Before Italian neighborhoods, parishes, and pizza on the boardwalk, there was a quieter beginning.

This episode explores the story of Giovanni Battista Sartori, widely regarded as the first Italian immigrant to settle in New Jersey around 1800. Arriving alone in Trenton, Sartori entered a place with no Italian community, no Catholic church, and no established space for what he brought with him.

Through history and a brief fictional vignette, this episode examines how arrival shapes perception—how food, faith, and enterprise functioned as early infrastructure long before Italian American life became visible in neighborhoods across the state. It sets the lens for the series that follows.

Email: njhistorypodcast@gmail.com

#ItalianAmericanHistory #NewJerseyHistory #ImmigrationHistory #Foodways #RootsSeries

Diocese of Trenton. History of the Catholic Church in the Diocese of Trenton. Trenton, NJ: Diocese of Trenton, n.d.

Jefferson, Thomas. The Papers of Thomas Jefferson. Edited by Julian P. Boyd et al. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1950–.

San Felese Society of New Jersey. “Early Italian Presence in Trenton.”