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To Apizza Or Not To Apizza

To Apizza or Not To Apizza
Colin M. Caplan
March 7, 2022

Change is one surety provided by the passage of time especially in reference to human culture, activities, language and food. Looking at one of the present day’s most popular foods on the planet, pizza, it may not be so apparent how this distinct and delicious edible fuel source came to be. The simple answer, and usually the correct one, is that pizza hailed from Italy and migrated around the world in the minds and traditions of hopeful families looking for a better life. This culinary seed sprouted in faraway lands like Argentina and the United States early on but it took decades before it became widely accepted.

In Italian, Pizza means pie or cake, and really refers to the crust or base of the bread. While there are many kinds of pizza in Italy, the one that has captured the hearts, minds and mouths of our global lust is the Neapolitan Pizza. Most of the world’s understanding of pizza originated from Campania in southern Italy centered around Naples, hence the proliferation of the Pizzeria Napoletana, or Neapolitan Pizza House. After the fall of the Roman Empire Italy was a collection of City-states, the largest being the Kingdom of Two Sicilies headquartered at Naples. Over the centuries this area of Italy had seen its share of rulers from all over Europe and North Africa, each one leaving behind remnants of their culture. When Italy was unified in 1861 by Giuseppe Garibaldi, the country began to homogenize and centralize its power and influence in its northern states. Florentine Italian became the accepted language and all other languages and dialects were shunned. Campanian language was forced out of society slowly but surely, and over time its words were rendered to linger on only in oral tradition and memory.

Pizza’s origin was Campanian and the original language of that region was Neapolitan giving evidence to how pizza was originally spoken and written. The Italian word with article La pizza also exists in Neapolitan but following the language’s syntax rules in Italian La converts to a’, and the Italian una converts to na’. Whereas Italian one writes la pizza (the pizza) or una pizza (a pizza), Neapolitan writes a’pizza or na’pizza. Where the word gets even trickier is in its Neapolitan pronunciation; in Italian it’s pronounced la peetza or oona peetza, but in Neapolitan it’s said ahbeetz or nabeetz. One example of Neapolitan pizza spelling shows up in music in the 1966 Italian song, ’A Pizza, written in Neapolitan by Alberto Testa & Giordano Bruno Martelli and performed by Aurelio Fierro where the line “‘a pizza Cu ‘a pummarola ‘ncoppa” is translated “pizza with tomato sauce on top.” Records of the Neapolitan way of speech exist and many people in Campania still speak the language amongst each other, but Neapolitan has largely been removed from writing and teaching, the results of major cultural shifts.

When millions of southern Italians fled Italy starting in the 1870s they unwittingly exported their food and language with them. The earliest pizzerias in the United States opened in cities with large Campanian populations particularly in the Northeast. Ethnic enclaves helped immigrants build new lives within their language barrier while continuing their traditional homeland rituals. In many of these neighborhoods, termed Little Italy’s, cultural change and assimilation was slowed. Over a period of about 60 years thousands of Campanian families stayed on in the US, adopting American customs while continuing the old. Meanwhile back in the old country, Italians were in the midst of two world wars, ever changing cultural habits, and new trends, completely removed from their diaspora across the sea. In this way Italy’s culture, food habits and language evolved while Italian Americans held onto their fading traditions, repeating and teaching each successive generation the lessons of the Italy of their ancestors.

It is not surprising that many Italian American traditions preserved ancient Italian culture that is no longer customary in Italy. Like a time capsule the language, rituals and food of old Italy still manifests in the older Italian American communities. One case study is in New Haven, Connecticut which continues to have the largest Italian American community per capita in the county, largely made up of descendants from Campania and having a very large contingent hailing from Amalfi, its Sister City. It’s widely recognized as a pizza lover’s city with its own style of pizza (New Haven style) and its own way of saying it, Apizza, pronounced ahbeetz. Looking at both historic and newly opened pizzerias in the New Haven area the word Apizza is predominant in both restaurant names and on menus. Upon reading this word the casual onlooker might assume somebody misspelled pizza or have a liberal creative license. Only the savviest of Ooni fans have already recognized the historic connection the word Apizza has to old Campania. Indeed, the New Haven area is the last and only place in the country where the term Apizza is used instead of pizza.

There are a number of historic variations of the spelling of apizza that show up in photos, articles, menus and other records. In the New Haven area a pizzeria known as App’s Italian Pies in West Haven had a sign on its façade that read “ARBEETS” dating to about 1930. Soon after a 1933 photo inside the Fair Tavern in New Haven shows a sign behind the bar that reads “A’PIZZA” revealing the word’s evolution to include the article, hence the apostraphe. While Apizza use was centered around New Haven it was actually once more widespread than it is now. In fact nearly every Connecticut city had pizzerias that included Apizza in their name or menus up until the last quarter of the 20th century and some still exist. Beyond Connecticut historic records of the use of the word Apizza existed in parts of New York, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware and Florida, some spelling it Apizza, some La Bitz, La Pitz and LaPietz. In 1943 an article in the Washington Evening Star about pizza at Coney Island in Brooklyn, New York says that pizza goes by the name “ahbeets” giving credence to its use in the Big Apple. But by 1960 the term apizza was disappearing from areas outside of Connecticut and in the following decades its use was more and more limited to Italian American enclaves in the New Haven area.

