By Philip Sean Curran, Staff Writer
An ocean separates Princeton from Pettoranello, a small town in Italy that holds a special place for sisters Ellie and Anna Pinelli.
The two women are among 3,000 Italian-Americans living in Princeton, Lawrenceville and elsewhere in the region who can trace their roots to Pettoranello, descendants of the Italian immigrants who came to here to find work during the 19th and 20th centuries.
This Friday, the Pinellis are scheduled to fly to Italy as part of 20-member delegation from Princeton visiting the township’s sister city of Pettoranello during a two-week tour of the country. The two communities have been sister cities for the past 20 years, but the relationship between them goes back much longer.
The first native of Pettoranello to arrive was Achille Carnevale, who came in the mid-18th century and eventually started a construction business, said Ellie Pinelli in an interview Friday. Eventually, he would bring others from the mountain hamlet, located between Rome and Naples.
Men, many having to leave their wives and children behind until they could relocate them to America, worked as stone masons who helped build the neo-Gothic buildings at Princeton University. Others found jobs as gardeners, worked at quarries or did other work to support themselves.
Ugo Rossi said Friday that his father, Eduardo, came to America in 1950 with barely no money and unable to speak English. But for men who could work with their hands, college towns offered jobs.
Still, he said being separated from his family was hard on his father but many men left families in Italy while they lived and worked in Princeton.
”It was not uncommon. A lot of men did that,” said Mr. Rossi, a retired Princeton High School teacher.
Only later, in 1956, was Eduardo Rossi able to bring his family here.
Those “Pettoranesi,” meaning people from Pettoranello, carry names familiar to anyone who grew up in Princeton, names such as Carnevale, Pirone and Nini.
Most of the Italians in Princeton came from that little town in Italy,” Ellie Pinelli said.
Twenty years ago, those Pettoranello descendants started a nonprofit foundation that seeks to give back to the community that welcomed their parents and grandparents. One its biggest efforts was restoring a section of Community Park North, now named Pettoranello Gardens, that volunteers help keep up.
Every five to 10 years, representatives from the two towns cross the Atlantic to see one another. In June, a 10-member delegation from Pettoranello visited the township and, as part of the trip, toured the university to see the buildings that the men from their community helped build, Anna Pinelli said Friday.
Some of the Princeton delegation is already in Italy. The rest are due to fly out from Newark on Friday, arrive in Rome on Saturday and then travel to Pettoranello on Sunday for an official celebration.
”For us,” Ellie Pinelli said, “it’s like going down memory lane.”

