1001 Main St History - Museum buildings

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away in 1950 and Gene died in 1965. Dominic Tomeo was then the sole owner of the lots until his death in 1983. The following photo shows members of the Tomeo family gathered together in the early 1940s: One of the sons of Felix and Michelina Tomeo, John Tomeo, was killed in World War II in the 1945 Battle of Cologne. It is said that when the Tomeo family moved into the two-story building in an unknown year, they initially rented the original Tomeo house to May LaSalle. In 1924, the Rossi family (consisting of Grace DiGiacomo Rossi and her six children) moved into the Tomeo house and continued to rent the house from the Tomeo family until 1941. Grace (Grazia) DiGiacomo (1879-1959) was born in Castiglione di Carovilli, Isernia, Italy and came to the U.S. in 1906. Her brother already lived in the area. In 1908, she married Mike (Michele) Rossi, who had been born in 1867 and had come to the U.S. from Italy in about 1889. He worked as a coal miner in the area in mines such as the Sunnyside and the Monarch, and died in 1924 of what is believed to have been black lung disease. The family was living in a house on Front Street in Louisville when he died. It was at that point that Grace and her six children, who ranged in age from about 3 to 14 at the time, moved into the Tomeo House. Their rent was $7 per month, according to son John Rossi and confirmed by the 1930 census. The family members met their financial obligations by engaging in many different types of work in order to get by. For example, one of the sons, Frank, began to work in the Jacoe Store at the age of 10. His brothers also worked in the store at different times. Their mother took in laundry. 4