Just as Italians left Italy for a better life, so have New Haveners fled to other parts of the US over the years, some bringing their recipes for New Have style apizza. In the last 30 years the number of pizzerias making this style has increased dramatically to nearly 60 locations coast to coast, and some use the word apizza in their name. Prominent examples include Pete’s New Haven Style Apizza with locations around Washington D.C., APIZZA in Boston, Fantini’s Apizza in Stuart, FL, Apizza Di Napoli in Aiken, NC, Dimo’s Apizza and Apizza Scholls in Portland, OR, Tolli’s Apizza in John’s Island, SC, Tomatoes APizza with locations around Detroit and Sorriso Apizza in Alpharetta, GA. The American melting pot is continuously being stirred but some of its ingredients keep coming up to the surface. The continuing use of the word apizza in the New Haven area and its culinary embassies around the country provides a lineage of language, food, culture and tradition. In this way Apizza helps pump fresh energy and blood into the 45 billion dollar per year heartbeat of the American pizza scene and it retells the often lurid stories of bygone family histories and their withering memories of an imperceptible land, far, far away.

Christmas in New Haven

Christmas in New Haven
Colin M. Caplan
February 27, 2020

The improvement of New Haven’s civic life became a focus of city leaders in the beginning of the 20th century exemplified with the first public Christmas tree lighting on the New Haven Green in 1913. With a growing city full of hopeful immigrant families, well-to-do long-time residents, and a robust population of civically minded men and women, New Haven recognized the need for more public ceremonies. The act of a Christmas tree lighting which began in Germany as a custom called Tanenbaum, made its way to these shores with German immigrants a century or more prior. Its popularity had already taken root in American households, societies, churches and stores, and the tree with its flickering flames represented faith, life, light and hope.

While there were Christmas trees lighting up during the holiday in private homes, department stores, churches, community organizations and social clubs, New Haven was without a public tree lighting for most of its years. The first wave of public Christmas tree lightings in American cities began in 1912. This was a way of connecting people of all classes and backgrounds calling for the lit tree and jubilee, ushering in a new American ideal for what Christmas meant as a public celebration. These first cities to celebrate included New York City, Boston, San Francisco, Hartford and New Britain. This message made it to New Haven the following year when Amelie Sternberg Traut, child of German parents and wife of a New Britain industrialist, lectured on the merits of a public Christmas tree lighting to the Woman’s Club of New Haven on October 10, 1913.

The enthusiasm behind the public Christmas tree lighting was heating up in New Haven in late 1913 when members of the Women’s Club of New Haven encouraged Mayor Frank Rice to plan this celebration. Along with the New Haven Civic Federation, the mayor appointed a tree lighting committee headed by Lila M. Atwater along with other civically engaged city women. With their help and planning an inclusive celebration was organized for the benefit of impoverished children and their families starting on Christmas Eve on the New Haven Green.

The plan included hoisting a large evergreen tree up in the middle of the Green, attaching strings of hundreds of colored electric lights with a star at the top.  The electricity was donated by United Illuminating and a local contractor offered their service for free. At 6:00 PM Mayor Rice pressed the button lighting up the tree and beginning the festivities. A big band of musicians from the Second Company Governors Foot Guard was accompanied by 200 school children singing Christmas carols. That first evening thousands of New Haveners attended the event. The tree stayed lit until New Year’s Eve providing a glowing beacon for a hopeful future.

New Haven’s community Christmas tree lighting tradition continued year after year, growing in size and importance. The tradition has maintained its purpose to the greater community after over 100 years of pubic celebration. The ideals of these original civic-minded city leaders for an inclusive community celebration bringing light and warmth to the neediest is a tradition that helps renew bonds and begin new ones for New Haveners for years to follow.

Jerry Thomas, Father of American Mixology

Jerry Thomas, Father of American Mixology
Colin M. Caplan
October 10, 2018

“The Lord smiled benevolently upon the city of New Haven, Connecticut,” were the first words in Herbert Asbury’s introduction to the 1927 reprint of Jerry Thomas’ own, The Bon Vivant’s Companion or How To Mix Drinks. Mr. Thomas, considered the father of American mixology, was believed to be born in Harbor, New York in 1830, but grew up in the Elm City. Jerry’s older brother, David, ran the Park House, one of the city’s leading hotels located along Chapel Street facing the Green. Here as just a youth, 15-year-old Jerry became assistant bartender, learning and yearning to invent and create new libations from the bar’s base of spirits. His guests included young Yale men, seasoned bankers and sailors alike.

From 1845-47 Jerry concocted his drinks from the Park House in New Haven and for another year or so he followed his brother to another local hotel, the York House on Forbes Avenue, until 1849. Jerry’s quest to quench his patrons’ thirst began to set him apart, and he established himself as the first recorded cocktail bartender in the country. Yale boys couldn’t handle his handiwork and Jerry needed a hardier clientele with a more adventurous alcoholic disposition. He looked west.

