Lewalski 1

Alanna Lewalski

Professor Larry Rowley

Honors 1000

11 October 2017

Who Are We?

The life of an immigrant is filled with many opportunities, many struggles, and many

triumphs. Antonia Callas came to the city of Detroit from Greece at the age of nineteen with her

mother, father, brother Damien, and sister Alexis in 1918. The family had left Greece to assist

Antonias aunt and uncle already settled in Detroit with their restaurant; while there, Antonia

joined the workforce to help her family with financial needs and found strength and

independence in a new life in which she could lead herself.

In 1908, Antonias aunt and uncle arrived in Detroit to start a business of their own: they

built a restaurantmore specifically, a dinerfollowing the example of other Greek families

they knew that came to the United States (Greek Americans 233). By early 1917, their

business had started to struggle, so they asked for Antonias family to join them in Detroit and

assist in running it. As Antonias parents had been thinking of immigrating to Detroit for a long

time, they agreed to come. They also thought it would be a welcome experience to remove the

family from Europe during the first world was, as the United States had not yet joined while

Greece had been involved since 1914 (Jurgens 238). By the time that April 1917 arrived and the

United States joined the war, Antonias parents had become so invested in the idea of

immigrating that this information produced no change in their plans (Gumery 1218). They took

their time preparing for the move, but eventually made the journey to the United States, arriving

in January of 1918.
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Antonias brother Damien was quick to join the war efforts and entered the United States

army. He had been involved in Greece, so it came as no surprise his family. However, his

departure meant that Antonia had to take on the work that was first meant for him. Although it

was only work for a family business, Antonia began to appreciate what it meant and felt like to

work. She assisted in all aspects of the business of running the diner. However, it soon became

clear that the familys financial struggles would not be so easy to end. The family required

another source of income. They arrived at the conclusion that one member of the family would

need to look for work elsewhere; Antonia accepted the responsibility.

By this time, the Callas family had been in Detroit for two months. Antonia began

looking through the paper in an attempt to find options available to her. Among listings for

stenographers and government jobs, she found an advertisement about the Civil Service

Examination and felt that would serve as a good starting point (Classified Ad 10 no Title).

She found information about the examination, prepared herself, and took it at the end of March.

She succeeded with the examination and was able to find a job at a postal office.

The work was not the most interesting, but Antonia still felt pride over what she was

doing to help her family. She was shocked and thrilled whenever she would find herself

watching other workers and realize that she was a part of them. Antonia felt a connection to the

people of Detroit. Although she still loved her first country and original home, she was

beginning to see the beauty of her new world. The work she did made her feel like a valuable

member of American society, offering her own contributions just as other citizens did.

At her job in the post office, Antonia worked with an older woman, Shannon ONeil, who

began to reveal to Antonia a world that she had not yet imagined. Shannon ONeil introduced

Antonia to the fight for womens equality. It was something Antonia had never spent much time
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thinking about in the past, but once her attention was called to it, she could not ignore it.

Shannon told Antonia of womens long fight for suffrage. The issue of womens suffrage was

perhaps first formally discussed in the United States in 1848 during the Seneca Falls Convention

and an amendment to the Constitution that would grant women the right to vote has been brought

up during Congress sessions since 1878 (Roy 150, 154). Although gaining the right to vote

would not solve all issues of inequality in the United States, it was an important step in the

movement: the power to vote would give women the ability to chose leaders that would aide in

further advancing the cause.

Antonia began to pay attention to the amount of women she would encounter that were

part of the workforce. The numbers seemed fairly impressive to Antonia, but a level of fear

existed regarding what would happen to such numbers when the war ended and soldiers came

back looking for work. Such thoughts reminded Antonia of the need to raise awareness of the

fight for equality, and she began her own personal efforts by educating her sister. They were both

introduced to Carrie Chapman Catt, the woman who had renewed Michigans fight for womens

suffrage after 1915 (Paganelli 4492). The city felt freeing to the sisters, like they were being

given the chance to truly live their own lives.

While Antonia was immersed in the cause for equality, her eyes began to open up to

many aspects of Detroit. It was a city of immigrants, a group of diverse individuals that managed

to work as a whole. Antonia was a separate being from the rest, but also acknowledged that there

was an undisputable connection between her and all other citizens. She knew that this unity she

felt was not perfect and that inequality was not only an issue of gender, but she held onto hope

that cities like Detroit filled with so many different people would be able to lead the way to a

better future. As the months wore on and November approached, Antonia found a newspaper
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article titled Women and Factory Work that mentioned how even when the end of the war

came, women would no longer be satisfied with living only domestic lives (Women and Factory

Work). Antonia found the article obvious: her job at the post office had given her a chance to

understand what it truly meant to be independent. In Detroit, she found a life for herself; her new

home was a world of new possibilities. She came for her family and still held onto that part of

her life, but she was also able to find a place in which she could gain the freedom to be her own

person.

Works Cited

"Classified Ad 10 -- no Title." Detroit Free Press (1858-1922): 14. Jan 23 1918. ProQuest. Web.

2 Oct. 2017 .
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"Greek Americans." Worldmark Encyclopedia of Cultures and Daily Life, edited by Timothy L.

Gall and Jeneen Hobby, 2nd ed., vol. 2: Americas, Gale, 2009, pp. 233-236. Gale Virtual

Reference Library, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?p=GVRL&sw=w&u=lom_waynesu&v=2.

1&it=r&id=GALE%7CCX1839300163&asid=f8e6c2617bd3fe699f9addf5898e2548.

Accessed 1 Oct. 2017.

Gumery, Keith. "World's Columbian Exposition." American History Through Literature 1870

1920, edited by Tom Quirk and Gary Scharnhorst, vol. 3, Charles Scribner's Sons, 2006,

pp. 1214-1218. Gale Virtual Reference Library,go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?p=GVRL&sw

=w&u=lom_waynesu&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CX3470800264&it=r&asid=300a75cd33c6a

eb7fd1f804c722384b6. Accessed 30 Sep. 2017.

Jurgens, Jane. "Greek Americans." Gale Encyclopedia of Multicultural America, edited by

Thomas Riggs, 3rd ed., vol. 2, Gale, 2014, pp. 237-253. Gale Virtual Reference Library,

go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?p=GVRL&sw=w&u=lom_waynesu&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CC

X3273300080&it=r&asid=08208e9dbd2236621ca404b8649ad315. Accessed 28 Sep.

2017.

Paganelli, Caruso, Virginia Anne. A History of Woman Suffrage in Michigan. Dissertation

Abstracts International , vol. 47, no. 12, 1987, p. 4492. America: History and Life

[EBSCO].

Roy, Anupama. The Struggle for Right to Political Participation: A Study of Women's Question

and Suffrage Movements in France, United Kingdom, and United States of America.

Punjab Journal of Politics, vol. 24, no. 2, 2000, pp. 135158. America: History and

Life [EBSCO]
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"Women and Factory Work." Detroit Free Press (1858-1922): 4. Oct 26 1918. ProQuest. Web.

29 Sep. 2017 .