Venda Nova do Imigrante - ES - Brazil
Domenico Carnielli was 18 years old when in 1889 he and his brother Giovanni, sons of Francesco Carnielli, left their family, who lived in a large house in Conegliano, Treviso, Italy. With a group of Italians, they went to Brazil longing for better days. Life in Italy was tough for a big family. A widower with 6 children, Francisco got married to a widow, who already had a daughter. Together they had 3 children.
When they got to Espirito Santo, they went to Sao Pedro town (close to Matilde), where today is Alfredo Chaves town. They stayed on a piece of land received from the government. There, Domenico got married to Vitoria Caliman.
Having heard about the availability of fertile land, they went to Venda Nova, where they purchased a piece of land at Sapucaia. They chose a region in the mountains because in Italy they had worked by the Piavo River and learnt that floods damaged plantation.
At Sapucaia they worked in the fields. By this time, Giovanni returned to Italy to get married, but when he got there, his fiancee had already gotten married to somebody else. Therefore, he got married to Catarina Modazeni, known as "Goba". Then, he returned to Brazil with his new wife. At Sapucaia they had 13 children; one of whom still lives there today.
In 1921, Domenico Carnielli makes a deal with Pedro Cola and bought the Providencia farm (The Carnielli farm).
At first, he sent his son Francisco, who had just got married to Angela Destefani. Later, Domenico moved with his single children to live with Francisco.
The Carnielli family has always worked in agriculture: they have cut down trees in order to have pasture, and they have grown coffee, corn and sugar-cane for their own needs. They also raised cattle to have milk, cheese, meat, and they raised some pigs and chickens.
All the work was done by family members. The men would work in the fields, hunt and go shopping. And the women had many tasks besides helping with the farm labor: they would take care of the house, the animals and the vegetable-garden, would milk the cows, make cheese, cook meals, sew and also, would be the most responsible for the education of the children.
A warm welcome to visitors has always being a mark of the family. And it's important to remember that for years, the family opened the doors for free to the teachers who used to teach in a room of the house.
In 1980 Domingo Carnielli, son of Francisco Carnielli and Angela Destefani, became the patriarch of what is left by his father, together with his wife Enedita Zorzal and their 10 children: Francisco Joel, Aloisio, Gloriete, Leandro, Vera Lucia, Antonio, Camilo, Pedro, Ines and Danilo.