TUNCURRY (AUSTRALIA) – Lipari and Australia: two worlds apart, linked together by the sailing boats hosting thousands of immigrants. Looking for a better life. One of these boats – “Oraya” – , brought Filippo Sciacca and his wife Maria Fazio – both born in Lipari some thirty years earlier- in one of the regions of Australia, with its Wallis lake. It was 1889…
They had left the Mediterranean to discover more waters : their fortune was in fact built on those waters. A family fortune as well as a personal fame.
Filippo is a fisherman with an expertise and he made of fishing a key to success. His methods, used in the Mediterranean, found wide application in that remote corner of the planet. Becoming very acclaimed.
With the help of his many children ( he and Maria had already five when they left Lipari and added five more in Australia, summing up to a total of ten), Filippo started his venture as a fish monger, selling his fish along the river banks of New South Wales and along the embankment of Sidney’s harbour.
He put together a ” squad” mainly consisting of other italian immigrants, whom he hosted into his own house, tuned into a huge sleeping headquarter.
He made it through the first difficulties and he managed to acquire some land: his aim was to create a “corner of Sicily” in the australian countryside.
He then planted fruit trees and even grapes.
Seven years after his brother in law, Vincenzo Fazio, joined Filippo’s venture.
He soon became his partner and married a local girl.
But times were tough: economy was unstable in Australia. And Tuncurry was almost cut off: Sidney wasn’t far but still hard to reach. That implied that often enough they had to get rid of the catch and come back home empty hands.
Until the railway came in.
It was 1910. Vincenzo, meanwhile, started a transpostation and removal business, operating between Tuncurry and Sidney’s fish market.
That was a real boost for the business: the story goes that Filippo’s squad had caught the most incredible fish which was seen hanging out his home for a long time.
Another time it is told that they caught such an enormous amount of fish to be afraid for their own lives,as this heavy load was likely to sink the fishing boat.
Meanwhile the time for engine operated boats had arrived and Filippo was preparing for retirement: he would be passing his fortune onto his kids.
Two of his kids, Vincent and Antonio, felt they could be even luckier than their father. In 1923 the Sciacca Brother’s Oysters was founded, cultivating and selling oysters only, managed by Vincent since 1930. He eventually married Molly Henze and fathered four kids. Two of them , Maurice and Max, are the actual owners and managers of Sciacca Brother’s Oysters Industry.
During the years of “depression” the industry was ran in cooperation with another immigrant’s family: the Carnemolla. After splitting from his brother and partner in business, Vincent moved to Sidney with his wife, although still managing the industry. Then, in 1939, he returned to Tuncurry where he remained until his death, in 1975.
That remote corner of Australia has never forgotten this people.
Sciacca Avenue, in Tuncurry, is the echo of first immigrants whom donated to Australia their love for the sea along with new and successful tecniques.
Original version ( Italian) by Maria Lenzo.
First published on 29- 01- 2003
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