It is fitting that Christos
Tsakonas, the man credited with encouraging the first Greek immigration to the United States, was born in a hut in the Peloponnese — a land first immortalized in the third
century as “idyllic” in the genre of poetry known as pastoral. The two most
famous ancient pastoral poets, Theocritus and Vergil, celebrated shepherds and
herdsmen as free men who lived in harmony with nature far from the corruption
of the city. The poets sang of a bucolic ideal and they called it “Arcadia,” but it was more a state of mind than a
specific geographic location in the Peloponnese.
In this enchanted land without
time and precise place, the goat-god Pan, ruler of woods and hills, protected
the shepherds, herdsmen, and hunters as he frolicked with his beloved nymphs,
drinking deep of the sweet, running water. The lovely descriptions of the
placid, limpid streams of water are central to the themes of pastoral poetry.
The poets call the streams “life giving” and immortalize the waters as “sacred,
symbolizing life, vitality, and the powers of nature.”
Christos Tsakonas was born
in 1848 in the province of Laconia, which happens to be next to the
geographic Arcadia. Laconia is the most southern part of the Peloponnese and even today it can be described as a
bucolic setting not unlike that celebrated by the poets. As a young boy he
lived a laconic life similar to that of his ancestors, the Spartans. It is
noteworthy that the spirit of pastoral life, and the
spirit of freedom and loyalty to one’s neighbors—those very qualities extolled
by the pastoral poets-- were deeply ingrained in Christos Tsakonas. Perhaps
these attributes account for the remarkable life he lived in the United States and made possible for others from the Peloponnese. Perhaps these traits, so loved by the
ancients, helped create the stuff of which myths are made.
The exact village in
Laconia when Christos was born is Zoupena at the
foot of the Parnon Mountains east-southeast of Sparta. In the hot summer months, those living
in Zoupena and the neighboring village of Goritsa went to Tsintzina, now used as a
mountain retreat to escape the heat. In Christos’
time and still today, people from these two villages who shared
this special sanctuary are known as Tsintzinians because Zoupena and Goritsa
were settled centuries later than Tsintzina.
A plentiful supply of water
from calm, murmuring springs was the primary attraction of the mountain
residence in Christos’ time. Villagers gathered at the springs of “Kamaraki” to
scoop up water half a cup at a time to fill their urns, or went to either the
Psito Spring or the Soumou Spring for fresh water, unaware that poets had
described water from the mountain springs as “sacred and life-giving,” and the
springs as places where the goddesses refreshed themselves as they “ushered in
the movements of nature, guiding her rhythms.” Today, water flows in every
house in Tsintzina and it is still life giving and central to village
life.
Nikolaos Caravasos, great
grandnephew of Christos Tsakonas, lives now in Swarthmore, PA but was born in Zoupena. He explains
that the people of Tsintzina have lived peacefully in their village for
centuries and life there is a time to rest up for the
fall and winter chores, preparing their fields and harvesting their crops of
wheat, grapes, and olives. It is a very picturesque village, he says, nestled
between several hills and sitting in a valley surrounded by pine forests. Mr.
Caravasos explains: “Even in the hot days of summer, life at Tsintzina is a
breath of fresh air, especially when one takes a walk through the pine
forest. Although primitive by today’s standards, it provides a sense of
tranquility, crisp cool mornings and serene nights.”
Kamaraki – Small Arch Overview
Close-up of Kamaraki Spring
Christos grew up in Zoupena and Tsintzina
not knowing his father, who died shortly before his son was born. A strong
mother who instilled in Christos qualities of discipline, resolve, and selflessness
raised the boy and his brother and two sisters in extreme poverty. While in his
late teens and determined to seek a better life, Christos began his odyssey. He
went first to Piraeus, next to Alexandria, Egypt, and finally to the United States. On his journey to the States, he
traveled with Nikolaos Anagnostou, from the Arcadian
village of Achouria near Tripoli. They arrived in the United States on March 8, 1873, on the S.S. Anglia.
The fact that this humble
peasant was almost single handedly responsible for the growth of Greek
entrepreneurship in the United States is a phenomenon on many levels.
Poets celebrated men such as Christos as “rustics” living contented, simple
lives in the song-filled, whispering glades of the forests of ancient
Arcadia where sacred springs of waters were
libations for the muses. The poets romanticized the rustic life as one filled
with innocence and purity, but where emotions of friendship and loyalty to the
village were extraordinarily intensive.
Mr. Caravasos sitting at the entrance of Psito
Against this backdrop, the
young, wily adventurer left his village and eventually traveled to America. There, Christos set out immediately to
become not a laborer, but an independent merchant in charge of his own destiny.
He never forgot his village, however and the pull of his birthplace and his
loyalty to his friends were strong. Over the years as he became successful in
business ventures, he encouraged and paved the way for others to make the same
odyssey. Soon large numbers of immigrants from the Peloponnese were settling in the United States.
Christos has the honor of
not only encouraging, but also showing the way for other Greeks to go to the United States. When Christos journeyed to America in 1873, he was clearly a pioneer but
also a visionary who quickly saw the potential for a productive life in his
newly adopted country. Two years after arriving, he returned to the
area of his birth and came back with five young men whom Theodore Saloutos,
author of The Greeks in the United States, called “the nucleus for the
succeeding waves of immigrants from Sparta.”
