An Italian immigrant was the queen of Fonda
By Bob Cudmore, Focus on History, Daily Gazette, 3-26-05
Hear more about this story Tuesday morning at 7:40 a.m. on The Bob Cudmore Show on AM 1570, WVTL radio in Amsterdam.
People in Fonda called her Queen Libby. A formidable woman from Italy, Queen Libby literally stopped a train, saved a man from the electric chair and became a major property owner in Fonda.
Elizabeth Luciano was born in Pietremalara near Naples, Italy in 1872. She came to America alone when she was 15 and settled in Fonda to be near relatives who lived in Johnstown. She married another Italian immigrant, James Cassell. They had three children before Cassell died at the age of 33. Libby then married Alfonso Mancini, who worked for the railroad, and had four more children. Libby and Alfonso returned to Italy for a time where Alfonso was a jailor. Libby returned to America by herself and Alfonso eventually followed her back to America.
According to one of her grandchildren, Libby was a large woman who received her nickname when she knocked down a man who had used an ethnic slur about Italians. “The next time you see me, you bow,” Libby told the fallen man, leading him to refer to her as Queen Libby or Queen Lib.
Queen Libby ran a boarding house and grocery store in the west end of Fonda, where she fed, housed and cared for Italian immigrants who worked on the railroad. She had a good head for business and purchased 16 two family houses in the village. Patsy Cassell, one of Libby’s sons, ran a popular Fonda tavern called Patsy’s for many years.
In 1923, one of Libby’s daughters, Eva Mancini Pepe, was about to give birth to her first child. Eva had married Ralph Pepe, whose father Salvatore had founded Pepe’s Bakery, still a family business on Amsterdam’s South Side.
According to a clipping from The Recorder from January 20th of 1923, Libby was informed by telephone that her daughter was about to have a rare Caesarean section at St. Mary’s Hospital in Amsterdam.
Libby secured a red flag at the Fonda train station and when an express came “thundering in its usual way” she waved the red flag, convincing the engineer to stop the train and take her to Amsterdam. Arriving at the hospital, she charged into the operating room. Libby also made a phone call to the New York Central Railroad and demanded that the next possible train stop in Fonda to take her husband to Amsterdam.
The headline from the newspaper clipping reads: “Flags train to reach daughter as stork comes: Fonda woman bossed the whole New York Central Railroad but got to Amsterdam hospital on time.”
The child born that day was Vincenza Pepe, who passed away in 2001. Eva Pepe had seven children and the child she bore in 1924 is Salvatore Pepe of Amsterdam, who has provided information for this story.
“Queen Libby was strong-minded, tough but a gentle grandmother,” Pepe said, recalling that Libby gave quarters to her grandchildren.
Ann Nardick Sherman of Amsterdam also claims Queen Libby as a grandmother. Sherman’s mother was Constance Cassell, one of the children from Libby’s first marriage.
According to Sherman, Libby was an interpreter for Italians who could not speak English who were brought before the court in Fonda. Libby once saved an innocent man from the electric chair. Libby called Italy where the real murderer had fled and had him sent back to the United States for trial. Governor Franklin Roosevelt was so impressed that he visited Fonda to commend Libby and a parade was held in her honor.
Queen Libby died in 1938 and her grandchildren say her funeral was the biggest funeral ever seen in Fonda.
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