Plymouth, Massachusetts

1910 Census Statistics¹
Population: 12,141
Native Born Italians: 1,188

For six years, Vanzetti struggled to find a place he could call home in America.  He toiled in appalling conditions as a dishwasher in New York City and performed hard, unskilled labor in Connecticut and Massachusetts.  He gave up on his trade as a pastry chef in New York City after being discharged (twice) after a few months as part of an employment agency scam.  In 1914, Vanzetti arrived in Plymouth, the place where he would remain (barring a brief stint in Mexico) until his arrest in 1920.

"I learned to look upon the place with a real affection, because as time went on it held more and more of the people dear to my heart, the folks I boarded with, the men who worked by my side, the women who later bought the wares I had to offer as a peddler." ~Bartolomeo Vanzetti

In Plymouth, Vanzetti worked an assortment of jobs.  Initially, he cared for the farm, garden, and swimming pool of a private estate known as the Stone Establishment.  After a year, Vanzetti took his services to the Plymouth Cordage Company.  Vanzetti was employed by the rope-maker for a year and a half, before fleeing to Mexico in 1917 as the United States entered World War I. 

"Life in America is exciting and monotonous at the same time.  Therefore, little time to write and few things to say.... America is tormented by a huge crisis.  There is terrible unemployment that is growing day by day.  People fear for the future.  You ask me if I like America so much because I don't talk about returning home.  That's it.  My character, my way of thinking, love for liberty, and physical strength for which I don't fear fatigue make me welcome in this country.  On the other hand if the nostalgia of the family, of all of you, of friends, and the native skies enlighten my mind and wrench my heart, the thought of knowing my ideas are so different from you, from my father, and from my native country stop me in my desire to return home." ~Bartolomeo Vanzetti, December 15, 1914

Vanzetti returned to Plymouth in the summer of 1918 and undertook a variety of jobs involving manual labor.  He became best known for his work as a fish peddler.

¹Thirteenth Census of the United States Taken in the Year 1910 (Washington: Government Printing Office, 1913).