Because of his daring acts,
Christos became the embodiment of the proud and simple man who demonstrated he
had qualities central to the mythos created by the pastoral poets, particularly
Theocritus and Vergil. These poets sang of men who had strong commitments
to family, friendship, and their village, and they immortalized them in the
pastoral poems set in villages where the streams murmured, the glades
whispered, and songbirds were joyous.
The bold adventurer may not
have become the stuff of which myths are made if he had simply been looking out
for himself. The focus of Christos’ life was still his village and in 1877,
twelve to fifteen young men from Tsintzina left for America and in 1882, another seventy made the
voyage in three boats. Saloutos says that Mr. Tsakonas “directly and
indirectly” lured 1,000 young Spartans to Chicago in the 1870s and 1880s and that the
first waves of immigrants during this period were “almost exclusively from this
one village.”
Peter W. Dickson is a
modern-day historian and Tsintzinian who is an authority on Christos Tsakonas
and the Tsintzinians. Formerly with the U.S. State Department, he has written
numerous articles for scholarly journals on this subject. Dickson calls
the historical and sociological contributions of this initial band of
Tsintzinians “profound” and he calls Christos Tsakonas “a prophet.”
The contributions are
profound, Dixon claims, because these early pioneers
founded the first Greek societies in both Chicago and San Francisco and the society in Chicago then established the city’s first Greek
Orthodox Church. With Christos Tsakonas as their leader, they became fruit
merchants and supplied produce initially for a chain of about ten candy and
fruit stores.
He calls Christos “a
prophet” and elaborates that he was “a prophet
who preached about the economic opportunities that America offered.” Dixon says Christos’ message was “a strong
one” and explains that the period of 1875 to 1890 was a time of mass migration
to America for the Tsintzinians even though the
area where they lived in the Peloponnese prospered during this period.
The historian points out
that to understand the contribution Christos Tsakonas made in establishing the
Greek community in the United States, one has only to look at Tsintzinians in
America. In 1873, the year Christos
Tsakonas arrived in America, the number of Greeks in all of North America was extremely small, especially when
compared with other European immigrant groups. It is an astonishing fact,
however, that by the mid 1880’s, almost one third of all Greeks in the United States were from Tsintzina.
In pastoral poetry, the midpoint of the
journey is highly symbolic and the “encounter on the road” can change the
nature of the story. Christos Tsakonas knew intuitively about the importance of
the “midpoint of the journey.” Before his pilgrims from the Peloponnese boarded ships for the United States, he arranged for them to have an
encounter in Athens.
Pastoral poets have the
adventurer traveling from the city to the country because the journey from the
sophisticated city to the simplicity of the country gives the rustic setting
its charm. The motif of this mythical journey as found in Theocritus and
Homer is deeply rooted in Greek literary tradition. Christos Tsakonas reversed
the journey. He moved his followers from the country (Tsintzina) to the city (Athens), where they had their first
sophisticated “make-over.” The men were smartly dressed and groomed by Ioannis
D. Zachariou, a prominent businessman and the only Tsintzinian living in
Athens in the 1870’s. Mr. Zachariou operated an
impressive catering service for the Royal Palace and foreign embassies in the
capital.
The midpoint encounter was
very important because it prepared the men for their adventure. First, in
a selfless way that matched the generosity of Christos, Mr. Zachariou used his
many contacts to help the men secure passage. Then, he called upon his
experience and innate good taste to groom the men for their fantastic journey.
Dressing them all in fine European clothes, complete with suits, ties, and
bowler hats, they must have been the smartest looking group of immigrants to
ever step off the boat at Ellis
Island.
All Tsintzinians who planned
to migrate to America were told, as a rite of passage, to “go
see Zachariou,” and they did. Zachariou himself never visited America because his business was so successful
and unusual for the times that he could not leave it. In 1905, when
automobiles were a novelty, he used motorcars to deliver caviar, champagne, and
other delicacies to the Palace and embassies and the nobility became dependent
upon him for this luxury and for his unfailing good taste and
perfectionism.
In his book, The Greeks
in America, Spiridon Kontakis gives an historical account of Greek
immigration and claims that the turning point in the numbers of Greeks who came
here occurred in 1882 when nearly one hundred people from Tsintzina and nearby
villages sailed to these shores. Kontakis says that this captured public
attention because such an exodus to the New World was unprecedented, given the traditional
inclination of Greeks to go elsewhere in search of a better life. Prior
to this, no more than twenty Greeks a year arrived in the United States.
Christos’ message may have
been compelling, but so were his efforts to establish the young men he lured to
the promised land in their own businesses.
Because of his selfless devotion to the welfare of his fellow Greeks, when
Christos retired in 1907 to return to Greece, the young villagers he helped honored
him on his birthday with a huge party. The birthday party was held in
Jamestown, New York, now the permanent site of the Tsintzinian club house where
the annual reunion is held and has been held every year since 1914, making it
perhaps the only gathering of descendants from one village to meet annually
over four or five generations.
