• General Notes

  Assunta was born in Dunbar, Pennsylvania, the daughter of Domenico Rega and Maria Angela De Rosa. As a small girl she returned to Italy with her family, returning to America in 1921. The family was from Calvanico, near Salerno and Naples.
  There is an Italian tradition was to take one girl from the family, not educate her, and have her act as essentially the maid. This task was given to Assunta. She was by far the best cook of the family. She was a hard worker keeping the house clean and the meals cooked. Her meals were delicious! However, if you believe the "low-fat" camp for healthy nutrition she would not have gotten a gold star! There is another camp that tells the virtue of olive oil so perhaps her meals were healthy enough.
  Assunta passed on her excellent cooking skills to all of her daughters.
  After their arrival in America her brother Mike Rega invited lots of men over to a party at his house in Mt Pleasant to meet his sisters! Josephine and Assunta were there, and the men got to choose the women that they wanted. Carmine Caparosa went first and chose Josephine and Abele chose Assunta.
  Abele and Assunta had 5 children in 7 years, starting with her first born son, Amadeus. Her youngest child was Pearl Mary, born in 1933.
  They settled in Jeannette along with many of her siblings.
  In 1936 there was an automobile accident involving her husband, two of her children, her brother Patsy and one of his children. This unfortunate accident left Patsy, Abele and his daughter Vita dead. Assunta was widowed at age 40 with 4 small children.
  She was able to survive on her husband’s military pension, as well as taking in laundry. Despite the hardship she provided a sound, loving home for her family. In later years her widowed mother came to live with them as well.
  She enjoyed spending Sundays and holiday’s with her relatives, and remained very close to her sisters her entire life.
  She raised her family on 13th Street in West Jeannette. As her children grew and left home, Assunta eventually moved from the house to an apartment.
  Assunta’s oldest child Amadeus left Jeannette after high school, eventually settling in San Jose, California. Assunta would go to San Jose for a few months to visit Amadeus’ and his family.
  During her stay she watched "I Love Lucy" every chance she could get and it was often on being in reruns and extremely popular. One of his son’s, Larry, didn't think much of "I Love Lucy" but it was one of Grandma Assunta's favorite shows. As Grandma Assunta made her way to turn on the TV for her daily viewing Larry made the mistake of announcing that it wasn't on. This happened to be a time that another program more to his liking was on. Grandma turned to Larry and said "You Lie!!" She switched on the TV just as Lucy was starting.
  Another favorite show of hers was "All Star Wrestling". What was particularly irksome to her was the fact that the wrestlers that were constantly cheating somehow were never caught by the referees. Inexplicably the referees seemed to always unfairly be penalizing the wrestlers who played according to the rules while through some sort of oversight the cheaters somehow got away with their cheating ways in full view of the audience. Unfortunately, due to the inequitable treatment of the "men in black" and the "men in white" the boastful, cheating, incompetent wrestlers seemed to always win. Viewers were invited to see a rematch at the local civic auditorium in the next few days. During her stay Assunta never got to see the rematch.
  She also lived with her daughter Pearl and her family for some time. During this period she would bake massive amounts of bread, and have her granddaughter Kim take the bread to ‘the old ladies down the street’. Each Sunday she would make home made pasta for the family
  Assunta Rega Tarquinio led a full life, and when she passed away in 1974 she left 4 children and 12 grandchildren to carry on her legacy. Assunta is buried in Sacred Heart Cemetery in Jeannette.
  

Details of Assunta's family with Abele Tarquinio