutes away, and Johnny and Tommy a few minutes away. Her daughter Margaret lived with her, and her other daughter about twenty minutes away. Holidays and usually on Sunday we all came to Aunt Stella's house for "coffee and." It was a noisy, loud bunch, but we were always together for weddings, funerals, Christmas and holidays.

Aunt Stella's husband had a farm in Livingston, and they used to load up the ice truck with the relatives and all the food and spend the day at the farm. The women did most of the cooking – some men helped – and the kids used to play baseball. It was great. The only problem was they only had an outhouse when you had to go to the bathroom, which we all hated to go to.

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