Through the years, Christos
Tsakonas noted that the Greek Diaspora tended to settle in small towns in the Midwest, in large metropolis such as
Chicago and New York City, and in the thriving industrial areas of
Pennsylvania and Ohio. He built his chain of fruit and
candy stores by traveling from town to town where the immigrants settled and
establishing stores that offered ready employment to the young Tsintzinians and
Spartans who apparently were lured to America by stories of his success. He would turn
the management of these stores over to those who had business skills and thus
encouraged his compatriots to become entrepreneurs.
This large population of
Greeks led to the formation of churches and societies, including the first
Greek Orthodox Church in 1891 and the Therapnean Society. Of all the
organizations, however, the Tsintzinian Society is unique. It has been meeting
for more than ninety years in its own private clubhouse on the shores of
Lake Chautauqua near Jamestown, New York. Peter Dixon says this is “unique in
American cultural history… there appears to be no other group of people from
one village anywhere that has continued to meet more than a century after arriving
in America.”
Spiros Andritsakis, a Tsintzinian who lives in
Athens says there are other qualities that make
the American Tsintzinians unique and it is the generosity they have
demonstrated in remembering their homeland. Mr. Andritsakis explains that
it is because of fundraising done in America between 1923-26 that a
road was built connecting Skoura to Goritsa. Later, a beautiful church
was built in Zoupena with funds from America. Mr. Andritsakis also credits a
number of individuals from America with making significant cash donations
to improve village life.
Many of the fundraising
ideas were discussed during the gatherings at Lake Chautauqua. They began as businessmen’s
conventions to help foster commercial ties as well as social contacts and
evolved into annual conventions that served to preserve old ethnic ties.
Yearbooks of the 1920’s list more than 500 Tsintzinian businessmen who came
together to socialize, cement business contacts, and reminisce about their
heritage. Today’s gatherings continue to draw two to three hundred
participants, although many fourth and fifth generation Tsintzinians have never
been to Tsintzina or even Greece. It is estimated that thousands of
Tsintzinians and hundreds of descendants of Christos Tsakonas now live in the United States.
The large numbers of Greeks
who followed Christos Tsakonas now live successfully in the United States, including Hawaii. They are the fruits of the bountiful
harvest Christos created when he had the imagination to begin his journey from
the country to the city, a journey that began in Tsintzina and ended on the
distant shores of America. Just as he was unaware that he
came from a land celebrated as a pastoral paradise by the poets, so too he was
unaware that he created his own “Thalysia,” or “harvest festival,” a theme that
is mythical and sacred to the pastoral poets.
The Thalysia celebrates that
which is fruitful, bountiful, and mystical. It is a public celebration of
nature’s generosity. It is lush, joyous, exuberant and, above all,
fertile. It is the supreme moment when the human world and cosmic order
come together and man finds meaning. For Christos Tsakonas, the Thalysia he
created in the United States — the supreme harvest festival —was his
Ithaca. It was the end of his heroic, restless
journey, and the beginning of the journey for all who followed him.
(Interestingly enough, Ithaca,
N.Y. is the home for many Tsintzinians
residing in the United States.)
Those who followed him call
themselves The Tsintzinians. John Zacharias, one of five principals of Gateway
Financial Group, Pittsburgh, is current President of the Tsintzinian
Society. John and his brother Sam are in the life insurance and
investment businesses and they serve Greek American clients nationally and
internationally, helping them manage and transfer their wealth. The Zacharias
brothers are typical of many Tsintzinians who are self-made, successful, and
have close ties to the Greek American church and community.
Mr. Zacharias said this
year’s reunion was attended by almost two hundred Tsintzinians. He said most of
the members are self-made men and women who have their own businesses, valuing
self-sufficiency, freedom, strong family ties, and the bonds of friendship. The
highlight of the conference was the unveiling of a magnificent stone sculpture
of one of the springs in Tsintzina, perhaps Psito or Kamaraki. Dino
Seferlis, an artist of world renown, created this outstanding work of art. It
depicts the ancient spring with a woman drawing water
and another carrying a jug of water on her shoulder. This is the very spring
that must have been used for centuries by villagers, and it is also the one
Christos Tsakonas must have visited many times in his childhood.
Sculpture
of Kamaraki by K. Seferlis
Some say before Christos left on his odyssey he
stopped at a peaceful place in his village that the pastoral poets would call
“a lovely setting.” It was here that songbirds welcomed Dawn as she made her
shy, rosy entrance. It was here that the spring offered its cool life-giving
waters — waters that the poets called “sacred.” Christos stepped
deliberately into this setting, as if beginning a journey. They say he
reflected there in tranquility on his simple life. Nearby the goat-god
Pan and the nymphs looked on intently, unseen. Others claim that as Christos
Tsakonas cupped his hands to drink the cool, life-giving water he appeared to
have a vision. They say a magical glow surrounded this simple, humble man
as he stood slowly, drank deeply from the life-giving waters, and looked toward
the West.
AURELIA is the author
of a novel, A Lone Red Apple.
It is a love story set on the island
of Mykonos.
Visit her page at www.aloneredapple.com