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More Deep River Stories to Tell

Personalities, immigration, institutions, and curiosities. Those are the four categories through which personal and historical events in Deep River can be understood and enlightening in More Deep River Stories by Frank Hanley Santoro.

The Deep River Historical Society (DRHS) will be hosting a book talk on Santoro’s book at the Stone House on Thursday, Sept. 22. The literary tribute to the town is the author’s second work covering stories from the people and institutions of Deep River, and is Santoro’s fourth book release overall. Like the first volume of the two part series, Deep River Stories, the theme of the book “is to reflect Deep River’s sense of itself as a small New England town,” according to its introduction.

The 10 stories Santoro includes in his work present readers with the various personalities, immigrant groups, and institutions that have shaped the town as it is today, with stories told of the Jeff and Linda Hostetler, longtime leaders with the DRHS; Jonathan Kastner, whose hundreds of embellishments on the bulletin board of Devitt Field have earned him the title of “The Poet of Devitt Field,;” the origin and familial history of the 88-year old Calamari Tavern, and stories of how the migrant Polish, Italian, and Swedish communities contributed to the growth of Deep River. Each story is accompanied by paintings by local artists, tying both literary and illustrative elements together and to the town.

While the three immigration groups contributed in their own unique ways to the shape of the town, and there were differences in experiences before and after leaving Europe, Santoro explained the commonality between the groups in regards to their departure from their native countries to the United States: escaping dour pecuniary, living, and political circumstances.

“The similarities, at least for all three ethnic groups, were economic and poor conditions, and some political unrest in their own countries,” he said. “The characteristics in their native countries differ quite a bit. The conditions in Poland, Italy, and Sweden, which gave rise to all these people leaving, were quite different.”

According to DRHS Curator Rhonda Forristall, who along with other DRHS members, was a contributor to the work, said that the three ethnic groups represented in the book were selected by Santoro given their presence that persists in town both in population and institutionally.

“The Scandinavian Society is still active, and you can go and visit day-to-day. The same with the Sobieski hall out on Warsaw Street. The buildings are still there, the families are still, and it's still an active part of the community,” said Forristall. “This really is a diverse community.”

While reception to the new immigrants in the tri-town area was generally warm, Santoro said there were some unwelcoming, even violent, incidents that followed the integration of new peoples from Europe. One particularly gruesome event occurred in August 1900, when a woman named Mrs. Robert Doane and an Italian immigrant named Antonio Cutone were walking alongside the railroad tracks in the village of Centerbrook. The two were attacked by a group called the “Whitecaps,” who, according to Santoro were a radical vigilante group similar in activity to the Ku Klux Klan, and viciously beat Mrs. Doane, as Cutone escaped the assault. The incident was published in an issue of the Hartford Courant, which reported that, “Cutone was notified to leave town in six days, but has not done so, and has no intention of doing so,” according to the book.

Following long discussions about the inclusion of the story, Santoro and others at the DRHS decided to give it a place in the book, as a way to demonstrate that despite the overall warm reception to the Italians by “the native Yankee establishment,” as written in the work, tales of violence against outsiders can leave a stain on the history of an idyllic, welcoming town like Deep River and others in the area.

“To some extent, the theme is a classic New England town with white picket fences, and everything is wonderful. That’s mostly true but not 100 percent true. We put that story in there just to illustrate the fact Deep River is not immune from ugliness.”

Other than stories of how immigrants shaped Deep River, readers can also learn about the opening of the Calamari Tavern on Main Street, and its founder John Jacob “JJ” Calamari, whose Italian family fled the country to escape it’s political instability with Austro-Hungarian Empire, originally migrated to Argentina, before settling in Chester. It was in 1933 when JJ purchased a building used from the Pratt Read Company and opened a bar to the public, where it has stood since, having been passed down in ownership to both his son and grandson, Russel Victor and Russell John. “The Tavern is truly one of Deep River’s gems,” the book concludes in its chapter.

Three chapters of the work are dedicated to the town’s connections beyond the region, such as other towns of the same name in states Indiana and Michigan, and in Canadian province of Ontario. According to the book, the town of Deep River, Washington, is the residence of Krist Novoselic, the bassist of the 1990s rock group Nirvana. The two other chapters tell of Deep River’s tectonic connections to Morocco with the Honey Hill Fault line, and a swashbuckling tale of George Haig (originally Chamichian), father of former Deep River Land Trust president Suzanne Haim. Born in modern-day Gazianteb, Turkey, George become a member of guerrilla warrior groups in Middle East fighting against the European colonial forces, and was even interviewed as a young man by the military to become known as “Lawrence of Arabia,” and became a part of his ranks as an interpreter for a British officer.

With the sequel to his previous work on the topic, Santoro and the rest of the DRHS hoped to have expressed in the book the theme of Deep River’s growing identity, and the changes that have come about and must be preserved.

“Many think of history as some dusty stuff you put in the closet that happened 200 years ago, and ‘who cares about that.’ But what we’re talking about today will be history tomorrow,” said Santoro. “It’s a living, evolving process.”

The book talk will be held at the Stone House on Thursday, Sept. 22 at 7 p.m.. Admission to the event is free of charge but donations will be accepted and directed to the DRHS.