NEW CASTLE Author honors parents in self-published book

The author will be in New Castle on Saturday to sign books.
By LAURE CIOFFI
VINDICATOR NEW CASTLE BUREAU
NEW CASTLE, Pa. -- Philomena Jurey spent her career meeting the rich and powerful as a reporter for Voice of America, the government-sponsored radio station aired worldwide, but what truly fascinated her was the lives her parents led in New Castle.
"I'd always thought that my mother and father had really interesting lives and, in 1984, when I began research for a book about my own career, I found their story was more interesting," Jurey said.
Jurey initially went onto to write about her years as a White House reporter in "A Basement Seat to History: Tales of Covering Presidents Nixon, Ford and Reagan for the Voice of America," but always kept the idea for a book about her family in mind.
She was able to finish the project last year and has self-published "Bella Giornata and Elbow Grease: Remembering Papa and Mama, the Sparanos of New Castle Pennsylvania."
She will be at the New Castle Public Library on Saturday to talk about and sign copies of her new book.
'Loving remembrance'
"This is a loving remembrance," Jurey said. "I tried to view them [her parents] as individuals in their own right as subjects to culture and social pressures."
While Frank and Fortunata Sparano are featured, Jurey puts their lives in context with the history that they lived through including immigration, the Great Depression and the rise and fall of industry in western Pennsylvania and eastern Ohio, especially New Castle.
Jurey, 74, is one of three children who grew up in the Mahoningtown section of New Castle, where her parents owned a neighborhood bar and restaurant. They later went on to open a hotel in the city.
"It's just one of those books about how families struggled when they came to this country," Jurey said.
Her mother's own ambition to become a writer inspired and helped Jurey write this book, she said.
"When she was a young girl growing up in New Castle, she acquired a love of reading at the Mahoningtown School, and she sent away for books on how to become an author. She was a would-be author and she always said she would write about her life."
Learning about their lives
Jurey said she learned much about her mother's life when her mother lived with her in Washington, D.C., in the last seven years of her life as she battled a number of ailments including breast cancer.
Her father's life wasn't as easily accessible, but Jurey did have his two Bibles -- one so worn it was bound with tape -- where he kept important information about the lives of his family members.
She admires his courage coming to America at 15 and first settling in Niles before moving to New Castle and meeting and marrying her mother.
When it came time to name the book, Jurey took the two sayings she most often heard from her parents.
"My mother had an old Italian saying which started with bella giornata, Italian for 'beautiful day.' She was an optimist. She believed each new day would be a beautiful day. My father used to tell us to use elbow grease to do a good job," she said.
The lives of Jurey's brother, Joseph Sparano, and sister and brother-in-law, Theresa and Chuck Abramski, all of Lawrence County, also are documented in the book.
Sparano, who finished reading his copy of the book this week, said he's really pleased with it. "I think most people here would enjoy it," he said.
Jurey said she self-published the book because she didn't feel it had mass appeal for a traditional publishing house. She said she was pleased to get it printed at The Globe Printing Co. in New Wilmington, Pa.
"I thought how nice it was to have it printed by a firm just a few miles from where my parents lived, brought up their kids and were part of the city's history," Jurey added.