19-year-old Jerry Thomas set his sights on the setting sun, sailing off on March 26, 1849 for San Francisco aboard the bark Ann Smith where he experimented in making drinks with the ship’s own grog. It turned out the 24-man crew found Jerry’s recipes not quite above board and by the time they reached the Bay City on November 4, 1849 Jerry left the boat and kept a low profile. Once the coast was clear Jerry bee-lined for the El Dorado on Portsmouth Square, the city’s finest hotel at that time, and he became assistant bartender.

At the El Dorado Jerry began crafting original cocktail concoctions and his prominence as a drink slinger began to get noticed by the burgeoning immigrant population in this western-most frontier town. Most came for the Gold Rush, quick money and a new life. Some came to plunder. On one occasion in late 1849 the El Dorado became victim to a horde of banditos, set on holding up the bar for all it was worth. Instead Jerry offered them a drink, and he concocted a nearly lethal mixture which left all the miscreants writhing on the floor. Jerry’s action stopped the crime, and the local militia sentenced the punch drunk pirates to death.

Jerry Thomas’ reputation as a drink-dueling, bandit-busting bartender spread like San Francisco’s wildfires. Soon his El Dorado bar became a crowded social center. One extra large 49er came in demanding Jerry fix him a drink that would knock his socks off, and Jerry realized what was at stake. If Jerry didn’t knock this giant to his stool with a drink, his local clout would have been all but lost.

Jerry told the man to come back in an hour, and in that time Jerry awed the barroom while he carefully contemplated what drink he would have to craft. The result netted a full tumbler of Scotch whiskey, another of less boiling water, and a sulfur match. Jerry lit the match, ignited the whiskey flaming to the ceiling, and poured it arms stretched from one tumbler to the other creating a blue firestorm. Adding some sugar and lemon, the still-smoking drink was handed to the massive miner, and the Blue Blazer cocktail was born.

Upon consuming the drink in one large swig the miner fell into a daze, and Jerry’s Blue Blazer had become all the rage in California. Next Jerry set out to the Yuba River to mine for gold. Bar tending at night in Downieville, shown in the image below, he amassed $16,000 in savings. He even started a minstrel band and canvassed the area spreading music and his classy drinks to this rural outpost. Jerry’s stay along the Yuba was over and he felt obliged to learn more in another land. In late 1850 Jerry headed to Nicaragua and filled his head and stomach with new drink ideas.

Heading back home to New Haven in 1852, Jerry Thomas joined his family including brothers David, George and Andrew. David ran the City Hotel located directly across the street from the train depot on Union and Cherry Streets, and close to the harbor, Downtown and Yale. Andrew Thomas was the bartender at the hotel but when Jerry returned home, he and Andrew teamed up to open a bar and casino a couple blocks away. It was here in Jarvis Joslyn’s building at 75 Union Street in 1853 in the large second floor hall above a horse stable that Jerry proved his merry-making might. He introduced his flaming drink concoction made famous in California, the Blue Blazer, to the east coast here, testing the brawn of the Yale student body.

While well received in town, Jerry’s time in New Haven was cut short by his father’s death on February 19, 1854. He decided to set sail once again on his life journey of drink discoveries. Jerry first visited Charleston, South Carolina and learned how to make a proper Julep. He then tried out Chicago for a little before heading down to St. Louis. Here Jerry became the head bartender of the Planter’s House Hotel, the finest hotel in town, and invented Planter’s Punch and the Tom & Jerry drinks. Next Jerry uprooted again and dashed over to Europe where he visited Liverpool, Southampton, London and Paris in 1859. He returned to New York City in 1860 to work a bar, then traveled by wagon to San Francisco in 1861 to run the bar at the Occidental Hotel.

While in San Francisco, Jerry Thomas cultivated his best work yet, his landmark cocktail recipe book titled, The Bartender’s Guide. How To Mix Drinks, or The Bon-Vivant’s Companion in 1862. This was the first book of its kind in the world in the English language, and helped give Thomas the title of ‘Professor.’ In 1863 Jerry ventured to Virginia City, Nevada and returned to New York in 1865.

In the aftermath of the Civil War Jerry returned to Manhattan in 1865 to open a bar in the new Mortimer Building at Broadway, 22nd Street and Fifth Avenue. With his brother George the bar blossomed into an art museum and social center. Cocktails, art and a city busting at its seams made it a huge success. With Jerry Thomas at the helm, his Broadway barroom was one of the most popular in Manhattan. He opened his back room to struggling artist, Thomas Nast, whose racy political cartoons coined him both ‘The President Maker’ and ‘Father of American Cartoon.’ In 1873, Jerry Thomas and his brothers George and David moved up Broadway to number 1239 and five years later opened up at 3 Barclay Street.

In the afternoon of December 14, 1885, Jerry Thomas died of heart disease five minutes after returning to his house. He was 55 years old at his time of death, leaving not just his wife, Henrietta, and children, Henrietta, Milton & Louise, but a lifetime of adventures, passion and pursuit of making the perfect drinks. A rendering of Jerry Thomas in wax has been on display at The Museum of the American Cocktail in New Orleans, a testament to his continued esteem.