Brooklyn, or "Bruculinu," as many Italians affectionately pronounced it, is where Italian values, culture, and dreams thrived. In an era when over four million Italians found their way to America, the first significant influx came during the 1880s, primarily from rural peasant communities fleeing poverty and overpopulation. Although Italians in South Brooklyn have been traced back as far as the 1820s, the 1855 New York Census did not list any Italian natives in Brooklyn; however, by 1890, there were 9,563 Italians residing in the borough. By 1900, Brooklyn's Italian population was second only to Manhattan. Although the last notable wave of Italian immigration ended in the 1960s, Italian remains one of the six prevalent foreign languages in New York according to a 2007 census estimate. This work serves as a time capsule to remind us of the contributions and influences these immigrants have offered to the community.
Marianna Biazzo Randazzo received her master's degree from Brooklyn College and worked as the director of school programs at the Garibaldi-Meucci Museum. In 2016, Randazzo received the Literary Award from the Order Sons of Italy in America. Randazzo has curated photographs from the family albums of friends, colleagues, and Italian-owned businesses to capture the neighborhood's spirit in Italians of Brooklyn.